Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - James Krieger on the Science of Diet Breaks and “Refeeds”

Episode Date: March 13, 2019

The first few weeks of a cut are usually smooth sailing. You aren’t that hungry, your energy levels are good, and you’re still enjoying your workouts. Somewhere around the four- to six-week mark, however, the other shoe begins to drop. You’re starting to feel hungrier leading up to meals and less satisfied after. Your energy levels begin to sag, and especially in the afternoons. You’re no longer progressing in your workouts, which are feeling harder and harder. There are two schools of thought on what to do next: 1. Grit your teeth and keep dieting so you can move on to the fun stuff as soon as possible (maintaining and lean gaining). 2. Take periodic diet breaks where you increase your calorie intake to maintenance for several days or weeks, then continue dieting after your reprieve. Many diet break advocates say that taking a break here and there can speed up your metabolism, help preserve muscle mass, and even “hack” your hormones to supercharge fat loss. Others claim diet breaks offer no real benefit beyond “feeling good” and are only necessary if you’re too “weak” to stay the course. Who’s right? That’s what I ask James Krieger in this episode. James is an accomplished researcher and writer as well as a lifter who knows what it’s like to diet down to extremely low body fat levels, and in this episode he tells you everything you need to know about the real science behind diet breaks and refeeds. In this episode, you’re going to learn: - Why people incorporate diet breaks and “refeeds” into their cutting regimens - How taking diet breaks affects fat loss, muscle retention, and metabolic rate while dieting - When you should or shouldn’t take a diet break - The pros and cons of diet breaks versus continuous calorie restriction - How to take an effective diet break - And more. 6:06 - Why do people do diet breaks? 10:30 - What did your research find regarding diet breaks? 13:52 - For most people, isn’t the bulk of their total daily energy expenditure really their resting metabolic rate? 17:35 - How can you use diet breaks effectively? 24:38 - Is the weight loss related to a reduction of cortisone levels? 25:29 - Where can people find you and your work? Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

break. It's just a nice psychological break. And what that can do, you get a break. And then so when you're ready to go on a deficit again, you're re-motivated, you're feeling better and you feel ready to tackle another deficit again. Why hello, Mike Matthews here from Us For Life and Legion Athletics and welcome to a new episode of the podcast. This time around, I have Mr. James Krieger on to talk about diet breaks. What are diet breaks? Well, the first few weeks of a cut are usually smooth sailing or even the first month or so. You're not that hungry, your energy levels are generally good, and you are still enjoying your workouts and maybe

even progressing as well. You might still be gaining strength for the first month or so, but somewhere around the four to six week mark, the other shoe begins to drop. You start to feel hungrier leading up to meals and less satisfied after them. Your energy levels begin to sag. And especially as the day drags on, especially in the afternoons, you know, that 3, 4, 5 p.m. kind of slump. And you are no longer progressing in your workouts, which are also feeling harder and harder. And there are two schools of thought here on what you should do next. Some people say you just need to grit your teeth and keep dieting so you can move on to the fun stuff as soon as possible, like maintaining and lean gaining.

And other people say that you should take periodic diet breaks where you increase your calorie intake to maintenance for several days or several weeks and then continue dieting after your reprieve. Now, many diet break advocates say that taking a break here and there can speed up your metabolism, help you preserve more muscle as you get leaner, and even hack your hormones to supercharge your fat loss. Other people, however, say that diet breaks don't offer any real physiological benefit beyond just feeling good. It's nice to eat a bit more food after you've been dieting for several weeks, and that it's only necessary to take a diet break if you are just too weak or undedicated to stay the course.

Who is right here? Well, that's what I ask James in this episode. And in case you are not familiar with him, he is an accomplished researcher and writer, as well as a weightlifter who knows what it's like to diet down to very low body fat levels. And in this episode, James is going to tell you everything you need to know about the real science behind diet breaks and refeeds. Specifically, you're going to learn why people incorporate diet breaks and refeeds into their cutting regimens, how taking diet breaks affects fat loss, muscle retention, and metabolic rate while dieting, when you should and shouldn't take a diet break, the pros and cons of diet breaks versus just continuous calorie restriction, how to take an

