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Comment by dvt | Hacker News Reader

I did for a few months this year, but I've been lazy over the summer. I'm 155lb, 6'0, so fairly skinny, maybe at around ~15% BF. I noticed that fasting doesn't help with BF at all unless I eat very clean and lift. I was at 170lb, around ~28% BF earlier this year and had to work my ass off to get my body fat percentage down.

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Interesting. I just started experimenting with a 16-8 fast, and I have noticed that it is hard to eat larger portions when you constrain the eating window to eight hours. Did you think it helped maintain your 15% BF?

> Did you think it helped maintain your 15% BF?

Nope.

I stopped counting macros and started eating just whatever again at the beginning of the summer and I'm slowly gaining the fat back. Unfortunately, there are no shortcuts (at least for me).

Lifting specifically, or any sort of physical activity? I’ve been running and IF for the past month in order to cut my BF %. I was at about 16%, but I’d like to get down to 12%.

I've found that lifting is much better for weight loss than running/biking. I've gained weight while running 30-40 miles/week and typically lose weight while lifting (if I pay attention to my calories.) A lot of people say the same.

If you're focused on BF%, lifting is even more appealing since you'll be building muscle/reducing bf% even at a constant weight.

Lifting; I did Stronglifts 5x5 3 times a week. Part of the reason I stopped is that it got kind of boring and I got absolutely sick of doing squats 3 times a week.

It sucked, it was hard (especially on a caloric deficit), but it worked.

> I noticed that fasting doesn't help with BF at all unless I eat very clean and lift.

So what happens? You lose muscle and fat in the same ratio? Or do you keep the fat?

I haven't seen any studies that imply that fasting increases or decreases metabolic rates, which would mean that most people probably won't implicitly gain or lose significant amounts of weight just by switching to intermittent fasting.

There are people that literally just start skipping breakfast while keeping lunch/dinner/snacking the same. This is both technically intermittent fasting but also a reduction in overall caloric consumption. These people sometimes attribute their newfound weightloss to IF, when really they just started skipping a calorically dense meal every day.

I feel that my body kind of adjusts to the fasting and I just don't lose much of anything.

That sounds to me like "I eat more to make up the calories when I'm not fasting".

Fat first cus it’s easier to break down. Muscle afterward.

That's what I would assume, but they said the opposite.

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