WOW!
You have to watch the video of this one. Seriously.
This took place at the U of MN here and Heather is an amazing athlete and person.
Comments
What do you think? Post a comment and let me know!
Rock on
Mike N
You know you are a hardcore research geek and you are get all excited about getting a free awesome mug like the one above. I picked this one up at the recently Experimental Biology conference in DC. It also works great to mix up some instant high fiber oatmeal in the morning instead of paying $17 for a piece of toast, a bagel and orange juice. Oral glucose tolerance test anyone?
Even if you don’t have a cool mug like mine, you can benefit from research to help you add more muscle, strength and drop fat.
When you are reading research (which I know you all secretly do, admit it!) a huge tip the first thing to look at the subjects to determine:
Animal, human, or plant?
Ok, so plants are out for sure in the fitness research area (except as something to eat, well I guess animals are in that category too).
Ninja Attacks Out of Nowhere!
I can hear all the pubmed ninjas screaming already
“Animal research sucks since I am not a hairy white rat”
While some may argue with that statement, let’s look at human vs animal research in regards to a magical fat that can burn fat!
Before we dive into that hot topic, we will take a side trip to understand the benefits of animal vs human research since it is a very critical component.
1) Some studies can’t be done on humans
Any study where they say the animal was sacrificed would be at the top of the list. Know any humans that want to sign up for that one? I used my psychic powers to visualize a very short list. No you can’t list your neighbor Bob who never returned your lawnmower in 1983.
2) Easier to do
Running your own experiment on humans is much more intensive and time consuming. I can say that from first hand knowledge.
Humans are busy people (just like you) and coordinating them and getting them to follow the protocol closely takes time (read: many grad students)
1) Translates better to you!
Since you are not a 205 lbs white Wistar rat, data collected from other human is more relevant to you and your efforts to gain muscle, strength and drop fat.
2) More Realistic
Related to #1, the results obtained are going to be more realistic of what to expect. As we will see, this is very important to understand so you don’t spend your hard earned money on worthless supplements to burn fat and gain muscle.
The fatty acid conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) is an omega-6 polyunsaturated essential fatty acid. Remember that some fat is essential, with the two main essential fatty acids being omega-6 and omega 3.
Back in the early 2000s, CLA was all the rage as a fat burning fat. It can be found in nature as one of the fats in beef and dairy, so it can be sold in supplemental form. While there are many different types (isomers) of CLA the main ones are the trans-10, cis-12 and cis-9, trans-11 forms.
Much of the early (and even recent) data on CLA is from our 4 legged fury friend the rat. Looking at these data, we see that CLA is crazy good!
One study showed done by James P. DeLany et al. showed a 10% drop in body fat with CLA in only 12 weeks!
That is insane! If you are currently 19% body fat, in 12 weeks you would be in the single digits just by taking some CLA (ok, a crap ton of CLA, but still…..)
In the same study, CLA showed a nice dose response effect, so the more you took the more fat you lost!
The mice still ate the same amount of food too! So much for starving yourself, just take some CLA, right?
Many other studies went on to verify this response, showing that CLA was able to make super fit and lean mice.
But……what about you and me? Will it work
Despite CLA being in the food chain, human trials were a bit slow to come around. Heck, even just recently researchers are still looking at CLA in rodents, but now combining it with other things (Macarulla, AN 2011).
In one of the longest trials on CLA in humans, Jean-Michel Gaullier and friends showed that CLA did work!
Sweet! I am off to the supplement store to get some right now!
Hold on their Tex, just because the result was statistically significant, does not mean it will do crap in the really real world.
After 2 years, compared to a placebo, one type of CLA showed a lost of 1.8 kg (give or take 3.7 kgs) and the other CLA group lost 2.7 kgs (give or take 3.4 kgs). At its best, over 2 whole friggin years, the average was just under a 6 lbs loss.
I am unimpressed and this was one of the more positive studies!
In a meta-analysis (think many studies pooled together), CLA did not appear to do much for muscle gain either (increase in fat free mass). Schoeller DA, et al in 2009 reported a very short term effect of less than 1%.
What did we learn today?
Leave me a comment below!