effective diet break, and more. This is where I would normally plug a sponsor to pay the bills, but I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in. So instead, I'm just going to quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my fitness book for women, Thinner, Leaner, Stronger. Now, this book has sold over 150,000 copies in the last several years, and it has helped thousands of women build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 1,200 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you want to know the biggest lies and myths that keep women from ever achieving the lean, sexy, strong, and healthy bodies they truly desire, and if you want to learn the simple science

of building the ultimate female body, then you want to read Thinner, Leaner, Stronger today, which you can find on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. Now, speaking of Audible, I should also mention that you can actually get the audio book 100% free when you sign up for an Audible account, which I highly recommend that you do if you're not currently listening to audios. I myself love them because they let me make the time that I spend doing things like commuting, prepping food, walking my dog, and so forth into more valuable and productive activities. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer and get my book for free, simply go to www.bitly.com slash free TLS book. And that will take you to Audible. And then you just have to click the sign up today and save button, create your account. And voila, you get to listen to Thinner, Leaner, Stronger for free. All righty. That is enough shameless plugging for now, at least.

Let's get to the show. James, welcome back to my podcast. Thanks for having me again. I'm glad you're here. Yeah. The last time, oh, we spoke about rep ranges and people really got a lot of really good feedback on that. I mean, a good topic obviously to talk about, but you did a really good job just laying out the research and also sharing very practical, simple advice that people could go, cool, I'm now not only smarter, but I can go right to my programming now and make it a little bit better. So that was great. So this time around, we're talking about fat loss and diet breaks, really intermittent calorie deficits, right? So for people listening, we're going to be talking about,

is it better to just maintain a set calorie deficit for a period of time if you want to get lean or really lean, or is it going to be more effective to cycle the calories? So be in a deficit for a certain period of time and then come back somewhere close to maintenance for a period of time just to give yourself a physical and psychological break. And so that's going to be the topic. All right. I will pass the mic to you. All right. So, yeah. You know, people do diet breaks and the reason people tend to do them is, I guess I'll just kind of summarize everything I'm going to talk about just right away. Diet breaks work, but they don't necessarily work for the reasons people think that they do. So I would say in the past two or three years, diet breaks and refeeds have become really popular

in the realm of fat loss, especially with competitors, physique competitors and bodybuilders and things like that. And so what they'll do, obviously, they'll be dieting for a period of time, and then they'll do what's called a refeed, which is basically just a temporary diet break. Sometimes it might just last over a weekend. Sometimes it might last for a week or two weeks. Sometimes it may last longer. And so the idea that a lot of people had behind that was that that would have a hormonal benefit in terms of fat loss. So when you're actively trying to lose fat and you're in an energy deficit, you got one primary hormone that is involved is a hormone called leptin. And leptin is produced by your fat cells.

And so what happens is leptin kind of acts like a lipostat, you know, like how a thermostat works in your home to keep your home, you know, at a certain temperature. Leptin works in a way to try to keep you at a certain body weight. at a certain temperature, leptin works in a way to try to keep you at a certain body weight. And so fat cells produce leptin and they feed back on your brain and tell your brain to adjust its energy expenditure and appetite. What happens is as you lose fat, your leptin levels go down. So what happens is you're not getting the feedback signal to your brain that you're full and things like that. So you feel hungrier, your energy expenditure goes down, your body's trying to conserve energy. And obviously, if you're trying to lose fat, that's not something that you want.

So a lot of people think, well, hey, if you do a refeed or if you have a diet break, it'll help bring your leptin levels back up. Maybe it'll help boost your energy expenditure, may have a benefit on your appetite. And then there's just the psychological aspect, right? I mean, at least it feels good if you've been in a deficit for some period of time just to eat a bunch of carbs. Yeah. And what I'm going to argue here is really the benefit is psychological, not physiological. So a lot of people think the benefit is physiological based on what happens with leptin, because when you do start to feed again, your leptin levels go up. But if you look at the research, the leptin levels really don't go up enough to where it's really going to make any difference. Your leptin levels actually aren't

really restored until you basically gain the fat back that you lost. And obviously, nobody wants to do that. So really, the actual benefit of diet breaks is psychological, right? You've been dieting for a period of time. And dieting is hard, especially if You've been dieting for a period of time and dieting is hard, especially if you're doing it for a long time. And I don't care whether you're a competitor or if you're just a person who just is looking to lose weight for health reasons. When you've been dieting for a while, it takes a psychological toll on you. And so a diet break, it's just a nice psychological break. And what that can do kind of help you get a break. And then so when you're ready to go on a deficit again, you're re-motivated,

