Subject: My bodyopus experience.week 2 + some rantin Copyright Lyle McDonald 1996 Date: 1996/05/14
Before I get on with this week's summary of things, I need to clear the air about a couple of criticisms I got for the week 1 summary. Perhaps clear the air is the wrong way to put it. I simply want to address some of these criticisms so I don't get them again. Most of the major ones centered around my method of measuring bodyfat. I am using the home calipers which use a one site (supra-iliac) measurement to estimate bodyfat percentage. There seem to be several major criticisms so I'll address them in turn. 1. One site vs several. The standard Jackson-Pollock equations use either a three site (pec, abdomen, and thigh for men or tricep, supra-iliac, and thigh for women) or a seven site (subscapularis, tricep, pec, abdomen, supra-iliac, thigh, and axillary). This is the standard in America. Other equations may use the bicep and medial calf as well as others. I'm not convinced that the one site measurement is wholly accurate. In fact, I'd be very surprised if it gave much more than even a rough estimate of true bodyfat percentage. So, why am I choosing to use it? Well, it's quick and convenient for one. I can take it first thing in the morning on Monday's and be sure of two things: 1. Tester competency and consistency: I am always taking the measurement so I know it's at least consistently done compared to the others (see next section for a discussion of accuracy vs. consistency) 2. Same conditions: I stop carbs at 6pm on Sundays and take my measurements upon awakening (about 8am) on Mondays. Someone adressed the fact that low carb diets cause dehydration (see my third section). Well, assuming I carbed more or less consistently and drank more or less consistently, my hydration level should be more or less consistent since I will have gone about the same amount of time with carbs. 2. Accuracy vs. consistency: As mentioned, the one site measurement has been questioned as far as accuracy is concerned which is valid. However, something that seems to have been forgotten is that no measurement of bodyfat (short of being dissected and weighed) is 100% accurate. All caliper equations are derived from hydrostatic weighing which was derived from dissection of cadavers. This means that there are two levels of estimation that are present. In addition, all of the assumptions that caliper measurements are made under (including homogeneity of skinfold, densities and so forth) are currently being questioned by some researchers. So, truth be told, no caliper measurement is truly accurate. Thus, none of them (whether you do a 7 site or a 1 site) will give you more than relative change anyway. Here's an easier example to understand. We have two scales. When you hop on one, it says you weight 150 lbs. The second says you way 146. Which one is correct? Ask anyone who's dieting and they will tell you the second is correct. The point being that it doesn't really matter which one is 100% accurate. Now you reweigh yourself 4 weeks after dieting and exercising. The first scale shows you at 146. What do you think the second will show? Well, assuming they are both still calibrated correctly, the second should put you 142. Despite the fact that you can't tell which was wholly accurate, as long as you weigh consistently on one scale or the other, you can get an indication of relative change. Of course, if you weighed yourself the first time on the first scale at 150 and the second time on the second scale at 142, you'd think you had lost 8 lbs. Consistency, not accuracy, is what I'm striving for here. (Anyone who wants to see the issue of body composition measurement analyzed is mind-numbing detail is encouraged to pick up Timothy Lohman's "Advances in Body Composition Assessment" from Human Kinetics Publishers.) 3. Dehydration: One individual brought up the fact that dehydration will affect bodyfat measurement and that the low carb diet promotes dehydration. This is correct sort of. Now I have to bore you with some more physiology. For simplicity, the body is frequently divided up into a two compartment model (and, yes, I know there are more complicated models out there but this is the most simplistic). As the name suggests, we differentiate two components which are: 1. Fat mass (FM): this is all fat except for the small amount of essential fat (about 3% in males and roughly 10-12% in females) 2. Fat free mass (FFM) or Lean Body Mass (LBM): Everything else. This includes water, muscle, bone, organs, skin, and