Alan Aragon: Why total daily protein beats meal timing

1. 0:00 – 2:28

   Intro

   1. SBSteven Bartlett0:00

      I asked my audience for their 15 most popular unanswered questions about how to lose fat or to gain muscle mass. The first one, how do I lose weight fast? But we just answered that.

   2. AAAlan Aragon0:10

      Yeah.

   3. SBSteven Bartlett0:10

      The second one, is creatine this miracle thing that everybody should be taking in?

   4. AAAlan Aragon0:13

      There's almost nothing creatine can't do.

   5. SBSteven Bartlett0:16

      Wow, some statement.

   6. AAAlan Aragon0:18

      (laughs)

   7. SBSteven Bartlett0:18

      Next, is there any harm in eating too much protein?

   8. AAAlan Aragon0:20

      It's rare. And in fact, almost everybody who has some degree of an issue with their body fat levels underconsume protein.

   9. SBSteven Bartlett0:27

      The next question's about PCOS. What would you say to a woman struggling with PCOS in terms of dietary prescription?

   10. AAAlan Aragon0:34

       That's a damn good question, man. Can I go into detail with this? Because a lot of people are very misinformed about this stuff.

   11. SBSteven Bartlett0:40

       The floor is yours.

   12. AAAlan Aragon0:41

       Okay, so...

   13. SBSteven Bartlett0:42

       Alan Aragun has been using science to help elite athletes unlock peak performance for over 30 years.

   14. NANarrator0:48

       And now, he's breaking down the nutrition and training strategies that actually deliver results.

   15. AAAlan Aragon0:52

       It's important to take an evidence-based approach to diet, nutrition, training, supplementation, because if you don't, then you end up wasting a lot of time.

   16. SBSteven Bartlett1:00

       So let's start with protein. So how much protein should I be eating to gain muscle?

   17. AAAlan Aragon1:04

       What is your goal body weight?

   18. SBSteven Bartlett1:05

       Around 90.

   19. AAAlan Aragon1:06

       Take 90 and multiply that by (beep) . There's your protein target.

   20. SBSteven Bartlett1:10

       What about calorie restriction? I've heard you say that 10 or 20% of your calories can come from pretty much anything you want.

   21. AAAlan Aragon1:16

       Literally anything. (laughs)

   22. SBSteven Bartlett1:17

       So I could eat McDonald's or something, and I could still lose weight theoretically?

   23. AAAlan Aragon1:20

       That's true. And this is reflected in research, along with diet breaks. That's one of the tactics that you can use for long-term adherence to a plan, and I'll explain how.

   24. SBSteven Bartlett1:30

       I also want to talk about the ketogenic diet, menopause, fasting, sugars, and this.

   25. AAAlan Aragon1:35

       That, that always gets me, man. That, that picture always gets me.

   26. SBSteven Bartlett1:37

       Why?

   27. AAAlan Aragon1:38

       I used to drink heavily. I was overworked and trying to be the best father and the best husband, huh, and it got real bad. I just needed to stop, and I did.

   28. SBSteven Bartlett1:50

       How?

   29. AAAlan Aragon1:50

       I just...

   30. SBSteven Bartlett1:52

       Wow, really?
2. 2:28 – 5:15

   Why Should the Audience Listen to You?

   1. SBSteven Bartlett2:28

      why should I listen to you? What have you done in your career in over the last 30 years that has given you the knowledge, the information, the wisdom that you have on nutrition, dieting, fitness, et cetera? Who is Alan?

   2. AAAlan Aragon2:43

      I have over 30 years of experience in the field. The first 10 years consisted of personal training. The second decade of my career was nutritional counseling, just counseling people on, on how to eat, what to eat. And then the third decade of my career, which is actually right now 13 years now, is the research and education side. My colleagues and I, we, in quotes, do the science, we publish the science. I've been a part of 30, 30 publications.

   3. SBSteven Bartlett3:16

      30 studies?

   4. AAAlan Aragon3:16

      Yeah. Yeah, a, a combination of narrative reviews, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses, and randomized control trials.

   5. SBSteven Bartlett3:26

      And how many people have you worked with directly over the last 30 years in terms of in your, your nutritional counseling role-

   6. AAAlan Aragon3:33

      Mm-hmm.

   7. SBSteven Bartlett3:33

      ... but also as a, as a trainer?

   8. AAAlan Aragon3:35

      Individually, it's, it's triple digits. In groups, potentially quadruple. Yeah.

   9. SBSteven Bartlett3:44

      And some of those people that you've worked with over the years are fairly high profile-

   10. AAAlan Aragon3:49

       Yeah, yeah.

   11. SBSteven Bartlett3:49

       ... individuals?

   12. AAAlan Aragon3:50

       Probably my most interesting story is getting an email from Steve Austin, and, and, uh, the wrestling fans know him as Stone Cold Steve Austin. In so many words, he said, "Hey, Alan, I've been, I've been doing my research, and you're, you're the guy, so I wanna work with you. Um, I know that you mentioned that you're not working with clients, but could you please make an exception for me? Here's my number." (laughs)

   13. SBSteven Bartlett4:20

       What did you do with him, with Stone Cold?

   14. AAAlan Aragon4:22

       I helped him get his nutrition right for his, uh, in quotes, uh, comeback to television. It was mainly focused on primarily fat loss.

   15. SBSteven Bartlett4:35

       And you worked with Derek Fisher as well, who's the five-time NBA champion.

   16. AAAlan Aragon4:39

       Yes.

   17. SBSteven Bartlett4:39

       The longtime LA Lakers player.

   18. AAAlan Aragon4:41

       Yeah.

   19. SBSteven Bartlett4:42

       And Pete Sampras, the former world number one tennis player and Grand Slam champion.

   20. AAAlan Aragon4:46

       Yeah. Pete Sampras, that's right.

   21. SBSteven Bartlett4:48

       When people come to you, and when they message you and DM you, there's probably similar themes, similar themes as to like what they're trying to accomplish and what their goal is. If you just from the top of your head had to state the most popular themes that people are trying to accomplish, w- what are they?

   22. AAAlan Aragon5:06

       How to improve body composition.

   23. SBSteven Bartlett5:08

       And what does that mean?

   24. AAAlan Aragon5:10

       How to lose fat and/or gain muscle.

3. 5:15 – 9:39

   The Biggest Myths About Protein

   1. AAAlan Aragon5:16

   2. SBSteven Bartlett5:16

      One of the things that I'm, I'm particularly intrigued by, which kind of dovetails into both of those subjects of fat and, uh, muscle gain, is the subject of protein, and, um, because there's been so much said about protein. You know, when I was growing up, they said you have to have protein right after you eat your meal. You have to have this much protein. You have to have it before you eat your meal. It doesn't matter when you have it. So I want to do a bit of myth-busting on the subject of protein. What are, what are the biggest myths that people currently believe about protein consumption?

   3. AAAlan Aragon5:45

      The biggest myth is that they have the hierarchy of importance all screwed up. Like, everybody's worried about how much protein per meal you need to have for this or that goal. When do you need to time protein relative to the training bout or waking or sleeping or all of that stuff? The-... main thing they need to be focused on is how much protein do they need to eat by the end of the day. Because when you hit that goal, you've basically won the whole game. The, the relative placement, the distribution, and the doses of the protein, the timing of it, oh, man, it rarely matters. It, it rarely matters beyond getting that protein in, in a way that's comfortable and convenient for you, and in such a way that you can stick to in the long term. Some people are more like grazers. Some people are more like gorgers. They're both fine as long as you hit the total by the end of the day. So, the hierarchy is, of utmost importance, get your total daily protein. And then, of secondary importance, would be, what is the distribution of the constituent doses of that protein total through the day? And then, of third importance, d- down here, is like, when specifically are you supposed to time that protein around the, the, the training bout? So, so yeah. The... Well, the way that I put it I- is like this, the day- the daily total for protein, that is the cake. The distribution of the doses through the day, that's the icing on the cake, and it's a very thin layer of icing.

   4. SBSteven Bartlett7:22

      And how do we know that? How do we know that it doesn't really matter what time you have the protein, and that the most important thing is just making sure you get the protein?

   5. AAAlan Aragon7:31

      That's a great question. The reason that we know that distribution doesn't matter as much as the total is through a couple lines of evidence that I can think of. So, there's Yasuda who c- who compared a three-meal model with a two-meal model, and the three-meal model had superior effects for, um, for muscle gain. But there is a study that was just published, gosh, within the last month. It was better from a methodology standpoint because they fed the subjects an abundance of protein. So, Yasuda and college who- and colleagues who tested the two versus three, he totaled everybody out at 1.3 grams per kilogram of body weight per day. That's the total daily protein dose. And so, we know now that that's a suboptimal total if you wanna push muscle growth. So, for pushing muscle growth, we know you, you should be at 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight, which translates to 0.7 grams per pound of body weight. That's where you really wanna be if you want to maximize muscular adaptations to resistance training, like muscle size and strength gains. So, this latest study, they compared three, uh, three protein feedings versus five protein feedings, and the totals of protein intake in the day in both groups were around a gram per pound, so right around a 2.2-ish grams per kilogram of body weight. So, we have the optimized daily total, and we're testing three versus five protein feedings. We're doing progressive resistance training. And this is the key, this happened in resistance-trained subjects. There were no significant differences in mu- in muscle size and strength gained between the three protein feedings a day versus five protein feedings a day. And this is the best-designed study to date on the, on the topic. And,

4. 9:39 – 11:44

   How Many Meals Should We Eat for Optimal Muscle Gain?

   1. AAAlan Aragon9:39

      and so-

   2. SBSteven Bartlett9:39

      Because when I grew up and read stuff about gaining muscle, it said you had to have like five or six meals a day.

   3. AAAlan Aragon9:44

      Mm-hmm.

   4. SBSteven Bartlett9:45

      Um, I said, "That's what bodybuilders do."

   5. AAAlan Aragon9:48

      Whenever we, we talk about any kind of physical goal, any, any sort of fitness goal, we have to address two main things. So, who's the, who's the population, and what goal are we talking about? And maybe a third thing we need to address is, what is at stake? So, what level are we talking about? So, population, goal, what level? What's at stake? So, with bodybuilders, at elite levels, it is... Most of them c- consume five, six meals a day. Some of them do like even seven or eight in the off season. And these are individuals who are enhanced, and so their ceiling for, for muscle growth and their rates of muscl- muscle growth are significantly higher than people who are, in quotes, "natural." And the amount of food that these individuals can process and use productively is significantly more. And so, with that population, I can see it being pretty standard for them to be consuming at least five, six meals a day since they tend to have- since they tend to be eating double, (laughs) the amount of, of the average person.

