"Eat Often, Dem Muscles Soften", Or A Take On Meal Timing

Greetings, brohegans.

Been some time huh? Yeah, bring the hate. I've been slacking, and you've been missing me. I can totally understand, I'm just that good. Please don't post below to disagree with this specific point.

I wanted to write today on meal timing. After some interesting discussions on fasting in MFQH, and Shane's take on IF, I decided it was too recurrent a topic not to write on it.

I already covered one of the most spread faces of meal timing, the anabolic window, here. 

As you already know, this is one of the most resilient myths in the industry. But I'm coming too early (pun not intended, although my girlfriend would disagree) on this. Why did I call meal timing a myth? And whence did it came?

We have to examine first why the people who support these ideas do so. Keeping meal frequency high has often been preached in fitness circles, especially bodybuilding, but also among people who were trying to diet down. We'll take a look at both.

Eat frequently to lose weight. Easy, right?

The mother of all myths. You must have heard this a hell of a lot.

"Nah, bro, fuck three meals a day. Eat every hour to stoke the metabolic fire!".

It'd be very ironic not to admit I used to believe this, to be honest. Fortunately for all of us, internet has brought an era of free information like none before for everyone who's willing to put in some effort and learn. The catch? You have to learn what advice to heed, as well, and sadly, you can find these myths in maaany more websites than you can find blunt truth backed up by studies.

I frankly think it may have arised by a wrong grasp on TEF. TEF stands for Thermic Effect of Food, and refers, roughly speaking, to the amount of energy that is lost in the form of heat when digesting macronutrients. Indeed, eating stokes your metabolic fire, but the people preaching these myths have so far failed to mention TEF is totally portion dependent.

As it is, if we consider isocaloric and with equally divided macros diets, we reach the same TEF with different meals.

Let's consider a TEF of 20% for the food we eat, and a daily intake of 2000kcal.

Diet #1:

1. 9AM, 1000kcal meal. 200kcal TEF.
2. 1PM, 500kcal meal. 100kcal TEF.
3. 5PM, 250kcal meal. 50kcal TEF.
4. 9PM, 250kcal meal. 50kcal TEF.

With a net total of 400kcal TEF, a 20% of 2000kcal, our daily set intake.

Diet #2:

1. 7PM, 1500kcal meal. 300kcal TEF.
2. 9PM, 500kcal meal. 100kcal TEF.

A total net of 400kcal TEF, again.

Indeed, and according to this, Bellisle et al. found no differences in 1997 with body calorimeters and measuring energy expenditure any difference between more, smaller meals, and fewer, bigger ones.

Now, we know that more meals don't lead to higher TEF, but we also have studies supporting the evidence that fewer meals may be even better! As it is, Leidy et al. tried in 2010 to determine how much meal frequency mattered, and divided their test subjects into groups with normal and high protein, and 3 or 6 daily meals. Well, results showed that the higher protein groups reported better fullness. Take this with a pinch of salt, because they also showed higher ghrelin levels.

You have the information. Use it responsibly.

Eat frequently to build muscle. 

This is but the other side of the same coin. It is based usually on the myth regarding protein absorption, which has been know from the 90's to be of about 5g/hour for most usual proteins, although some fast digesting ones like whey have rates upwards to 10g/hour. However, and contradicting the myth, you still have EEA in your bloodstream 5-10 hours after having eaten, as you may have guessed by now. So whence comes the problem?

Again, the most likely culprit is the "legit research" conducted by supplement companies. Of course, it'd be great for them if this were actually true, and you had to eat protein every 2-3 hours. Can you imagine how much whey they'd sell? 

So, what can we make of all this?

• Meal frequency is irrelevant when trying to lose weight. Net caloric expenditure remains as the really important to factor in determining body changes.

• Meal frequency is irrelevant when trying to gain weight. Again, net caloric expenditure trumps over. Only in cases where very little protein has been consumed should we worry about upping frequency. However, that may not be the best idea, as some studies have also found that the more frequently and in smaller quantities you eat protein, the likelier it is to be used for energetic instead of structural purposes.

• Fasting helps with hunger control management. I'd frankly recommend a protocol like IF or similar when trying to lose weight, as it'll help you to be in a deficit without hunger.

• Energy balance is key, as we've seen. However, fasting may not be the best approach while bulking, as you usually have to deal with decently higher kcal intakes.

• In the end... The best diet is whichever you can adhere to, as usual. Don't forget that results usually come from perseverance and not from perfect planning.

Peace,

J.

Sources:

-Bellisle, McDevitt R, Prentice AM, Meal frequency and energy balance, 1997, British Journal of Nutrition.

-Leidy, Armstrong CL, Tang M, Mattes RD, Campbell WW, The influence of higher protein intake and greater eating frequency on appetite control in overweight and obese men, 2010.