Refeeding
- Thread starter Ruhl
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D
Dianabol
Guest
Dear Ruhl,
If I might be so bold allow me to reply in specific:
1. I don't compete. Can someone please tell me about refeeding in the off-season: how often to refeed, how much to increase total calories by, and for how long before going back to normal calories?
>>>> In the off-season, you would be on a bulking diet yes? And thus, refeeding won't really be necessary unless you were dieting in the off-season? Perhaps, you might divulge your current menu in a quantitative and qualitative sense, and we might be in a better position to compare notes?
Still, the notion of a weekend caloric surplus on top of a weekday caloric surplus is very appealing. To be honest, taking a good 4,000-5,000 calories from "clean" foods is worse than being tied-up and whipped. The former is painful and boring while the latter could dare I say be a tad more amusing.
Let's go by the argument that, if 5,000 calories is rather anabolic, then 10,000 calories will be hyper-anabolic. But we won't be refeeding for too long since this could lead to a disproportionate gain in fat relative to muscle. And thus, we normally keep the refeed to one day for every week or even every two weeks, depending on your bodycomposition and other biological factors. If you are a hardgainer, then you just might want to refeed every day...
That being said, you could go crazy on Sunday or Saturday, and stuff yourself silly with all the junkfood you can find. This is perhaps, eating for sanity (quoting Vince Taylor....), since a food craving gnawing away at your mind might just be the last straw that cause the so-called steroid rage, or worse still, road rage.
Thus, on one weekend day, have your potatoes sauteed in butter, your chicken wings battered, and fried, your pasta laced with as much triple-cream as the cows would allow, your coffee with as much sugar as you can comfortably dissolve, your sirloin with the fat..... you get my drift.
After this one day of dietary hereticism, return to your "clean" diet of boiled potatoes, steamed rice, grilled skinless chicken breasts and all the tasteless but necessary, dare I say penitentiary approach to nutrition, and on a grander scale, life in general that tends to be the hallmark of the bodybuilding subculture.
Just give us a sample of your typical menu and other pertinent lifestyle factors and we'll see what we can do.
Godspeed, and happy HSTing
If I might be so bold allow me to reply in specific:
1. I don't compete. Can someone please tell me about refeeding in the off-season: how often to refeed, how much to increase total calories by, and for how long before going back to normal calories?
>>>> In the off-season, you would be on a bulking diet yes? And thus, refeeding won't really be necessary unless you were dieting in the off-season? Perhaps, you might divulge your current menu in a quantitative and qualitative sense, and we might be in a better position to compare notes?
Still, the notion of a weekend caloric surplus on top of a weekday caloric surplus is very appealing. To be honest, taking a good 4,000-5,000 calories from "clean" foods is worse than being tied-up and whipped. The former is painful and boring while the latter could dare I say be a tad more amusing.
Let's go by the argument that, if 5,000 calories is rather anabolic, then 10,000 calories will be hyper-anabolic. But we won't be refeeding for too long since this could lead to a disproportionate gain in fat relative to muscle. And thus, we normally keep the refeed to one day for every week or even every two weeks, depending on your bodycomposition and other biological factors. If you are a hardgainer, then you just might want to refeed every day...
That being said, you could go crazy on Sunday or Saturday, and stuff yourself silly with all the junkfood you can find. This is perhaps, eating for sanity (quoting Vince Taylor....), since a food craving gnawing away at your mind might just be the last straw that cause the so-called steroid rage, or worse still, road rage.
Thus, on one weekend day, have your potatoes sauteed in butter, your chicken wings battered, and fried, your pasta laced with as much triple-cream as the cows would allow, your coffee with as much sugar as you can comfortably dissolve, your sirloin with the fat..... you get my drift.
After this one day of dietary hereticism, return to your "clean" diet of boiled potatoes, steamed rice, grilled skinless chicken breasts and all the tasteless but necessary, dare I say penitentiary approach to nutrition, and on a grander scale, life in general that tends to be the hallmark of the bodybuilding subculture.
