Meals @ a certain time of day?

FunkyTobias wrote: »

longtimeterp wrote: »

FunkyTobias wrote: »

longtimeterp wrote: »

Intermittent fasting is just one example of how meal timing can play a role, as levels of insulin and glucose in the blood can play an important part in the body's preferred source of fuel and nutrient use. While there are very specific conditions where this will present some advantage to fat loss, the timing of meals with regards to their frequency, not necessarily time of day, can play a role in a weight and fat loss strategy.

Care to back up that claim?

Care to refute it?

The burden of proof falls squarely on the shoulder of the person making the claim

After you eat, insulin and fatty acids are elevated. You are in the fed state and there's zero fat burning going on. Your body is relying completely on glucose oxidation during the hours following the meal.

One way of measuring this is via the respiratory quotient (RQ). An RQ of 1.0 denotes pure carbohydrate metabolism ("storage mode"), while 0.7 denotes pure fat metabolism. To put this into perspective, consider that RQ is 0.95-1.0 for about 1.5-2 hours after a meal, 0.82-0.85 after overnight fasting and 0.72-0.8 after 16 hours of fasting.

As the hours go by and the nutrients from the meal are done being absorbed, RQ drops in conjunction with insulin. There's a shift towards fat burning and mobilization of stored fat. This process is mediated by insulin and blood-borne fatty acids; when levels drop, an energy deficit is "sensed" and catecholamines (adrenaline and nordrenaline) increase.

The catecholamines travel through the blood and bind to receptors on fat cells. A receptor can be thought of as a "lock." Hormones and neurotransmitters are keys that fit into that lock and make something happen. In this case catecholamines trigger fat mobilization by activating hormone sensitive lipase (HSL), which then shuttles the fat out of the cell to be burned off.

*Thanks Martin

You're proposing a hypothesis based on acute responses, which rarely translate to actual measurable differences. Any actual research?

Why the heck not...

Effect of intermittent fasting and refeeding on insulin action in healthy men

Nils Halberg , Morten Henriksen , Nathalie Söderhamn , Bente Stallknecht , Thorkil Ploug , Peter Schjerling , Flemming Dela
Journal of Applied PhysiologyPublished 1 December 2005Vol. 99no. 6, 2128-2136DOI: 10.1152/japplphysiol.00683.2005

ABSTRACT

Insulin resistance is currently a major health problem. This may be because of a marked decrease in daily physical activity during recent decades combined with constant food abundance. This lifestyle collides with our genome, which was most likely selected in the late Paleolithic era (50,000–10,000 BC) by criteria that favored survival in an environment characterized by fluctuations between periods of feast and famine. The theory of thrifty genes states that these fluctuations are required for optimal metabolic function. We mimicked the fluctuations in eight healthy young men [25.0 ± 0.1 yr (mean ± SE); body mass index: 25.7 ± 0.4 kg/m2] by subjecting them to intermittent fasting every second day for 20 h for 15 days. Euglycemic hyperinsulinemic (40 mU·min−1·m−2) clamps were performed before and after the intervention period. Subjects maintained body weight (86.4 ± 2.3 kg; coefficient of variation: 0.8 ± 0.1%). Plasma free fatty acid and β-hydroxybutyrate concentrations were 347 ± 18 and 0.06 ± 0.02 mM, respectively, after overnight fast but increased (P < 0.05) to 423 ± 86 and 0.10 ± 0.04 mM after 20-h fasting, confirming that the subjects were fasting. Insulin-mediated whole body glucose uptake rates increased from 6.3 ± 0.6 to 7.3 ± 0.3 mg·kg−1·min−1 (P = 0.03), and insulin-induced inhibition of adipose tissue lipolysis was more prominent after than before the intervention (P = 0.05). After the 20-h fasting periods, plasma adiponectin was increased compared with the basal levels before and after the intervention (5,922 ± 991 vs. 3,860 ± 784 ng/ml, P = 0.02). This experiment is the first in humans to show that intermittent fasting increases insulin-mediated glucose uptake rates, and the findings are compatible with the thrifty gene concept.

FunkyTobias wrote: »

^^ No mention of fat loss^^

Sorry, i thought you were asking me to support my IF/insulin response/fat oxidation comment...i mean i guess using more stored fat wouldn't support losing fat, but it seems to me it does...

I eat only three meals a day with no snacking.
10am breakfast
3pm lunch
7pm dinner

I eat when I'm hungry

that's about it

I use set meal times as part of my self-discipline routine. Knowing that I am weak-willed, eating at set times helps me control my desires to eat un-necessarily.