   6. SBSteven Bartlett11:08

      Mm-hmm.

   7. AAAlan Aragon11:09

      And so, but the interesting thing that happens is that the guidelines from this very sort of fringe elite population, that's what trickles down into the general public, and then they're stuck thinking, "Okay, maybe I need to eat every 2.5 hours," or, or some such.

   8. SBSteven Bartlett11:24

      Mm-hmm.

   9. AAAlan Aragon11:24

      But yeah, with the, with the general population, and even, um, recreational athletes and people who are hobbyists, and, and stuff, you really... The impact of actual protein distribution is, mm, inconsequential compared to the total.

5. 11:44 – 16:26

   How Much Protein Should We Consume Per Day?

   1. SBSteven Bartlett11:44

      So, how much protein should I be eating a day? 'Cause you- I think you disagree with the recommended daily sort of allowance that they suggest we eat. As, um, I think I'm 90 kilograms.

   2. AAAlan Aragon11:55

      Mm-hmm.

   3. SBSteven Bartlett11:56

      How much protein should I be eating to gain muscle, lean muscle mass?

   4. AAAlan Aragon12:01

      Okay. So, we're gonna apply you to the population, and the goal, and the stakes questions. So, what would you say your training status is?... is you're obviously not a beginner. Um, so you're somewhere between intermediate and advanced.

   5. SBSteven Bartlett12:20

      Mm-hmm.

   6. AAAlan Aragon12:21

      Right?

   7. SBSteven Bartlett12:21

      Yeah.

   8. AAAlan Aragon12:22

      So what is your goal?

   9. SBSteven Bartlett12:26

      Just to lose fat and gain muscle.

   10. AAAlan Aragon12:28

       Okay.

   11. SBSteven Bartlett12:28

       Familiar story, I'm sure.

   12. AAAlan Aragon12:30

       Okay. The way that I do it is I go 1.6 to 2.2 grams per kilogram of target body weight or goal body weight.

   13. SBSteven Bartlett12:39

       Mm-hmm.

   14. AAAlan Aragon12:41

       So that's the range that you would be looking at. Now, with you in particular, I would go more towards the upper end, because you mentioned that you... part of your goal is to decrease body fat to a, to a, to a minor degree-

   15. SBSteven Bartlett12:59

       Mm-hmm.

   16. AAAlan Aragon13:00

       ... but you're still, you're pushing the envelope 'cause you're already lean.

   17. SBSteven Bartlett13:03

       Mm-hmm.

   18. AAAlan Aragon13:04

       So, there's an interesting thing about high-balling protein that facilitates that, uh, reduction in body fat. We don't-

   19. SBSteven Bartlett13:13

       Wait, so if I have a lot of protein, it helps to reduce body fat?

   20. AAAlan Aragon13:18

       Yeah (laughs) . Yeah, it does, and the way that we know this is because there have been several studies now, four trials, one case study, um, by Joey Antonio and colleagues, and they examined the effect of very high protein intakes, uh, anywhere from about 3.3 all the way to 4.4 grams per kilogram of body weight, roughly, gosh, you know, gram and a half to two grams per pound, 'cause-

   21. SBSteven Bartlett13:49

       Is that because you're eating less carbohydrates, you're sort of substituting it for something else, essentially, in terms of you, you feeling hungry? So if I'm having 3.3 grams of protein, I'm probably not gonna be having something else which is more fatty.

   22. AAAlan Aragon14:02

       Yeah, that's right. That's right. So this particular line of research was done on people who were resistance training, and it was done in free-living conditions, and they just gave them the assignment to essentially increase their, their protein intake by 50%, and literally add 80 to 100 grams of protein on top of their existing habitual dietary intakes.

   23. SBSteven Bartlett14:35

       So what would you say to me, then? You'd say push even higher in terms of grams per kilogram of body weight?

   24. AAAlan Aragon14:41

       What is your goal body weight?

   25. SBSteven Bartlett14:43

       I don't actually have a goal body weight, to be honest. I, I just have more of a, a goal in terms of, like, strength and-

   26. AAAlan Aragon14:48

       Um, how about this? Were you ever in the shape that you are wanting to be in, and what-

   27. SBSteven Bartlett14:55

       Yeah.

   28. AAAlan Aragon14:55

       ... what was your body weight at that time?

   29. SBSteven Bartlett14:57

       I was around 90. I think I was just a little bit, uh, below 90 kilograms.

   30. AAAlan Aragon15:01

       Mm-hmm.
6. 16:26 – 21:51

   Is There Any Danger in Too Much Protein?

   1. AAAlan Aragon16:26

   2. SBSteven Bartlett16:26

      Is there any such harm in eating too much protein?

   3. AAAlan Aragon16:30

      It's rare. Uh, you would have to have a preexisting chronic kidney disease, and then it's generally not a good thing (laughs) to be high-balling the protein. Um, but even people with chronic kidney disease have to realize the trade-off that they're incurring with low-protein diet and older age, sarcopenia, and stuff. How are they gonna mitigate that? But for the general healthy population, there have been many studies that have rolled out looking at effects on kidney function, liver function, bone health, and there is virtually zero threat to those organ systems that, that you would think might be threatened by a high protein intake. So the human organism, perfectly well-equipped to metabolize and handle high protein amounts.

   4. SBSteven Bartlett17:22

      And n- not all protein is equal, I guess, because you've got, you've got these animal proteins and then plant proteins, um, that come from things like eggs and so on. W- what is the best type of protein do you think? Is there such a thing?

   5. AAAlan Aragon17:35

      I think that the best thing you can do is get a mix of different types of protein. It is true that gram for gram, generally speaking, animal proteins are more, in quotes, "anabolic" than plant proteins, meaning that they stimulate a greater growth response-

   6. SBSteven Bartlett17:56

      Of muscle?

   7. AAAlan Aragon17:56

      ... at the muscle level. So they stimulate muscle protein synthesis more potently than plant proteins, and there are, there's maybe one exception to that, that we know of, which is mycoprotein, which is a fungus-based protein that actually (laughs) outperformed milk protein for stimulating muscle protein synthesis. So there's interesting exceptions like that, but generally speaking, animal proteins are better for muscle protein synthesis than plant proteins. Now, with that said, Stephen-Once you consume a certain amount of total daily protein, then it doesn't appear to matter how much of your protein is animal-based versus how much your pro- your protein is plant-based if we're looking at things like muscle size and strength gain, because this has been actually compared in controlled interventions, where, um, vegan group has been compared with an omnivore group, and total daily protein was optimized at 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight per day, or 0.7 grams per pound in both groups, progressive resistance training for 12 weeks, no significant differences between groups in muscle size and strength gain, whether it was a omnivorous protein intake or whether it was a plant-based protein intake. And we have two studies showing that now.

   8. SBSteven Bartlett19:21

      You must have so many moments where you're working with someone through your career who's got a goal, and he feels like they just can't accomplish it, where you find yourself saying the same thing over and over again to people about how to lose fat or to gain muscle mass. Is that same thing just to eat- have more protein?

   9. AAAlan Aragon19:41

      It's a common thing with the general population, with the lay public. Like, my- my protein target is at least 160 grams a day, so I just make sure that I have four meals with at least 40 grams of- of protein per day, and it's so easy to do. It's incredibly easy to do because two of my meals per day are just real, whole foods, and then two of my meals per day, two to three, are protein smoothies. And so, uh, it is just so incredibly easy for me to- to get my protein intake through, like, two scoops of protein, bam, that's almost 50 grams of protein right there, right there. (laughs)

   10. SBSteven Bartlett20:22

       (laughs)

   11. AAAlan Aragon20:22

       So, you have two of those a day, I've got more than half my protein covered.

   12. SBSteven Bartlett20:26

       But if I- if I have all of my protein in one meal...

   13. AAAlan Aragon20:30

       Mm-hmm.

   14. SBSteven Bartlett20:31

       Is that going to impact my ability to gain muscle or lose fat, if I have it all in one meal, if I just have, like, one massive protein shake, if I put, like, five scoops?

   15. AAAlan Aragon20:39

       Now, if you were telling me, "Hey, Alan, I want to place really good in the Nationals this year, the NPC Nationals, classic, classic physique, or, you know, classic bodybuilding, or just any one of the physique divisions," I would say, "You know, y- y- you are not going to want to try to get all your protein in a single meal, because what we want to do is we want to maximize the number of microanabolic events in the course of the day. We want to maximize the amount of times you maximally stimulate muscle protein synthesis in the course of the day." And just from a- a pragmatic standpoint, you could probably do that at least three or four times, and if you're able to do that three or four times in the day versus once with that one big banger of a meal, then you might actually, over time, gain more muscle than you would have.

   16. SBSteven Bartlett21:38

       Mm-hmm.

   17. AAAlan Aragon21:38

       And this could make the difference between placings at the end of the, uh, end of the prep period. So- but as somebody in the general population, theoretically, you could.

   18. SBSteven Bartlett21:50

       Hmm.

7. 21:51 – 23:55

   How to Lose Weight Fast

   1. SBSteven Bartlett21:52

      I am gonna challenge you to do something here. I asked my audience about weight loss and asked them for their 15 most popular questions that are currently unanswered for them-

   2. AAAlan Aragon22:02

      All right.

   3. SBSteven Bartlett22:02

      ... about weight lost. The first one was, "How do I lose weight fast?"

   4. AAAlan Aragon22:08

      Ha. So, essentially, you can engage what would- could be classified as a- as a- as a protein-sparing modified fast. You're basically crash dieting. Um, I don't love doing that, though, honestly. (laughs)

   5. SBSteven Bartlett22:25

      Listen, I've got a wedding. I need to- I need to lose weight fast. How do I lose weight fast?

   6. AAAlan Aragon22:29

      Losing weight fast. So, you would basically do an aggressive caloric deficit, so anywhere, I- I would say, 20% below your maintenance needs, 20 to possibly 40, depending on the individual, percent below your maintenance needs, and then keep the protein high, and this is going to default you to relatively low carbohydrate, relatively low fat, and just train regularly. Don't hurt yourself. Um-

   7. SBSteven Bartlett23:03

      Protein high, you said?

