Eat Stop Eat is an approach to intermittent fasting which centers on sprinkling 24-hour fasts into an otherwise normal lifestyle. The approach was developed by Brad Pilon, author of the book Eat Stop Eat.
According to Pilon’s website, the book is a result of his graduate research at the University of Guelph in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. His research focused on the benefits of short-term fasting, where he discovered that many things he believed were truly turned out to be false. Pilon learned that when you eat has a bigger impact than what you eat.
While getting enough nutrients, vitamins, and minerals is important, beyond hitting those minimums, the details of what a person eats matter very little. Malnutrition just isn’t a problem for most people who have the time to read nutrition blogs, for example. However, simple tweaks regarding when you eat can make a huge difference in your health and body goals.
What Is the Eat-Stop-Eat Diet?
The Eat-Stop-Eat diet is a type of intermittent fasting — aka time-restricted eating. Eat-Stop-Eat falls into the “alternate-day fasting” form of IF. That’s because on the Eat-Stop-Eat diet, you fast once or twice a week, ideally with a complete break from food for 24 hours at a time. For example, you might eat normally until 7 p.m. on a Saturday, then fast until 7 p.m. on Sunday, at which point you can go back to regular eating.
That said, there is some flexibility: If you can’t make it the full 24 hours, Pilon says anywhere between 20 and 24 hours will work.
You should never fast on consecutive days, and you shouldn’t exceed two fasts in any one week. In fact, fasting just once a week could still be beneficial, as you’ll create about a 10 percent calorie deficit, Pilon says.
Eat Stop Eat is designed to work. Not just to work in studies but to work for real people who live in the real world. This book will show you the one oversight every other diet makes and the almost unbelievable answer to the truth about lasting weight loss.
After all my research I am convinced that the answer to long lasting weight loss is not a special food or supplement. It has nothing to do with cutting out fats, carbs, proteins, sugar, salt or any other nutrient.
Eat Stop Eat was designed around three core principles. It had to be effective, it had to be flexible, and it had to be sustainable. After all, what good would a diet be if it wasn’t effective? Or if you couldnt fit it into your life. And a diet would certainly be useless if you couldn’t stay on it!
In fact, with Eat Stop Eat, you’ll never have to count a calorie, measure your food or opt for the ‘light” choices on the menu ever again. You won’t have to skip thanksgiving dinner, and you can enjoy all of your favorite foods.
I was floored when I started reading the research and realizing that the true key to weight loss isn’t months of avoiding your favorite dishes and feeling guilty about every single piece of food you put in your mouth. Just about every diet does – they make you feel guilty for eating…who wants to feel guilty for eating? That’s a recipe for diet failure if I ever saw one.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The Eat Stop Eat program was created by Brad Pilon, who is an expert in health, weight loss and nutrition. He is from Burlington, Ontario which is a small suburb outside of Toronto. He has been passionate about fitness and bodybuilding since he was young and he got a degree in Applied Human Nutrition. He has worked for one of the top supplement companies in the world, which gave him access to a world of professional Bodybuilding.
He then went on to study protein synthesis and leucine, which gave him even more insight into how the human body worked. He researched more and more and developed the Eat Stop Eat program as a way to help people lose weight. His goal is to help everyone who reads his programs to lose weight and build muscle as quickly as possible.
How Does Eat Stop Eat Fasting Work?
Eat stop eat method>involves complete calorie restriction for two days which naturally leads to weight loss. Besides the caloric restriction, which has an immediate effect on weight, the eat stop eat schedule also shrinks your appetite during eating time. It means you consume fewer calories overall.
Practicing it for a long duration reduces the calorie intake in the body leading to weight loss, assuming the level of physical activity remains the same. Of course, if intermittent fasting is combined with exercise, it can speed up the weight loss process.
The Eat Stop Eat Method and Fat Loss
Calorie Deficit
When you try to lose weight, there are numerous factors involved, and one of those is your calorie consumption. You don’t want to restrict calories to lose weight, but a moderate calorie deficit is essential. If you fast twice a week, it may be a more sustainable way to reduce your caloric consumption than restricting your daily calorie intake. Time-restricted eating helps you eat less overall, which means you consume fewer calories. Some studies show intermittent fasting can preserve your lean muscle mass. 24-hour plans like the Eat Stop Eat diet restricts your calories only twice weekly, which can be far less stressful than counting your calories at every meal.
Metabolic Shift
When you don’t fast, your body gets fuel from carbohydrates you eat throughout the day. When you fast for 12 plus hours, your body depletes its glucose stores and shifts to burning fat for energy. This metabolic shift is called ketosis. Studies show a metabolic shift specifically targets fat cells, which helps you lose weight. Fasting for 12 hours can trigger a metabolic shift. A metabolic shift can occur after just 12 hours of fasting, but your body may take longer to switch. The Eat-Stop-Eat claims that a 24-hour fast will make it more likely you’ll enter a ketogenic state. But, there’s no evidence to support the claim.
CONCLUSION
If you want a simple and easy solution for losing weight, this program is for you. If you can simply put food out of your mind for 24 hours (it gets easier the more you do it) then you can be on the path to weight loss.