I apologize for being Missing In Action for the last couple months.
If you haven’t already heard, the 5th edition of Eat Stop Eat has finally been released (YEAH) so I have some time to blog again.
I think the best place for you and I to catch up is with the series of DEXA experiments I’ve been conducting on myself.
(Special thanks to the team at the Bone Health Clinic in Toronto for allowing me access to their DEXA Scanner.)
The DEXA scans (and also the BODPOD measurements and Metabolic Rate Measurements) were all part of an experiment to compare myself now at age 35 to the data I had from when I was in my mid-twenties. And I’m happy to say – They were pretty much exactly the same.
This has served to be a fun experiment. I also planned a series of photoshoots to coincide with my DEXA measurements. Then, I found old pictures so we could do some fun comparisons. In the pictures above I’m all roughly the same body fat percentage (around 11-12%), and I have roughly the same amount of lean body mass (around 152-153 pounds).
In fact there are only two differences. In the first picture (taken 6 years ago) I LIVED body building. I had dieted for 4 long months before this picture was taken. I had followed the high protein lifestyle, I did cardio in the morning, weights at lunch and then cardio again after work. I took every single supplement I could get my hands on. And, it worked. The results were awesome and I was really happy with how I looked. But, I wasn’t necessarily happy with the process.
The middle picture was taken three years ago. I was about 3 years into Eat Stop Eat. I was lean, I didn’t have to do a harsh diet for 4 months to take the picture, I was still very happy with how I looked, but I was even happier with the process, since it was significantly easier.
The last picture was taken this past February. Nothing other than a spray tan, a quick shave of the chest and some water loading was needed for that pic. I’m now extremely happy with the process. I’ve even changed my body since the second picture. I’m increased the width of my shoulders while becoming a little less chesty (I took a LONG break from any sort of chest training). Eat Stop Eat has let me get rid of almost all of my Obsessive Compulsive Eating. I don’t worry about macro-nutrient profiles, calorie cycling, food combining or any of that stuff.
So the big difference between these three pictures was the approach to getting lean. The second difference is the hair 😉
To tell you the honest truth these days I only really think about nutrition when I’m writing about it. Outside of my ‘job’ it’s not something that eats up a lot of my ‘mind time’ anymore. And I certainly don’t live a ‘fitness lifestyle’. (Even though I have a facebook page dedicated to nutrition and fasting, I’d love it if one day that page was full of people talking about Guinness, Scotch, and Vintage Port..we’ll get there one day. In the mean time, you may as well pop over and say hi –> www.facebook.com/bradpilon)
Of course, after posting these pics on facebook I received some questions about fasting and gaining muscle. For the last couple years building more muscle has not been my goal ( I’ve been trying to improve my Adonis Index, not ruin it). However… I figured why not give it a try?
So I set a goal to increase my lean mass while decreasing my body fat using Eat Stop Eat…and to do it in 6 weeks.
I also wanted to make sure I knew WHERE I was increasing my lean mass, and I didn’t want to ruin my adonis index, So I did the following experiment. I took a look at the pictures above..and thought that the one thing I’d like to improve is the width of my back as seen from the front. So on every day I wasn’t fasting I did a weight workout with 5 exercises. 3 exercises for my back, Some squats, and then an exercise for my arms (still no chest training). The goal was to increase the muscle mass in my back while keeping everything else close to the same.
The results? After 6 weeks I had a second DEXA test done. My Lean Body Mass had increased by 3 pounds while my body fat decreased by another pound. The exciting part was that all of this lean mass gain was in my trunk. And since I wasn’t training chest at all, it’s a good bet that the vast majority of those 3 pounds was in my back (Thank you pull overs, heavy rows and heavy chins).
Here’s the result:
(With my lean body mass up to 155 pounds it’s also important to point out that this the most Lean Mass I have ever had since i started measuring in my Mid Twenties.)
Now, a 3 pound change in a group of muscles as large as your back is hard to notice, especially in a front picture. However, as I said, the reason I chose ‘back’ as my target was I didn’t like how narrow I looked in my previous pose. So I was actually trying to improve a pose…or I guess I wanted to improve how my back looked from the front (figure that one out).
Here’s a better comparison:
Now, I’m really wishing I didn’t use the black background for the second photos (live and learn) and I still have no idea how to set up the lighting. But the point is my approach to eating is incredibly simple (fast once or twice a week), as is my approach to working out. I use my workouts to direct my muscle growth in a specific purpose (As my favorite business coach likes to say – Progress is on Purpose), and it works for me.
OK, so enough about me and my experiments, let’s get back to Eat Stop Eat.
I’ve included some great new information. This includes new information on hunger, on breakfast, on muscle and fasting, on endurance training and my favorite – new information on autophagy or cellular cleansing.
The approach hasn’t changed (it’s still 1 or 2 fasts per week, each fast lasting 24 hours) and the basic message is still the same (view each fast as a mini ‘win’ and stress less about your food choices), I’ve just included more information on the health benefits, research, and application of fasting.
I hope you enjoy this updated version of Eat Stop Eat, and I’ll do my best to get back into updating this blog.
BP
PS – To get the updated 5th edition of Eat Stop Eat go here ==> www.EatStopEat.com