   8. AAAlan Aragon23:04

      Yeah, protein high, and calories-wise, so for example, if you maintained at w- we'll- we'll just take a round number, 2,000 calories. So, you would just lop off about a third of that, and then just go and s- see if you can maintain your fat loss while maintaining strength levels, relatively. You're- it's almost inevitable to crash diet and, uh, lose some strength in the process, but, I mean, we're- we're talking about something that's not an optimal process, but yeah, that- that's- that's the game. Basically, aggressive caloric deficit, keep protein very high, and then you just go, and the deficit could be anywhere from 500 to 1,000-ish calories below what you normally

8. 23:55 – 25:33

   Why Do I Gain Weight After Stopping Ozempic/Ozempic?

   1. AAAlan Aragon23:55

      take in.

   2. SBSteven Bartlett23:55

      The second one is, "Why do I regain weight after stopping Ozempic, Wegovy, et cetera?"

   3. AAAlan Aragon24:04

      All right, so those GLP-1 RAs, the recep- GLP-1 receptor agonist drugs, like Wegovy, they have, um, at least three different mechanisms that all converge towards almost nullifying your- your hunger and your appetite response. And so, when you cut out the drug, then your normal appetite comes back, and...... an unfortunate reality for a lot of, uh, GLP-1 users when they get off the drug is they just don't have the habits, and they don't have the skills necessarily to maintain their weight loss. And, of course, once again, they're fighting their appetite. So I would say, perhaps try, um, a weaning-off process instead of just a jumping-off process. A weaning-off process, where you are reinforcing countermeasures to overeating, where you are reinforcing good training habits and good dietary habits, and where al- where you're also progressively learning how to live with and deal with sensations of hunger between meals, and just train those habits in, and, uh, it can be done. I- I- I- I'm not one of the people in the camp who says it's impossible to get off of a weight-loss drug successfully.

9. 25:33 – 31:38

   Does Dieting Affect Metabolism?

   1. AAAlan Aragon25:33

   2. SBSteven Bartlett25:33

      So number three, again, is, is my metabolism damaged after dieting? And they're asking a question here about something called adaptive thermogenesis.

   3. AAAlan Aragon25:40

      Yeah. (laughs) Okay, so this is not really a short shot here.

   4. SBSteven Bartlett25:43

      Okay.

   5. AAAlan Aragon25:44

      So the- the process of metabolic adaptation is kind of complex, and it happens in both directions, whether you try to gain weight or whether you try to lose weight. So, earlier, we talked about, uh, an increase in non-exercise activity thermogenesis, or NEAT, an increase in NEAT in response to an increase in calories. So that occurs, and across studies, I- I gave an example that showed a 336-calorie increase in NEAT when 1,000 calories were stacked on top of people's maintenance, but there are other studies where the caloric increase was not quite that aggressive, and so, so on average, increases in NEAT, or non-exercise activity thermogenesis, are about 200 to 300 calories. So you increase your energy expenditure about 200 to 300 calories if you're overeating.

   6. SBSteven Bartlett26:40

      Yeah. So your body will start to twitch more and move more-

   7. AAAlan Aragon26:44

      Mm-hmm.

   8. SBSteven Bartlett26:44

      ... burning more non-active calories-

   9. AAAlan Aragon26:45

      That's correct.

   10. SBSteven Bartlett26:46

       ... when you're overeating, yeah?

   11. AAAlan Aragon26:47

       Yeah.

   12. SBSteven Bartlett26:48

       So that's an ad- that's an adaptation?

   13. AAAlan Aragon26:49

       That- that's the adaptation in the caloric surplus side. So in the caloric deficit side, it's just the opposite thing, just the mirror of it. So people decrease their non-exercise activity thermogenesis, or their NEAT, they decrease it on average, like, 200 to 300-ish calories-

   14. SBSteven Bartlett27:11

       Okay.

   15. AAAlan Aragon27:12

       ... as a result of dieting, so this is part of a metabolic adaptation that occurs with dieting.

   16. SBSteven Bartlett27:19

       Is this why people don't think the calories in, calories out system is working for them sometimes, because they don't realize that if they're in a cal- calorie deficit sometimes, they are subconsciously moving around less, which means that they're burning less calories, um, so actually they're not in a calorie deficit?

   17. AAAlan Aragon27:37

       Yes, that's correct. So with the dieting side of things, which is much more of a public health issue, weight loss is, is much more of a, a necessity than the weight gain, it's- it's tougher for most people, because in addition to the decrease in non-exercise activity that'll cost people 200 to 300-ish calories that they're no longer, uh, no longer burning at the end of the dieting cycle, then you've got what's called adaptive thermoreduction. Okay, so you mentioned adaptive thermogenesis. Technically, that is the... there's non-shivering adaptive thermogenesis, and there's shivering adaptive thermogenesis, but that all has to do with increases in energy expenditure in response to cold environments. So that's technically, that's what adaptive thermogenesis is, it's increase in energy expenditure. When people diet, there's something called adaptive thermoreduction, and that is that... part of it is a decrease in non-exercise activity thermogenesis.

   18. SBSteven Bartlett28:42

       You're, you're basically saying that the body changes-

   19. AAAlan Aragon28:44

       Mm-hmm.

   20. SBSteven Bartlett28:44

       ... when we're in a calorie deficit.

   21. AAAlan Aragon28:46

       Mm-hmm.

   22. SBSteven Bartlett28:46

       It stops doing as much.

   23. AAAlan Aragon28:48

       Yes, that's the activity part.

   24. SBSteven Bartlett28:50

       Yeah.

   25. AAAlan Aragon28:51

       But then there's also the metabolic part. So we've got a decrease in non-exercise activity.

   26. SBSteven Bartlett28:57

       Yeah.

   27. AAAlan Aragon28:58

       Then we have adaptive thermoreduction, which has to do with a, a metabolic component that has to do with the sympathetic nervous system, and also potentially thyroid output as well. So there's this metabolic change that goes on, and there's behavioral or activity change that goes on, and so-

   28. SBSteven Bartlett29:18

       So when people say, "I've got a slow metabolism," they might-

   29. AAAlan Aragon29:21

       When-

   30. SBSteven Bartlett29:21

       ... be telling the truth?
10. 31:38 – 32:13

    Best Diet for Long-Term Weight Loss

    1. AAAlan Aragon31:38

    2. SBSteven Bartlett31:38

       Question four, what diet actually works best for long-term weight loss, keto, low-fat Mediterranean, intermittent fasting? And you gotta give me a-

    3. AAAlan Aragon31:47

       (laughs)

    4. SBSteven Bartlett31:47

       ... answer, yeah.

    5. AAAlan Aragon31:49

       (laughs) I'll say it in one sentence. The diet with enough protein, enough total calories, that is comprised predominantly of healthy food choices, that fits the individual's personal preferences and tolerances.

11. 32:13 – 33:29

    How Do I Specifically Lose Belly Fat?

    1. AAAlan Aragon32:14

    2. SBSteven Bartlett32:14

       How do I lose belly fat specifically? Can you target the belly?

    3. AAAlan Aragon32:20

       Targeting belly fat specifically is a matter of targeting total body fat. You can't necessarily spot reduce the, the belly fat. Now, if we're to go a layer deeper, it is possible for certain diets to be more conducive to preventing visceral fat gain, or maybe even accelerating visceral fat loss. Visceral fat is the fat, uh, in the, within the abdominal cavity, around the, the organs. And so, it is possible for certain diets to be more conducive to reductions in visceral fat, and that would be diets that have a lower proportion of saturated fat. And it's just, yeah-

    4. SBSteven Bartlett33:06

       Which, which is, what's, what's an example of a saturated fat food?

    5. AAAlan Aragon33:08

       Land, fatty land animal meats. So, land animal fats are going to be your saturated fats that are more conducive to visceral fat gain. So if you were to switch out, let's say, fatty cuts of meat, just trim that fat out, and if you replaced it with something like avocado, nuts, olive oil, seeds.

12. 33:29 – 38:09

    Why Is Fat Loss Harder During Menopause?

    1. AAAlan Aragon33:29

    2. SBSteven Bartlett33:29

       On menopause, why is fat loss harder, and what actually works?

    3. AAAlan Aragon33:33

       Okay. During the menopausal transition, which begins at a woman's mid-forties on average, and then ends in, in the mid-fifties, there are changes, physiologically and hormonally, that can challenge a fitness program. So it can challenge their ability to execute the fitness program and adhere to it. And so, things like hot flashes, and joint pain, changes in sexual function, and poor sleep, all of those things can converge to lead to a, a decreased ability to stick to a program and do the necessary physical activity and dietary adherence to reach th- the, sort of the standard rate of progress for body composition change. And so the solution to that would be to simply e- you don't have to rearrange a whole program because somebody's going through menopause. You don't have to cut out nutrients and do any special things. What has been effective is just lowering the expectation of progress, so whereas I would typically have somebody gun for a pound a week of fat loss, somebody in the menopausal transition, they have more challenges to that going on simultaneously, so we would go for about half of that.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett34:58

       Protein? What do, what do they do in terms of protein? Just keep the protein high?

    5. AAAlan Aragon35:03

       K- same range, yeah. So w- with protein, I gotta say, there's sort of a two-tiered recommendation. So the general public with average goals-

    6. SBSteven Bartlett35:13

       Mm-hmm.

    7. AAAlan Aragon35:13

       ... will do just fine on 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight. That's kind of like the general population average goal, folks. Somebody like yourself, uh, somebody like me, and folks who are oriented towards maybe pushing the envelope a little bit more than the average, 1.6 to 2.2 grams per kilogram of body weight. And, you know, there's a little margin over here for people on the fringe, physique competitors, who I would have no problem seeing them go higher than that 2.2 grams per kilogram cutoff.

    8. SBSteven Bartlett35:52

       Is there anything else that peri or menopausal women need to understand about gaining muscle and keeping fat off when they're going through menopause? Is there anything else that we've missed?

    9. AAAlan Aragon36:07

       You know, I, I would just emphasize the understanding that midlife presents maybe the highest point of, uh, psychological stress in, in people's lives. So starting from the late-forties, going all the way into people's fifties and sixties, it's, it's like that, you know, the concentrated period in the menopausal transition, mid-forties to mid-fifties is when people are dealing with ailing parents, the stress of ailing parents, the stress of kids going through high school or college, the stress of hitting a high point in their careers, the pressures thereof, the time and the energy that is necessary to allocate for all of those things-

    10. SBSteven Bartlett36:50

        Mm-hmm.

