00:01
Hey everyone, it's Mikki here. You're listening to Mikkipedia. This week on the podcast, I speak to Brandon DaCruz. Brandon and I this week do a deep dive into one of the most debated models in metabolism research, the constrained energy model proposed by Dr. Herman Pomser. We unpack the nuances of Pomser's hypothesis. Brandon challenges some of the prevailing interpretations and explores how it compares

00:30
to the traditional additive model of metabolism, where exercise is believed to directly increase total daily energy expenditure. Of course, every time you are on social media, you will hear a whole host of things about exercise. And over the last few years, the message really has been that exercise doesn't really contribute to weight loss. In fact, it is far more helpful for weight maintenance. Brandon offers a different perspective.

00:59
and his intake on how the constrained energy expenditure has been misrepresented to suggest that exercise is ineffective for weight loss. And he brings both data and coaching insights to the conversation. We also explore the concept of metabolic adaptation, sustainable metabolic scope, and what the research really says about the relationship between physical activity and body composition over time. So this conversation

01:25
I believe is essential listening for anyone navigating the complexities of energy balance, fat loss and exercise science. One thing I will add is that Brandon did a fantastic deep dive into this topic with Lyle McDonald on his podcast, Chasing Clarity. And I've popped a link to that in the show notes, because of course we did not have the time and I'm just not smart enough probably to go into all of the complexities that Brandon and Lyle discussed.

01:53
However, I do think you'll leave this podcast with a much better grasp that exercise plays in the calorie deficit model of fat loss and why it isn't just about weight maintenance. For those of you unfamiliar with Brandon, to be fair, I'd be very surprised if there were very many of you at this stage. He's an online nutrition and physique coach and sports nutritionist. He is also a national level NPC physique competitor and an internationally published fitness model.

02:22
who's written articles and filmed educational content for publications like Men's Fitness Magazine and Bodybuilding.com. Brandon has spent over 12 years working within the sports nutrition and fitness industries and has coached every type of client from Olympia-level professional men's physique competitors, college athletes, MMA fighters, CrossFit competitors, and lifestyle clients.

02:45
Brandon believes in blending what's been proven in the research with his own anecdotal and firsthand in the trenches experience to improve body composition, optimize performance and enhance health in order to help his clients achieve their goals, whether that be building muscle, losing body fat, increasing performance and or optimizing health and longevity. This is what he refers to as his health centric coaching model, as he believes that improving one's health is a cornerstone to optimizing their physique goals.

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and I have links not only to that podcast interview that I mentioned, but also to Brandon's website and his Instagram where he shares a lot of valuable information. And I'll also pop in the notes links to the other podcasts we refer to with Herman Poncer and of course Drew Best and Eric Trexler. All right team, before we hit the play button, I would like to remind you that the best way to support this podcast is to hit the subscribe button.

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on your favorite podcast listening platform. And if you feel like it, why don't you leave a five-star review? That will increase the visibility of Micopedia and amongst literally thousands of other podcasts out there. So more people get the opportunity to hear from the guests that I have on the show, like Brandon D'Cruz. All right, team, enjoy the conversation.

04:06
8am. Nice one. Hey Brandon, first of all, so good to see you, particularly after meeting in person. And I feel like I'm now just catching up with a great mate who is like always going to be the smartest person in the room. So thank you so much for taking the time to be here to educate, not just educate, but in such an accessible way, both me and my audience on all of the topics you do in today, particularly the constrained energy model.

04:35
So anyway, how are you? I am doing incredible, Mickey. So first and foremost, I want to relay that same message back to you in terms of it's always an honor to have conversations. really like the fact that not only through Zoom have we been able to have a lot of conversations that we've recorded for the benefit of the audience, but we also have pretty lively email interactions, DM interactions, which I really appreciate. But even more so about that, and I told you this in person, getting to meet you in person was an absolute pleasure. I really live for those in-person interactions, especially with like-minded individuals.

05:04
And the longer that I'm in this, the more I realize I may be a little bit different than most. And I really do have an intellectual curiosity and I need people in my life like yourself that are going to push back on things or that are going to dig into a topic or are going to provide me the latitude to really dig into something because I'm always, my podcast is called Chasing Clarity. And the reason for that was I'm chasing clarity to be able to provide that clarity on complex topics to other people and to bridge the gap between research and information and practical application. Because I've told you this in person.

05:33
Education and knowledge and research and all these things mean nothing to me if they're not applicable. And I really think that there's a bridge that we can gap individuals like you and I that are practitioners and that have an ability to read and comprehend research and delineate it, you know, in terms of delineating poor research and good research, and then really being able to make it comprehensible and also digestible for a large audience. And that's really something that drives me forward, you know.

06:00
we're going to discuss something that I've gotten a lot of feedback from. I think that I take a little bit different of a perspective on the constrained energy expenditure model because I'm not a researcher. I'm not an academic, nor am I just a content creator. And so a lot of times when people put out these statements, it almost becomes black and white. It's a dichotomous perspective on a specific physiological adaptation. And they don't realize the ramifications from a psychological perspective that that could have on the audience that's listening to them that cannot.

06:29
dig into the research, they don't have that type of background. And it ends up being a situation that I was obviously recounting with you, where I have clients that come to me and they're like, hey, I've heard this about this constrained energy expenditure model. This exercise not worked, does it not increase energy expenditure? I'm really confused. Could I never increase my maintenance calories? I've been stuck in this scarcity mindset of eating less and doing more. And I'm not sure if I'm ever going be able to get out of eating the quote unquote 1,200 calories a day without precipitously gaining weight. And so really my goal.

06:58
with every podcast that we do together or any podcast that I put out is really to provide clarity on this complex topic and also break down some of the limitations in some of these models. And it's not to target, you know, Herd and Ponser who put this out. It is really to be able to provide a more all-encompassing viewpoint, especially from a practical and applicable perspective. 100%, Brandon. And so what I will first say to the listeners is that just today, and this podcast will come out in a few weeks, but today you released a podcast with Lyle MacDonald that really dived deep

07:28
in taking a different, like you into this topic, but of course you talked about it in a lot of depth, much more than what we've got an opportunity to do today. So I will absolutely pop that in the show notes. But the other thing that you said about, you know, good and bad research, and sometimes it's not even, and I know that you'll agree with me, good or bad, it's just misinterpreted. And it depends on who it is that is actually doing the research to your point. And Ponsa is amazing. He's been on my podcast and we DM'd about him. You're like, he sounds like a

07:56
a lovely guy and absolutely he is. And Drew Best is another one that I've chatted to, who is part of his research group. And of course, now Eric Trexler, who I believe you might've met actually at the most recent conference. Can't remember where it was, but you met Cliff as well there. Yes, you go. And it's just, I think to your point is you just do come at it from a different perspective as expected.

08:22
compared to someone who, like Ponta, who was an evolutionary biologist. He only looks at one side of things. But this is the thing with research is you become very, very focused and an absolute expert in one area, whereas you and I, as practitioners, we have to have that 30,000 foot view on how this relates to the people that we interact with. So just to clarify for the listeners, Brandon, can you actually give us

08:51
your sort of – tell us what the constrained energy model is versus the traditional additive model of metabolism. Absolutely. So first and foremost, the reason that we're discussing this today is really because there's been a lot of interest and controversy that's come over the past few years, especially on this topic, especially since Ponser's book, Burn, came out. And that's a pop science book. Now, to set the stage, the traditional model of metabolism, which is referred to as the additive model,

09:20
suggests that the more activity or exercise that we do, the more calories you burn. Very simple. It's a linear dose response. And this implies that your energy expenditure increases in a pretty linear fashion as the calories you burn through exercise would be added on top of the rest of your total daily energy components. So that would be on top of your resting metabolic rate, your thermic effect of feeding, and your non-exercise activity. And together, that whole amalgamation would be your TDE, which is the total amount of calories you burn per day. Now, the Contrain model

09:48
which Ponser introduced based largely on his work with the Hadza tribes, which is a group of hunter-gatherers. It argues that total daily energy expenditure is regulated within a narrow range. And this applies in his model and in his postulations, even as physical activity increases. So his claim is that beyond a certain threshold, the body compensates by reducing energy spent on other physiological functions. And essentially what the message is, is that we're capped as to how many calories we could burn per day. So in the book, I'm going to pull, I have a note here.

10:17
Let me pull this up. In the book, he even states, the bottom line is that your daily activity level has almost no bearing on the number of calories you burn per day. Yes. Now, here's my stance on the topic of physical activity and energy expenditure. I do not disagree that there's a ceiling to your total daily energy expenditure. But in the real world, where I've coached clients for well over 15 years, the vast majority of people will just never get close to that ceiling. The reality is most people aren't training hard enough or frequently enough to reach any meaningful constraint.

10:47
So while the model may have some theoretical merits in specific context, which we'll discuss, I believe that it's been overstated, oversimplified, and often misapplied, especially when you used to argue that exercise is ineffective for weight loss or body composition improvement or management. And in practice, I have to say that I still see exercise and physical activity as effective tools for increasing energy expenditure and improving body composition in my clients, especially, and I want to make this point because we'll discuss this later, but especially when it's paired with sufficient fueling.