you're feeling better, and you feel ready to tackle another deficit again. So I would say, I would argue that's really the primary benefit of diet breaks. I don't think there's convincing evidence to me, at least, that there's a physiological benefit to it. Interesting. And for anybody listening, I guess the reason why you'd have to gain the fat back to get your leptin back to the previous level is because it's produced by body fat, right? So if you have less body fat, you're just going to have less leptin circulating in your body. There's a number of studies that have shown that. You're not going to restore leptin levels to a point where it's make a big difference. Right. And anybody who has gotten really lean and stayed that way for a bit

can probably attest to that. I mean, I know I've experienced that a couple of times when I've died it down to not super lean, but you know, maybe around 7%, like where you want to be for a photo shoot basically, and tried to maintain it. And I found that because I'm not in the gym 10 plus hours a week, I'm exercising maybe four to six hours a week. And that just is what it is. I can only eat so many calories if I want to stay that lean, but it never felt like enough, even though that that's, that was it as far as if I wanted to stay that way, but I felt energy starved. I felt like I was still kind of in a deficit, even though I wasn't. Yeah. And that's it. That's, it's just your body trying to restore

back its body fat levels that it lost. You know, that's what it's trying to do. Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of word of mouth. So if you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it. It really helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say thank you.

You can find me on Instagram at MuscleFor Life Fitness, Twitter at Muscle for Life, and Facebook at Muscle for Life Fitness. Do you want to jump into the details of this? There's a study that was, I think you had covered it in your research review, right? So it was alternating two weeks of 33% calorie restriction with two weeks of maintenance versus continuous restriction for 16 straight weeks. And then, I mean, I would like to hear just your breakdown of that research and then a bit more about why you're saying that you think it's more psychological than physiological. And then we could probably wrap up with, okay, so what are the practical takeaways then? How do we put this into use to make our fitness journeys more enjoyable and more effective?

Yeah. So the study you're talking about, I'm trying to go off memory. It actually had a name. I'm trying to remember the name of the trial, but yeah, I did review it in my research review. And so just as you said, they had two groups and one group basically did two weeks in a deficit followed by two weeks of maintenance. And that was a 33% deficit. And so, so being that they were alternating every two weeks, their total time was ended up being 32 weeks long. So they had 16 weeks of dieting, basically, if you combine it and 16 weeks of maintenance. Let me just share if for just for to jog your memory and also for anybody listening, I pulled it up, james it's intermittent energy restriction improves weight loss efficiency in obese men the matador study the matador yeah

matador as well as trying to think the matador study so so yeah so they had then the other group just did 16 straight weeks of continuous dieting the intermittent group did way better than in terms of weight loss and fat loss than the continuous restriction group. And so a lot of people took this study and they kind of ran, I would say too far with it and started saying, Oh, you know, maybe there's these hormonal benefits to diet breaks and, and maybe there's some benefits to energy expenditure. And they did test resting energy expenditure in the study. And they, by the end of the study, they saw a benefit to resting energy expenditure in the intermittent group. But in my research review, I kind of went into a lot of

detail. I kind of dove into the details of the study. And the resting energy expenditure data was just not as convincing as it might seem at first glance. In fact, the resting energy expenditure was actually better in the continuous group early on in the study. So the resting energy expenditure just wasn't very convincing, especially there's no way that, that the differences that they saw in resting energy expenditure would actually contribute to the, to the large differences in weight loss that they saw. It was just, you know, resting energy expenditure really doesn't play a real strong role in weight in body weight regulation anyway. I mean, it's really more your total daily energy expenditure and your needs and things like that, but they didn't

actually test those things in the study. In most people though, isn't the, really the bulk of their TDE really their RMR? I mean, unless they're very active. Yeah, it is. But the thing is, is that the RMR doesn't change a whole lot with dieting. Ah, okay. Yeah. The whole metabolic damage thing, yeah, is more myth than anything else, right? I mean, yeah, your resting metabolic rate might decrease, but it might decrease by maybe 100, 150 calories. I mean, that's certainly not enough

to stop you from losing weight. Right, right. And that's also certainly not enough to make a big difference, the difference that they saw in the Matador study. And so, you know, when I looked at the methodology of that study, I mean, it was a very well done study. One thing I thought was really great about it is they provided food to the subjects. But

