Official: myth/fact and scince/bro-science thread

[BeeBoop]

You're making a mountain out of a mole hill. There are plenty of people who do fine when eating less frequently a day. You can look at the example below for one. It really comes down to personal preference. If you're happy eating 10 times a day as your paper suggested, by all means keep doing it but it seems to be a huge hassle having to plan so many meals a day.

Edit: This video has a better picture of their results.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnT6dOgF674

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[Zivic]

You're making a mountain out of a mole hill. There are plenty of people who do fine when eating less frequently a day. You can look at the example below for one. It really comes down to personal performance. If you're happy eating 10 times a day as your paper suggested, by all means keep doing it but it seems to be a huge hassle having to plan so many meals a day.

Edit: This video has a better picture of their results.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnT6dOgF674

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I'm plenty fine going on bro science , but everyone here wanted studies. I'll go by what has worked in the real world. I consider myself elite relative to the general population. So you read up all you want, what all the fatty donothings do makes no impact on me and my lifestyle

 

[SP33Demon]

Man I could post stuff all day in this thread. Let's get it started.

MYTH: Tribulus Terrestris increases testosterone
REALITY: It can act as a libido enhancer but does not increase testosterone. There is some evidence that Tribulus Alatus increases testosterone but the verdict is still out on that.
LINKS:
1) Brown GA, Vukovich MD, Reifenrath TA, Uhl NL, Parsons KA, Sharp RL, King DS (2000). "Effects of anabolic precursors on serum testosterone concentrations and adaptations to resistance training in young men". International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism 10 (3): 340–59. PMID 10997957.

2) Brown GA, Vukovich MD, Martini ER, Kohut ML, Franke WD, Jackson DA, King DS (2001). "Endocrine and lipid responses to chronic androstenediol-herbal supplementation in 30 to 58 year old men". J Am Coll Nutr 20 (5): 520–8. PMID 11601567.

3) Neychev VK, & Mitev VI. (2005). "The aphrodisiac herb Tribulus terrestris does not influence the androgen production in young men". Journal of Ethnopharmacology 101 (1–3): 319–23. doi:10.1016/j.jep.2005.05.017. PMID 15994038.

 

[Kaido]

I'm plenty fine going on bro science , but everyone here wanted studies.

I think studies can be pretty swayed to the agenda of whoever is supporting the study. Wine & chocolate are ones that I'm always seeing as being "it's good for you" and then "it's bad for you!". Some good discussion here:

http://www.bonappetit.com/trends/ar...k-at-scientific-studies-through-the-millennia

http://www.bonappetit.com/trends/article/is-chocolate-good-for-you-or-bad

It's funny what you hear from people in the field as well. Like half my family has cancer and they were told by one of the top cancer doctors in the country that if they were serious about recovery, they should cut out all chocolate from their diet. Apparently chocolate makes cancer grow, which I've never heard before, but if a top doctor at a top cancer center was giving me that advice, I'd sure as heck cut it out lol.

There's too much blockage from the food industry (lobbying etc.) for that to ever come out, and even if it did, people still like to eat their junk food and wouldn't stop anyway because we're all addicts They said it was from their own internal experience & results and most people (particularly women) refused to stop eating it, so it was an off-the-record thing. But from my experience, field experts know what they're talking about it. It's like when a noob asks you how to setup their computer, and you tell them to dump Internet Explorer, get a good antivirus & firewall, run Windows Updates on a regular basis, etc. But to the general consumer, they buy a new computer, plug it in, and start using it without that tribal knowledge. As of 2012, apparently 1 in 6 computers did not have antivirus installed:

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/M,15826.html

And even scientific studies are hard to believe because you don't know who is funding what and what their agendas are. The China Study has some interesting information:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Study

The authors argue that "most, but not all, of the confusion about nutrition is created in legal, fully disclosed ways and is disseminated by unsuspecting, well-intentioned people, whether they are researchers, politicians or journalists," and that there are powerful industries that stand to lose a lot if Americans shift to a plant-based diet. They write that those industries "do everything in their power to protect their profits and their shareholders."

Try googling "milk is bad for you", for example (like this site). Makes you start wondering why they're pushing milk so hard, to the point of hiring Michael Bay to direct the commercials and spending nearly $40 million a year in advertising. They're certainly not pushing a "good product" so hard out of the goodness of their hearts; they want to make as much legal profit as possible, regardless of the health side effects.