11:16
and recovery and when the exercise sessions are properly periodized and progressed over time. So we really have to, we'll dig into a lot of the context, the limitations and things of that sort or even where this data came from. But I really think that it's important that we don't look at this in a black and white perspective as though the additive model is correct or the contrain model is correct. I think they both have their merits, but we really have to break down in what context is each applicable. And this is where I take issue with the contrain model. Brandon, can you repeat the sentence that you just read out again?

11:46
Absolutely. So in his book, he states, and this is a quote that I took out from there. It says, the bottom line is that your daily activity level has almost no bearing on the number of calories that you burn each day. And that just sounds, and actually, because it comes from something like, even though you call it pop science, I do love that term, and I have heard it before, but it has been some years. Because it comes from someone who researches metabolism, it carries a lot of weight with it. And of course, it will carry a lot of weight when his book came out.

12:14
to journalists and to sort of clickbait type articles that pretty much any layperson reading will go, what the hell's the point then? Yes. I know if you've seen some of the articles that have been published, especially like the New York Times, New York Post. Essentially, the headline is like, exercise is useless or, you know, even like the subtitle of the book was like, new research blows a lid off of how we burn calories and, you know, exercising things of that sort. And I understand that that's

12:44
really not his doing, that's more of a publishing aspect. They were trying to manipulate the context of the book, but I do think that there's a lot of limitations that are overlooked. And when you actually read into that book, they're not highlighted. And you really have to dig into the primary research and into the literature. And I've reviewed 20 plus papers on this topic. And it isn't until you really dig in and you have scientific literacy and you have experience that you're able to delineate and you're really able to see the issues in the way that constrained model has been interpreted or applied.

13:13
Yeah, and I've got to say, like I mentioned earlier that Drew Best and Eric Trexler are now part of Ponser's lab. I think, or maybe not, but doing work with, I can't remember what Trexler's actually doing, but if Ponser didn't have access to the minds of the likes of Trexler prior, if he was only in his evolutionary biology sort of like space, as we tend to be in silos, then you're not going to get that perspective. Whereas potentially moving forward, having the likes of someone like Trex there,

13:41
who has and does work in the trenches will be a bit like you, will be like, well, hang on, mate. These are the things that you might not have thought about because you mentioned that there were a lot of overlooked limitations with regards to the information that was put out there. Can you go over some of that stuff for us, Brandon? 100%. Just a little background, though, I want to give maybe some of the issues in which, how it's being interpreted or it's being applied.

14:11
I want to make this very clear. I don't have an issue with the Contrain model as a concept, but I do think that there are issues with how the data has been communicated, interpreted, and applied, especially as we were just discussing, in the mainstream media and pop science circles. So the model has been used to support some bold and what I believe are frankly misleading claims. And those include, exercise doesn't meaningfully increase your total daily energy expenditure, and exercise is essentially useless for weight loss. And while I understand where those claims come from in theory,

14:38
I don't think they hold up when you zoom out and look at the full body of evidence, and I've done so, and also when we apply them in real-world coaching scenarios. So as a coaching practitioner who works with clients in the real world, I think it's important to point out the facts. And I'm going to speak about the US just because that's the data that I know most, but this applies to most industrialized countries around the world. We're in a society where the majority of people are underactive, they're overfed, and in a suboptimal state of metabolic health. If we look at the CDC data, it's 74 % of US adults are overweight or obese.

15:06
And global studies show that only around 17 % of individuals meet both the aerobic and resistance training guidelines. So that means that 83 % of individuals are not hitting at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity aerobic activity per week and engaging in two strength training workouts per week. Which I've got to say is a bit of a mediocre bar, just saying. 100%. We see that even at that low of a bar, that low of a threshold. And I believe in making things not so out of reach that it's unattainable to people. But when someone hears exercise doesn't do much,

15:35
They may use that as a justification to stay sedentary, when in fact the vast majority of people out there that are interested in looking better and feeling better would honestly benefit from more exercise and more movement. And even if there is some compensation in total daily energy expenditure at high volumes of activity, that's not the situation 99 % of people are in. Now, when we actually look at some of the limitations of the data, we have to go back to where this originated. And that's what a lot of people are overlooking. They've heard the Hadza, but they haven't looked into the original study.

16:02
Now, one of the foundational pieces of evidence that Ponser uses to support the constrained model of energy expenditure comes from a 2012 study. And this was one that I sent you as the first study that I sent you, And it's on the Hadza modern, like, hunter-gatherer tribe, and their base in Tanzania. And in that paper, Ponser and his colleagues used the double-labeled water method to measure total daily energy expenditure. And what they did was they compared Hadza individuals to people living in industrialized societies. And despite the fact that the Hadza had significantly higher levels of daily physical activity,

16:31
The study found that total energy expenditure was similar between the Hadza and that of sedentary Westerners. Now, on the surface, that seems like strong evidence for a constrained system. But this is where we need to look into the data and into the limitations of that data and the study and how it was interpreted. First of all, this was not an Apple-Sapples comparison. So the first reason for these findings were there was a massive difference in body weight between groups, and no one acknowledges this. That's crazy to me.

17:00
Yes, when you look into the data, listen to this, Mickey, the Hadza women in the study were 95 pounds and the average Hadza man was 112 pounds. Now, on the other hand, they're being compared to average Western woman and man. And the average Western woman was 164 pounds, the average Western man was 178 pounds. So we're speaking about a 66 to 69 % difference between groups. Now, why is that important, you may ask?

17:24
We know that higher body mass equals a higher basal metabolic rate, which accounts for more than 50 % of most individuals' TDE. And in sedentary individuals, like the sedentary Westerners, it would account for up to 70 % of their total daily energy expenditure. On the inverse of that, we also know that lighter individuals burn less calories during exercise and physical activity. However, when you look at energy expenditure per kilogram of body weight, the HODs actually had a higher total daily energy expenditure as we'd expect given their activity levels. But

17:51
because they were so much lighter, their total calorie burn looked similar to heavier, more sedentary individuals who had higher BMRs. Now, the next issue that's completely overlooked in this study and in this data and in this entire topic is the topic of dietary and energy intake. Okay, before we get there, I just want to clarify a couple of things. So first with the body weights. So as I understand it from that, what the woman might be about 43 kilos, I think that's- Yes, right around there. It came out to 95 pounds.

18:20
Yeah. Yep. And then the men are about maybe 50, 51 maybe just. Yeah, right over there. Yeah. So the men weigh less than I do. Absolutely. And Brandon, was it not reported relative to body weight or was it sort of it was, but it was overlooked in the main conclusion of that paper? Yeah. So when they did this, they did the analysis based on, they broke it down to like fat free mass and then total body mass.

18:48
per kilogram. However, the issue with that is they weren't talking about the constraint in and of itself being body weight. If we look at all the metabolic adaptation literature, you will see that lighter individuals burn less calories per kilogram or per pound of mass. We have good research by Wesserturk, and he's a researcher that will come on to some of his research in terms of aerobic training later. However, Wesserturk has looked at the differences in energy cost of movement between light individuals or normal weight individuals rather and obese

19:16
individuals that are sedentary. He has found that there is such an increase in the energy cost of movement for sedentary overweight individuals that they can move around 40 % less and have the same total daily energy expenditure. Then if we go into another area of literature, which is something I'm very familiar with, is we had discussed quite a few episodes ago, Mickey, this might have been last year, we went through my high energy flux model. Within that literature, there's a researcher named Chris Melby, and he looks at

19:42
energy flux in terms of energy flux is the relationship between energy intake and energy expenditure. We really want to be in a high energy flux state from more food bringing in more nutrients into the system and pulling more nutrients or more energy throughout the system through more movement. However, there's a four compartment model to energy flux where we actually see that people that are massively obese because of their overweight and obese, they actually are in a state of high energy flux, but it's a poor or maladaptive state of high energy flux. What that means is

20:11
that they have high total daily energy expenditure because of high amounts of total body mass, which also yield higher amounts of lean body mass and also higher body weight. So we want to be in a high-flux state, being lean, active, and moving, and also sufficiently fueling ourselves as compared to someone in a high-energy flux state that is in a state of high-energy flux because they have high body weight and they're over-consuming calories. And they're essentially following that time course of creeping obesity, which we see in most industrialized countries where the average individual

20:39
in a sedentary population around the world is gaining between 0.5 to 1 kilogram per year. That's what they refer to as creeping obesity, meaning that over 10 years, you're essentially gaining 5 to 10 kilograms every single year, year on and year out. Really within that, in this research and in this topic, they never point out that there's a massive discrepancy. If you looked at any of the metabolic adaptation research and they saw these differences in energy expenditure, they would point out that there is a massive

21:07
There's a massive constraint when someone's very light. And then it also goes down to, which we'll discuss next, is their energy availability status because that impacts your total daily energy expenditure measurements. Yeah, no, 100%. I find it really interesting to think about energy flux in that sort of four-compartment system. And I hadn't actually thought about people who were overweight and obese still being in that high energy flux, but it was a maladaptive state. Because of course, of their metabolic health, I suppose, and the

21:36
and the energy cost of breaking down the food, but also what's driving that is the sedentary and the inflammatory, a lot of it. Yeah. So, their total energy expenditure is increased. So, there used to be this myth, essentially, in our industry where people thought that individuals were overweight because they had a low basal metabolic rate. And when they've done comparative studies, actually, they found that, if anything, those that were suffering with overweight or obesity have a higher metabolic rate because of the fact that they A,

22:05
higher amounts of body mass, which are going to contribute more times. If you were underweight, you would have less lean body mass as compared to someone that even just the cost, the energetic cost and the stimulus that comes from being overweight and walking around. If you ever look at someone with giant calves, a lot of times it's someone that has been overweight previously because it's essentially mechanical loading. I do like that example, like giant calves. Yeah, 100%. If you ever see like, it's funny, I remember one of my mentors had one time told me that if I ever wanted to

22:34
grow giant calves, shitty calves. He told me that all I needed to do was get overweight and just stay there for a few years and my body would adapt. He's being facetious in the same way. But the thing is that they have high energy expenditure because they're over consuming calories. So think about that. They have very high TF, essentially. If they're consuming 4,000 calories as compared to the Hadza that are consuming 1200 calories, their thermocavet-defeating is going to be three times the amount. And then they're also, because they have higher body mass, it's increasing.