something that needs to be kept in mind is, yeah, they provided the food to the subjects, but these are still free living people living on their own. So that doesn't mean that they're actually consuming exactly the diet that they've been prescribed. And so my opinion on the Matador study, the reason that they saw the differences they did is likely just dietary adherence. I would say the dietary adherence was likely much better in the intermittent group than the continuous group. And if you just think about that, just think about it in terms of if I'm going to ask you to diet for 16 weeks continuously at 33% restriction, that's a pretty large deficit. You're going to have a hell of a time sticking with it. Even if I'm providing

the food for you, you're going to be hungry. You're going to be hungry and you're going to be eating food that I didn't ask you to eat. I mean. Yeah. Yeah. As I say, because I don't know if I've ever really gone above 25% and that was about as far as I mean, yeah. Yeah. As I say, cause I don't know if I've ever really gone above 25% and that was about as far as I wanted to go with it. Yeah. And if I'm going to ask you to do that for 16 weeks, I mean, there's just no way you're going to be able to adhere to that. Now, if I asked you to only do that two weeks at a time, it's much more doable and you're just going to adhere better. And so I would argue the reason they got those results they did in the Matador study, the intermittent group just, I think, did it, had a better dietary adherence just because again, 33% restriction is a hell of a lot easier to do

that for two weeks at a time than 16 weeks straight. Do you remember approximately how much more fat the intermittent group lost? Because they were also dieting for twice as long. That would need to be considered for anybody who was going into it, even if they were like wanting to try to quote unquote replicate what they see right there in the research. Let's not forget that you had mentioned, right, there was 32 weeks for the intermittent group. Yeah, but they weren't only dieting 16 out of that 32 weeks. So, the actual time- Of course. They were still quote unquote dieting for that period though, right? They still had to follow the plan. They couldn't just do whatever for two weeks and then go back to it for two weeks. Yeah, they were still dieting in the sense that they had to

eat what researchers were asking them to eat, but you're still eating a lot more calories, so you're not going to feel as hungry. So it's still going to be easier to adhere. So the cumulative weight loss, it was 14.1 kilograms in the intermittent group and 9.2 kilos in the continuous group. So you're looking at about a five kilogram difference there. I mean, that's about 10 pounds. Pretty significant. Pretty large difference there. It should be considered though that it did take twice as long to get there. And even if for some people they may go, well, an extra 16 weeks, it's just something that should be noted. I mean, there's no way any adaptations in energy expenditure or anything can explain that large of a difference between the groups.

Only dietary adherence can really explain that big of a difference. I mean, I can't think of any other explanation for it. explanation for it. In your opinion, just based on all of your research and also just experience working with people, how do you think it might go if it were a more moderate deficit, let's say something closer to 20%? And I'm assuming, I mean, I didn't ask about macronutrients in this Matador study, but let's say it's also a kind of standard higher protein, higher carbohydrate, this Matador study, but let's say it's also a kind of standard higher protein, higher carbohydrate, more filling diet, right? How do you think that would fare versus the same protocol, but intermittent calorie deficits? I think with a smaller deficit, I don't think you'd see as much of a difference between the groups just because a smaller deficit is easier to adhere to. I think

the big thing was that it's just, it was such a large deficit that yeah, it's just easier to adhere to. I think the big thing was that it was such a large deficit that, yeah, it's just easier to adhere to a large deficit if you're just doing it little bits at a time rather than continuously. Yeah, that makes sense. I guess one key takeaway for anybody listening is if you have heard about this research, I don't know if this made the rounds on social media and so forth, probably did. Don't necessarily think that intermittent calorie deficits is just better, period. There's no reason to be in a continuous calorie deficit. And I guess that'd be a good segue right into some more practical takeaways, how to use diet breaks effectively and how to not just go about it rotely because,

oh, look at this. I should just don't assume that, oh, you should just always, you should be two weeks on two weeks off period. That's how you do it. So, yeah, I think there are some good practical takeaways. I mean, first, I mean, I think diet breaks are a really good thing. I think that can be really helpful to people for periods of time. And, and not only just because as a break from the psychological aspect of dieting, but also even just for, let's say, someone who's overweight or obese, a diet break can be beneficial because you can almost think of it in terms of as a practice for weight maintenance. If you're overweight or obese,