Rock on
Mike N
Schoeller DA, Watras AC, Whigham LD. A meta-analysis of the effects of conjugated linoleic acid on fat-free mass in humans. Appl Physiol Nutr Metab. 2009 Oct;34(5):975-8.
Jean-Michel Gaullier, Johan Halse, Kjetil Høye†, Knut Kristiansen, Hans Fagertun, Hogne Vikand Ola Gudmundsen Supplementation with Conjugated Linoleic Acid for 24 Months Is Well Tolerated by and Reduces Body Fat Mass in Healthy, Overweight Humans. T he American Society for Nutritional Sciences J. Nutr. 135:778-784, April 2005
Arias N, Macarulla MT, Aguirre L, Martínez-Castaño MG, Gómez-Zorita S, Miranda J, Martínez JA, Portillo MP. The combination of resveratrol and conjugated linoleic acid is not useful in preventing obesity. J Physiol Biochem. 2011 Apr 1.
James P. DeLany, Fawn Blohm, Alycia A. Truett, Joseph A. Scimeca3, and David B. West Conjugated linoleic acid rapidly reduces body fat content in mice without affecting energy intake. Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol 275:R667-R672, 1998.
Norris LE, Collene AL, Asp ML, Hsu JC, Liu LF, Richardson JR, Li D, Bell D, Osei K, Jackson RD, Belury MA. Comparison of dietary conjugated linoleic acid with safflower oil on body composition in obese postmenopausal women with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Am J Clin Nutr. 2009 Sep;90(3):468-76. Epub 2009 Jun 1
Banu J, Bhattacharya A, Rahman M, Fernandes G. Beneficial effects of conjugated linoleic acid and exercise on bone of middle-aged female mice. J Bone Miner Metab. 2008;26(5):436-45. Epub 2008 Aug 30.
Plourde M, Jew S, Cunnane SC, Jones PJ. Conjugated linoleic acids: why the discrepancy between animal and human studies? Nutr Rev. 2008 Jul;66(7):415-21.
Fischer-Posovszky P, Kukulus V, Wabitsch M. [Conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) and their relevance in the reduction of body fat. A critical review of the currently available data]. MMW Fortschr Med. 2008 Jan 17;149 Suppl 4:128-31. Review. German.
Li JJ, Huang CJ, Xie D. Anti-obesity effects of conjugated linoleic acid, docosahexaenoic acid, and eicosapentaenoic acid. Mol Nutr Food Res. 2008 Jun;52(6):631-45. Review.
Mosley SA, Shahin AM, Williams J, McGuire MA, McGuire MK. Supplemental conjugated linoleic acid consumption does not influence milk macronutrient contents in all healthy lactating women. Lipids. 2007 Aug;42(8):723-9. Epub 2007 Jul 4.
Diaz ML, Watkins BA, Li Y, Anderson RA, Campbell WW. Chromium picolinate and conjugated linoleic acid do not synergistically influence diet- and exercise-induced changes in body composition and health indexes in overweight women. J Nutr Biochem. 2008 Jan;19(1):61-8. Epub 2007 May 24.
Whigham LD, Watras AC, Schoeller DA. Efficacy of conjugated linoleic acid for reducing fat mass: a meta-analysis in humans. Am J Clin Nutr. 2007 May;85(5):1203-11.
Gaullier JM, Halse J, Høivik HO, Høye K, Syvertsen C, Nurminiemi M, Hassfeld C, Einerhand A, O’Shea M, Gudmundsen O. Six months supplementation with conjugated linoleic acid induces regional-specific fat mass decreases in overweight and obese. Br J Nutr. 2007 Mar;97(3):550-60.
Salas-Salvadó J, Márquez-Sandoval F, Bulló M. Conjugated linoleic acid intake in humans: a systematic review focusing on its effect on body composition, glucose, and lipid metabolism. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr. 2006;46(6):479-88. Review.
Larsen TM, Toubro S, Gudmundsen O, Astrup A. Conjugated linoleic acid supplementation for 1 y does not prevent weight or body fat regain. Am J Clin Nutr. 2006 Mar;83(3):606-12.
Haugen M, Alexander J. Tidsskr Nor Laegeforen. Can linoleic acids in conjugated CLA products reduce overweight problems? 2004 Dec 2;124(23):3051-4. Review. Norwegian.