But on the flip side, food is good and you're going to die anyway, so why not enjoy things? I think it all depends on your own personal living situation & goals. I'm allergic to dairy, so that's an automatic no-go for me anyway. I also think going vegan the right way (with a proper amount of protein, good carbs, good fats, etc.) is healthier than a meat-based diet, but I like to grill and I like eating burgers & bacon and those don't make me sick like dairy does, so you have to decide on where you're going to draw the line. Heck, some people do well on a fruitarian diet:

http://www.details.com/health-fitness/diet/201211/fruit-diet

There are vegan bodybuilders:

http://www.thefirstsupper.com/rawveganmythvideo.html

There's all kinds of paths to different health & fitness goals. Some of them are junk, but a lot of them work equally as well as the traditional methods. Bottom line is, at some point you will die, no matter how healthy or unhealthy you eat. From a physical perspective, I think what is important along the way is how good you feel and if you're getting the fitness results you want - whether that's being thin, having a six-pack, big muscles, or being strong. Not many people enjoy being overweight & feeling like crap on a regular basis - I know I sure didn't when I wasn't living a healthy lifestyle!

I think most of the broscience & studies & stuff boils down to change. Changing your diet is probably one of the top 5 hardest things you will ever do in your life. Heck, I've been posting here for like 5 years and have accumulated a vast amount of knowledge about nutrition, and I still don't do any of it on a regular basis I think a lot of it is either misunderstood nutrition & workout information & the rest is not consistently applied. Like when people start working out and tell me they've plateaued after 2 weeks, not realizing it takes years to achieve competition-worthy results. Ah well.

 

[Zivic]

I think most of the broscience & studies & stuff boils down to change. Changing your diet is probably one of the top 5 hardest things you will ever do in your life. Heck, I've been posting here for like 5 years and have accumulated a vast amount of knowledge about nutrition, and I still don't do any of it on a regular basis I think a lot of it is either misunderstood nutrition & workout information & the rest is not consistently applied. Like when people start working out and tell me they've plateaued after 2 weeks, not realizing it takes years to achieve competition-worthy results. Ah well.

Change is easy... but you nailed it right on the head, sticking with that change(s) i the hardest thing.

Consistency is the secret; or as kai greene says, 'days of efficiency'.

 

[Kaido]

Change is easy... but you nailed it right on the head, sticking with that change(s) i the hardest thing.

Consistency is the secret; or as kai greene says, 'days of efficiency'.

I think motivation is one of the most under-discussed topics in the health & fitness scene, with probably the second being clear information being overshadowed by broscience & marketing. The very first thing I always see is people getting motivated to get in shape and their first course of action is to "go workout", but never changing their diets, and then not getting the results they want. And nobody wants to listen to the bit about how diet is more important because that's hard and working out is fun & easy compared to changing what you eat.

I think having a plan that works and reasons why you should eat well & exercise are really important. Every diet is easy for the first couple of days, but then the majority of people slide back into their old habits, so you need some reasons beyond just "I feel like getting in shape right now" because that wears off as soon as you get tired or don't feel good. So having some clear goals and reasons why you want to accomplish those goals can help you solidify wishes into commitments. And to make that commitment work, it helps to have a plan that you can follow so that you know what you're supposed to do every day.

Ultimately that results in: you have goals, you have reasons why you want those goals, and you have a detailed plan to achieve those goals. So you know what you want, you know why you want it, and you know how to get what you want. That's a much different picture than "I should get in shape so I'm going to exercise like crazy" and then that emotional motivation wears off after a few days.

In addition to clarifying your motivational story like that, I think it's also important to get your work environments setup - your kitchen, your lunchbox, your workout space, your workout clothing, etc. If there are barriers, those will stifle your routine, especially on days when you're not feeling like doing anything. If you make it easy, then, well, it's easy to do!

I also think that visual tracking & commitment are important: having a poster that tracks your daily progress per your diet & exercise plan that you can see and make notes on helps because it makes you accountable every time you look at it, instead of just keeping it in your head. And of course, actually committing to a goal - making a plan, setting your physical world up, and then committing to working the plan - is really important because then you've put a stake in the ground that says "I am committed to this".

So now that the picture is bigger: you have your typical New Year's Resolutions of "I want to get in shape" that lasts for what, maybe two weeks at best on average? Versus someone who has clear goals, has reasons why they want to achieve those goals, has a detailed plan, has their environment setup, has a visual tracking system in place, and has made a commitment to their plan. That's an entirely different story and has vastly different outcomes. Some people are naturally motivated and it comes easy to them, but the majority of people aren't wired that way and need some extra help in order to achieve success.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a donut to eat :biggrin:

 

[SP33Demon]

MYTH: Eating before and after a workout (i.e. "bracketing") is not beneficial.
REALITY: The body actually stimulates protein synthesis in a carb/protein mix during resistance training. Afterwards, insulin sensitivity is higher so your body will absorb more.
LINKS:
During exercise - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18430966
After exercise - http://jap.physiology.org/content/108/3/554.short