everything else in your body. (As an aside, this is what allowed the hucksters at EAS to make such rediculous claims about creatine. The studies found increases in lean body mass with creatine supplementation. While the implication was that the gains were in muscle, if you read the articles closely, they never came out and said that exactly as they couldn't be sure. All they said was the creatine caused gains in LBM but that could just as easily be water. You can increase LBM by eating a bunch of sodium as it causes you to retain water. Which is basically what creatine does as well although the sodium won't make you stronger.) Ok, so what? Well, number one, I'm taking my body comp measurements under similar conditions so hydration or dehydration level should be more or less the same. Again, consistency, not absolute accuracy is what I'm trying to achieve here. Number two, in theory at least, dehydration shouldn't radically affect absolute body fat amounts although percentages will change. Fat is maybe 3% water by weight and the rest is stored triglyceride. So, changes in dehydration with a low carb diet (which are mainly ocurring through dropping of water stored in the muscles anyhow) *shouldn't* be a major factor with skinfold measurements. As a brief aside though, hydration does drastically affect Bioelectrical Impedance bodyfat measurements as it's using total body water to determine bodyfat. Now, my statement about hydration state affecting percentages but not absolute amounts may have some confused. So, here's the explanation. Let's say I have 200 lbs of LBM and 20 lbs of fat (I wish). That is a bodyfat of 20/200 = 10%. Now, I start a low carb diet. During the first 2 days, I drop 5 lbs of water and glycogen (which, recall, is part of the fat free mass component). I now have 20 lbs of fat and 195 lbs of FFM. So, my bodyfat percentage (if measured) should increase to: 20/195 = 10.25%. So, even though the percentage of bodyfat went up, the absolute amount of fat in pounds doesn't change. This is yet another way to make false claims about a supplement affecting bodyfat percentage. Let's take our 200 lb, 10% bodyfat individual again and feed him creatine for 10 days at high doses. He gains 10 lbs of water but nothing else changes. His bodyfat% is now: 20/210 = 9.5% and our intrepid researchers can now claim that creatine caused a .5% drop in bodyfat without dieting. Which is roughly true. But, he didn't really lose any fat. This is also how bodybuilders can claim such hideously low bodyfat percentages. It's probably more or less physiologically impossible to get to less than 2 or 3 lbs of fat on the human body. But, by increasing muscle mass, and total body water (through things like creatine, sodium/potassium loading, etc), they can change the ratio of fat mass to fat free mass. Now, please quit bitching about how inaccurate my methods are. I'm not doing clinical research here. I'm just trying to be generally helpful as I guinea pig my way to (I hope, I hope, I hope) 6% bodyfat and perhaps help others do the same with Bodyopus without making any mistakes I stumble on. Lyle McDonald ------------------------------------------------------ Alright, it's week two and here's the score so far. Starting: Monday 5-6-96 Bodyweight: 153 BF%: 13.6 Fat mass: 21 lbs Fat free mass: 132 lbs. Recall that this was down 3 lbs of fat from my first measurement. I doubt that I'll keep up this rate of fat loss without starting to lose some muscle. Even still, my goal is about 7% bodyfat which is an additional 11 lbs of fat loss. I figure 4-5 weeks. Which is just in time for my skating season to start. I'll be lean, strong and look good (which, of course, is the real reason I'm putting myself through this). My week at a glance: ------------------- Sunday: Finished off my carbing with two small Ultra Fuel and Designer drinks with the last one at 6pm. Took 50 mg of Vanadyl before bed to start driving down blood glucose. Monday: 1:15 of weights. Decided to go work the whole body in one session in a roughly HIT fashion (1-2 sets of each exercise for 6-10 reps to failure, one exercise per bodypart). Squats were the exception and were worked in a 5X5 format. This decision was made due to the fact that some bodyparts worked on Tuesday of last week were still sore on Friday of last week possibly inhibiting carb-up. Although I didn't get the awesome pump that you are supposed to, all my lifts did go up. I either got the same reps with a higher weight or more reps with the same weight. Even