What Is The Ideal Time For Fasting
Well, this is going to depend on your lifestyle.
What hours do you work? What time do you wake up?
What time do you go to bed?
If you want to have success with intermittent fasting these are the questions you need to start asking yourself. Your answers will vary from the next person. The ideal time for fasting is really going to be determined by your schedule.
Here is an example: When I was following the 16:8 schedule I was waking up at 6 am, started working at 8 am and then my first meal was at Noon. When I got home around 6 pm, Id eat dinner and have a light snack at 7:30 by 8 pm I was done eating until Noon the next day.
I, of course, was also following a ketogenic lifestyle so my total carb intake was anywhere between 15 20 carbs per day . This allowed me to get the most out of intermittent fasting.
If you want to get started on Keto check out my FREE KETO EDITION: EAT THIS, NOT THAT. This is a great place to start and will show you all the foods that are Keto approved. As well as, foods you should avoid.
Want to know what your Macros are? Download the CARB MANAGER APP for FREE.
Like I said before, its whatever makes the most sense for your lifestyle. Whatever time frame is easiest for you is what you should aim for and this will allow you to be consistent!
Foods To Eat During The Undereating Phase
During the undereating phase, eat only small portions of the following foods:
- Protein: poached or hardboiled eggs
- Dairy: milk, yogurt, cottage cheese
- Broth: chicken or beef
- Raw Vegetables: carrots, peppers, mushrooms, greens, onions
- Fruits: bananas, apples, mango, kiwi, peach, pineapple
- Vegetable Juice: beet, carrot, celery
- Small amounts of olive oil, apple cider vinegar
- Water, seltzer, coffee, tea
- Sweet drinks like fruit juice and soda
So Is 20/4 Fasting The Best
In practice, any of these approaches will yield results in the form of fat loss and health benefits, as long as you dont binge eat during your feeding window.
The choice becomes a balance between which method you will be able to stick to, and how badly you want to see the results. The 20/4 protocol is a great choice for those that want best results with a little less hunger than on OMAD. Its a close second to OMAD for effectiveness, but allows you to keep eating just a little longer!
20 hours without food is quite a long time, and you will find that you will get full quite quickly after breaking your fast. This will help you eat at a caloric deficit each day too. This gives you the best of both worlds, so to speak, with the benefits of a long fast, but an eating window that feels much longer than OMAD.
The main takeaway is this: a 20 hour fast will do wonders for your health, and for your waistline. Youll feel fresh, alert, and light on your feet but you can eat enough to be content within 4 hours without having the time to really overdo it. So pick whichever approach works for your lifestyle, but 20/4 is definitely worth a try.
Recommended Reading: How Many Calories When Intermittent Fasting
How To Successfully Do The : 4 Intermittent Fast
The Warrior Diet plan involves fasting for 20 hours during the day followed by overeating in a 4-hour window at night.
For example, you may set your feeding window at 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm. During this time you can eat as much as you want with an emphasis on unprocessed, organic whole foods particularly those high in dietary fats and protein.
After 10:00 pm, you fast or eat very small portions of specific foods such as raw fruit and vegetables until 6:00 pm the next day. Its important youre eating as fewer calories as possible during this time.
The method is best suited for people who have tried intermittent fasting before or who already consume a low-carb/ketogenic diet.
Hofmekler recommends you follow a three-week, three-phase plan initially before starting the Warrior Diet. This helps the body adapt to the eating and fasting schedule and become accustomed to using body fat as energy. This three-week introduction includes:
Once you have completed the three-phase diet, it is recommended you start it again before following the 20:4 guidelines.
How Long Should You Be Fasting
Again, this is going to be totally dependent on what works best for you. What Intermittent Fasting Schedule looked like a good fit for you? If you are just beginning then my recommendation would be to start with the 16:8. This will more than likely be your best choice. The key is to be consistent. If you stay consistent youll see the results youre after. Its so important to find ways to make new changes work for your lifestyle and not make your lifestyle work around new changes.
Read Also: Is Fasting Necessary For Psa Blood Test
/4 Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan
It may be difficult for first time keto dieters to incorporate both methods into their lifestyle at one time and, despite our warning against doing so, we know that people will aim to do this anyway.
Instead of expressing our frustration, itd likely be more valuable to provide you with a framework of what a 20/4 fasting approach would look like whilst also following a ketogenic diet.
Of course, this depends on when you plan to break the fast so well not title the meals as breakfast, lunch, dinner etc. but look at it from a 24-hour cycle.
What Are The Risks Of The Warrior Diet
You may be wondering, How much fasting is too much?