    11. AAAlan Aragon36:51

        ... all of those things distract from, "Oh, I've got a fitness program here. Oh, my coach is making me do this and this and this, and now he's making me diet like this." That's the thing that I- I would emphasize. There's nothing special or different that needs to be done. And in fact, there's a lot of mythology that's circulating the space right now, where coaches and gurus and even some physicians are telling women that they are just doomed to gain a bunch of belly fat and lose a bunch of muscle during menopause, it just happens, you're doomed. Well, that's just not true. Uh, there is a study called the Swan Study, that's the longest and largest study of its kind, and the average amount of fat gain during the entire menopausal transition was 1.6 kilograms, which is three and a half pounds, and the, um, average amount of muscle loss total during the menopausal transition was 0.2 kilograms, that's about half, half a pound of muscle loss. Statistically significant? Yes. Insurmountable? No. So, uh, and are there gonna be outliers who experience double the muscle loss and double the fat gain of that? Yes. But none of this is insurmountable.

13. 38:09 – 41:18

    HRT During Menopause

    1. AAAlan Aragon38:09

    2. SBSteven Bartlett38:09

       What do you think about taking, is it HRT? Does that help?

    3. AAAlan Aragon38:15

       Yeah. Well- well, it- it helps those who need it. So HRT should be looked at on an individual basis. One of the things that really annoys the absolute crap out of me is when I'm seeing comment sections on social media with people telling everybody that, "Hey, you just turned 40. Time to go on HRT." That is between you and your doctor. People are trying to universalize major changes like HRT. Some people definitely benefit from it, and just the same, there are a lot of people who don't need it.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett38:52

       The people that benefit from it, do they find it easier to gain muscle mass and to not gain fat? Is that kind of, like, what-

    5. AAAlan Aragon39:00

       That is a common-

    6. SBSteven Bartlett39:01

       Okay.

    7. AAAlan Aragon39:02

       That is a common result, yes. But my thing with HRT is- is this. So, there has to be a symptomologic reason to get on it. So you have to be incurring or e- e- experiencing symptoms that are disrupting to your quality of life.

    8. SBSteven Bartlett39:21

       Mm-hmm.

    9. AAAlan Aragon39:22

       Regardless of what your blood labs are, like, for testosterone, for example, if you are out of range for testosterone, on the lower end, let's say, but you have no symptoms and you feel fine, you perform great in all aspects, then it's really up to you whether it bugs you enough that you're below (laughs) range or on lower- on the lower end of the range, um, to correct that. It- it's up to you. And so symptomologically driven. Now, the other thing to look at with HRT is, and a lot of people, they get a single testing point, and they judge their need to get on hormonal replacement therapy based on a single- single test. What people need to do is see whether there is some sort of trend going on in one direction or another, or not. And if that trend is going in a bad direction over time, and you- you can do this by just multiple time points, over- over an extended period, it's debatable, maybe six months, 12 months, to see what's going on. Try to correct things through lifestyle and diet. And often, they are correctable. Um, I've just, I've come across many cases where a guy will be under-slept, overworked, eating like crap, gets his testosterone levels tested. "Oh, you're right at the bottom or you're even below range. Oh, time for HRT." Well, hold on a second. Let's get this guy some sleep. Let's improve his lifestyle, improve body composition, and then bang, testosterone levels double. This is not an uncommon thing. And so I'm very much a proponent of, first, are there symptoms driving the justification for HRT? And then secondly, are we basing things on a single time point or did we actually see a trend over time?

14. 41:18 – 44:58

    PCOS and Diet Restriction

    1. SBSteven Bartlett41:18

       My next question's about PCOS.

    2. AAAlan Aragon41:20

       Mm-hmm.

    3. SBSteven Bartlett41:21

       A lot of women are struggling with PCOS and that's causing them to have irregular menstrual cycles and, um, fertility issues. What would you say to a woman who is struggling with PCOS in terms of dietary prescription?

    4. AAAlan Aragon41:39

       Okay. So, PCOS shares a lot of metabolic characteristics with type two diabetes. So, um, there is insulin resistance going on. There- there is impaired glycemic control going on. And so we can pretty much justify being cautious with total amount of carbohydrate intake with, um, PCOS. W- with type two diabetes, there's two tiers of importance dietarily. So of first importance with type two diabetes, you have to structure the diet so that it allows body fat loss. The success of GLP-1 drugs h- has actually proven that at the heart of type two diabetes is overeating. Uh, an abundance of body fat. So the way that type two diabetes happens is, in genetically predisposed individuals, they gain total body fat, and then they gain visceral fat, an un- an undue amount of visceral fat, and then this leads to insulin resistance and impairment of glycemic control. So PCOS is- is very similar in this regard.... uh, there is no standard or consensus-based PCOS diet protocol. But because it shares so many similar characteristics with type 2 diabetes, then we can pretty much employ the same principles of how we would intervene with type 2 diabetes, which would, number one, put a priority on total body fat reduction. And then, tier number two would be, all right, do we need to restrict carbohydrates even further? And so, that would be very similar with, with PCOS, and at kind of a population level with type 2 diabetes, mm, roughly 130-ish grams of carbohydrates a day seems to be sort of the sweet spot, uh, below which people have an easier time controlling their blood sugar than above that total amount. But that's just a statistical average. We still have to look at things case by case.

    5. SBSteven Bartlett43:46

       My girlfriend, she, um, has PCOS, and she did the ketogenic diet with me. She's on it at the moment. We've been doing it for about eight weeks now.

    6. AAAlan Aragon43:52

       Mm-hmm.

    7. SBSteven Bartlett43:53

       We'd, we'd do it intermittently throughout the years, um, and she said her menstrual cycle has perfectly corrected itself. I think, at its maximum, it was, like, 60 days, her menstrual cycle.

    8. AAAlan Aragon44:04

       Mm-hmm.

    9. SBSteven Bartlett44:04

       And then, because she's restricted her carbohydrates, as you were saying, in, in, in this way using keto, it's, it's, like, she said it's perfect. It's, like, perfectly predictable now.

    10. AAAlan Aragon44:14

        That's awesome.

    11. SBSteven Bartlett44:14

        Ket- I, I, I say that, in part, because people, I think people don't... With PCOS, you have ir-irregular menstrual cycles. They don't often consider that carbohydrate, sugar, glucose, whatever could be the perpetrator.

    12. AAAlan Aragon44:27

        Yeah. Yeah, well-

    13. SBSteven Bartlett44:29

        'Cause it's framed as a disease, like, you, you're born with it, maybe it's heritable, maybe there's, uh, an element of truth to that. But, um, it's crazy that that dietary intervention had such a profound impact on her in particular.

    14. AAAlan Aragon44:40

        It's glad to hear that you found something that works. That's-

    15. SBSteven Bartlett44:44

        Yeah.

    16. AAAlan Aragon44:44

        That's in-... You know, that's g-... Anytime you present with some sort of clinical condition, I would first tell you, "Hey, see, see an endocrinologist or see a, a doctor who specializes in that particular issue."

15. 44:58 – 46:31

    What to Do With Irregular Menstrual Cycles

    1. AAAlan Aragon44:58

    2. SBSteven Bartlett44:58

       And in terms of menstrual cycles, generally, if you do have an irregular menstrual cycle, is there anything you should be thinking about?

    3. AAAlan Aragon45:06

       Number one, see a doctor. Number two, consider whether or not you are over-training and undereating.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett45:11

       Yeah.

    5. AAAlan Aragon45:12

       So what happens with female physique competitors, menstrual disruption, menstrual cessation a f- a few months into prep, if, sometimes even a few weeks into prep depending on how aggressive the diet is. And so, uh, menstrual disruption is very common in competitive athletes and in recreational athletes who have to maintain a certain level of leanness while maintaining a high volume of exercise output.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett45:41

       Is that the body from an evolutionary perspective saying, "Listen, we, uh, we don't have the energy to have a baby here, so we're just gonna shut this down"?

    7. AAAlan Aragon45:47

       That is right on.

    8. SBSteven Bartlett45:48

       Mm. So you kind of do... You don't wanna be restricting your calorie consumption too much if you have an irregular menstrual cycle, and you're trying to correct that.

    9. AAAlan Aragon45:58

       Yeah. No, no. Um, the so-called female athlete triad begins with over-training, undereating, potential eating disorder nurturing going on there, and then down the line, the menstrual cycle gets disrupted and stops, and then h- hormonal changes happen that are negative, and then, a- ultimately results in osteopenia, osteoporosis. And so, that chain of events is unfortunately really common with women who, um, don't pay attention to a healthy menstrual cycle.

16. 46:31 – 47:51

    Muscle Memory

    1. AAAlan Aragon46:31

    2. SBSteven Bartlett46:31

       People use this term all the time, muscle memory.

    3. AAAlan Aragon46:34

       Mm-hmm.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett46:34

       Uh, I, I thought it was nonsense, but, uh, I spoke to someone the other day, and they said to me, "Actually, no, your, your body does have a muscle memory, which means that if I fall off now, uh, and I stop going to the gym, my body is gonna be able to get back to my current physique faster because I was here once upon a time."

    5. AAAlan Aragon46:53

       Yes.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett46:54

       Is this, is this true?

    7. AAAlan Aragon46:55

       That is true. There's some debate going on amongst the community what, what goes on physiologically with, like, when you train, you create, you create new myonuclei. So you increase your so-called myonuclear domains, and those stay relatively permanent even during times of detraining. But there's still the so-called proprioceptive or motor component to training that sticks with people, sort of the skill aspect of it that sticks with people to be able to execute the movements and do the things to cause the adaptations. So not only do you have that muscle memory from the myonuclear domain standpoint, but you have the motor learning at the neurological component, and to a degree, you, you also have the skeletal component to be able to capacitate those, that rebound in loading and muscle gain, r- muscle regain rather.

17. 47:51 – 49:14

    Is the Gut Microbiome Affecting My Weight Gain?

    1. AAAlan Aragon47:51

    2. SBSteven Bartlett47:51

       Is the gut microbiome playing a role in my ability to lose weight?

    3. AAAlan Aragon47:56

       Hmm. Not a big one. Um, of course, if I-

    4. SBSteven Bartlett48:00

       Why did you make that sound?