Risérus U, Vessby B, Arnlöv J, Basu S. Effects of cis-9,trans-11 conjugated linoleic acid supplementation on insulin sensitivity, lipid peroxidation, and proinflammatory markers in obese men. Am J Clin Nutr. 2004 Aug;80(2):279-83.
Rainer L, Heiss CJ. Conjugated linoleic acid: health implications and effects on body composition. J Am Diet Assoc. 2004 Jun;104(6):963-8, quiz 1032.
Frankly, I created this product because I’m sick of the pseudoscientific crap I’m seeing tossed around the fitness industry as legit information. With all of the misinterpretations of research and stuff that is flat out created out of thin air, no wonder people (even coaches and trainers) are confused. And if there is one thing I know about coaches and trainers is that they’re always trying to learn more…but many don’t have the formal education to navigate the complex and crazy world of research. I created this product to give people the power to break free from hype and dogma and make decisions based on fact, not fiction.
And I’m not really worried that people won’t buy products again. I think people like to learn from others. However, I think it is imperative to be able to determine who to listen to and to critically analyze for yourself what those people are saying. I think this product will help to determine who is legit and who is pulling stuff out of their ass.
I actually started getting involved in research in the summer following my second year of university. I volunteered in a motor control lab doing experiments on the effect of vision on movement planning. It was a pretty awesome experience and I was completely hooked after that.
For my 4th year thesis I did a really interesting biomechanics study where I looked at the inertial characteristics of the human foot (hey…I said interesting not exciting) and presented the poster at the World Congress of Biomechanics which is kind of a big deal if I do say so myself.
Then I went to grad school and did some exercise physiology research in one of the world’s leading labs for muscle protein metabolism research under the very brilliant Dr. Stuart Phillips.
Aaaah, yes, Dr. Stu Philips is a great guy. I am such a huge dork (um, Warrior Nerd) that I had my picture taken with him at the recent Experimental Biology conference in DC. Great guy.
Yep. I’ve actually been a trainer/coach for around 11 years now and have probably put in tens of thousands of hours on the training floor with clients. These days, of course, I’ve pulled back significantly so I can spend more time with my family and work on other projects, but I still make sure to get in my “in the trenches” time. I also provide services to one of Canada’s very few government funded Bariatric Medical Programs for the evidence based treatment of obesity.
Any parting words you want to add, like how much you love my blog, hahaha.
You have a blog? I thought you were just going to put this in that shoe box you keep in your trunk with all those weird photos you take of yourself with other researchers. 
In any case, I guess I just want people to know that there is now a product available not only to tell you what to do, but how to discover what to do for yourself and to challenge the assumptions you’ve created by reading popular fitness information. Thanks for letting me share this message.
In all seriousness, you did a great job on the product and I highly recommend everyone pick it up today (Wed), before the price doubles this Friday. Go to the link below to get it now
Thanks again Mark for taking time out your crazy schedule today!
It has been my pleasure. Thanks Mike!
With consistent weigh ins on the Omiron brand electronic scale with body fat reading, I went from 259.2 pounds on March 3rd to 234.6 pounds on April 5th.
It does not appear so. My January 3rd weigh in was 242.2 lbs. and lean, feeling strong and loving life, PR’ing in everything I tested and enjoying the concept of Met-Flex. After my neck injury from 2001 made a resurgence, loss of sleep due to pain and stress wrecked me for about 6 weeks and I gained 17 pounds of undesirable weight. Now, at just over/under 235lbs, I feel better than I did at 235 in September.
Will Williams After Picture
As I mentioned before, the concept of Metabolic Flexibility was working nicely for me and one variable [which would prove to be a huge player this time] that I did not factor in was developing a numbered caloric compliance window. Or, I did not assign a low-compliant or non-compliant limit to my desired daily caloric intake, as my desire was to add some muscle. I do not need to look at total calories too closely to add muscle. In fact, I may be one of those people who add lean muscle just by typing it! (editor’s note, I hate you Will)
After attending Adam Glass’ Physique Transformation lecture at The Movement Minneapolis’ and coming back to Philly armed with your work with for the science and Adam’s “on the ground” concept for me, I developed, tracked, and tested the following five factors:
1. Desired caloric intake of 2100 calories [not to include veggies] with a 20% over & under window of compliance.
2. Tracking my macronutrient ratio and recording the effects of consuming 1 gram of protein for each pound of lean mass [no problem!].