23:02
their total daily energy expenditure, especially from the resting metabolic rate component, because there is a much higher energy cost to keep the lights on on someone that has so much more body mass. to tangent off of that, we also have to consider the fact of low energy availability. And the Hadza live in a very different food environment than you or I do. And so they don't have constant unlimited access to food. And they're likely in state of low energy availability, which would cause metabolic adaptations that naturally suppress energy expenditure.

23:29
And this is confirmed. Now, they don't do low-energy availability studies in the Hadza because that would be very invasive first and foremost. And that's not really the research that they're looking at. A lot of the research that Ponser did was actually observational. However, we do see in other trials, so there is work by Anthony Hackney at a UNC, which looks at different aspects of the Hadza and other hunter-gatherer tribes. And we do see things like they have lower testosterone levels. So there's some literature that shows that the Hadza men essentially have 50 % lower testosterone levels.

23:57
have a lower lean mass. And then we often have to consider the potential epigenetic adaptations that favor calorie conservation in hunter-gatherer tribes. So we have to consider that there's something called the thrifty gene hypothesis. And this has been best formulated through a researcher that put out the dual intervention model, John Spiegel. And he's spoken about this multiple times. But we see in the Irish potato famine, there was individuals that had epigenetic changes to their metabolism, which were they favored waking.

24:24
And this was essentially a survival adaptation. this could be, now think about it logically, if the Hadza have been generationally in this low energy availability state where they have very low body mass, they're not burning a lot of calories and they're also not eating a lot of calories. So they're essentially in this metabolically adapted state. So to me, this initial study is less about, know, people have taken it to be like, there's a hard cap on energy output. Whereas really, I think it's about the complexity of comparing two populations of drastically different lifestyles, body compositions and food environments.

24:54
Now, this is another point I want to make, and I haven't seen any researcher that is just a researcher on this topic point this out, but we have to consider what would happen if the Hadza were in a different environment or had different body composition. If the Hadza maintained their habitual high activity levels yet, they had the same body weights as the Western group and the same energy availability, there's no doubt in my mind, their total daily energy expenditure would be higher by comparison. Despite the fact that this study is often referenced in relation to the contrain model, I don't think it's compelling evidence

25:23
the universal constraint that Westerners specifically should be worried about because we are not genetically programmed with the same ancestral background as the Hadza first and foremost. And second of all, we're not in the same state. We're not massively underweight. We're not massively under fueled. I'm talking about the average person. And so this is not something I don't think that we can take hunter gatherer data and apply the constraint that they're seeing on all people. essentially what you're saying, this,

25:51
study illustrates more the metabolic adaptation and the potential generational epigenetic, the downturn on everything because there's a lack of food coming in. The body is basically in survival mode rather than that there's this cap on the number of calories that you can burn in a day. Yeah, I think that we can definitely point out two things. I do think that there's a constraint to energy expenditure. I just don't think that these individuals, that is the reason that they have a

26:21
a lower than expected total daily energy expenditure. Really, when you look at total daily energy expenditure, the guys are close to 3,000 at 112 pounds. If we had 112-pound woman, which would be the most easy comparison because most men in the US or in any industrialized countries are not going to be 112 pounds. Even so, if we had 112-pound woman, we would say if she can maintain her intake at 27,000 3,000 calories, we'd say she has really high energy expenditure. think really what people are overlooking or the message that has been put out is that

26:51
despite the fact that the Hadza are so active as compared to the sedentary Westerners, they still didn't have higher total daily energy expenditure. My whole thing is, but they didn't have significantly different energy expenditure and they're significantly smaller. They are getting a benefit from added activity. It's just that there's a constraint due to body weight, due to metabolic adaptations. I think that's something that really needs to be disentangled in this literature. Now, keep in mind, this entire model was only put forth in 2016. This initial data came out in 2012.

27:20
There's another 2015 study on the biology of energy conservation, and then the Contrain actual model came out in 2016. This is less than 10 years, and people have run with this. What I find interesting about this is in no other area of the literature would we have, except the lean mass hyper responders, which we don't get into, have people with such a small database really run with a lot of claims. I'm not saying that that's Ponser's fault. What I'm saying is that he put a message out. The media took this and have really promoted it like it's something that's really well-substantiated where we're to go through evidence, which I...

27:50
wholeheartedly believe, disprove this and refute this. Well, it's super interesting and we will get there almost immediately. it is interesting. There are a lot of things actually, Brandon, that I see. And I see it a lot actually when I'm reading research papers is that a claim is made and there is a reference to that claim. And then you go to the reference and that reference doesn't actually support it at all, but it's almost just blindly accepted. And I think this is the problem with, unfortunately, this is where we're at with

28:19
scientific research and with what is put out there in the peer-reviewed published papers. Cliff and I, we looked at one that was put out on female athlete requirements last year. We just even followed a couple of the claims and we were like, I cannot believe that this even got published. It was just, unfortunately, dare I say, a bit of an indictment on the field that this is happening. But I mean, all that to say,

28:48
All that aside, let's go through the evidence that refutes it. Absolutely. So really when it comes down to looking at evidence, would you rather us go through the evidence he uses to reinforce his argument and the holes in that, or would you rather just go through the evidence that refutes essentially the argument that exercise is useless for weight loss? I think the latter, Brendan, because I do think that people are... I think that's the more...

29:17
Even to your point of what you just said about the body weights just blows, know, blew my mind when I was listening to that, you and Lyle discussed that. But unless you felt like it was necessary for us to go through more of the limitations, I'd love to hear the evidence it refutes. Yeah, we can go through, definitely. I'll go through some studies I have off the top of my head, which I also send you on why exercise is useful. And I'll give some substantiated claims. But then if you want to double back to some of the evidence that he uses, because I know that he covered some of those in...

29:45
his conversation with you. And I just saw some holes in leaving things out that need to be pressed upon. Okay. Actually, I'm so sorry to interrupt, but the Westerturf, the aerobic, the half marathon study? Yes. Do you want to review that? Yes, please. All right. Absolutely. All right. So we're going to go through Westerturf. And this is often referred to as the half marathon study. And I'll give you some context behind it. And this was something you guys briefly touched over. And then you went to the Midwest. And I'm going to cover that one too, because

30:12
That one has even more flaws than the Westerterp study. Oh, brilliant. Essentially, the Westerterp study, which is often, you'll hear this in pop culture references, that has a half marathon study. And what they did was they put men and women through a 44-week running program, gradually building them up to training for a half marathon. And at the end of those 44 weeks, they actually competed in a half marathon. So it's important to realize that because there was actually the last six weeks of that, it was a tapering program. And really what it came out to is the results found that total daily energy expenditure increased by 669 calories in men.

30:42
and 430 calories in women. Now this study had both men and women running the same distances per session. And it's important to hit on that and to realize that that's why their total daily energy expenditure increases were different as women on average burn less calories for the same distance and duration of aerobic activity than men do. So in any study, there used to be this big theory back in the 90s and early 2000s that women did not respond to exercise as well, nor did they lose weight in response to exercises.

31:09
well as men. That was because it was duration studies, meaning they would have five times a week, they would do a 45-minute session. Well, yes, women are lighter. They have less energy output or less power output. They're going to burn less calories per session. Now, when you equate those and you put – and we'll discuss this in the next studies, which are by Donnelly. When you really equate things and they say, all right, men and women are going to burn either 400 or 600 calories per session, we see almost equivalent weight loss. That's a limitation we also have to hit on.