    5. AAAlan Aragon48:01

       (laughs) Well, there's some people in the space who put the m- microbiome a- a- as the, uh, master regulator of everything. But, uh, I, it's definitely a part of the, the axis of organ systems that, that re- manifest whatever, you know, result we're looking at. It's part of it, yes. But it's not the, the... it's not the main puppeteer of everything. Everything's works in concert to... And, and I'll just give you an example there. So, there are certain supplements that are, um, that are claimed to be able to, in quotes, "fix the gut microbiome and cause greater weight loss." So there have been many studies looking at this sort of phenomenon. And while there is a statistically significant effect in some cases, the absolute amount that they can help for things like body fat loss or body weight loss is usually not-... practically significant. It's, it's too small to be considered meaningful. And so, I wouldn't necessarily rely on changes in the gut microbiome for impacting, like, global changes in body fat.

18. 49:14 – 50:42

    Why Do You Eat So Many Eggs?

    1. SBSteven Bartlett49:14

       Here, I have 20 eggs. I heard that you eat 20 eggs per week, which is about, you know, four eggs a day, potentially. Why do you eat so many eggs?

    2. AAAlan Aragon49:26

       Well, number one, I'm one of those weirdos who actually loves eggs. I love, I love the taste of them. (laughs) Um, they're a great source of protein, a decent source of fat. Most of the fat in there is oleic acid, by the way, which is a monounsaturate that predominates. Olive oil is a low saturated fat thing. Of course, the knock on eggs is their cholesterol content, um, but interestingly, uh, it's dietary saturated fat that has the greater magnitude of impact on blood lipids than dietary cholesterol, interestingly enough. I recognize that the major health agencies would want you to stop your egg consumption to, like, one a day, possibly two a day if you're an elderly person. But I take the, uh, health agencies', um, or even the consensus guidelines as a, "Okay, that's cool. That's a good starting point." Um, I happen to like eggs. I'll eat more than that. Check my blood, check my health, I'm doing just fine. So I'm one of those people who can do four eggs a day just fine.

    3. SBSteven Bartlett50:32

       Is this part of your broader testosterone protocol?

    4. AAAlan Aragon50:34

       (laughs) I, I like the fact that, uh, eggs are conducive to testosterone production.

19. 50:42 – 51:26

    Testosterone Levels

    1. AAAlan Aragon50:42

    2. SBSteven Bartlett50:42

       So, you're 53 years old, right?

    3. AAAlan Aragon50:43

       Yes.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett50:44

       Do you test your testosterone levels?

    5. AAAlan Aragon50:46

       I have not tested my testosterone levels in forever, but I'm not concerned with it, because once again, it would be a symptom-driven thing for me to even care. So if I was experiencing the symptoms of low testosterone, then that would give me a reason to check it out and see what's going on.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett51:07

       Mm-hmm.

    7. AAAlan Aragon51:07

       And then, I would have to take a step back and look and see, what can I modify with lifestyle? What, what do I have available to change non-drug-wise? And you know what? If I ever need to take exogenous testosterone, if that day ever comes, well then so be it. I'm just not there.

20. 51:26 – 53:22

    What Supplements Do You Take?

    1. AAAlan Aragon51:26

    2. SBSteven Bartlett51:26

       What supplements do you take every day?

    3. AAAlan Aragon51:29

       I take a multivitamin. I take two multivitamins, actually. Uh, the reason why I take two multivitamins is because really, certain key, uh, nutrients in there, they, they have to be in such small amounts per single pill that it's really just meaningless. And so I, I take two multivitamins, one of them with iron, one of them without iron, and I also take fish oil, uh, I take magnesium, and I take vitamin D3. I take vitamin C, uh, and, and by the way, I really should preface this with this is the bro science side of my personal habits, because I'm taking my vitamins more on a placing-your-bets basis, rather than, "Hey, man, this is just the bottom line, evidence-based, I think everybody should do this." Okay, so I want, I wanna make sure that's clear. I also take magnesium and I also take collagen, and I also take creatine.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett52:28

       If I told you you could only take three of those supplements, which three would you pick?

    5. AAAlan Aragon52:33

       That's a damn good question, man. Can I have, uh, can, can I... I'm gonna count my two multis as one.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett52:39

       So, your multivitamin-

    7. AAAlan Aragon52:40

       Mm-hmm.

    8. SBSteven Bartlett52:40

       ... would, would that be the first one?

    9. AAAlan Aragon52:42

       Yes.

    10. SBSteven Bartlett52:43

        Okay, so multivitamin.

    11. AAAlan Aragon52:44

        And omega-3s, fish oil, vitamin D3.

    12. SBSteven Bartlett52:49

        So you've, you've sacked off the creatine?

    13. AAAlan Aragon52:51

        (laughs) You're a genius (laughs) . That's, those are, those would be, those would be the top three. I would c- can I add creatine in there? Could I squeeze it in there?

    14. SBSteven Bartlett53:03

        No, no, no, no, no.

    15. AAAlan Aragon53:04

        Oh, bro.

    16. SBSteven Bartlett53:04

        You had to pick three, so you picked-

    17. AAAlan Aragon53:05

        I picked three.

    18. SBSteven Bartlett53:05

        ... multivitamin, omega-3, vitamin D3.

    19. AAAlan Aragon53:08

        (sighs) Well, it might humble me to kick the creatine out, so okay, fine. I'll leave those three.

    20. SBSteven Bartlett53:13

        You call creatine King Creatine.

    21. AAAlan Aragon53:15

        Yeah.

    22. SBSteven Bartlett53:15

        Why do you call it that?

    23. AAAlan Aragon53:18

        It's the only non-pharmacological

21. 53:22 – 56:46

    Creatine

    1. AAAlan Aragon53:22

       supplement that, that really, really has very strong and deep and broad evidence base for, um, enhancing the effects of, of resistance training. So, strength gains and size gains. More strength than size. The, the size gains, they, they come with the initial, uh, loading phase where a lot more intramuscular water happens, or, you know, in- intracellular, intramyocellular hydration. That is the, the big, immediate part of creatine that, that folks feel when they go on it and when they go off of it. So you, you'll lose a few pounds of lean mass if you get off of creatine. I call it King Creatine because it has possibly close to a th-... I wanna say (laughs) it's reached a th- over a thousand studies, and the majority of those studies show, um, positive effects. Usually, with, with creatine, if you were to compare a group taking creatine versus a group not taking creatine, so the creatine group will have, like, a 20% increase in their lifting capacity, whereas the non-creatine group will have, like, 12-ish% increase in their lifting capacity over a typical study, like, eight to 12 weeks-ish. And so, that is a significant strength gain advantage, and over the long term, that would definitely augment muscle hypertrophy as well. And once you're loaded with creatine... So, being loaded with creatine means that you saturate your muscle creatine stores, and that requires either a loading phase of-... 20 to 25 grams per day for five to seven days, or, um, a maintenance phase that you engage with three to five grams a day. You'll be loaded at, um, about 30 days. And so during that loading phase, it's pretty common for people to gain roughly 2% of their body weight, um, as lean mass.

    2. SBSteven Bartlett55:29

       Hmm. People seem to talk about creatine like it's this miracle thing that everybody should be taking, and it's one of the, one of the few supplements that it seems all the, uh, experts I speak to about this stuff seem to agree upon. There, obviously, vitamin D and omega-3 comes up all the time, and multivitamins. But creatine seems to, you know, nobody seems to have much of an issue with it or be able to point to many side effects of taking with it, both for men and women.

    3. AAAlan Aragon55:52

       Yeah, it's got the muscul- musculoskeletal, um, benefit. There, believe it or not, there's even, um, benefits for creatine on, on joint health. So, um, not only that, not only the, the athletic performance and muscle hypertrophy side, but there are things like, uh, improved glucose control, improved memory. So, different domains of cognition can be enhanced by creatine. The level of creatine in the brain can increase with, with supplementation, and then you create a pro-energy environment in the brain, and that's how, uh, these positive effects on memory happen with creatine supplementation, especially in people with, uh, cognitive decline. So, so it, there's almost nothing creatine can't do.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett56:41

       Wow. Hmm. Some statement.

    5. AAAlan Aragon56:45

       (laughs)

22. 56:46 – 58:35

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    1. AAAlan Aragon56:47

    2. SBSteven Bartlett56:47

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    3. NANarrator57:42

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    4. SBSteven Bartlett57:42

       Oh, my God, Steve! (laughs)

    5. NANarrator57:44

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    6. SBSteven Bartlett57:45

       What are you doing?

    7. NANarrator57:46

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    8. SBSteven Bartlett57:54

       No.

    9. NANarrator57:54

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    10. SBSteven Bartlett58:16

        Wow. You're glowing.

    11. AAAlan Aragon58:16

        Wow, Steve-

    12. NANarrator58:17

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    13. AAAlan Aragon58:17

        ... you still look great.

    14. NANarrator58:18

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23. 58:35 – 1:02:06

    Diet Breaks

    1. NANarrator58:35

       Diet breaks. What's a diet break, and why does that, why is that a useful tool?

    2. AAAlan Aragon58:40

       Yes. So, one of the big things that dieters encounter are progress plateaus. And so we can define a progress plateau as four to possibly eight weeks of no change in body composition, despite good compliance to the program. With that definition out of the way, then intervening and overcoming or managing a plateau is really sort of this individualized process that needs to be looked at case by case, where, for example, if somebody feels like they're in the midst of a plateau, and they have been on program, then there's really only two reasons the plateau happened. So, reason number one is that their compliance was inconsistent, so poor compliance is number one, or number two, they have reached energy equilibrium, so they've reached a genuine and bona fide new maintenance point. But there's something that is overarching with the plateau concept that people need to understand. So, we automatically look at progress plateaus as something negative, when people need to reorganize or reframe their perception of what a plateau is, and the plateau is just the body doing its job. When we look at the body as an adaptive survival unit, then homeostasis is a big part of that. So, if the body achieves homeostasis, then hallelujah! We're, we're gonna live. (laughs) We're gonna survive. So, if, for example, somebody has a lot of weight to lose, let's say somewhere to the order of over 20 pounds, 20, 40, 60 pounds to lose, they have to understand that multiple plateaus will be encountered en route to their ultimate goal. And the way that the body changes is always going to be this surge, slow, stop pattern, and it just continues this way. And with every progressive plateau, the surge part gets shorter, and the slowing part and then the plateau part gets longer. So, you can think of it as staircases and landings. So, with each successive plateau, the staircase gets shorter, the landing gets longer. But it's supposed to go like that.And the plateaus should be getting longer because the ultimate goal, after all, is a plateau of sorts. And when people come to realize that, then they can look at plateaus as, what I call, maintenance practice. So if they have that mental shift from seeing plateaus as this negative thing where I need to go sniff out the next great diet or the next great product, they can look at it as, "All right, so the plateau is a good thing. The body is doing its job. Now, we have an opportunity to practice maintenance." And think about it this way too, Steven. Anybody can get weight off, but weight loss maintenance really is the issue. So the better you get at weight loss maintenance, then the more you can win the game.

