A month ago in the post Intermittent Fasting – Improving Your Success Rate, A New Strategy, I announced that I was trying a new intermittent fasting method. Instead of doing 1-2 weekly fasts of 22 hours, I would try the daily 16/8 fast. This is how I described the 16/8 method.
All eating is done in an 8 hour window (EX: 1pm – 9pm). No day is special. Just wake up and push your “breakfast” to 1pm. And because everyday is normal, there is no reason to celebrate or get sloppy in that 8 hour window.
Well it has been a full month and I’m ready to report my findings. After a week on this method, I made some alterations. On days when I lift weights, I will start eating at 10 AM. I’ve also found that many days, I just feel like 14 or 15 hours is enough. It could be because I’m already at my ideal weight and I’m an ectomorph. If I were overweight or an endomorph, I’d probably be more strict.
One trick I added was making my first meal super low on carbohydrates on days when I end the fast at less than 16 hours. This usually means eggs and sausage cooked in butter. To be clear, I do not do this on days I lift weights. Those days I consume a moderate amount of carbs. I’m medium carbs on workout days and low carb the rest of the week.
Personally I like this intermittent fasting method better. It just seems more natural. I’m also gaining even more discipline over hunger. Being able to decline poor food choices when hungry is now something I’m very comfortable doing. I wish I could say I notice the results better than the other method, but it is still too soon to tell.
Did anyone else try the 16/8 method? Do you prefer it?
I did try the 16/8 and I have to say that I prefer and will go back to the 20-22 hr/once a week method, I do a 13-14 hr fast between dinner and breakfast most days anyway. The problem that I encountered with 16/8 is that it tends to be much harder for me because of my work/commute schedule and trying to get food in at the appropriate time. I end up extending the 8 hrs, then moving the 16, etc..
Dear CriticalMas,
been reading your site for quite a while now. Just saw that deepfitness site? whats it supposed to be? where do the articles come from? do you make money from that site? I would like to have a fishing site called deepseafishing.com for fishing in puget.
thanks, thomas
DF is a collection of articles we got years ago from some free article site. I added some code to clean it up a bit. It makes very little money. Some of the articles are good, most aren’t.
Im going to try fasting on Sunday for the full day just to see if I can do it. I have lost roughly 15 pounds just by tweaking my diet a little bit. I attribute most of my success to following the examples you have set for yourself MAS, through your research. The wierd thing is, I don’t even work out. Thanks
Ed –
Congrats. I am glad to hear about your diet success. I just received an email from a friend that has dropped 54 pounds.
[...] fasting method. I wasn’t strict with it. I did it about 3 days a week. From the post Intermittent Fasting – The 16/8 Update: Personally I like this intermittent fasting method better. It just seems more natural. I’m [...]
I’ve been doing this 16/8 fast for about one month now. I started out 2 months ago with the EatFastEat fasting for about 24 hours a couple of times per week. To me, 16/8 is much more manageable. However, sometimes if I cheat on my diet I will throw in a full 24 hours and then resume the 16/8. I’ve been playing around with different variations over the last 2 months and maintaining a pretty strict workout routine as well (cardio and weights) for the last three months. In total, I’ve dropped over 20lbs and feel great. My skin, health, and energy have all improved greatly.
This diet (or variations of it) works great if you really stick to it.
I just wanted to put up an update. Since my last post, I’ve maintained this 16/8 diet pretty religiously. I’ve now dropped an additional 5 pounds since June. I stopped going to the gym in August because my schedule was and is too busy. However, even without exercising on a daily basis, I’ve continued dropping pounds. It’s been just about ten months since I started fasting in one way or another, and I know now I’ll never give it up. Truly, it takes a lot of self control, but it’s the best way to reduce weight and keep it off.
@Jeff – Congrats on the fat loss. For me fasting has became as normal as eating.