31:37
increases in total alien injury expenditure closely match what would be predicted by the additive model based on their activity levels. Now, there was no strong evidence of compensation other than a slight decrease in sleeping metabolic rate in men, but that was around. Now, there's different figures that are thrown around. Some say 47, some say 74, and the highest that I've ever seen in a review on this study was 100 calories. Now, that was only seen in the men. Now, this also uses evidence that

32:03
Exercise doesn't lead to weight loss, especially in women, but in actuality, the men and women in the study recons, meaning they lost fat and they built muscle. So men lost 3.8 kilograms of fat mass and gained 1.6 kilograms of lean mass, while the women lost two kilograms of fat mass and gained 1.2 kilograms of lean mass. So even though the study is often cited as showing a constraint, what it actually shows is that energy expenditure increased as expected. And as activity went up,

32:28
so did their calorie burn. The only constraint would yet again be body weight because women on average had a lower body weight. Now we'll go into the Midwest exercise trial and there's multiple versions of this. to speak about the Midwest exercise trial two that's by Donnelly, which is the initial one. And then I'll go through the reanalysis because this study has been pulled apart many times over the years in terms of reanalysis data to really be able to give you guys more of an all-inclusive and all-encompassing viewpoint on this. So the Midwest exercise trial two was a 10 month exercise only intervention where overweight, obese,

32:58
or obese adults were randomized into two groups. One group was set to burn 400 calories per session. The other group burned 600 calories per session. Now, it's important to note this. There was no dietary changes made, just exercise. They essentially told them, follow your current diet, which we know in the real world, oftentimes that doesn't happen. There's compensation, things of that sort, but we'll discuss that. Now, they actually did a dose response of this. So, exercise expenditure progressed from 150 calories per session to the target exercise expenditure.

33:27
400 or 600 calories per session at the end of month four. So, was only six months that they were either exercising 400 calories per session or 600 calories per session. But in both conditions, they were training five days per week. Now, the results found that the 600 calorie per session group lost 5.2 kilograms, the 400 calorie per session group lost 3.9 kilograms, and the control group who didn't exercise, they were just there in the intervention, they gained 0.5 kilograms, which is very normal because as I mentioned before,

33:55
People of industrialized countries gain between 0.5 to 1 kilogram per year. This was a 10-month study. So if you look at that, the 600-calorie group lost more weight than the 400-calorie group, but the 400-calorie group lost more weight than the control group that didn't exercise at all. So we're seeing a clear dose-response relationship. More exercise led to more fat loss, even without dietary changes. Yet, and this is where I kind of have an issue with this, is in these books, or in his book, or even in his published work, this is often cited as proof that exercise doesn't work. And I understand why.

34:25
And this is where a lot of people aren't really reading and looking into it. And it's because the weight loss wasn't as dramatic as some expected. But that's where you have to really look into the context behind this. These were ad-libinum diets with absolutely no dietary intervention. So compensation could have been through food intake. And another re-analysis of this data found that the people that were quote unquote non-responders or had the least weight loss were actually those that compensated in two areas most, meaning they increased their energy intake.

34:52
in response to exercise the most, and they also decreased their non-exercise physical activity the most. Now, there's a secondary analysis of the same Midwest II data set, but they looked at this a little bit differently. And I'll break it down for you guys. It's not really important in terms of the context of this conversation, but they looked at early morning, late and sporadic exercise timing. Well, they found that the early group lost 7.2 % of body weight, the sporadic group lost 5.5 % of body weight, and the late group only lost 2.1 % of body weight. Now, the participants in the early exercise group who are the most adherent group,

35:22
They lost an average of 13.5 pounds of fat mass in 10 months without any dietary change. And this was all fat mass. And what's more interesting is total daily energy expenditure still increased modestly in all groups. Now, the reason that that's interesting is that their body weight was actually dropping. And that's not what we see in dieting studies when diet has induced weight loss alone because total daily energy expenditure often lowers during active weight loss. So I'll give you an example. There's a great review. And there's also data just from this group. It's out of Columbia.

35:51
Rosenbaum and Liebel. They did a review in 2010, I believe, and they found that total daily energy expenditure can drop by 25 % with a loss of 10 % of body weight. Now, the highest adherence group lost 7.2 % of body weight, so it's about 70 % of that. But they did not have a decrease in total daily energy expenditure. They actually had an increase in total daily energy expenditure. Why was that? That was because the exercise increased that. Now, I get why he uses this data to his argument. As in these studies,

36:17
was a considerable amount of participants who didn't achieve the expected weight loss thresholds. But I don't think that that's strong evidence of energy compensation or the fact that energy expenditure gets capped. But it's more so that compensation to exercise is real. People who didn't lose as much weight in these studies were often eating more than they were prior to starting the study. So they went from, say, maintenance calories to a surplus. They were moving less outside of training, which lowered the net deficit in and of itself that they were creating through exercise, or they weren't as adherent. And that's where I view this from a coaching perspective. And the advice

36:47
I would give to those out there is if you want to use exercise as a tool for fat loss, you have to monitor total energy intake and your need. Otherwise, compensation can essentially quietly eat away at your deficit. That's not something that I've ever heard. I went through many podcasts that he's been on, a lot of his work. It's almost like this constrained energy model and the constraint to energy expenditure and the capping of energy expenditure is in its own silo. There's no acknowledgement.

37:13
of the fact that energy intake changes, that there's different compensatory increases in response to exercise. There's no acknowledgement of metabolic adaptation. So as people lose weight, their total daily energy expenditure decreases. that would actually, even if you were maintaining the same amount of exercise per unit of kilogram of fat-free mass, you'd be burning less calories. And the other fact is that we're not looking at, when there is a constraint, the fact that low energy availability could be causing that constraint. All of that is just one blowing my mind, but I've got so many

37:42
and things I want to ask you about with it and just your perspective on it. And the first thing I'm thinking about, Brandon, is the early, sporadic, and late exercise. And I wonder behaviorally, if the people who exercised early really felt like they'd sort of achieved something early in the day, sort of bit of an anchor behavior for them to then be a little bit more conscious of what they eat throughout the day. So therefore they're going to see like greater results from that. Like, is that what you sort of take from the

38:12
early exercises, I suppose, more success with fat loss because this is what I'm thinking just from a coaching perspective. I've always say, get it done early. You're much more likely to actually do it. also, you feel like a bit of a rock star. 100%. So from a practical perspective, and I do know that there is some literature on this. I looked into this many years ago. I do think from a practical perspective, I have this mentality and I tell this to clients, if you win your morning, you win your day. I'm a big proponent of

38:40
FACED cardio. And I realized that evidence doesn't bear that out. So if you look at the Brad Schoenfeld study that one of my friends, Alan Aragon, is on, they looked at four weeks of three times per week aerobic training in women. They looked at FACED versus FED cardio. And there was essentially equivalent outcomes. Although if you really dig into the paper, they did see higher fat oxidation in terms of grams per day. And that could lead to some equivalent or some significant outcomes if that study had been elongated or if those individuals had been very lean. Because we know that as we get leaner, it's harder to mobilize.

39:09
transport and oxidize fatty acids. But nonetheless, we know that fast and cardio, in most circumstances, they're going to be equated. However, in a practical perspective, I know that when I start my clients off with early morning fast and cardio, first of all, it shortens their eating window. So it's a time in the day where there's an anorectic effect of exercise, especially aerobic training, where it decreases your appetite. We also know that from the energy flux research, where higher levels of physical activity act as an appetite regulating system. So essentially, when you have low levels of activity, you have

39:36
appetite dysregulation where you're not getting the same satiety signals, but when you get into the zone of balance, essentially, it helps with maintaining a better appetite response to food. actually get greater satiety signals post meal ingestion. so really with the morning exercise group, find that they started their day in a productive way first and foremost. They got their exercise out of the way. And also, if you look at the other analysis, there's an analysis by Herman in 2015 that actually found that those that were more adherent and in the early morning group,

40:04
ended up being more active throughout the day. That doesn't mean they did more exercise, but they did more essentially non-exercise activity so their need was higher. And we actually see in their analysis that those that were in the late group actually had decreased non-exercise physical activity. Now, from a practical perspective, I think to myself, if someone was waiting all day to exercise and they were waiting until the night, they might have been dreading it and almost like conserving energy. Yeah. if that wasn't done explicitly.

40:28
Then the other thing they found that the late exercise group was there was more compensatory eating afterwards. Think about it. We do know that ghrelin signaling is actually higher at the evening. I say this with not trying to joke about this, but no one binge eats in the morning. No one binge eats for breakfast. It's always at night and we actually see that appetite signaling and hunger even on a VAS scale, visual analog scale is higher in the evening. That's often where people lose control. It could have been that the late exercise group, it's multifactorial. early exercise group started really productive and they said, listen,

40:57
I'm going to say more active or they're just subconsciously staying more active, but they don't want to ruin the work that they put in the morning. They really started their day in a productive way and they want to keep that momentum moving forward. And I see that with many clients that I get them on fasted cardio, it really sets up some structure for them. And also it makes it so they have essentially made a smaller eating window first and foremost. They've avoided a time in the morning where they would normally be hungry, but they actually got that anorexic effect. It delayed their morning ingestion of calories by one or two hours. That keeps them more satiate at night because we could redistribute calories.

41:27
But also the fact that those in the lay group actually had the inverse of that. They had the opposite response where they overcompensated with energy intake and they under did their activity throughout the course of the day. So I think practically we could say that some people will feel much more productive, accomplished from that early exercise group. And I do say in practice, I do utilize still regardless of what the research says, morning facet cardio for its fat oxidation effects, for its structure, for starting a day off in a really good...

41:53
It's also something that's easy. There's low barrier to entry. can have someone just literally put on tennis shoes, walk outside, get some morning sunlight exposure, set up their circadian rhythm. There's so many multifaceted benefits of getting active in the morning. I love that you called them tennis shoes. That is hilarious. So no, I agree with you on, and particularly with that late exercise, I kind of think about the mentality of I need to fuel that afternoon training session. So you're actually probably likely to overdo it on food.