    3. SBSteven Bartlett1:02:05

       How do I get good

24. 1:02:06 – 1:06:02

    How to Get Good at Weight Loss Maintenance

    1. SBSteven Bartlett1:02:06

       at weight loss maintenance?

    2. AAAlan Aragon1:02:07

       All right. So in order to properly maintain, you have to properly get there. And so properly getting there means that you have to do your best to maintain your lean body mass while you're losing body fat. So what happens to a lot of people when they diet is they lose a lot of lean body mass along with-

    3. SBSteven Bartlett1:02:30

       L- lean body mass, you mean muscle?

    4. AAAlan Aragon1:02:31

       Yes, muscle mass.

    5. SBSteven Bartlett1:02:32

       Muscle mass.

    6. AAAlan Aragon1:02:33

       Along with their fat mass. And so muscle tissue is something very important to keep on the body while you're losing fat because muscle is... we can look at it as our metabolically active... Ev- every tissue is metabolically active, even, even body fat. But muscle tissue specifically is the center of our dietary fuel usage. It is the metabolic engine of the body, if you will. And so if you're losing muscle tissue, you're really losing metabolic leverage while you're losing body fat.

    7. SBSteven Bartlett1:03:11

       So the way that I infer that is that muscle's very greedy.

    8. AAAlan Aragon1:03:15

       Yeah.

    9. SBSteven Bartlett1:03:15

       And it, it takes a lot... It takes up a lot of calories.

    10. AAAlan Aragon1:03:18

        Mm-hmm.

    11. SBSteven Bartlett1:03:18

        So if I lose my muscle, when I get... when I drop my weight, it's almost like the greedy guy who s- who sucks up all my calories is no longer there and so I'm quite likely just to, to rebound quite quickly.

    12. AAAlan Aragon1:03:31

        That's a great analogy, and i- and it's accurate too. And in fact, there is a phenomenon that, in the literature, it's called collateral fattening, and that happens when the body senses an energy crisis at the end of a diet where you've lost a bunch of muscle mass. The body senses that, "Oh my gosh, we just lost a bunch of precious tissue. We have to do whatever we can to get it back." And so your hunger signals ramp up and your body kind of behaviorally, and even metabolically, does what is necessary for you to feed that back as soon as possible. And this does not necessarily happen, certainly not to that kind of magnitude, if you keep your muscle mass while you're losing body fat. You don't experience this collateral fattening type of phenomenon where people just rebound like crazy because their appetite is out of control at the end of the diet. So the way that you preserve muscle mass during the fat loss process is a couple things. So you have to make sure that your rate of weight loss isn't indicative of something that's too quick. So about a half a percent to a full percent of your body weight lost per week is as fast as you really wanna go, so ro- roughly a pound a week. Uh, some people who start off heavier, okay, two pounds a week is fine at the very beginning. But you generally don't want to lose more than 1% of your total body weight per week because then that increases the chances that you're losing an undue amount of muscle mass along with your fat mass. And so if you can, in essence, control the weight loss rate, then you will keep your lean mass. Now, the other two things that need to be going on at the same time are you need to be resistance training and you need to be consuming enough protein. So yeah.

    13. SBSteven Bartlett1:05:34

        Strength training and protein.

    14. AAAlan Aragon1:05:36

        Enough protein and you got resistance training and then you have sort of a top speed limiter on how much weight that you lose per week. And 1% loss a week, uh, uh... 1% loss a week is spectacular actually for most people. Even a pound a week, even half a pound a week, you're looking at, like, in two years, you lost 50 pounds. Most people took, like, two decades to put on their 50

25. 1:06:02 – 1:11:26

    Diet Rebounds

    1. AAAlan Aragon1:06:02

       pounds.

    2. SBSteven Bartlett1:06:02

       So you actually don't wanna lose weight too quickly or else you are susceptible to rebound?

    3. AAAlan Aragon1:06:08

       It is gonna come off quickly if you have a lot of weight to lose. It'll come off quickly at the beginning. So for example, uh, somebody who is in a state of obesity, let's say they weigh 250 pounds and let's say they're losing two, two and a half pounds a week at the beginning of the program, that's fine. But on average, on average, you, you would want to look at, mm, roughly a pound a week as a good benchmark. And I still would not frown upon or scoff at a half a pound a week for certain cases. And, uh, we can talk about some of those stubborn cases, like, uh, on the topic of plateaus, for example. I had a client, uh, I- I'm sure she doesn't mind being named. Uh, she's a great person. Pam, Pam Greshock, she's a veteran coach in the space. Uh, she's perimenopausal, so she's in her, her 40s, and she wanted to lose what we calculated out to be eight pounds of fat. And she stored the majority of it where she didn't want it, was around the midsection. And I had it in mind that, okay...This is somebody who's perimenopausal, so there's going to be a lower rate of progress going on. This is somebody who is highly trained, so she doesn't have a lot more muscle to put on that would give her some, you know, some extra, in quotes, metabolic leverage for the whole process of improving body composition. So, she's highly trained, perimenopausal, wants to lose eight pounds of fat, which would represent the final eight pounds, so sort of that, that pushing the envelope. Knowing those three things, I knew that this is gonna be a difficult and slow-going process. So, whereas, I would normally have somebody expect roughly, or at least gun for, a pound a week loss, for Pam, it was more like, "Are you gonna be okay with one to two pounds per month? Like, if we can get rid of one to two pounds of body fat per month, I would be happy with it, and I think you should be happy with it." And so, I convinced her of that. And with her wanting to lose eight pounds, I think it helps to give people a visual of what a certain amount of weight loss looks like. So, coincidentally, a gallon, (laughs) a gallon jug, if you fill it with butter, that's eight pounds.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett1:08:48

       Hm.

    5. AAAlan Aragon1:08:48

       And so, I had her visualize this eight-pound jug. And, um, I also had her do a butter visualization too. So, um, a standard stick of butter is four ounces, so four sticks of butter is one pound. And, uh, in her case, she wanted to lose... well, she wanted to lose eight pounds, so that's 32 sticks of butter that would be removed from her body at the end of the dieting cycle.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett1:09:17

       Is that what this is here? What is this?

    7. AAAlan Aragon1:09:21

       (laughs) That is 10 pounds of butter. This is an amazing fricking visual, and thi- this is because you asked about diet breaks as a tool for people achieving long-term weight loss or just breaking through plateaus or managing plateaus. So, every five to 10 pounds that somebody loses in a dieting cycle is high time for a diet break. The way you can define a diet break and put some parameters on it, so it- it's what I call non-YOLO maintenance. So, you take off the rules, take off the restrictions, but you're not eating with sheer abandon. You're just relaxing the diet. You take a week off the diet either every four to eight weeks while you're dieting, or you take a week off of the diet every five to 10 pounds that you lose. And the sound of five to 10 pounds seems like, oh, that's nothing.

    8. SBSteven Bartlett1:10:20

       Hm.

    9. AAAlan Aragon1:10:20

       But no, it's a milestone.

    10. SBSteven Bartlett1:10:22

        This is 10 pounds?

    11. AAAlan Aragon1:10:23

        Yes.

    12. SBSteven Bartlett1:10:24

        That's crazy.

    13. AAAlan Aragon1:10:26

        10 pounds of, of (laughs) butter off the body. So yeah, every time you, you lose 10 pounds, it's, five to 10 pounds, in, in my experience, is high time to take a diet break to just alleviate the mental and the physical fatigue of dieting. And that's one of the tactics that you can use for long-term adherence to a plan. On the topic of plateaus, you can a- w- when you're dieting, you will hit a point where the plateau periods or the maintenance phases are gonna be longer than the dieting phases. I think that- that's ideal to be able to hit that point for a long-term weight loss goal. And so, it's a lot e- easier, a- or at least a lot less intimidating, for somebody to know that they're going to be dieting for four to eight weeks at a time, in between a, let's say, a two to three-month maintenance phase.

26. 1:11:26 – 1:19:35

    Fasting

    1. AAAlan Aragon1:11:26

    2. SBSteven Bartlett1:11:26

       What about f- fasting? Do you think that fasting is... 'cause a lot of people talk about this thing called autophagy, where if you fast for, I don't know, 48 hours, your body switches into this state of autophagy, where it starts to heal and repair itself. Are you a fan of fasting? For weight loss or for a- autophagy or other things?

    3. AAAlan Aragon1:11:46

       For the control of calories in, fasting is legit. And it's also legit for... it, it actually works a- as a... as one of the options for dieting. There just has been a massive accumulation of studies showing that it works great. So, the intermittent fasting variants, we have one c- one we talked about earlier, time-restricted eating, and we've got every-other-day fasting, and then the other third major variant would be twice-weekly fasting, or the 5:2 type of model. And then, you have, like, consecutive day fasting type of models as well, which are less studied because there's more risk involved with them, and it- it's tough to, you know, incur that risk in research. When you bring up autophagy, that's where I kind of have to push back on, um, not on your, your mentioning of it specifically, but just in general. People will say, or w- will make claims that, yeah, autophagy... And we can say that, uh, we can explain a- autophagy as a way that the body gets rid of, uh, parts of damaged cells. It's an important process within the body, and it is a catabolic process, or a breakdown process. But the thing is, it happens in a caloric deficit, regardless of whether fasting is involved or not.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett1:13:19

       Really?

