Shock the body?

zig zagging calories is good as the body doesnt get used to what you're giving it everyday. Its good for people with not much weight to lose. If you keep cals low every day, the body sees it as being in a "famine" mode, so metabolism can slow and can end up in a plateau. As long as you're not going over your weekly cal intake, then it will be fine.

It absolutely works. If you keep doing the same thing all the time, your body gets accustomed to it. Just like watching the same movie over and over, it loses its wow factor.

If you switch it up, your body gets confused and has to put in more work to catch up, which burns more calories and breaks plateaus. Variety is the spice of life.

i wonder this too, i tend to skip a lot of meals sometimes and then eat a lot other days and i have heard different things. good question

In my personal opinion as far as the exercise goes I think its BS. I don't think my body is that stupid personally.

"Last week you did alternating bicep curls followed by tricep kick back, this week you did chair dips followed by 21's accckkkkk what do I do!!!"

To work a muscle you contract it and elongate it under tension. Now granted you can hit slightly different angles and work it in a slightly different ways, which honestly is great for fully developing the strength needed to progress and growing as much of the muscle as possible, but the bulk of the muscle doesn't "know" that you've changed anything so it can't get "confused". Last week it contracted and elongated X number times with Y amount of weight. This week it did the exactly same thing. Not very confusing.

Want growth? Increase something every week. Either X or Y. Weight or reps. Do one more rep, or add 5 lbs and do less reps and then the week after do one more rep.

As far as the diet goes. I have no real opinion either way.

It absolutely works. If you keep doing the same thing all the time, your body gets accustomed to it. Just like watching the same movie over and over, it loses its wow factor.

If you switch it up, your body gets confused and has to put in more work to catch up, which burns more calories and breaks plateaus. Variety is the spice of life.

But can you PROVE that it works? Or do you just have faith that it works?

I'm not asking that to be antagonistic. I really want to know. Does it work or do people just think it works?

I have to say it all comes down to a simple thought for me. "I think, so therefore I am" I know I'm a bit of an odd duck. What works for one does not work for all. For me it either Did work or I Thought it did work hard enough so that it did work.

I think people like to think that things have to be complicated or mysterious to actually work. If they are not, people can't justify not getting the results they want, when they want them. Just my own opinion and a little self reflection.

I agree. I think it's a load of ****.

Hmm bump.

bump

As I understand it, our bodies are not only good at adapting to changes, but they are exceptionally good at establishing stability in our systems - at least a reasonably healthy body is. We see this effect in things such as heart rate, body temperature and blood pressure.

What we are talking about in this case is energy homeostasis, which is accomplished in our body with various hormones such as insulin and leptin. The hormonal balance in our body is established through feedback loops that tell our system what the energy needs are and what the energy sources are. If our caloric intake is consistently at a certain level, the body systems include that data in the equation, and if the caloric intake is insufficient for our energy needs, the hormones will adapt to that over time and make our metabolism more efficient - therefore burning fewer calories. Our bodies continually make these adjustments at minute levels, which is why eating something will temporarily speed up your metabolism.

This capability, it is assumed, is the product of eons of evolution, and allowed our ancestors to live through times of famine. Natural selection presumably killed off the genetic lines that did not have this inborn ability to turn down the thermostat.

So here we are, wanting to lose weight. We continually feed ourselves with a caloric deficit. The body - to achieve energy homeostasis - dips into our fat stores to run the systems - yay, the pounds start coming off. Over time however, if the caloric deficit continues, our bodies wise up and assume that there might just be a famine in the works, so the efficiencies start kicking in. Lucky us. This is where the 'shock the body' theories come into play. It is theorized that by feeding the body more, the increase will be incorporated into those feedback signals and the body will get the message that the famine is over. and the same adaptation mechanism that slowed down our metabolism will speed back up - at least temporarily.

As far as I know, these are working theories and biological models that are still being researched. Something like this may be difficult to 'prove' over a long-term study, because it is difficult to establish a control on something like this for an extended period, however, there are some short-term studies that have documented these effects.

I would prefer not to think of temporarily changing the caloric inputs as 'shocking' or 'tricking' the body, but rather as altering the feedback mechanisms that drive these processes. There are so many variables to something like this that there are certainly people who it will fail to have results with. An example would be someone with endocrine system disorders where the systems aren't necessarily functioning correctly. In general though, the concept behind this is sound. Applying it to our weight loss programs is probably not going to be very effective unless we really understand what we are doing though.

No proof what so ever except my own body. I wore a bodymedia fit. I had an exact calorie deficit of 3500-3750 for 3 weeks. I lost 1 lb a week. The fourth week I had a deficit of 1002. I lost 6 lbs. Then back to my 3500-3750 and I lost nothing. Did that for 3 weeks. 4th week I had an overage for the week and was SO depressed and angry at myself. Lost 9 lbs. I lost 18 lbs in my 8 weeks with it and most of the loss was when I did not have a deficit or had a minor one. I can't figure it out to be honest with you. I only know that through my experiences when I just stick with my 3500 calorie deficit a week I get little results. I have to "shake it up".

I also have found this to be true in my personal exercise program. Walking as fast as I can for 20 minutes burned approx. 348 calories. Walking then running then walking slower (interval) burned close to 500 for the same 20 minutes.

I'd be so interested in learning the PROOF or even the SCIENCE behind WHY this works myself. I will be staying tuned