Just give us a sample of your typical menu and other pertinent lifestyle factors and we'll see what we can do.
Godspeed, and happy HSTing
I am 5'7'', 150 pounds and totally deconditioned. My 'off-season' is a permanent cutting diet. I am on about 2200 cals at the moment and have taken an extended lay-off due to injuries. Diet is 30/40/30 (protein/carbs/fat). When I start training again, I will eat more, but I will still find refeeds easy enough as I will always use a 30/40/30 diet.
By what % of total cals do you think a diet's calorie total should be increased by during refeeds?
By what % of total cals do you think a diet's calorie total should be increased by during refeeds?
D
Dianabol
Guest
Dear Ruhl,
If I might be so bold, allow me to reply in specific:
1. I am 5'7'', 150 pounds and totally deconditioned. My 'off-season' is a permanent cutting diet. I am on about 2200 cals at the moment and have taken an extended lay-off due to injuries.
>>> Righto. Why might your off-season be a permanent cutting diet? Are you afraid of fat-gain Besides, 2200 calories is about maintenance for your weight? 2200/150 = about 15 calories per pound of bodyweight? And how might your injuries be? What exactly are they? Care to share? Are you under any professional care for them? If so, what form of therapy? Any medication? If so, how much and how often?
2. Diet is 30/40/30 (protein/carbs/fat). When I start training again, I will eat more, but I will still find refeeds easy enough as I will always use a 30/40/30 diet.
>>>> I think I understand now. Since you're not training, you don't eat as much. Off season to you means not training. I was thinking along the lines of off season in a bodybuilding sense. Curiously, do you find it easy to maintain this caloric ratio? Or does it drive you nuts trying to balance everything?
3. By what % of total cals do you think a diet's calorie total should be increased by during refeeds?
>>>> Refeeds tend to occur over a day, usually. It all depends on your body-composition and level of activity. How lean are you? If you are quite lean, you could get away with an extra 500 calories per day. In fact, what I'd recommend is this - increase your calories by 500 a day, and do this for a week. Weigh yourself to see if there is an increase in weight at the end of the week. Shoot for a gain of no more than two pounds a week. Keep increasing calories on a weekly basis until you get such a rate of weight gain. Meanwhile, keep an eye on your bodyfat percentage too, since once it hits 15%, it is time to diet down to a single digit. It is better to bulk when you are lean than when you are fat simply because a lean person gains more muscle than fat when on a caloric surplus as compared to a fat guy.
Refeeds can be helpful if you are on a carb-restricted diet. The protocol is to take 10-15gm of carbs per kg of bodyweight for one day of the week to replenish glycogen stores. This can work out to be a helluva lot of carbs to take in one day, and a cyclical ketogenic diet is finicky and for the most of us, we don't have to resort to such tedious means to getting ripped. Then again, a carbohydrate refeed is unncessary if you are already having sufficient carbs.
Honestly, refeeds are more of a psychological thing than a physiological thing since a day of refeeding amidst a whole week of semi-starvation isn't really going to reverse anything save for soothe the cravings that you might have. Once more, I ask, how lean are you? Is there a need to even be on a cutting diet now? And when you decide to train and eat more, how much more do you intend to eat?
Let's see if we can talk this through. I wish you a speedy recovery from your injuries
If I might be so bold, allow me to reply in specific:
1. I am 5'7'', 150 pounds and totally deconditioned. My 'off-season' is a permanent cutting diet. I am on about 2200 cals at the moment and have taken an extended lay-off due to injuries.
>>> Righto. Why might your off-season be a permanent cutting diet? Are you afraid of fat-gain Besides, 2200 calories is about maintenance for your weight? 2200/150 = about 15 calories per pound of bodyweight? And how might your injuries be? What exactly are they? Care to share? Are you under any professional care for them? If so, what form of therapy? Any medication? If so, how much and how often?