Well, the warrior diet can lead to side effects such as:-
- Fatigue and lack of energy
- Insomnia
- Hormonal imbalance
- Weight gain
If you experience any of these symptoms and they concern you, you may be fasting too much. The warrior diet, or intermittent fasting in general, is not appropriate for everyone. To ensure you get sufficient calories and nutrients, try to incorporate healthy and nutrient-dense foods into your daily meals.
Additionally, the warrior diet may lead to disordered eating patterns, such as binge eating. Often, binge eating is associated with self-hate, shame, and guilt, which can negatively and severely impact an individuals mental health.
Also Check: What Food To Eat To Break Intermittent Fasting
Are : 4 & Omad Safe Are There Side Effects
No studies have specifically investigated the safety of these protocols, but most studies report a small number of adverse effects that typically include hunger, headaches, slight dizziness, or gastrointestinal upset.
Following these protocols, especially OMAD, can be quite difficult for some. Studies have reported high rates of participant dropout, likely due to the challenge of adhering to such a limited eating window on a sustained basis.
For those who are looking to optimize muscle growth, long fasting periods may not be ideal, but this isnt completely clear yet.
Finally, fasting can be contraindicated in some diseases such as type 1 diabetes, pregnancy, and preexisting eating disorders. For individuals with these or similar conditions, speaking with a well-informed physician is warranted.
Although no serious side effects have been reported in existing studies, some individuals with medical conditions may want to exercise more caution.
Why Might Changing Timing Help
But why does simply changing the timing of our meals to allow for fasting make a difference in our body? An in-depth review of the science of IF recently published in New England Journal of Medicine sheds some light. Fasting is evolutionarily embedded within our physiology, triggering several essential cellular functions. Flipping the switch from a fed to fasting state does more than help us burn calories and lose weight. The researchers combed through dozens of animal and human studies to explain how simple fasting improves metabolism, lowering blood sugar lessens inflammation, which improves a range of health issues from arthritic pain to asthma and even helps clear out toxins and damaged cells, which lowers risk for cancer and enhances brain function. The article is deep, but worth a read!
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Can Intermittent Fasting Help You Retain Muscle
This is a very common question to be asked. Most traditional diets help you lose fat but along with that you end up losing a lot of muscle too. The best thing about retaining your muscle tissue is that it is metabolically active and it therefore helps you use more calories as it tends to keep your basic metabolic rate high.
The good things about the Intermittent Fast is that it does indeed help you retain your fat-free mass. This is said to happen as during IF a lot of fat burning hormones are being produced in higher amounts. The HGH especially can truly help you retain your muscle mass even though you’re losing fat.
Spontaneous Fasting / Skipping Meals
This is one that I would recommend for anyone who is on the fence about intermittent fasting, or feels overwhelmed by setting restrictive fasting times.
This is a gentle introduction to intermittent fasting, which is led by your lifestyle and body. It is perfect for those who donât like to feel restricted, or get disheartened if they donât meet the criteria of their diet.
You simply allow yourself to skip meals if you donât feel hungry, or too busy to eat.
Cooking and eating take up a surprising amount of time, and embracing this way of eating will give you the time to work on other thingsâmaybe replace a meal with something you enjoy, like going for a walk or yoga ð§ââï¸
Spontaneous meal skipping is an effective way to recondition the popular belief that we need to eat three meals a day. You will not starve if you skip a meal now and then!
Recommended Reading: Is Fasting Good For Your Health
It May Aid Weight Loss
Various methods of intermittent fasting, including 20-hour fasting cycles, have been linked to weight loss.
One study, which closely mimicked the Warrior Diet , found that people who consumed meals over four hours in the evening experienced more weight loss than those who consumed the same amount of calories in meals throughout the day.
Whats more, those who ate one meal per day showed significantly reduced fat mass and greater muscle mass .
A recent review of six studies concluded that various types of intermittent fasting, ranging from 3 to 12 months, were more effective at promoting weight loss than no dietary intervention.
However, the review found that there were no significant weight loss differences between dieters using intermittent fasting or continuous calorie restriction , meaning that calorie restriction without fasting was equally effective .
Additionally, although reducing calorie intake is the most common outcome of the Warrior Diet, some people following this eating pattern could technically consume too many calories during the four-hour overeating period and experience weight gain.
Is Intermittent Fasting The Same Thing As Time
Time-restricted and intermittent fasting are very similar, if not the same thing. Time-restricted eating is a form of daily fasting wherein the time of the day during which a person eats is carefully restricted. Like people that do Intermittent Fasting 20-4, folks who practice time-restricted eating typically eat during an 8- to 12-hour daytime window and fast during the remaining 12 to 16 hours. There are some sites that say intermittent fasting is about caloric limitations while time-restricted eating is not. That is not the case at all. The differences between the two are one of semantics in our opinion, but we like to say that time-restricted eating is focusing on your intermittent fasting eating window and less on fasting hours completed.