if the one-site caliper isn't accurate, the fact that my lifts went up implies that I didn't lose any muscle. Started getting nauseous towards the end and finished up with 10' on the Lifecycle. Diet: Ate my standard 1700 calories or so (recall bodyweight is 153 and my body temp isn't all it should be.) My diet is pretty repetitive throughout the week. It is roughly: Post workout: 1 scoop Designer with 1 T flax and a packet of Equal Breakfast: 4 eggs scrambled Lunch 1: canned tuna with 2 T mayo Lunch 2: same as lunch 1 Dinner: 3-4 oz of ground beef with some mustard for flavor Before bedtime: 1 scoop Designer with 1 T flax and Equal Supplements: took 50 mg Vanadyl with 200 mcg chromium and 250 mg magnesium with my first and last shake in addition to my normal vitamins (one a day, extra A, C, and E, and calcium). Also took ECA twice. Tuesday: Did 45' on the Lifecycle. Diet: same as Monday. supplements: same as Monday. Notes: Still not in ketosis perhaps from drinking too much diet soda (some individuals find that the citric acid in most sodas keep them out of ketosis). Took ECA too late in day and didn't get much sleep again. Wednesday: 1 hour on the Lifecycle (yawn) at a heart rate of 155. My butt is numb. Thank grog for portable tape players. (Ok, big time in-joke here. When I worked food service in college, we had an industrial trash compactor in the basement which we called Grog. Due to massive boredom, we developed an entire mythology around Grog. Taking the trash down was referred to as making an offering to Grog. If your offering was worthy, Grog would accept it. If not, he (it?) wouldn't. Since Grog worked sporadically at best, this analogy worked well. Our small trash bins were the Hell Spawn of Grog. What can I tell you, we were really bored. You don't even want to know about the time I made 'donuts' out of pizza dough dipped in sugar. Trust me on this one.) Diet: same as Monday. Boring, yes. But, to be ripped, I can deal with it. I can eat for variety on the weekends. Supplements: dropped vanadyl, magnesium, and chromium as there is no glucose to clear and they are not needed. Probably good to give my liver a break from the vanadyl anyhow. Notes: I feel much better this week than the same time last week. I'm starting to adapt to the low carbohydrates. Not that I feel like running a marathon or anything but I don't feel like warmed over shit. I can see some slight differences in abdominal fat and am starting to tighten up nicely. If I flex really, really hard I can see my abs underneath the blubber. 4 weeks and I won't have to do that anymore to see them. Thursday: Went for a 30' walk in the morning as I slept too late to get to the gym. Feel really good considering the lack of carbs. Only a trace of ketones this morning which is a bit strange but I'm assuming (hoping) that they are being burned and I didn't accidentally eat too many carbs yesterday (doubtful but they sneak in the damnedest of places). I look considerably leaner today. Just for fun, I took body comp with the home caliper. It put me at 12.7% (more because I moved up to the next age bracket which shows you just how screwed up these equations are anyhow) at a weight of 148 (dehydration). This puts me at 18.8 lbs of fat (2 lbs down) and 129 lbs of lean (3 lbs down but don't forget that lean weight also includes water and glycogen and I know I'm dehydrated/depleted). Muscles are very flat looking and I feel even punier than my normal puny self. Being the masochist I am, I sat on the damn Lifecycle for another hour tonight. My butt is still numb. At least the carb-up is in sight. Friday: Alright, depletion and carb up time. Ate very little this morning: one Designer w/Flax shake and some fried pork skins. The depletion workout was a bit different this week. I decided to use the NFPT methodology for high rep circuit training instead of the giant loop of last week. They suggest using three primary exercises (leg press, bench press, row) to use the largest muscle mass possible and I figure the other bodypart will get enough indirect work to deplete and get their enzymes churning. The circuit was: -------------- Leg press Cable row DB Incline bench Leg press Undergrip pulldown DB Flat bench press abs or low back (alternated each circuit) All done for fairly hard sets of 20-25 reps. I finished 5 circuits in just under an hour and then hit 5 minutes on the Versa climber as I was getting bored and wanted to finish up. I'm not sure how anyone keeps from getting bored doing this for 2 hours and I'm