3. Tracking and recording the effects of experiments involving days where I eat any available combination of High-Medium-Low quantities of meal;
Frequency-Intensity-Density.
4. Not freaking out if I drank a whole bottle of wine or ate way more calories than 2100 on days where my body said to me “Hey, how ’bout a little more, eh?”
5. Applying pain resolution techniques to my body in order to facilitate a higher quality of movement so that I could train better, faster, and smarter.
Heck yeah! I noticed that after the last few weeks of training in a state of reduced pain, when speed training tests well for me using the Gym Movement Protocol, I am hungry like the wolf. So, in another 5 or so days, when I recalibrate my 100% compliance ratio based off another Body-fat & lean mass reading, I will continue to record the correlation between when I move fast and when I eat the most calories.
I am not kidding when I say that last Sunday I tested well and trained for speed and ate 3 AhI tuna steaks, 4 16oz tubs of whole milk cottage cheese, 2 cans of beans, and a bushel of veggies over the 9 hours that followed my session. And the next day I woke up and felt like dy-no-mite.
Thanks for the science that proves that we are capable of running our own experiments. Over and out. Will Williams, Authentic Strength. Philly, PA
Kudos to Will for taking the knowledge that he learned and applied it pronto for MASSIVE results. Dropping 25 pounds without a loss of strength in about 4 weeks is insane! While these results are not normal, and yes before I get tons of hate mail I know that some of that was water and glycogen perhaps so it was not 100% fat. The take away is that crazy results can happen with the correct action!
If you are in the Philly, PA area, I highly recommend you get out to see Will at Authentic Strength.. It will be well worth your time.
If you are not near the Philly area, I have a few spots open in my E-class where I will personally lead you step by step to determine what is best for YOUR body for more muscle, strength and less fat. I guarantee you will see massive results and be even more awesome!
Rock on
Mike N
PS -The E-class will fill up fast, so I apologize if you sign up and find it to be full. Due to the very personal nature of this course, I can only fit 25 people at one time and I don’t plan to ever offer it again at this price! Don’t miss out!
As you know, my wonderful wife Jodie and I spent a week in Mexico recently. We rented a house with about 16 other nuts right on the beach north of Playa Del Carmen (not too far from Tulum and Cancun) and had a blast!
While I was there, I learned a few important lessons that will help you drop some fat!
The trip was awesome and much needed time away, even though I was working on research studies part of the time.
As you know, I am a huge kiteboarding addict. If you have not tried it yet, you must take a lesson and give it a go!
We got out kiteboarding on 2 epic days. Wow! Here are some videos below
Special thanks to CJ for the awesome videos! When we got there on the last day, nobody else was even there while the wind was cranking. Insane.
Yep, I was visited by the Mexican police, up close and personal like.
Once we landed, we picked up the rental car and I wondered why a car was only 49 clams for a whole week? Hmmm, seems too good to be true, but all of them were around that price.
As I soon found out, that was without insurance and by the time we added in full coverage, the cost was up to $350. That was the price AFTER I negotiated down about $80 and agreed to a timeshare visit the next day for another $100 off to bring it to $250. In hindsight, I think I could have even done better, but lesson learned.
Rember this point and I will come back to it.
Rental car–check! Off we went, attempting to find the house.
Fast forward to our first trip out kiteboarding to Isla Blanca as seen in the videos above. It is just north of Cancun and quite hard to find if you have never been to Mexico before.
I soon learned that signal lights mean nothing and people just pull over into your lane. Literally. It doesn’t seem to matter if you were their first or not.
Take the worst driving in any US city and multiple it by 5 and you are close.
Driving in the city was not on the list of fun things to repeat ever again, but we had our minds setting on ripping some epic shallow water while the wind was up; so off we went.
Turns out the speed limits make zero sense. At one point they go from 100 kilometers per hour to 40. It was at this point that I saw flashing lights in my rear view mirror. My first thought was, it must be someone else; so I just pulled over and to my horror the lights stayed behind me.