Case in point: Coach Scratch would track how long he was fasting using the Zero fasting app. This app basically times how long you are fasting and app UX which features a fasting elapsed time circle can span multiple days. However, Coach Scratch more regularly has timed his time-restricted eating window. That is Coach Scratch notes if he ate for 4 hours, 3 hours, or sometimes only1 hour.
At the end of the week, since he is a big proponent of Intermittent Fasting 20-4, his goal is to average a 4-hour time-restricted eating window. Confused yet?
Lets boil it down for you: essentially, you can track your fasting hours or your eating window hours and we like to track the eating hours while doing the Intermittent Fasting 20-4 protocol.
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Intermittent Fasting Results The Bottom Line
I started using Intermittent Fasting for weight loss and I did achieve my weight loss goal with it relatively quickly, but what I discovered were a host of other benefits that I did not anticipate.
And it is those extra benefits that keeps me going with Intermittent Fasting.
I have another article about the full benefits of Intermittent Fasting, but to summarize they are:
- With 16/8 Intermittent Fasting I have more energy
- I love the extra time I have with 16/8 Intermittent Fasting
- I have less intestinal problems with 16/8 Intermittent Fasting
- I am more conscious about what I eat
- I have more mental clarity throughout the day
- I just feel better overall.
I realize there is something called the Placebo Effect that might account for some of this, however Id argue that after 2 years that mental trickery is not likely to continue and that instead the real life physiological effect of Intermittent Fasting shows through. Maybe thats true, maybe not, but for me, Intermittent Fasting is the way to go.
What about YOU?
This Is It: Im Sticking To If For Life
Too many of us try all these fad diets that the diet industry pushes on us all the time and then give up and go back to our regular eating habits.
Phentermine does magic. I adore this medication. When I feel I have gained some additional kgs I refer to Phentermine. In a week or two I am able to decrease my weight by 2-3 kgs with no hardships and tortures. Usually I am not having side effects and my appetite is low. I dont want to eat. Thus I recommend Phentrermine at highly. It gives necessary results in short period.
Theyre complicated, theyre difficult to follow and they have such a large learning curve. Thus, we see-saw in weight and we give up yet again.
But intermittent fasting isnt making the diet industry any money there are no special foods, recipes, powders or pills to buy. This helps me feel more at ease that its not a fad diet trying to become viral for profit.
Its just an EASY eating lifestyle change: just limit your eating window to no more than 12 hours. Thats it. Easy peasy.
I dont think I will stick to 20-4 fasting long-term, but from now on, the eating window is an unbreakable law in my life.
I will not eat past a 9-hour window at the very least, I expect to stop the crazy see-sawing of weight gain and have the added energy of a well-rested body.
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Foods To Eat On A 20 Hour Fast
Since a 20 hour fasting only allots a four-hour eating window, the foods you eat during this intermittent fasting window are crucial to refueling your cells and getting the most out of IF.
Remember that your body will be converting fat into ketones, so its important to fuel your body with plenty of healthy fats and fatty whole foods.
The best choices include nourishing whole foods like:
Warrior Diet : What You Need To Know
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The What Diet?? Yea, you read it right, The Warrior Diet. Also called 20/4 fasting.
This diet trend has us going back to our early roots as ancient warriors and hunter-gatherers.
Just as our primitive cousins would hunt or battle all day, and eat their large meals at night, this diet has you fasting all day, and eating all of your calories in the evening.
This article discusses everything you need to know to determine if the Warrior Diet is right for you if youre looking for a safe way to lose weight and improve your health, all while awakening your inner She-Ra.
Quick Links to Information in this Post
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Intermittent Fasting: An Overview
Intermittent Fasting is simple. You don’t eat for a while, and then you eat for a while. Period. Don’t count calories. Don’t fret over amounts. Don’t fret at all. Eat. Stop eating. Eat again.
The “20”” part of the Intermittent Fasting 20-4 means you don’t eat for 20 hours. The “4” part means you get to eat for 4 hours. As such, there are many variations of Intermittent Fasting you will find on the Internet. For example, Intermittent Fasting 16-8, you don’t fast as long, and you get more time to eat.
However, we have found that if you want to lose weight, the 20-4 is a beast. So on this page, we are calling the Intermittent Fasting 20-4 our “playbook.” We will often refer to the 20-4 Intermittent Fasting approach as The Warrior’s Diet too. They are essentially the same thing with some minor differences, notably that the Warrior’s Diet may be more comfortable to introduce when getting started on Intermittent Fasting 20-4.
