Intermittent Fasting: The “Calories Don’t Matter” Lie

I love intermittent fasting.

It’s a great tool for improving fat loss, and many of my PT clients have used it over the years.

However, I often see “experts” putting out content claiming that “calories don’t matter on intermittent fasting”, as if eating all of your food between the hours of 12pm-8pm somehow tears a hole in the space/time continuum and pulls body fat through the vortex.

This is complete and utter nonsense!

Deep down I believe we all know it doesn’t work this way, but it’s still easy to get fooled by the glossy hype on some of the videos.

Heck, even my own family have fallen for it.

“This YouTuber says I can eat whatever I want when I do intermittent fasting, because it’s not about counting calories. As long as it’s within my 8-hour feeding window, the fasting helps me burn off alories don’t matter. I get to eat whatever I like as long as it’s between 12 and 8, and the fasting helps me burn everything off!”

This was an actual conversation I had with a relative about a year ago.

I’ve been a PT and fitness writer for 22 years now and I’ve seen a whole lot of bullshit trends come and go during that time, so hearing those logic-breaking claims made me want to give him a shake.

However, as I raised the eyebrow of skepticism I realized it was already too late, for he was sold on the idea of getting awesome results for zero effort.

He waxed lyrical about how his new-found “guru” was at the cutting edge of new research and how he was teaching us all of the secrets which “they” (?) don’t want you to know, so I decided to just let him crack on and check in with him six months later.

He gained 49lbs in that time.

Beware The Bullshitters

Unfortunately, this kind of shithousery has existed for decades.

There will always be a charlatan ready to snatch your money with promises of an easier way.

In recent times we’ve seen these tactics used on several “next big thing” supplements (e.g. fat burners, ketones) and diet plans (e.g. Atkins, Dukan, Cabbage Soup, Keto, Intermittent Fasting).

All of these diet plans are very different with regards to the foods which they say are “allowed” or “not allowed”, but the one thing which they all have in common is that calories do matter.

Also, as a general rule, I’d like you to avoid anyone who claims to have a “secret” or to teach you something which “they” don’t want you to know about.

Those motherfuckers never provide any peer-reviewed research to support their radical claims (because none exists!) and they never specify who “they” actually are (because “they” don’t exist).

By this point in human evolution, the details of weight regulation and body composition are well-known to us, and this information is very easily available to anyone, yet these scammy clowns would rather try to mislead you into thinking they’ve got some kind of “insider knowledge” which the rest of the world’s top scientists are yet to discover.

Fuck ’em all!

How I.F. Actually Works

Rant over, let’s get down to business.

Intermittent fasting is not so much a diet, but more a dieting tool.

When I showed you how my clients apply I.F. to their nutrition plans I spoke about how they liked to set up the structure of their “feeding window” in different ways:

• 12/12
• 16/8
• 20/4
• and more!

The concept with all of these is the same – we want to find the structure which fits your lifestyle most easily, and then you’ll eat all of your daily calories within your chosen “feeding window”. (1)

Once you get into the habit of doing this on a regular basis you’ll start seeing results.

This is because you are:

• Staying within your daily calorie target
  Because there’s less chance you’ll over-eat when it’s all crammed into a relatively short window.
• Cutting out unplanned snacks
  Because once you get used to not eating between certain times of day, those additional calories make a huge difference to results.

I hope that clears this up for you.

As for my old pal, he’s now knee-deep in a “60-day sugar cleanse”, which sounds as much fun as an intimate date with a jar of halitosis.

He may never escape the vicious cycle of falling for every new fad diet, but I’ve been able to help anyone reading this post to avoid his same mistakes, then I’m a very happy PT!

Further Reading:

If you enjoyed this blog, then you’ll probably also like reading these.

>> Russ’ Guide To Intermittent Fasting
>> Does Late Night Eating Make You Fat?
>> Why Calories (Not Macros) Are The Key To Weight Loss

References:

1. Howell, S., et al. “Calories in, calories out” and macronutrient intake: the hope, hype, and science of calories. Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab (2017).