Continuous eating vs 5meals/day

[JEDI]

5 small meals/day keeps your metabolism up.

how about the standard 3 meals/day (breakfast/lunch/dinner), but every 5-10 min eat a baby carrot/celery stalk/romaine lettuce leaf?

 

[crt1530]

Originally posted by: JEDI
5 small meals/day keeps your metabolism up.

how about the standard 3 meals/day (breakfast/lunch/dinner), but every 5-10 min eat a baby carrot/celery stalk/romaine lettuce leaf?

Those things have almost no calories and zero protein/fat. They will not keep your insulin levels stabile like eating balanced meals and snacks.

 

[SVT Cobra]

6 meals a day every three hours....

 

[SludgeFactory]

Originally posted by: JEDI
5 small meals/day keeps your metabolism up.

The notion that you somehow significantly boost your metabolism with meal frequency is a myth. The reality is that people simply tend to eat less when they do several small meals per day.

Continuous eating is probably a behavior pattern that will be difficult to control in the long run, when the lettuce leaf every 5 minutes gradually turns into a couple crackers or cookies. The gorging pattern (1-2 meals per day with an extended fast of many hours every day, aka intermittent fasting) is another that can get out of hand if you aren't disciplined about it and have some structure to what you're doing.

IMO, the bottom line is to figure out what pattern works the best for you, and then stick to it.

 

[SVT Cobra]

Originally posted by: SludgeFactory

Originally posted by: JEDI
5 small meals/day keeps your metabolism up.

The notion that you somehow significantly boost your metabolism with meal frequency is a myth. The reality is that people simply tend to eat less when they do several small meals per day.

Continuous eating is probably a behavior pattern that will be difficult to control in the long run, when the lettuce leaf every 5 minutes gradually turns into a couple crackers or cookies. The gorging pattern (1-2 meals per day with an extended fast of many hours every day, aka intermittent fasting) is another that can get out of hand if you aren't disciplined about it and have some structure to what you're doing.

IMO, the bottom line is to figure out what pattern works the best for you, and then stick to it.

No it is not a myth, eating carbs/protein spikes insulin, insulin in turn speeds up metabolic processes such as muscle building or fat loss depending on the amount of calories present.

 

[SludgeFactory]

The studies I've seen indicate that meal frequency doesn't make much of a difference in BMR. Leptin is the major regulatory hormone for BMR, not insulin. Metabolism is a long term, big picture process, and the most important factors are how fat you are, how fat you're supposed to be, and how hard & long you've been undereating if on a diet. All these studies say no significant difference.

Meal frequency and energy balance.

Feeding frequency and energy balance in adult males.

Thermogenesis in humans after varying meal time frequency

Effect of the pattern of food intake on human energy metabolism.

Frequency of feeding, weight reduction and energy metabolism.

In real life, where people have free access to food all day long and have the ability to make (bad) choices, then yes, the studies I've seen show that they tend to diet better with 5-6 meals/day. But in the lab, the reality is that when you control their food and start playing around with meal frequency, the number of feedings doesn't seem to impact BMR.

This has been discussed at a few diet/fitness forums, and I know it trickled down to bodybuilding.com as well, mostly under "intermittent fasting" discussions, where people are talking about using IF for dieting because of the potential for appetite blunting and increases in insulin sensitivity IIRC.

 

[SVT Cobra]

When your on a short term cut, to put it simply...you don't give a shit about Basal metabolic rate...all you are about is increasing insulin sensativity...which means spiking it more...

Also it has its benefits on a cut because it causes the stomach and liver to produce enzymes more often that keep you from getting hungry

Trust me I know what you are saying, but for an active person looking to gain muscle or lose fat 6 meals a day is where it is at. 😛

 

[SludgeFactory]

Originally posted by: SVT Cobra
When your on a short term cut, to put it simply...you don't give a shit about Basal metabolic rate...all you are about is increasing insulin sensativity...which means spiking it more...

Also it has its benefits on a cut because it causes the stomach and liver to produce enzymes more often that keep you from getting hungry

Trust me I know what you are saying, but for an active person looking to gain muscle or lose fat 6 meals a day is where it is at. 😛

I don't disagree that 6 meals a day will tend to lower a person's energy intake on a diet, but I don't see the evidence that it significantly changes energy expenditure or boosts metabolic rate, which has become the commonly held belief.

I'm not disputing that it works for the majority of people, I just have an issue with their reasoning for why it works 🙂

 

[SVT Cobra]

Originally posted by: SludgeFactory

Originally posted by: SVT Cobra
When your on a short term cut, to put it simply...you don't give a shit about Basal metabolic rate...all you are about is increasing insulin sensativity...which means spiking it more...

Also it has its benefits on a cut because it causes the stomach and liver to produce enzymes more often that keep you from getting hungry

Trust me I know what you are saying, but for an active person looking to gain muscle or lose fat 6 meals a day is where it is at. 😛

I don't disagree that 6 meals a day will tend to lower a person's energy intake on a diet, but I don't see the evidence that it significantly changes energy expenditure or boosts metabolic rate, which has become the commonly held belief.

I'm not disputing that it works for the majority of people, I just have an issue with their reasoning for why it works 🙂

Do you understand what insulin is and how it works? If you do I am baffled to why you do not understand. 😉