Intermittent fasting has been hailed by many as an optimal path to weight loss over the last few years, with many anecdotal cases appearing to show that only eating within a limited time window each day can help support an individual’s fitness goals.
In a new video, Cam Jones of YouTube’s Goal Guys sets out to try intermittent fasting for himself, by sticking to this diet plan for 30 days. He won’t be exercising during this month, as he is also recovering from a cracked rib, and so he hopes that fasting will enable him to prevent any weight gain during this lack of physical activity.
“I’m going to be trying what is probably the most common form of intermittent fasting, which is the 16/8 method,” he says. “Meaning I’ll be fasting for a 16-hour window each day, while eating all of my meals in the remaining 8. I’ve decided to set this eating window between the hours of 11 a.m. and 7 p.m., so basically I’m going to be giving up breakfast, my favorite meal of the day.”
While food is off-limits for the majority of the morning, Cam is still able to drink water and black coffee under the rules of intermittent fasting. “With the help of a cup of coffee, my morning fasting hours go by relatively painlessly,” he says. This doesn’t last, though. Just a couple of days into the challenge, Cam finds himself clock-watching for most of the morning, waiting until he can eat. And despite reading claims that it can take up to 7 days for the worst of the cravings to abate, he is still “miserable” with hunger by day 10.
Around halfway through the month, things begin to change, and Cam starts to feel some benefits; the hunger pangs aren’t as bad, he is immediately more productive in the mornings as he is getting straight into work rather than spending time on breakfast, and he is even able to go for a morning run after a 14-hour fast.
“Once my hunger problems are gone, this challenge becomes a lot easier,” he says. “I found hydrating consistently through the morning has helped a lot with reducing my hunger, and when I can eat, I’m trying to consume healthier, more filling meals that can help take me through my fasting periods. And the first meal of the day when my fast is over is so, so good.”
Cam weighs 155 pounds at the start of the challenge, and by the end of the month he has dropped 6 pounds to 149.
“I’m definitely leaner, wow. I look good!” He says. “What’s exciting to me is that intermittent fasting can be a really useful tool for me moving forward. After I got past those initial 2 weeks of feeling hunger, things were honestly pretty easy to maintain. And with the added discipline of monitoring when I’m eating, I felt I was a lot more conscious of what I was eating as well.”
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