and you're trying to lose fat, and you lose a bunch of fat, and now you want to maintain, I mean, all the research shows that most people are successful at losing weight. It's just keeping it off. That's the hard thing. And so those diet breaks can actually act as a practice for maintenance, really, if you think about it. So I don't think there's any set time. You know, I don't think there's any magical formula for like, oh, well, you should go two weeks on, two weeks off or four weeks on, two weeks off or whatever. I think it totally depends on your goals,

the size of your deficit, how long you're thinking about dieting for. What you're doing in the gym, right? Yeah. What you're doing in the gym. I think all those things will play a role in how frequently you should do diet breaks and things like that. And also just personal preferences too. I mean, there's so many factors I would say that would play a role in a decision on when you should do diet breaks and how often. I don't think there's any set answer for that. Now, I will say that when you do do a diet break, I am a proponent of returning immediately to maintenance, or I would say at least your estimated maintenance for whatever new body

weight you're at. I don't think there's a benefit to that so-and-so called reverse dieting because you're just, all you're doing is prolonging the deficit when you do that. Just interject. So idea of going and just kind of eating by feel, eating whatever you want to eat, that's probably a bad idea because it's probably going to lead to overeating, right? Which might feel good and, but it's just going to prolong the whole process. Yeah. That's the thing. If you're tracking, I would say still keep tracking, tracking your calories and stuff like that. Yeah, don't just eat however much you feel like eating because your body's going to want to go back to its original weight that you were losing at. So,

if you just eat however much you feel like eating, you're going to end up overeating. So, you still got to keep things under control and have some restraint. What I like to do just as a simple tip is I usually I'll take, I like to follow a meal plan when I'm cutting. I just eat the same things every day. I'll make little changes here and there, but it's the easiest way to go about it. And I don't mind it because I can eat stuff I like and what's the big deal. But when I'm going to take a break, which I'll just throw it out there for me, this

is my body, but I've found it pretty workable with at least a lot of people I've worked with is somewhere around the six to eight week mark of being in a deficit. It definitely feels good to just take a little break. And sometimes it's not a full week, even for me, sometimes it's just several days and I feel good again. Maybe that's just my physiology or whatever. I'm just throwing it out there. What I like to do is take my meal plan and really I'll usually just add one or either add one or two meals in, or just take meals that are there and just increase the portions of usually I'm increasing carbs is how I do it. So for what it's worth, that's something simple and practical. Yeah. That's something I do with my clients. Similar thing is our, you know, if I do have

them go back to maintenance i generally have them increase their carb intake maybe a little bit of fat too usually i try to keep protein intake's always high so i just kind of you know basically keep protein intake where it's at and if it protein intake goes up along with it that's fine and i also wanted to note too you know here we're talking in terms of weeks there's no rule it has to be even in terms of weeks you could be a person and i've done this with some people before where you have a diet break basically you know once a week or something like that now that's not a cheat day and that's what i want to make that distinction you know it's not a cheat day it's just a day where you are deliberately going to eat at maintenance

calories rather than in a deficit so yeah i should probably add that actually a caveat even for myself. So the last time my standard where I kind of hover somewhere around 10%, that's comfortable for me. And so last time I dieted down to the seven, six, whatever that somewhere in that range percent, I was actually, now that I think about it, I was doing, I wouldn't say it was, you could, maybe you could call it a refeed. I wasn't quite getting to maintenance. I was eating a lot of carbs though, once a week, cause it would just feel good. And it would feel like, yeah, if nothing else would just feel good to eat a bunch of pancakes and syrup. But I was doing that as well.

And then because of where I started my cut, I think the last time it was maybe a 12 week cut, but somewhere around the six to eight week mark is where I took a few days. I'm like, I'm just going to eat a bit more for a few days. If I remember correctly, I just added my lunch at the time was like a salad with some protein and I added like a side of rice or something, add some carbs there. And then my dinner, I just added some additional carbs there. I think I like ate some oatmeal because I wanted to eat oatmeal and that was pretty much it. That was, and that worked well for me. My workouts were okay. I had good energy levels. I continued to lose fat, no big deal. So it worked. Yeah. And I also think something too, you know, when you do diet breaks, people need to anticipate that their body weight might jump up

just a little bit, but you're not gaining fat when you do that. That's just, you're going to have extra residual food in your digestive tract. And then you may maybe up in your glycogen stores a little bit, carrying a little bit more body water, but that's just perfectly normal. Interestingly, I've even had people, their actually body weight goes down a little bit when they do a diet break, even though they're eating at maintenance calories. So it varies based on the person, but just to be aware. So people don't, like if they're stepping on the scale. So, so it varies based on the person, but just to be aware, like if they're stepping on the scale and all of a sudden, you know, they see the scale go up and they're like, Oh my God, I'm gaining all this fat back. You're not, you know, if you're eating at maintenance calories, you're not going to be gaining a bunch of fat back. So.