2. Diet is 30/40/30 (protein/carbs/fat). When I start training again, I will eat more, but I will still find refeeds easy enough as I will always use a 30/40/30 diet.
>>>> I think I understand now. Since you're not training, you don't eat as much. Off season to you means not training. I was thinking along the lines of off season in a bodybuilding sense. Curiously, do you find it easy to maintain this caloric ratio? Or does it drive you nuts trying to balance everything?
3. By what % of total cals do you think a diet's calorie total should be increased by during refeeds?
>>>> Refeeds tend to occur over a day, usually. It all depends on your body-composition and level of activity. How lean are you? If you are quite lean, you could get away with an extra 500 calories per day. In fact, what I'd recommend is this - increase your calories by 500 a day, and do this for a week. Weigh yourself to see if there is an increase in weight at the end of the week. Shoot for a gain of no more than two pounds a week. Keep increasing calories on a weekly basis until you get such a rate of weight gain. Meanwhile, keep an eye on your bodyfat percentage too, since once it hits 15%, it is time to diet down to a single digit. It is better to bulk when you are lean than when you are fat simply because a lean person gains more muscle than fat when on a caloric surplus as compared to a fat guy.
Refeeds can be helpful if you are on a carb-restricted diet. The protocol is to take 10-15gm of carbs per kg of bodyweight for one day of the week to replenish glycogen stores. This can work out to be a helluva lot of carbs to take in one day, and a cyclical ketogenic diet is finicky and for the most of us, we don't have to resort to such tedious means to getting ripped. Then again, a carbohydrate refeed is unncessary if you are already having sufficient carbs.
Honestly, refeeds are more of a psychological thing than a physiological thing since a day of refeeding amidst a whole week of semi-starvation isn't really going to reverse anything save for soothe the cravings that you might have. Once more, I ask, how lean are you? Is there a need to even be on a cutting diet now? And when you decide to train and eat more, how much more do you intend to eat?
Let's see if we can talk this through. I wish you a speedy recovery from your injuries
Good post, Dianabol.[b said:
I am certainly not an expert on this subject, but.. one thing not mentioned here is resetting/increasing of leptin levels thru refeeding.
Also, if one has been dieting (and low-carb) for several weeks, it has been advised that the person take a 1 week break & eat at maintenance (with adequate carbs), then resume dieting. This is said to help "jump start" fat loss again, if it stalls. This has been suggested recently by Bryan H. in another thread, but I thought I would add it here as it may be relevant.
D
Dianabol
Guest
You hit the nail on the head, dear Abitro
Leptin levels don't get affected that much really.
Interestingly, increasing calories while remaining hypocaloric not only jump starts fat-loss again, but can lead to gains in lean mass, depending on how low your calories previously were.
I for one experience an impairment in temperature regulation when I do some serious dieting, but I counter the apparent cold by taking spicy food. Nando's Hot Peri-Peri sauce is marvellous
Hot peppery soups are great too - filling, practically zero calories and they turn up the heat.
I wonder if thyroid downregulation during dieting can be partly offset by the consumption of spicy foods. If I ate six to seven times a day, the several heat spikes due to spicy foods might be helpful. Might be
Godspeed, and happy HSTing
Leptin levels don't get affected that much really.
Interestingly, increasing calories while remaining hypocaloric not only jump starts fat-loss again, but can lead to gains in lean mass, depending on how low your calories previously were.
I for one experience an impairment in temperature regulation when I do some serious dieting, but I counter the apparent cold by taking spicy food. Nando's Hot Peri-Peri sauce is marvellous
Hot peppery soups are great too - filling, practically zero calories and they turn up the heat.I wonder if thyroid downregulation during dieting can be partly offset by the consumption of spicy foods. If I ate six to seven times a day, the several heat spikes due to spicy foods might be helpful. Might be
Godspeed, and happy HSTing