42:21
It's almost a conscious decision because I need the energy. But also that I'm just going to sit down all afternoon because I need to conserve for the afternoon session if you hit it. Because of course, you've got all day to bargain with yourself as to why you can't exercise. it's just, I mean, the earlier you get it done, just the more successful it is. And also just from a coaching perspective, I will say that I always try to encourage my clients to do something in the morning, whether that's the resistance training session or that's their

42:50
on road training session. if you actually look at the resistance training literature, there is some literature and this is actually in the sports performance literature, like Olympic athletes and things of that sort where exercise performance peaks in the mid afternoon. That's why we see more of the Olympic records broken in the mid afternoon.

43:06
One time in my life when I was only looking at research and I was only physiology focused, I wasn't thinking psychology. Now I'm 15 years into this, it's completely different. I don't put the cart before the horse. I used to always have clients train in the afternoon. However, I realized that there were so many things that would come up throughout the course of their day that could be limitations to them. It was a barrier to entry that they had to overcome to get there. But I want them to do something that's going to move them forward in terms of getting closer to their goals early in the morning. So on non-training days, I'm always going to have them do fast cardio. On training days, I would rather prefer them to do resistance training because

43:35
We never know what's going to come up across the course of the day. I trained personally at 5.30 AM. I don't need to do that. I set my own schedule now, but I've had that schedule where I've trained so early for so many years because of the fact that I had a corporate job while I was also trying to manage and build my coaching business. And that was a 10-year stint that I had that schedule, waking up at 3 AM, getting to the gym by 5.30 AM after doing all my morning check-ins and things of that sort. And now I know, and I continue this tradition or this schedule and the structure because of the fact that

44:05
I know that there's a lot of things that come across my day, come up across my day that could potentially derail me. And I want to put myself first. I essentially, it's a mentality. There's a great book on this. Pay yourself first. So essentially what I mean by that is I like to tell clients to make a daily deposit. It's almost like a daily, like a penny into their progress bank. And by getting that session, whether it's a cardio session or resistance training session early, done early in the day, you know that you got it done first and foremost. There's a feeling of accomplishment, but also you don't have to worry about something potentially.

44:34
veering you off track and then you missing that session, having to make it up and also feeling the guilt that comes along with that. So I think that there's both physiological benefits, psychological benefits, but also what really matters, especially to me, is behavioral benefits. Oh, 100%. And I know if I've ever gotten afternoon, like last night, we had a gym session in the afternoon. And but I'm always going to do something in the morning, like because actually

44:59
The likelihood of me doing something in the afternoon is always so much higher if I've done it in the morning. And not all of us are Olympic athletes. In fact, that's a ridiculous thing to say. 99.9 % of us are not Olympic athletes. And it doesn't actually matter if you're not going to be at peak performance. You're totally right, Brandy. But here's the thing with that. So initially, initial research on resistance training, sorry, I had to double back to that. No, another. The initial research on resistance training was that outcomes in terms of strength progression were inferior.

45:28
in the morning as compared to the afternoon. And then if you actually look at those studies, they did a series of studies on that. Initially, what was ending up happening, they were taking people that generally would work out in the afternoon or evening, and they were placing them into the morning. And so there was essentially trying to, they were really in a place or in a state where they weren't adapted to that early morning training. So they were tired and they were having decreases or decrements in their performance, which I will note can easily be overcome by caffeine, the ingestion of caffeine. However, in addition to that, they've done more

45:58
what I would say is more extensive or more exclusive studies on that topic. And what they found is that you can easily acclimate if you train the morning consistently over time. So yes, maybe the first week that you'll feel a little groggy or sluggish because you're used to be sleeping during that time, or the fact that you're not used to being at peak performance. It's a different gym environment. It's different people. You don't have the same atmosphere. However, within a week or two, you completely acclimate. And I can say that both from the literature, but also from

46:26
having done that with clients where I've transitioned them. Hey, listen, we're going to start with three mornings a week. We're going to get your resistance training session in early in the morning prior to going to work because I've noticed that when we leave it to the evening or the afternoon, something comes up to kids, you have to stay late at work and either you're skipping the session or you're having a dramatically shorter session that isn't as effective and you're burnt out, you're suffering from mental fatigue, which is another area of the literature that we actually see that mental fatigue, even from monotonous tasks that you do on your computer, whether that's be

46:54
answering emails or being in business meetings and things of that sort can actually decrease performance in a resistance training session. So we're having multifactorial benefits by just shifting it to the morning and you will acclimate to it. that's a message to people out there. Yes, the Olympic athletes, they're going to want peak performance because they're utilizing a four-year training cycle to peak for one day. However, you're not an Olympic athlete. You don't need to worry about that. And also your body will acclimate and you'll have the same results in terms... We see that in literature in terms of strength progressions and lean body mass progressions.

47:23
when you acclimate to training in the morning as compared to the afternoon. Yeah, I love it. And we are so off a tangent. But one thing I need you to address because you mentioned fasted cardio. What about for women?

47:35
in terms of, well, first and foremost, the literature on fatty cardio, a lot of it is on women. I don't see there being a disadvantageous effect. I do know that there are some claims out there about cortisol causing some issues. some of them are really, I'm trying not to be offensive here. Yes, outlandish is a great way to put it. Essentially that it's going to increase cortisol production, which we see in cardio studies in and of itself. We have to realize that

48:02
Cortisol is not only an energy-deliberating hormone, but it's trying to get substrate into the system. There are some claims, and I've seen these made, where if women do fasted cardio, they will increase cortisol production, it will cause belly fat, and they'll also lose lean mass. That's just not something that we see buried out in the literature. To be in a state of hyperhormozolism to actually lose lean mass, you would have something like an actual disease, first and foremost, like Cushing's or something of that sort.

48:30
Second of all, we do not see that substantial of an increase in cortisol from cardio, especially if we're talking low intensity cardio, which is usually what I recommend. I hate cardio. do like having people a little bit more well-fueled just because it's glycolytic activity. if we're talking about low intensity, steady state cardio, whether that be a jog, a walk, an incline walk, whatever it may be, I don't think any of you have to worry. It's going to increase. It's going to help with insulin sensitivity. It's going to help with nutrient partitioning. It's going to help with metabolic flexibility. And so that is not something that I ever see being an issue. And I'll tell you, as someone that has coached...

48:59
hundreds upon hundreds of women, I've never seen that be a limitation, nor, and this is another thing where a lot of people will make that claim that there's this weird claim or cardio increases fat gain. That's never been seen in any literature, nor is that seen, I'll tell you, as someone that was a bodybuilder myself, many of us utilize morning fasted cardio and post-workout cardio. Bodybuilders are the leanest individual out there. And yes, there's a lot of factors that go into that, but it's certainly not causing belly fat or whatever it may be. Okay, thank you. I'm so sorry. I just knew that people would be listening to you.

49:28
talking about fasted cardio and the number one question that will pop into the head is, yeah, but what about females? So thank you so much for addressing You know what, we're going to talk about cardio next in terms of females' response to it. And we'll go into some literature which shows by exercise alone that it does have a substantial effect on total daily energy expenditure and on fat loss. Amazing. Let's go there now. Perfect. So like we just discussed, we've already went over some of the studies that are used in support of this constrained model.

49:57
I think it's important to look at well-controlled studies that would actually refute this. It's not that these were designed, these were actually studies from the early 2000s. It wasn't that they were designed to refute this, but they really do show the limitations of this model. These are studies where they put people at maintenance and then increase their aerobic training to test the claims that adding exercise doesn't meaningfully impact or increase total daily energy expenditure and are ineffective for fat loss. Ross and colleagues have done two controlled studies that show that when energy intake is controlled, exercise can drive substantial reductions in body fat.

50:27
even the absence of dietary restriction. So in the first one, this is a men's only study, but I'm going to go through a female only study as well. this lab has done both. So I do want to make this applicable to both sexes because I work with both. But in the first study, this is 2000 study, they took 52 obese men and they were randomized into either a diet only group or an exercise only group that had no dietary change. Now over three months, the diet and exercise groups lost the same amount of body fat.

50:51
was around 16.5 pounds, but the exercise-only group lost more fat mass and preserved more lean mass. Now, I wanted to know about the energy increase in terms of the total energy expenditure. Luckily, there's a researcher named Diana Thomas that does all these mathematical modeling work. She did a reanalysis of this. In a 2014 review, she reanalysed this study to look at the energy expenditure levels and found that the prescribed energy expenditure from exercise was supposed to be 700 calories per day.

51:19
And their actual energy imbalance, which was back calculated by their weight loss, was 701 calories per session. So not only did exercise result in weight loss, but it produced better body composition change compared to diet alone. Then four years later in 2004, the same group ran a similar study with premenopausal women who had abdominal obesity. The exercise-only group lost 6.5 % of their body weight, which was again the same as the diet-only group, but with no dietary changes. So they just kept them at maintenance and then induced the deficit from exercise alone.