Oh crap, this is NOT going to be fun, and we will be utterly lost on top of it.
The cop comes up to my window and asks for my license.
Double crap. It is not with my credits cards and pesos.
So, I get pulled out of the car now and asked to visit with him, in addition to having to show my passport.
Since I was going over double the speed limit (85 in a 40 zone), I am in really deep crap which involves a $180 fine (that is American, not pesos) and a trip to the police station for an indeterminate amount of time.
Add to this my poor Spanish and an unfriendly guy, with a gun, yelling in Spanish (although the fine and jail visit was oddly enough spoken in English—hmmmmm).
Since he has my passport now (crap), a gun (double crap) and another guy with him also with a gun watching me like a buzzard ready to swoop on dead rotting meat, my leverage is nothing.
I knew that technically since it was my first violation, they should give me a warning; so that was a little bit of leverage.
I asked in Spanglish if there were any other possible solutions since I did not have $180 in cash, nor could I get any since the cash machines spit out pesos. He mentioned that if I paid cash on the spot, he may have a memory lapse.
I offered up $20.
Ooooops, bad idea, that only made him more pissed. So much for low balling.
I then offered up $40 as that was the only amount of American cash I had on me, otherwise I will have to visit the Mexican pokey.
After a few minutes of grumbling he accepted. I went back to the car (sans passport still), found $40 (oddly enough from the visit we did the day before to the resort/ time share) and paid him off. I had my passport in hand now and was on my way.
Crisis avoided, other than I was utterly lost now.
As I pulled ahead, my buddies had pulled off to the side in a parking lot and waited, so kiteboarding was going to happen after all that day. Hell ya.
The point of this is leverage.
When you have leverage, you can do lots of things with LESS effort
Lose leverage and you are screwed. Tons of effort for little out come.
Nutrition and training are no different.
My whole job as a trainer/consultant is to find points of leverage and exploit the crap out of them for my clients/athletes.
Every person only has so much time. Whether it is goofy NCAA rules or that they live a very busy life. My goal is to offer them starting points that have the most leverage. Less action on their part for a BETTER outcome. Sign me up!
Metabolic Flexibility is teaching the body to use the right fuel at the right time.
Burn carbs during high intensity weight training sessions, but burn fat during day to day activities and low intensity work. This allows you the best of BOTH worlds–intense training and more fat burning!
Long term, we want to teach the body to be as adaptable as possible.
Better Adaptability = Health
If we break this down into action steps, here are 4 ways to maximize your Met Flex for faster fat loss and muscle gains. We want to create leverage so the action on your part is not crazy, but you get maxim benefit
I am sure you are bored out of your skull now about me yammering on about protein needs. The short action item: Get more!
How much more?
In studies where they were hypocaloric (calories were below maintenance levels, so a fat loss diet), clock in around a MINIMUM of 0.75 grams per lb of body weight (3-6).
So a 200 lb person would want to get 150 grams of protein per day on the low end.
I have had people go as high as 1.5 grams per pound of bodyweight per day; so our 200 lb friend would be at 300 grams per day. Most of the time this is not needed though. You want to do the minimal Effective Amount (mEA).
Work by Devkota S et al. (2) showed that replacing carbs with protein was beneficial in shifting molecular activity in muscle vs. fat; which should improve body composition (more muscle, less fat).
Most people (myself included) tend to eat the same things day in and day out.
When I get stressed and my schedule goes nuts (which happens a lot lately), I will fall back to the same routine, without much variety.
Variety is the spice of life and allows you to feed your body a huge array of powerful micronutrients which are critical for health and performance (Perez-Vizcaino F et al.) It also helps prevent OVERexposure to any one particular item or toxin too! A double whammy.
Why?
More micro-nutrients
Less exposure to bad stuff
Fills you up (automatically eat fewer calories)
Lots of BS to be sorted here regarding fasting. The definition I am using of fasting is zero calorie containing items during a set period of time. Noncaloric items only! None of this lemon juice, hot pepper and maple syrup crap style fasting. The same guy who promotes that horrible idea also says that since we inhale nitrogen in the air, we can pull nitrogren in by breathing and we don’t need nitrogen containing marcronutritients like protein. I almost spit my tea out when I read it! Stanely Burroughs (the author of this Master Cleanse) can shove his ebook where the sun doesn’t shine.