    5. AAAlan Aragon1:13:19

       Yes. You maintain hypocaloric conditions, autophagy ramps up.Um, you can have a linear hypocaloric model or a non-linear or intermittent hypocaloric model, and you'll get similar degrees of autophagy if you match the caloric deficit by the end of the week. Now, the other interesting thing about autophagy is that you can ramp up autophagy through exercise. And not only that, but both major types of exercise will increase autophagy. So resistance training increases autophagy. Endurance aerobic-type training increases autophagy. So if you want to, in quotes, chase autophagy, then doing it through intermittent fasting, or just going through prolonged periods of not eating can be a double-edged sword. Whereas the autophagy increases through exercise, they almost don't have a downside. And so, um, a lot of times with intermittent fasting, it can be a great tool for people who need to lose excess body weight. But what I'm seeing in the community is people thinking that intermittent fasting is something that is necessary to do regardless of your body fat level, that it's either necessary or beneficial, and that's not actually true per, per the research. There's, there's a, this one study in particular that looked at men who were already lean, and I believe this was by Templeton and colleagues, where they compared a linear dieting model with an every-other-day fasting model.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett1:15:04

       What does that mean, every-other-day fasting? So they took 24 hours off?

    7. AAAlan Aragon1:15:07

       Yes. Yeah. So it was, yep, every other day, and then the same deficit by the end of the, by the end of the week between the two groups. And the intermittent group actually lost more lean body mass than the linear caloric deficit group. So-

    8. SBSteven Bartlett1:15:30

       They lost more lean body mass?

    9. AAAlan Aragon1:15:31

       They lost more lean body mass, yeah.

    10. SBSteven Bartlett1:15:33

        So they lost more weight?

    11. AAAlan Aragon1:15:34

        They-

    12. SBSteven Bartlett1:15:35

        Or more muscle?

    13. AAAlan Aragon1:15:35

        Lost more muscle. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so that gives us a hint that fasting is great until it isn't, because you've achieved what you needed to achieve. And so then it just kind of becomes a tool. It, it, it's always just a tool to help people control calories in. One of the beautiful things about fasting, and whether it's time-restricted eating or whether it's some sort of variant of alternate-day fasting or twice-a-week fasting, is that it works in research regardless of whether people are meticulously tracking things or not. And so that, that can be a, a boon for individuals who don't necessarily like to micromanage their stuff. But for people who are trying to maximize retention of lean mass while they're pushing the envelope of, uh, fitness, uh, it can definitely be a double-edged sword once you're already lean.

    14. SBSteven Bartlett1:16:32

        But if I do want to maximize the benefits of autophagy, the best way to do that is fasting versus just calorie restriction, I'm assuming.

    15. AAAlan Aragon1:16:40

        We don't know what the optimal level of autophagy is that would actually confer health benefits. We don't know what that threshold is, and there's different ways that people try to measure autophagy. It's very hard to correlate certain levels of autophagy with certain, certain degrees of disease prevention. We, we're not there yet. Um, I don't think... I, I, I think big-picture-wise, I think that autophagy is an algorithm running in the background that is more of a bystander type of thing than a driver. Simple- sim- similar to insulin and glucagon. So the insulin and glucagon axis works when you feed versus when you're fasting. So glucagon levels go up-

    16. SBSteven Bartlett1:17:34

        What's glucagon?

    17. AAAlan Aragon1:17:35

        Glucagon is a hormone that mobilizes fuel stores in the absence of food, in the absence of calories. And autophagy is similar in that regard. And I think that a focus on pushing autophagy is sort of missing the forest for the trees, because if we were to push autophagy to its end, then we could go all the way to a phenomenon called autosis, which is runaway cell death, which happens in starvation in some cases. And so I think that we need to focus on other things like how do we maintain a certain body fat percentage while maintaining a certain physical activity level while maintaining a certain dietary pattern? I think that it's those things that are much more productive to target than seeing how far can we push auto- autophagy before potentially going into runaway cell death.

    18. SBSteven Bartlett1:18:39

        Mm-hmm. I was looking at the, the benefits of this thing they call autophagy, and it says that the ben- the proven likely benefits are cellular cleanup, so it repairs damaged proteins and organelles, I believe, improving cell efficiency, metabolic health, improves insulin sensitivity, neuroprotection, heart and muscle quality, maintains mitochondria, helps adapt to training and oxidative stress, immune tuning and longevity. There's sort of strong animal evidence, I believe-

    19. AAAlan Aragon1:19:10

        Mm-hmm.

    20. SBSteven Bartlett1:19:10

        ... around the longevity component, but they, the, the research that I was reading talked about how it can back- backfire because, um, tumors may use auto- autophagy to survive, um, and some treatments for established cancers aim to inhibit it, and if you overdo fasting, as you said in the study you cited, you can lose muscle, which is not great, and be fatigued, et cetera. Um, there is a bit of a trend,

27. 1:19:35 – 1:20:45

    Water Fasts

    1. SBSteven Bartlett1:19:35

       I think, th- with people doing a lot of water fasts and stuff like that quite periodically. I think it's rising. Even sort of juice fasts and stuff like that. What's your take on those types of fasts?

    2. AAAlan Aragon1:19:46

       I'm not a big fan, Steven. Uh, I think that the cycle that people go through, at least in the developed world, is that they go through the year, then November comes around, and then the holidays hit. They overdo it from November to through December, all the way up to the end of the year, and they're like, "Oh, boy, I have 10 to 20 pounds that I want to lose." And then, they just use these sort of fasts and these detoxes to crash off the bad decisions of the previous few months, and then the cycle repeats annually. So I think that it's a much healthier approach for people to secure and reinforce the right habits through the entirety of the year instead of, um, jumping on the fast to get rid of the- the- the holiday binges.

    3. SBSteven Bartlett1:20:44

       This

28. 1:20:45 – 1:26:44

    Keto Diet

    1. SBSteven Bartlett1:20:45

       sort of brings me to the ketogenic diet. Um, my dad used the ketogenic diet, and I think, actually, my brother as well, um, but also a few other- my friends in my life used it as a way to drop their fat quite quickly to sort of recomposite their body, um, very, very quickly. And the results of seeing someone on the ketogenic diet are quite astounding, because, uh, my friend the other day, uh, s- sent me a- the chart of his weighing scales at home, and it's this sort of gradual increase upwards. And then, he did the ketogenic diet where he cut out carbohydrates and sugars, basically, almost entirely, and it's just a straight line down in his body- his body weight. What is your perspective on the ketogenic diet? What is it good for? What is it not good for? Is it good at all?

    2. AAAlan Aragon1:21:29

       It is a very effective way to lose weight and fat, and that's for a- a few big reasons. First of all, if somebody goes from their typical Western dietary pattern to the ketogenic diet, then they're automatically cutting out a lot of highly processed, hyper-palatable carb-fat combo junk foods and snacks that are just energy-dense, easy to overconsume mindlessly. That's the good thing about the ketogenic diet in addition to, well, they're finally eating enough protein now. And so, along with the increase in protein comes an increase in satiety and a better hunger control. Now, the negatives of the ketogenic diet. The big one is that the majority of people who e- engage a ketogenic diet, they don't do it permanently. For one reason or another, they're no longer on the keto diet. And this is reflected in research as well, even in, uh, vulnerable populations who would stand to benefit from- from that level of restriction. So usually, what happens in research is you take- you take a group- two groups of subjects, and one is on the high-carb, low-fat control diet, and one of them is on a ketogenic diet which can be achieved by a maximum of 50 grams of carbohydrate in the day, or- or less. Then, you're on the keto diet. So what happens at the 12-month point in the diet, and sometimes at the six-month point, the keto group is now consuming about two to three times more carbohydrates than the original 50-gram assignment. So-

    3. SBSteven Bartlett1:23:14

       So they rebound?

    4. AAAlan Aragon1:23:16

       They just insidiously creep up the carb intake. There's something about the ketogenic diet that the majority of people who engage it just can't stick to. It's too restrictive for people.

    5. SBSteven Bartlett1:23:30

       They can't stick to it, but b- by what you're saying, they also end up rebounding-

    6. AAAlan Aragon1:23:34

       Mm-hmm.

    7. SBSteven Bartlett1:23:34

       ... above where they were before.

    8. AAAlan Aragon1:23:37

       They end up rebounding. Like, I'll give you a specific example. There was one study... Well, there was the A to Z study, where, um, the individuals on the Atkins diet ended up consuming what looked a lot like the Zone diet.

    9. SBSteven Bartlett1:23:56

       The Zone diet?

    10. AAAlan Aragon1:23:57

        Yes. The Zone diet is a 40% carbohydrate, 30% protein, 30% fat.

    11. SBSteven Bartlett1:24:03

        So it's k- c- the keto diet, roughly?

    12. AAAlan Aragon1:24:05

        Um, the keto diet is more like 60 to 80% fat, and then, you know, 15 to 20-ish percent protein, and then the carbohydrates are the remainder, a ver- a minor percentage. So what happens is, like, the people who started off at 50 grams of carbohydrate at the beginning of the study, the keto group, at the 12-month point, they were- they crept that carbohydrate intake up to around 150 grams (laughs) of carbohydrate, whereas their assignment was 50 grams of carbohydrate a day. This is a common theme in long-term keto studies, is this up-creep in carbohydrate intake over time, because people can't maintain the- the- the 50 grams of carbohydrate max required to stay in ketosis. And I'm not saying that there aren't a lot of people out there who are just living the keto life permanently. They're out there.

    13. SBSteven Bartlett1:25:05

        Yeah.

    14. AAAlan Aragon1:25:06

        But they are in minority.

    15. SBSteven Bartlett1:25:09

        I see them in the comment section. Whenever I talk about keto, I h- I see people say, like, "I've been on the keto diet for five years, for seven years, for 10 years."

    16. AAAlan Aragon1:25:15

        Sure. There's entire- there's huge communities of folks who've been on keto for five, 10 years. They're- or longer. And that's great. More power to these folks. But claiming that this is a universal solution ignores the reality that some people, most people, uh, per the research, the majority can't stick to it. So that's the- the caveat- one of the caveats of the keto diet. The other one would be for those who can stick to the keto diet for long enough. You really have to look at the quality of, uh, the diet in order for it to be cardiovascularly healthy.If you're gonna engage an, let's say an 80, 85% fat diet for the rest of your life, there's gonna be very different effects if that 80 to 85% are from land animal fats versus from nuts, avocados, olive oil. (laughs) Very different cardiovascular effects going on there. And so, uh, that's the other caveat with the keto diet. There's a Mediterranean type of keto diet that is healthy and that has, uh, you know, it, it is one of these cardiovascularly protective types of diets that you can engage. Whereas, if you just do, like, beef, bacon, and butter from here on out, then, eh, you don't have the best cardiovascular risk trajectory.