51:48
And just like in the men's study, the fat loss was greater in the exercise group, particularly in the abdominal region. So this is an example of women doing cardio and losing abdominal fat and this working. Now, this was also reanalyzed by Thomas and colleagues, and they reported that the prescribed exercise expenditure was supposed to be 517 calories per session, whereas the actual energy imbalance was 641 calories per session. So across both sexes, we see a consistent pattern. Exercise alone in the absence of dietary restriction

52:16
drive substantial fat loss as long as energy intake is controlled. And this is due to the exercise's effects on total daily energy expenditure. Because we're creating a deficit. Yes, because we're increasing total daily energy expenditure because exercise is effective for doing so. So if you really think about the findings of these studies, they completely contradict the idea that physical activity has little to no bearing on body composition change and total daily energy expenditure, which is often what's put out by those that support this model.

52:44
And really what it highlights is that exercise is a powerful tool, especially when you combine it with a structured plan and a high degree of nutritional awareness, because these were individuals that were actually maintaining their baseline diet. And that's where we see the efficacy of exercise because they're not compensating with eating more calories in response to that exercise. Yeah, totally. And I heard you and Lyle talk, and Lyle had a great phrase called exercise, what he called an exercise credit, which is speaking to the other side of the things where you just save.

53:13
because you exercise, you decide to be completely lazy for the rest of the day. But what I have seen a lot in people who do embark on a training program for a half marathon or whatever, absolutely, well, both they overcompensate, I need extra energy, so I need these extra calories. But also, when you do a long run, you're like, oh, I deserve a treat. And that treat, if you're not mindful of what's going on, or you just don't have that awareness of

53:42
what's actually in food. Very easy to then end up in a calorie surplus. And to that point, I gained five kilos when I trained for my first marathon. I can't remember the pasta party the night before and I'm going, can't fit my jeans, which was the absolute, absolutely the unintended consequence of both the, of much more so of the sort of like the treats that I was having because I was running. And also of course the

54:11
over fueling during my runs. No, I can't tell you how common that is. So when I first started in this industry, I initially started as a personal trainer. And so I always used to first focus on exercise first. And then when I started getting more and more into nutrition, I was actually studying it. I started integrating nutritional programming and manipulation to my personal training clients. And I realized very early on, and especially when I started to really start doing more dietary.

54:37
advice and guidance of my clients, but I was getting better results. And I thought to myself, let me trace back what was actually happening. I was using exercise as the main modality to manage body composition. A lot of times these people came to me, they didn't really care about being jacked. They wanted to lose weight and it wasn't working. And that was because they were compensating from an energy intake perspective. And now being a nutritionist and now having, you know, coached online for 13 years at this point, coach people over 15 overall.

55:01
I lead first with nutrition first. I manipulate the diet first and foremost. I build out a nutrient-dense diet. I really focus on that as the fundamental. The reason why I do that is actually not only because it leads to better results, but because I really have this ideology where every person has to eat. Not every person is going to exercise or going to really push exercise. I've had to come to grips with that because I am a meathead, I'm a bodybuilder. I was telling that. I love training. However, I had to kind of reformulate or...

55:26
of like adjust my stance over the years as I've gotten deeper and deeper into this industry because I work with such a wide variety of individuals and I have to realize that exercise sometimes isn't going to be a modality that they're willing to get right into off the bat, but I can manipulate their diet and cause some positive changes. And really what I've seen is as people lose weight, they're more likely to exercise, they feel better about themselves, they have more confidence, they're getting into the gym. And then we can use a multimodal approach where we combine both diet and exercise to really maximize outcomes.

55:52
But before that, if I was only doing the exercise and then I wasn't adjusting or really keeping them accountable to their nutrition or keeping them aware. And that's something I do now where I'm saying, you know, I get people into this high energy flux state, which we've spoken about at another podcast we've done. But I talk about eating more and moving more. it's it's a intrinsic and it's an integrated approach where I'm increasing both and making sure that biofeedback, their body weight, their training performance, all these things are going in the same positive direction. It isn't just, you know, compensating for eating or

56:22
doing extra cardio to have cheeseburgers or cheesecake. It is really having a fully integrated approach and realizing that we have to be aware of all components. So just like you may be tracking your steps, you're tracking your aerobic activity in terms of time, duration, energy expenditure, all those things, we also have to track our energy and take a response to that. We have to track all these other components, our body weight, and really take a more all-encompassing viewpoint on these topics or these activities.

56:47
that you get the best bang for your buck and you don't conflate, hey, I did exercise, but now I'm gaining weight. This doesn't work. No, there's other factors that we have to take into consideration. That's really where coaching comes in. Because you're able to have someone objective in your corner that says, hey, this should actually, your weight should be going down, Mickey. You're in a marathon. You're training for a marathon. You're doing a high level of endurance activity. You should have high energy expenditure. But what's going on in the actual fueling side?

57:11
We want to make sure you're adequately fueled, you're not in a low state of energy availability, but we also want to make sure that your body weight isn't going up and actually decreasing your likelihood to really exceed your previous performance. Yeah. And I don't know, to that point, if I think about how I've looked at that Westerter study in the past, and I've absolutely fallen for that doesn't really change your energy. Something happens on the background that you're not even burning even more calories when you...

57:39
when you train for a half marathon, whereas the much more likely explanation is that people are just eating a whole lot more so their weight's not changing. So that is a 44-week study. actually, around week 20, they found that their energy intake was baseline, meaning they were right around maintenance. After week 20, so for more than half the duration, the last 24 weeks, which is six-month duration, they were actually increasing their energy intake across the course of that phase. Now, that can be multifactorial. It could be that their training got harder, and so they tried to compensate for it.

58:08
It could be the fact that they had lost some of the weight early on, so they were having adaptive changes in their appetite signaling. We know that as weight loss occurs, leptin signaling goes down. We actually see leptin going down in the absence of weight loss in women, especially in comparison to men. That may be due to the fact that women naturally have higher leptin levels due to having higher body fat levels. There's literature that the literature doesn't really disentangle that. It could be an amalgamation of factors.

58:36
If that study ended itself and then some of the re-analysis and some of the reviews on that, that actually is used as evidence for energy intake compensation, not energy compensation from the constrained model perspective. We do see that people were starting to eat more, especially women. What's very interesting about that literature is that if you actually look at compensatory eating, in response, especially to exercise, we actually see that more predominantly with females than we do males. I don't know the reason as to why that is. It could be more of an emotional, a psychological perspective.

59:05
is something that's quite common. We always have to really dig into the research because if you're going to use something to substantiate a claim or to reinforce something that you believe, you have to look at the entire, not only the entire body of evidence, but if you're going to use a very particular, so the Western Shepard study that's a half marathon study, we got to look at every factor that was included in that. have to look at the limitations, the strengths, the weaknesses of that study. Then also, what are the potential limitations on that? Yes, there was somewhat of a constraint in the men with the sleeping metabolic rate, but it was in the area of 47 to 100 calories.

59:34
Now, their actual energy expenditure when measured was up 669 calories. So, say it was at the maximum constraint at sleeping metabolic rate, went down 100 calories. They still had a net increase of 569 calories, which is quite substantial. So, we have to really disentangle these things and not just take, they had a decrease. Sleeping metabolic rate is not something we generally measure, but people will just say, hey, they had a decrease in metabolic rate. All right, well, they had a total increase in total daily energy expenditure. So, we also have to acknowledge that, and that's something that I'm seeing lacking in the presentation of this data to reinforce this model.

01:00:04
It's interesting that you talk about women being much more likely to compensate from an energy intake perspective. My coaching head immediately thinks that as a woman, you're so used to cutting back everything. You're in this deprivation mindset. It's a very restrictive place with food a lot of the time. Then you're going into exercise thinking, I'm going to lose a few kilos. But then I think just that reward

01:00:30
mindset is probably a lot higher. Whereas men don't think about food the same way women do. I mean, I don't need to tell you that. You know that, you know, like it's just, it's an entirely different mindset. Obviously I'm generalizing. There are people who will not fit this model, but the ones that the women who tend to struggle in and around this area, I feel they put food on a much higher pedestal and put those reward foods on a much higher pedestal. Yeah, I couldn't have said it better. So Brandon, I really want to be respectful of your time. So I don't, I...

01:00:58
that we're going to get through everything, but is there one more concept that we need to understand better in order to appreciate the limitations of the whole constrained energy model that we haven't covered? Yeah, I think there's two concepts that would be really applicable, I believe. And you can correct me if I'm wrong. I know that I've been on many times, but you have a large amount of endurance athletes. Is that true in terms of your audience? % true. 100 So that is not my area of expertise, but I have dug into literature and I will give you guys something

01:01:27
that many people that speak about the constrained energy model do not acknowledge. And that is something called metabolic scope and the maximum sustainable energy expenditure. And this is where we really get into, you had asked me a question, it was something to the realm of, is there like a threshold effect or is there a dose response effect where like we start seeing a constraint and it kind of kicks in. And so, you know, there is evidence that at a certain point the body begins to adapt to high levels of physical activity by conserving energy elsewhere. But that threshold is actually a lot higher than most people think.

01:01:56
And the issue is that many make the contrained model seem like this small window of calories you can burn until you can't burn anymore. But if you were to mathematically figure it out, most of us would never have the time or energy to train enough to hit the enormously high amounts of physical activity needed to hit the contrained limit. Nor would we be able to do consistently, do so consistently, to actually reach a meaningful constraint that would actually have implications on our body weight, on our body composition, and on other aspects of the things that we're going for in terms of goals.

