Fat Oxidation Increases In Alternate Day Fasting

One of the reasons we fast is to cleanse our body and mind.  If you think about from a scientific perspective, we are also cleansing ourselves of old cells through autophagy and fat oxidation.  Since fat cells are so stubborn, some are literally stored away for years, this is significant.  If we want to renew and revitalize our whole body, than it is a necessity, whether obese or healthy weight.  Intermittent fasting should be considered hygienic, like brushing your teeth.

This article is reassuring:

Alternate-day fasting in nonobese subjects

Bad News For Beefy Women

Plowing through some articles on lipolysis while fasted I came upon this bad news for women.

It seems in Obese women, being fasted for 20 hours does not increase Lipolysis.  The Scientist

conjectures that this may be an effect of "hyposomatotropism", basically a fancy word for not 

producing  growth hormone. I think there must be some way around this snag in intermittent 

fasting for women.  My guess would be to try it over a 16 week period and see if the rate of lipolysis 

picks up (it takes a lot longer than that to become obese right).  Perhaps using different herbs and 

amino acids while fasting could help as well.  Think Carnitine, Leucine and Green Tea (Or perhaps 

a few shots of espresso!).  Definitely doing some fasted workouts too.

Here is the Abstract:
Blunted lipolytic response to fasting in abdominally obese women

Fasted Training, A Great Tool For Fat Burning!

This study is ridiculously confusing to read, but the point is easy enough to understand:

Lipolytic suppression following carbohydrate ingestion limits fat oxidation during exercise

The main point is that Lipolysis, or the release of fatty acids into the bloodstream, slows down after a carb meal.  No Lipolysis = No Fat Burning.

BUT THIS IS FAR MORE INTERESTING:

In the fasted control group (overnight fasting, about 14 hours), the rate of lipolysis exceeded the rate of fat oxidation.  In other words Fat is being released into the blood stream faster than the body can burn it for energy!

What this translates to is a fasted workout is a fat burning extravaganza.

So yes, unless your a bodybuilder obsessed with gaining girth on your thighs, workout fasted at leasted 3 times a week.

"Hmm, very interesting Mike."

"Thanks Professor Japhy!"

Fasting Damages Cancer Cells

Sometimes the best medicine is a strong dose of nothing.

Fasting weakens cancer in mice

The article states: "Even fasting on its own effectively treated a majority of cancers tested in animals, including cancers from human cells."

Furthermore:  "without exception, "the combination of fasting cycles plus chemotherapy was either more or much more effective than chemo alone," said senior author Valter Longo, professor of gerontology and biological sciences at the University of Southern California.

For example, multiple cycles of fasting combined with chemotherapy cured 20 percent of mice with a highly aggressive type of children's cancer that had spread throughout the organism and 40 percent of mice with a more limited spread of the same cancer."

I like those odds!

Fasting Helps Chemotherapy Reduce Brain Tumors

Fresh New Fasting Research.

It seems that the power of not eating has found itself in the midst of Brain Cancer Therapy.

Brain Tumors are notoriously deadly, but instead of sawing open your head and trying to dissect your

brain, now doctors are relying on chemotherapy, and combined with fasting it is much more potent.

What the article does not mention, but perhaps would be more interesting to me is the possibility of

proactive brain health.

Fasting Makes Brain Tumors More Vulnerable to Radiation Therapy

Going into the archives of Fasting Research

Mice are not men.

However they are mammals, and like human mammals they are omnivorous and prone to eating 24 hours a day if given the choice.  Another shocking article about the benefits of Intermittent Fasting.

Fasting Every Other Day


Excerpt from the article:

"A five percent reduction in calories would be the equivalent of reducing about 100 calories a day in a human diet," said Hellerstein. In other words, for the mice, intermittent feeding seemed to provide similar gain with a bit less pain than a more restrictive diet.

Hellerstein noted that animals in the wild regularly go through cycles of too much and too little food, though not by choice. Major predators, such as lions, may go days without eating and then binge when they make a successful kill. "It may be normal to have periods where we are not eating," said Hellerstein. "But in domestic life, there generally is continuous access to food."

So if you want to truly eat Primal or Paleo, try a little bit of starvation (without actually starving yourself).

This Article Sums Up Why I Practice Daily Fasting

In case you're wondering why I or anyone should fast daily, well I suppose there are a myriad of reasons.

This article from May 2012 Science Daily sums it up pretty nicely for me HERE.  Have your cake and eat it too!

Basically Mice were fed a fatty diet.  One group ate ad libitum 24 hours a day.  The other was restricted to an 8 hour eating window.  Guess who weighed 28% less and did not suffer ill effects of fatty liver, high cholesterol or diabetes?

Daily fasting really comes in handy during vacations, holidays and other uncertain times.  It's can be as easy as skipping breakfast.  When your back home just do a couple 24 hour fasts and you're right back where you started.

Here are a few images from 9 months Jan-Sep 2012 - Daily Fast is like exercise, it is habitual once you get used to it.  After some time you grow not only to love it, but it becomes a part of you.