Now you got my so fired up I lost my place! Oh ya, fasting and metabolic flexibility.
The downside is that this is where the physiology gets messy. People then assume they need to do all of their cardio fasted to burn more fat. It is true that fasted cardio will result in a burning more fat DURING the exercise session and this has been confirmed by measuring by the Respiratory Exchange Ratio (RER) during a fasted vs. a fed state (after eating) (7) It is also true that during a fasting condition, insulin levels are low, pushing the body towards more direct fat utilization (burning).
Sounds great so far, but hold the Master Cleanse ebook my fasted cardio bunny friend.
If we look past the ACUTE effects over 24 hours, it appears the fed state (after eating) increases the EPOC (aka afterburn) effect; resulting in burning of more fat calories TOTAL. This was shown in a great study by Paoli A et al. out of Italy recently.
I can see you throwing up your hands in utter confusion now! I can see people pasting comments like ”Dude brah, I did fasted cardio and got ripped. Your (sic) wrong!”
Lots of things work and if you got your result, awesome!
Going back to the concept of Metabolic Flexibility, we want the body to adapt to different conditions.
Fasting is just one of those conditions. I actually want my athletes to be able to do a lifting or cardio session during a fasted state WITHOUT a loss of performance! That is the key. If you are doing less work, you are burning fewer calories so the all the little things liked fasted, not fasted, protein only, BCAAs only, etc won’t matter a ton.
The ability to burn fat AND carbs for fuel, like a flex fuel vehicle, is best!
This increases your ability to adapt faster.
If you want to read an excellent review on fasted cardio, check out Brad Schoenfeld’s recent review of that topic (8).
I have presented 3 ways you can get more leverage over your nutrition and maximize your lean muscle gains and fat loss. While on my Mexico trip, even though I did not exercise directly, I did some kiteboarding, hiking and walking, ate all sorts of crazy foods (some that can’t be found in the US) and even had a few tasty adult style beverages, I ended up dropping 2-3 lbs without a drop in strength (once I recovered for the all day 3 leg flight festival to get home).
Time to put them into practice and let me know how it goes for you!
Rock on
Mike N
1) Perez-Vizcaino F, Duarte J. Mol Aspects Med. 2010 Dec;31(6):478-94. Epub 2010 Sep 15. Flavonols and cardiovascular disease.
2) Devkota S, Layman DK .Nutr Metab (Lond). 2011 Mar 4;8(1):13. [Epub ahead of print] Increased ratio of dietary carbohydrate to protein shifts the focus of metabolic signaling from skeletal muscle to adipose.
3) Layman DK, E Evans, JI Baum, J Seyler, DJ Erickson, RA Boileau. Dietary protein and exercise have additive effects on body composition during weight loss in adult women. J Nutr. . 2005; 135(8):1903-10.
4) Mero AA, H Huovinen, O Matintupa, et al. Moderate energy restriction with high protein diet results in healthier outcome in women. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. . 2010; 7(1):4.
5) Mettler S, N Mitchell, KD Tipton. Increased protein intake reduces lean body mass loss during weight loss in athletes. Med Sci Sports Exerc. . 2010; 42(2):326-37.
6) Walberg JL, MK Leidy, DJ Sturgill, DE Hinkle, SJ Ritchey, DR Sebolt. Macronutrient content of a hypoenergy diet affects nitrogen retention and muscle function in weight lifters. Int J Sports Med. . 1988; 9(4):261-6.
7)Paoli A, Marcolin G, Zonin F, Neri M, Sivieri A, Pacelli QF Exercising fasting or fed to enhance fat loss? Influence of food intake on respiratory ratio and excess postexercise oxygen consumption after a bout of endurance training. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2011 Feb;21(1):48-54. Dept. of Human Anatomy and Physiology, University of Padua, Italy.
8 ) Schoenfeld, Brad Does Cardio After an Overnight Fast Maximize Fat Loss? Strength & Conditioning Journal: February 2011 – Volume 33 – Issue 1 – pp 23-25
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