01:02:25
And this is where the concepts of metabolic scope and maximum sustainable energy expenditure become important. So I do want to hit on some of the definitional terms of this because it's something that it is in some literature, but a lot of people don't point it out when they get on podcast. So metabolic scope, just to simply make this or make this as simple as possible, it refers to the ratio between your total daily energy expenditure and resting metabolic rate. And it can be calculated by taking our basal metabolic rate and multiplying it by our physical activity level. And this will vary on the degree of activity. So if you're less active,

01:02:53
You have a lower metabolic scope and those who are more active have a higher metabolic scope. Now the concept that goes along with it is maximum sustainable energy expenditure and it's intertwined with this metabolic scope and it tells us how far above your basal needs your body can function over for a sustained period of time. And this is where there was a paper I sent you on making it by Thurber and colleagues for anyone that's interested. And this is a paper that Ponser is an author on.

01:03:16
They compiled measurements of total daily energy expenditure and basal metabolic rate from various endurance events. And this range from half-day activities to multi-month endeavors. They found that energy expenditure did start to fall off after a certain point, but not because the athletes weren't moving or it was because of essentially a constraint, but because their bodies couldn't keep up their fuel demands. And that's what's identified as an elementary limit. And really what that means is we basically have a ceiling on how many calories

01:03:41
digestive system can absorb and process on a consistent basis. So, we're essentially having a cap in terms of our fuel availability for those activities. However, they found that over shorter time scales that some athletes in 11-hour triathlons had a metabolic scope of 9.4 times BMR and those running 25-hour ultra marathons had a metabolic scope of 8.5 times BMR. However, the ceiling of maximal sustainable energy expenditure, and I really want people to understand this concept, the ceiling

01:04:08
for what we can sustain on say a daily basis is around 2.5 times BMR and in some athletes it can go up to three times BMR. But this means on a consistent basis, an individual can burn 2.5 times their BMR in activity. Now it's important to acknowledge this maximum metabolic scope value of being 2.5 BMR as this is where a significant constraint can occur. And the reason why I think it's important to point this out is because let's give some real world context. I'll give you myself.

01:04:35
I had around a basal metabolic rate of 2000 calories per day. So my maximum sustainable energy expenditure would be 5000 calories per day. For a woman like yourself, Mickey, I'm going to guess your BMR is somewhere in the range of 1600 calories per day. And the max amount of calories you'd be able to burn per day, day in and day out is 4000 calories per day. Now here's the thing, for you or I to burn 45,000 calories a day, we'd have to exercise for four to five hours plus a day, which isn't even realistic as fitness professionals. Like we do this as a living. And so most of those listening to this podcast,

01:05:04
may only reach their maximum metabolic scope one day per week when they have a really active day where they do a resistance training session, they do a cardio session, they go on a long hike that's hours long with their family, or they're playing sports and they're in an intramural activity, but they're not going to do so on a consistent basis. So they're never going to consistently hit this constraint that most are worried about. So most of you out there never have to worry about reaching this constraint as you don't have the time, the energy or desire to do so. However, I do want to touch on some of the endurance athlete data because I know that you interact with lot of individuals

01:05:33
do exercise a ton and that are going to be outliers to this. And that's where the data that the paper presents on the race across America is really interesting. So in this third-over paper, they looked at the race across America, which had athletes run approximately one marathon per day for six days a week for 20 weeks. And they used a doubly labeled water method to measure total daily energy expenditure in six of these athletes. And what they did was they measured them before the start of the race, during the first week of the race, and during the final week of the race, which was week 20.

01:06:00
they found that they had an average total daily energy expenditure of 3,000 calories. In week one, after one week of essentially running a marathon a day, their total daily energy expenditure had went up to 6,200 calories per day. And by week 20, their total daily energy expenditure was still over 5,000 calories per day. So they did find a reduction, but most of the reduction they found in total daily energy expenditure among these subjects was attributed to reduced body mass and daily mileage. Now, even after accounting for those changes, by week 20, there was a decrease of 596 calories,

01:06:31
more than was expected from week one to week 20. So there is a constraint here, but that's because they consistently exceeded the maximum sustainable metabolic scope. So when you actually look into the data and you pull up the supplementary files, you'll see that their metabolic scope went from 1.76 to 3.76 times BMR at the end of week one, which surpassed that 2.5 times BMR threshold. And across the entire 20-week race, they had an average metabolic scope of 3.11 times BMR. And so yes, this constraint does exist.

01:06:59
but it only shows up in context of extreme sustained activity. And to be honest, most people are nowhere near there. And even those who are endurance athletes, they aren't running a marathon a day, six days a week. Because if you really think about that from a training volume perspective, I want to say that's in the realm of over 150 miles per week, which most people aren't doing. And so I know that most of the clients I work with and that you work with, they aren't training three to five hours a day. They're trying to get leaner. They're trying to improve their metabolic health. Maybe they're trying to build some muscle or drop 15 to 30 pounds. And for them, the idea that their body is going to compensate by hitting

01:07:29
10,000 calories, 10,000 steps per day, we're doing resistance training and aerobic training a few times a week, just isn't grounded in reality. So I think that it's very important that we realize that yes, there's a threshold, but for the vast majority of people listening to this, you're not close to hitting it. And you shouldn't let the existence of a theoretical ceiling stop you from increasing your activity because for most of you out there, doing more is exactly what you need and could benefit from. Yeah, no, I love that, Brandon. I love that you highlighted the endurance-based studies because of course, to your point,

01:07:57
I do work with a lot of athletes and a lot of triathletes. as you described the exercise patterns, they're going to be out for maybe four to six hours on a Saturday and maybe two to three hours on a Sunday. And then throughout the week, it's going to be a lot lower, but it might still be a couple of double sessions. But we might be talking about a couple of hours, maybe two and a half hours split between two. I'm thinking a triathlete here. And then of course, I'm thinking about our multi-stage race that

01:08:27
we've got coming up like in our training cycle, we'll do Friday, Saturday, Sunday, might do anywhere from two to five hours each day across the course. But throughout the week, it's an hour, maybe 90 minutes max on other days. even within the realms of quite a high exercise load, it's still not going to be to the point where we're going to hit that ceiling.

01:08:50
No, 100%. And you're an outlier to that. And many of the people that you're familiar with are outliers and that come on the show. However, I do think it's important to also acknowledge the fact that this constraint is going to be most seen in the context of energy deficit, meaning that you're not adequately fueling yourself. However, if you are to ensure that you're fueling yourself, which many, it's kind of confounded because I could put this one of two ways.

01:09:13
Low energy availability is most likely in endurance athletes because they're training, especially high-level endurance athletes, because they're training so many hours per day and they're trying to keep their body weight essentially suppressed and lower. At the same time, these are the individuals that if they do fuel themselves properly, they are going to be able to get such higher energy expenditures than any other athlete because continuous activity is going to burn so many more calories than someone like myself that does mostly bodybuilding training. So, as long as... message to you guys is even if you do have intense endurance training that you're doing, as long as you fuel yourself adequately, you won't...

01:09:42
have as much of a likelihood to the contraint, but even besides that, then you get yourself out of a state of low energy availability and you're to have better performance. So we have to look at this from a multifactorial basis. also see, and this is another fact or another aspect of the contraint model that many people overlook is actually that the degree or the model that is most applicable actually changes within the context of your energy balance status. So there's a great study. I want to say it's by Willis and colleagues. And really what they found was that

01:10:12
They looked at like it's a large scale study and they pretty much looked at total daily energy expenditure across different individuals. And they wanted to see how well the additive or the constrained model predicted energy expenditure across different states of energy balance. So they looked at deficit, maintenance, and surplus. And what they found was that when participants were eating at maintenance or in a caloric surplus, the additive model explained the data better than the constrained model, which meant that the more activity these individuals did, the more calories they burned, just like we'd expect.

01:10:39
when participants were in a significant calorie deficit, that's where the constrained model started to fit the data more closely, suggesting that compensation is more likely to occur during underfeeding. And so that's the whole thing in terms of you guys doing high levels of endurance activity or myself, like we discussed previously. I take a high energy flux approach and this is where I help clients eat more, move more, and they're sustained higher output because we have better nutrient support. I'm making sure they're well fueled.

01:11:04
So, when someone is appropriately and adequately fueled, the additive model tends to hold, except at the very, very high ends of the energy expenditure spectrum. So, if you're going three point times your BMR and think about someone my size, that would be 6,000 calories a day sustained. That would be an immense amount of activity every single day, day in day out to actually hit that constraint. I think that other things would actually act as a constraint before then. Not being able to maintain my body weight and getting into a place where my performance was suffering, just wear and tear from the actual...

01:11:31
amount of exercise I was doing. So I'd probably be limited by injuries before I would really hit this theoretical constraint where I could no longer burn any more calories. I think that it's great that there's a lot of theory behind this method or this model, but I also think we have to think about the practical reality of it. And most people are not going to hit it. And even those that are, as long as they're doing things, I think in those situations where someone is an extreme endurance athlete, they're going to know that there are certain costs that are paid in terms of the activity you're doing. And they're also going to be very vigilant.