Yeah. And do you think the weight going down would be most related to maybe a reduction in cortisol levels? Cause the body is just like, this is nice. I used to think that too, but what's interesting is I actually looked at the research in that area. And actually in my research review, I have a presentation on this. I actually thought for a long time that there'd be cortisol induced water retention. But then when I looked at the studies that looked at dieting and cortisol levels, dieting doesn't really increase cortisol levels, surprisingly.

The only thing that increases cortisol levels is pure fasting. But even if you're on a very low calorie diet, like some of these 800 calorie per day diets that they'll put overweight obese people on, their cortisol levels don't go up. So I think there's something else going on, that whoosh effect that people get sometimes. I can't say what it is. There could be other hormones that are involved. At least it doesn't appear to be cortisol as the primary factor there. Yeah. So why don't we just wrap up with where people can find you and your work, including your research review, where you covered this study and if you have anything else new and exciting that you want to let people know about. So yeah, you just can head to my website, weightology.net. That's W-E-I-G-H-T-O-L-O-G-Y.net.

I've got my research review there and people can subscribe to for a very low monthly fee. And in fact, the study we just talked about, it was a study that was originally just for my research review subscribers, but a number of months ago, I made it publicly available just so for people thinking about subscribing to the research review, you can just see an example of the type of stuff that you might get. So look at that. You can see all my past podcast appearances, including my past appearances with you, Mike. And also all my upcoming speaking engagements are on there.

If any of your listeners happen to be in an area where I'm coming. So yeah, people can find all that stuff. And also all my social media accounts, if people want to follow me, are on there as well. Great. Yeah. And I'll just add as well. Great. Yeah. And I'll just add weightology.net. Go check it out. I've been following your work, James,

for some time and you're on a short list of my favorite people in this space who consistently produce really, really good content. And so I appreciate what you're doing and you've taught me a lot. One of the reasons why

I just like to have you on the podcast because it's easy where I can just go, oh, what are we talking about today? Cool. I'm going to learn something. Teach me something, James. So everybody listening, definitely James, one of the guys, one of the, one of the good guys that you should be following. If you like discussions like these, if you like the, this type of information, you will really like his work. Definitely go check it out. Waitology.net. That's it for now, James. I look forward to our next discussion. Yeah. Thanks for having me. Hey there, it is Mike again. I hope you enjoyed this episode and found it interesting and helpful.

And if you did, and don't mind doing me a favor and want to help me make this the most popular health and fitness podcast on the internet, then please leave a quick review of it on iTunes or wherever you're listening from. This not only convinces people that they should check the show out, it also increases its search visibility and thus helps more people find their way to me and learn how to build their best bodies ever too. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then just subscribe to the podcast and you won't miss out on any of the new goodies. Lastly, if you didn't like something about the show, then definitely shoot me an email at mike at muscleforlife.com and share your thoughts on how you think it could be better. I read everything myself and I'm always looking for constructive feedback, so please do reach out.

All right, that's it. Thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to looking for constructive feedback. So please do reach out. All right, that's it. Thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon. And lastly, this episode is brought to you by me. Seriously though, I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in. So instead I'm going to just quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my fitness book for women, thinner, leaner, stronger. Now this book has sold over 150,000 copies in the last several years, and it has helped thousands of women build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 1,200 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you want to know the biggest lies

and myths that keep women from ever achieving the lean, sexy, strong, and healthy bodies they truly desire, and if you want to learn the simple science of building the ultimate female body, then you want to read Thinner, Leaner, Stronger today, which you can find on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. Now, speaking of Audible, I should also mention that you can actually get the audio book 100% free when you sign up for an Audible account, which I highly recommend that you do if you're not currently listening to audio books. I myself love them because they let me make the time that I spend doing things like commuting, prepping food, walking my dog, and so forth into more valuable and productive activities. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer

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