still not convinced that it's necessary (see last week's mental notes). As mentioned in my first update, I decided to test my hypothesis that carb quality and frequency isn't all that critical (in terms of spillover to fat cells) as long as you stay below the total amount of carbs (16 g/kg of lean mass or about 960 grams for me). I plan to do this weekends recarb on junk food during the first 24 hours before switching over to complex sources during the second. Meal 1: 3 Butterfinger bars plus 1/2 scoop Designer Meal 2: same as meal 1 + a raisin muffin Meal 3: Two powerbars + some Captain Crunch Crunchberries I did not get up in the middle of the night to eat this time as I had some extra carbs (taken with some All Bran fiber) with Vanadyl, chromium, and magnesium prior to bed. Wish I had some Glucophage. Saturday: Weight is up about 3 lbs from yesterday. I'm waiting until Monday morning to remeasure body comp. Two more powerbars and the rest of the box of Captain Crunch for breakfast. At this point eating became random. Junk food most of Saturday including some great birthday cake. Sunday: Starting to mellow out on the carbs at this point as I'm getting full and getting over them. Starting to shift to more complex carbs and solid proteins like chicken and getting read to ditch carbs for the next 5 days. Ok, time for the Monday morning weigh-in/body-comp: Date: Monday 5-6-96 Monday 5-13-96 Change Bodyweight: 153 154 +1 BF%: 13.6% 12.7% -.9% Fat mass: 21 lbs 19.5 lbs -1.5 Fat free mass: 132 lbs. 134.5 lbs +2.5 Now, recall that measurement on Thursday put me at 18.8 lbs of fat so it looks like I may have regained some fat with my less than strict, junk-food carb up this weekend. In the big scheme of things, it's no big deal to me as it sure made the weekend a lot more enjoyable and less of a pain in the ass. Also, since I didn't track calories, there's no way to know for sure if I went over the 16 g/kg amount or not (once I started with the junk food, all notions of keeping records went straight out the window.) Ok, not bad (again, assuming that the one site caliper is even marginally accurate). Dropped another 1.5 lbs of fat with no loss in muscle (I take the apparent increase in fat free mass to be the extra glycogen and water from the carbing). All lifts went up more or less at this morning's workout which also implies at the very least, no loss in muscle. Some examples are: 5-6-96 5-13-96 Chins 2 sets of 8 with 2 sets of 9 and 8 with 28 lbs help 22 lbs of help *chins were done on the Cybex assisted Dip/Chin machine. What can I tell you? I'm a weenie. Dips 2 sets of 8,8 with 2 sets of 8,7 with 15 lbs extra 15 lbs extra Also, to quiet those complaining about the lacking accuracy of using the single site BF% measurement, I took a 3 site on myself (pec, abs, thigh) as someone explained to me via email how to do pec on myself. Here's how it worked out: Date: Monday 5-12-96 Pec (mm) 7 Abs (mm) 27 Thigh (mm) 8 Supra iliac (mm)* 18 Total of 3 (mm) 42 Bodyweight: 154 BF%: 12.2% Fat mass: 18.8 Fat free mass: 135.2 *Supra-iliac was not used for determination of body-fat percentage but merely as an additional site to track changes. Well, the results from the 3 site are actually very close (in both percentage and absolute numbers although it shows me with a bit less fat and a bit more muscle. Therefore the 3 site must be more correct, right? ;-) ) to the one site caliper. I'll keep taking both measurements each Monday to see if the correlation remains similar (i.e. will a .5% drop in the 3 site estimation be echoed by a .5% drop in the one site estimation. I doubt it as one major drawback to the one site measurement is it's lack of accuracy for small changes. I mean, it shows a drop in 1 mm at the supra-iliac as a huge, almost 2% drop in bodyfat. So, it's ability to discriminate small changes is not as good as with more sites). Also, as I get leaner, I won't really be paying attention to the bodyfat estimate as they tend to become less accurate at either the extremes of fatness or leanness and I'll simply compare the actual readings in mm. See you next Monday, Lyle McDonald, CSCS P.S. I apologize for the formatting on the body composition measurements. I'm keeping a diary of sorts on a word processing program and then just pasting it in. Also, I noticed a couple of stupid typos. In the rant section I mistyped 'weight' as 'weight' and then 'way'. And, in the workout summary, the second dip workout should have been '2 sets of 9 and 8 reps with 20 extra pounds hanging' instead of 15.