01:11:58
the fact that they need to stay well-fueled. That's where we have such great data from like Asker, Jürgen Drüb, I would say his name wrong, but fueling during this training session itself and actually utilizing both a glucose and fructose blend to increase the amount of carbohydrate that can be absorbed in the system. If we go from one gram per minute in terms of glucose absorption, we can go to 1.5 grams per minute. Or even if we look at these marathon studies where they're getting 100 to 120 grams of carbohydrates in a

01:12:25
liquid form or in essentially an advanced form in these endurance athletes, these marathoners, and then they're able to sustain those higher workloads. And so I think that if you're someone that is an endurance athlete and is very extreme in terms of your training, you have to make the provisions to fuel yourself effectively so you don't hit this constraint. But oftentimes, at the same time, I can make the inverse argument because many times if someone's doing that high level of an activity, they're doing that activity to actually

01:12:52
better their performance, they're not utilizing exercise or that modality of exercise to elicit more weight loss. Yeah, that's a hundred percent right. You're right. it's the really, and if you can't sustain that level of fueling, and I certainly, that's not how I operate, like you and I just operate differently like that, then it's the recovery aspect of making sure you're getting your nutrients in post workout and...

01:13:14
That's where I would differ there with regards to the fueling aspect. In light of the GI issues sustained by mere mortals who are trying to get in that level of fueling, when you're not an elite male young athlete who we've studied in the area of fueling up to that's like 120 grams, et cetera. Absolutely. But I think when it really comes down to it, for the majority of individuals that are listening to this podcast and trying to derive a benefit from it, because when we really, we have to consider our audiences.

01:13:41
I have to consider the fact that my audience is a wide spectrum. have worked with everyone from professional bodybuilders that I've put on the Olympia stages to the highest level of the sport to Lifestyle, Lisa and Genpop Gym to corporate executives. But when I really look back, even though I have worked with very high level professional athletes, including those in bodybuilding, in football, in MMA, really when it comes down to the majority of clients I've worked with over 1100 at this point, the vast majority have been lifestyle clients. so...

01:14:06
When I really think about how I'm going to depict a model or data or how I'm going to come across to an audience, I have to think about what is the best message for the better good for the majority of individuals. And when it really comes down to a podcast audience and, know, Mickey, I've had the great pleasure of being on your show multiple times and I've received feedback from individuals in your audience. And most of them are lifestyle clients trying to look better, feel better, function better. They're trying to lose some fat. They're trying to gain some muscle. And there's someone that

01:14:31
Their biggest constraint, quote unquote, is actually the lifestyle limitations that they have, the children, their business, the stress that they have. It isn't doing too much exercise. And I say that because I don't want you guys out there to believe into this fragility narrative that doing more exercise is not going to have a net benefit because I actually think that message is a net negative for our industry. And reality realize that not only do we have a substantial body of evidence and literature that shows that exercise is beneficial for a multitude.

01:14:58
whether it be for body composition improvement, for maintenance of fat-free mass, for better metabolic regulation in terms of maintaining metabolic rate, as well as if we actually look into the research, there's a great meta-analysis by shoulders and colleagues that actually sees that independently without the increase in lean mass, that resistant training and just engaging in regular resistant training and or aerobic training increases your resting metabolic rate. So there's many components of exercise that have an added effect on your life, on your body composition, and on your ability to show up as the best version of yourself.

01:15:28
The biggest message I want to get out here is that there are great theoretical theories or models that are out there and they do have some validity. I won't dispute that, but I don't think that it applies to the vast majority of you guys out there. And I don't want you to take the claims that you hear, the flashy podcasts, excerpts and titles that say exercise isn't effective for weight loss and take that to heart.

01:15:50
have that discourage you from doing an activity that could be so fruitful in terms of your body composition, your body fat, your metabolic health, all these things, these goals that you have, it could drive you forward if you engage in more exercise or better exercise, smarter exercise, more consistent exercise, more regular exercise. I also don't want you to take away from the information that you hear on this and say, well, exercise doesn't increase my total energy expenditure. It's useless. It isn't. That isn't the case. It's only at very particular levels of real world, like elite level,

01:16:19
athletes that we may see that, but that's not you. So don't take that data and mis-extrapolate it. And that's my biggest thing. I don't like when data is misrepresented, things are left out, or it's applied to a population that it isn't applicable towards. which is why, like even in my show, and Mickey, I know we've had these private conversations, I'm always going to go back to data that reflects the population that they actually studied is the population I work with. And so I always try to go back. That makes it ecologically valid. That leads to what's called translational research, meaning I can translate some of the findings.

01:16:48
and translate it into the real world and really integrate that into the methods and into the practices and the framework that I utilize to coach clients because that's really what matters to me. And also when trying to put out information, I'm really trying to empower through education rather than just putting out something that's flashy and that's controversial and they get a bunch of hits and engagement yet actually leaves people off worse than they were before they listen to it. A hundred percent. you know, at the end of the day, the common sense

01:17:16
explanation is, course, if you're more active, you're going to burn more calories. mean, isn't that just common sense? And a lot of what we discuss and a lot of the big pillars are in fact, those common sense notions that you eat a little less, you move a little more, 100%, you're going to have these improvements in your body composition. And of course, it's always nuanced, but that just makes way more sense than

01:17:44
Exercise is not beneficial for fat loss. 100%. And I think that that's something that I'm very happy that we were able to cover and really get across to your audience because I think it's an important message. I love the fact that you have a ton of researchers on, and I love digging into this. I go back and forth with a bunch of researchers on their papers and stuff, but I also always have to realize what is the practical relevance of this? does this apply to who I'm speaking to? Does this apply to my audience? And when something does come out, and there's been many times there for many years, I covered the topics of metabolic adaptation.

01:18:14
adaptive thermogenesis. And that was because there was a fragility narrative built that there was metabolic damage that essentially you could cause irreparable damage to your metabolism where it was downregulated from eating too less or eating too little. And you were going gain weight from eating too little. You had to eat more to lose more. There was a lot of mysticism and fallacies around that. And these have been topics that I've kind of stood my ground in and made sure that for those that are listening to the content that I put out, that they're more informed and they leave with greater clarity on something that could be incredibly confusing. And I always try to get across the fact that you only know what you know.

01:18:44
and an individual that's following us for educational content or for informational purposes or to be able to integrate some of the things we put out into their day-to-day lifestyle to improve their body composition and their health, they shouldn't have a science, need to have a science background to understand it. Yeah, 100 % Brandon. And look, as I sort of expected, because this happens when we connect is that my mind, like you just are so smart on so many areas that I always tend to go on tangents. So I know that...

01:19:10
that again, you had such a well thought out structure to our conversation and I almost ignored it entirely. But I do think that really you put forth or put across the really important tenets of the conversation. And I will 100 % link to the papers that you discussed here and also your conversation with Lyle. Like I'm only 45 minutes into it because it came up this morning, but

01:19:40
I cannot wait to delve more into it after we bring up the call because that's just got so much more in-depth information for the geeks who really want to get into it like me. So thank you so much, Brandon, for one, being here, and two, all of the work you do to put out this information to help educate practitioners, actually. A lot of your podcasts are really at the level of...

01:20:06
the educated, interested, but also the practitioners. So I'm so thankful for that too. Absolutely, Mickey. I always appreciate our conversations. And you know that since you've met me in person, that I'm always willing to go down a different rabbit hole. And I think that that's a great aspect about podcasting, because we can have a format, we can have an outline. But at end of the day, we want to make sure that the information that comes across is what's best for your audience. I'm always willing to go down a different rabbit hole or whatever it may be. As long as your audience is getting value from it and we're having a great time,

01:20:35
My job is done and I always appreciate your willingness to give me a platform to be able to put out information and educate other people. Amazing. And now where can people find you if they want like individualized advice, which I know that you give? Absolutely. So if you guys are looking for individualized one-on-one coaching, the best way to find me is through my email, which is betacruisefitness at gmail.com. You guys can also find daily content, which is at Brandon Cruz underscore on Instagram. And then another great place to find me if you guys are a podcast fan, because you're listening to this, please

01:21:05
look me up on Spotify. It's the Chasing Clarity Health and Fitness podcast. And I do everything from research deep dives and have great guests on. Mickey has been on herself and I've been very fortunate to be able to create a bunch of guest episodes with experts in their field that I have immense amount of respect for. But they also have practical skills as well. So that's a big thing for me. But I do everything from research deep dives to just practical coaching lessons within my podcast. And that can be found on Spotify or iTunes. And if you guys are a fan of podcasts, I definitely suggest you go over there.

01:21:35
100 % agree with that. Thanks, Brandon. You have a great rest of your day. You too. Later.

01:21:52
Alrighty, hopefully you got from that conversation that the science isn't settled in terms of exercise and its role that it plays in fat loss and then just it is almost common sense that the more calories that you burn through exercise, the more of a deficit is created and that will only enhance your fat loss goals. So just take any message out there that exercise is not that important, take that with a grain of salt.

01:22:19
go back and listen to this podcast, to Brandon's podcast with Lyle MacDonald, just to get a really, a good, deeper understanding of the topic if you're interested. Next week on the podcast, I bring to you a conversation I had, such a fun one, with Tara Ellis from Team Ellis Running, all about her experience with the Marathon majors and gut-related issues of which currants helped her overcome. One of my favorite supplements.

01:22:46
Until then though, can catch me over on Facebook @mikkiwillidenNutrition or Instagram, threads and X @mikkiwilliden. Alright team, you have the best week. See you later.