29. 1:26:44 – 1:28:55

    Gaining Muscle on the Keto Diet

    1. AAAlan Aragon1:26:44

    2. SBSteven Bartlett1:26:44

       What about gaining muscle on the ketogenic diet? W- if I'm restricting carbohydrates, is it more difficult to gain muscle mass?

    3. AAAlan Aragon1:26:52

       The short answer is yes, and the nuanced answer is, you still can gain muscle on keto. You know, the- the body is- is really resilient and- and quite genius at manufacturing the carbohydrate, um, endogenously or from within the body. So your- your body can make carbohydrate out of lactate, and fill, at least partially, your muscle glycogen stores. And so, um, going on a zero carbohydrate diet doesn't necessarily end up with the- the type of results that you- you- you might imagine for somebody who's completely avoiding carbohydrates. And in the research comparing strength gains from a high carbohydrate low fat diet versus a keto diet, the keto folks, as long as, uh, they're equated with protein and total calories with the control diet, they've got similar strength gains. It's quite a- an interesting phenomenon. Muscle size gains is different story, interestingly. Almost always, there's some advantage to the high carb low fat control group compared with the ketogenic diet group when it comes to both gains in lean mass as well as retention of lean mass during dieting. And one of those things is, mm, s- more or less obvious. It's, like, you- you simply carry more muscle glycogen when you're on a high carbohydrate low fat diet. And muscle glycogen... Glycogen is the stored form of carbohydrate within the muscle and then a minor amount in- in the liver, and for every gram of carbohydrate that you store as glycogen, there's, mm, three-ish grams of water stuck to it. And so just sitting there, you're carrying more- more muscle mass, more fullness on a non-ketogenic diet.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett1:28:54

       What about

30. 1:28:55 – 1:31:11

    Carnivore Diet

    1. SBSteven Bartlett1:28:55

       the carnivore diet? A lot of people have talked about that recently, um, which is just a diet where you just eat meat. What's your- what's your point of view on that?

    2. AAAlan Aragon1:29:03

       Well, okay, it's a little silly and it's a little extreme, but it has some merit to it. So the carnivore diet, when you get on it, it's similar to how when people go on a keto diet after they've been doing the standard Western diet since forever, so the standard Western diet has too much of everything. It's got too much total calories, too much refined carbohydrate. It's got too much of this type of fat and too much... Eh, it's got a moderate amount of protein, but you're also eating everything under the sun, from burgers to fries to cakes to ice creams to cookies, uh, in addition to pasta and everything else. So when you go from that excess of everything to the carnivore diet, you automatically and spontaneously eat far fewer calories than you used to on your standard Western diet. So the carnivore diet is actually the lesser of the evils when we're comparing it to the standard Western diet. And you can even try to optimize the carnivore diet. Like, some people engage a carnivore diet that is just extreme, like beef and salt, okay? So that is very appealing to people who have a tendency to jump on the carnivore diet 'cause it's even more extreme! And people with tendencies towards th- the extremes, they'll... A lot of them are ex-vegans actually, carnivores, 'cause they can only be (laughs) on one- one extreme side or the other. It's tough for them to be in the gray scale here. But the carnivore diet is, um, the lesser of the evils. It can be optimized, if that's even possible, if people had more variety within their carnivore model, within their plant-free diet model. Like, for example, if somebody went carnivore, instead of doing beef and salt, he had a rotation of fatty fish, poultry, beef, eggs, dairy, and who knows? He maybe- he might even justify protein powder in there for a dessert. Who knows? It- it's still animal-based. (laughs)

31. 1:31:11 – 1:31:58

    Do Vegans and Vegetarians Struggle to Gain Muscle?

    1. AAAlan Aragon1:31:11

       Um-

    2. SBSteven Bartlett1:31:11

       Do you find that vegans and vegetarians struggle more to gain muscle mass typically?

    3. AAAlan Aragon1:31:17

       Vegans and vegetarians in the general population do because they're not aware of how to structure the diet and the training program to- to achieve that, so-

    4. SBSteven Bartlett1:31:28

       What are they missing?

    5. AAAlan Aragon1:31:30

       They're just not eating enough total calories and they're not eating enough protein, generally speaking. Now, there are some vegans who will drink a bunch of Mountain Dew and, you know, (laughs) have- have, um, potato chips and- and things like that, and still stay vegan, and Oreo cookies are vegan, I- I believe as well. But vegans can still gain muscle on par with omnivores if they structure it right.

32. 1:31:58 – 1:36:46

    Do Most People Get Enough Protein?

    1. SBSteven Bartlett1:31:58

       Are most people that you encounter and have worked with over the years not getting enough protein?Like, the average-

    2. AAAlan Aragon1:32:06

       Yes.

    3. SBSteven Bartlett1:32:07

       ... person on the street?

    4. AAAlan Aragon1:32:08

       Yes. Almost everybody who has been overweight or obese, or just, uh, uh, had some degree of, of an issue with their body fat levels, almost all of them, under-consume protein.

    5. SBSteven Bartlett1:32:25

       What about people that are very skinny? Because I've got lots of friends that, um, would be in the skinny-fat category, where they, they kind of, they look very, very, very skinny, but they've got, you know, a little bit of roll here.

    6. AAAlan Aragon1:32:38

       Mm-hmm.

    7. SBSteven Bartlett1:32:38

       Um, and they often say to me that they just can't gain weight.

    8. AAAlan Aragon1:32:42

       Mm-hmm, yeah.

    9. SBSteven Bartlett1:32:43

       I've heard this a lot from, from friends. "I j- I just can't get, gain weight. I've heard I need to have more protein, but, you know, I- I'm just not gaining any weight."

    10. AAAlan Aragon1:32:51

        Yeah, that is the, in quotes, "hard gainer" phenomenon, and people have different degrees of body fat in, in that category. But these folks, what they actually have an issue with is a spontaneous increase in what we call non-exercise activity thermogenesis. So basically, it's an increase in spontaneous movement, just an increase in fidgeting, you know, tapping, moving around, uh, just being more hyperkinetic, in response to increasing their caloric intake. In 24 hours, you and I expend X amount of calories.

    11. SBSteven Bartlett1:33:33

        Mm-hmm.

    12. AAAlan Aragon1:33:34

        So, total daily energy expenditure is composed of, um, various components. So there is a resting energy expenditure component.

    13. SBSteven Bartlett1:33:43

        Mm-hmm.

    14. AAAlan Aragon1:33:44

        So our so-called resting metabolic rate or it's also called resting energy expenditure or basal metabolic rate, those are all interchangeable, that is the amount of calories that your body burns in a 24-hour period just to stay alive. Okay? So if you were bedridden, the amount of calories you, you burn just through your vital organs and your systems working, that's your resting energy expenditure. Now, the other part of energy expenditure is your active energy expenditure. So, active energy expenditure consists of, we can subdivide it into your exercise activity and your non-exercise activity. With hard gainers, it's their non-exercise activity that spontaneously goes up when they try to eat more to gain weight. There was an, an interesting study done in the late 1990s by Levine and colleagues, where he took a group of normal-weight subjects, it was mo- mostly male sample of subjects, and he fed them 1,000 calories above and beyond their maintenance requirements, and I believe this was, was for ten weeks. What happened w- during the, during the study and as a result of eating 1,000 calories above their maintenance needs, they ended up burning, on average, 336 calories through an increase in non-exercise activity. So, that, that is a very interesting phenomenon. One of the, uh, subjects in that study actually ended up burning almost 700 calories, uh, as an increase in their non-exercise activity thermogenesis. And so, what happens to this archetype, this hard gainer person, is they just start fidgeting more, they just start walking faster, they just start sitting less, they start bobbing their head more. I- and they can even, uh, just subconsciously train harder, train more, and their energy expenditure side just ramps up spontaneously in response to an increase in calories, so.

    15. SBSteven Bartlett1:35:59

        So, so if someone is a hard gainer-

    16. AAAlan Aragon1:36:01

        Mm-hmm.

    17. SBSteven Bartlett1:36:01

        ... and they struggle to gain weight because of this sort of spontaneous energy usage-

    18. AAAlan Aragon1:36:05

        Mm-hmm.

    19. SBSteven Bartlett1:36:05

        ... what advice would you give them? To stop moving? (laughs)

    20. AAAlan Aragon1:36:08

        Eat more. (laughs) Okay, so the principle would be to eat more. Uh, the practice would be eat more in a way that you get those calories in easily and conveniently. And so, you can structure liquid meals, two in a day but they rarely need three, shakes to have between their meals, uh, at any point in the day, b- where it's convenient, and then you just literally add nutrition and calories that way. And that, so that's the solution, just literally eat more.

33. 1:36:46 – 1:41:57

    What’s Stopping People From Reaching Their Body Goals?

    1. AAAlan Aragon1:36:46

    2. SBSteven Bartlett1:36:46

       I think the, uh, the thing that sits underneath everything we're talking about is motivation, whatever that means, which is, like, having the motivation to stick to something, discipline, whatever you wanna call it. When you look back through the last 30 years of your career, are there any similarities in the thing or the catalyst moment that made somebody finally stick to it, stick to the diet, stick to the exercise regime, stick to the whatever?

    3. AAAlan Aragon1:37:14

       Mm-hmm.

    4. SBSteven Bartlett1:37:14

       Is there, are there any themes of a person going from struggling to disciplined?

    5. AAAlan Aragon1:37:22

       So, the first thing that comes to my mind is they finally arrive at the point where their physical goals become priority number one. Changing the body, so losing body fat, gaining muscle, achieving your ideal body composition, that is a colossally difficult goal. Whenever I work with somebody who's preparing for a contest of some sort, whether it is in the more elite line of physique contests or whether they're just joining a transformation challenge, but they're both very, very serious, and they both are putting their program at the top of their priority list.

    6. SBSteven Bartlett1:38:08

       Mm-hmm.

    7. AAAlan Aragon1:38:09

       So, when I say top of your priority, I mean-You do what you need to do to stay alive and, and, and keep breathing as, as a top priority, and right there is your physical goals. Okay? So, the big problem with people who find that they can't hit their goals, or they can't stay consistent, or they're just having a struggle losing X amount of body fat, or even a struggle gaining X amount of muscle, is that they simply have five other things that are prioritized in their day above and beyond their, their program.

Episode duration: 2:06:29