The 4-Hour Body_ An Uncommon Guide to Ra - Timothy Ferriss [87]
Some athletes eat 10 times per day to break up caloric load and avoid excessive fat gain. I find this unnecessarily inconvenient, particularly when you are on a regimen of supplements that increases insulin sensitivity and GLUT-4 activity (see “Damage Control”). I eat four main meals per day for both fat-loss and muscular gain.
MY STANDARD NIGHT-OWL SCHEDULE
10:00 A.M.—Wake up, immediately breakfast + ½ shake (details later in this chapter)
2:00 P.M.—Lunch
6:00 P.M.—First dinner
7:30 P.M.—Training, if scheduled (I sip low-fat protein just before and throughout. Neil used Isopure®.)
8:30 P.M. (30 minutes post-training)—Dinner
15 minutes before bed—Second half of morning shake
The meal composition is nearly identical to the Slow-Carb Diet, as are the tenets, though we now add a starch such as brown rice or quinoa to the non-shake meals. There is no need to mimic my hours, of course. Just look at my meal spacing as one option that has worked.
Neil was different. He was prone to skipping breakfast and had little appetite. It was impossible for him to consume large meals from the get-go. The solution was to prescribe a calorie-dense shake for breakfast and increase the number of meals to achieve a proper food volume, even with smaller portions.
NEIL’S FOOD SCHEDULE
9:00 A.M.—Protein shake (see below)
11:00 A.M.—Protein bar (Balance Bar or, preferably, a Training 33 YouBar)
1:00 P.M.—High-protein/-carb lunch (usually chicken breast with potatoes)
3:00 P.M.—Protein bar
5:00 P.M.—High-protein/-carb dinner (usually sushi/sashimi with extra rice)
7:00 P.M.—Protein bar
9:00 P.M.—Protein snack with carbs (chicken or eggs or tuna)
11:00 P.M.—Protein shake
The choice is yours: eat big or eat often. Fat gain will be slightly more with the former, and inconvenience will be much greater with the latter.
Pick one and make it your religion for four weeks. It’s easy to lose a little extra fat later.
A NOTE ON SKIPPING BREAKFAST
If you skip breakfast even once a week, or opt for a nonbreakfast like coffee and toast even once a week, make the blender your first stop after getting out of bed.
The following recipe can also be used as a meal replacement or pre-bed snack:
24 oz (3 cups) 2% or whole organic milk
30 g whey protein isolate (chocolate tends to work best)
1 banana
3 heaping tbsp almond butter with no added sugar, maltodextrin, or syrups
5 ice cubes
Caloric and protein profile with 2% milk (approximate): 970 cal, 75 g protein
The Fixer: GOMAD
Everyone on these heavy squat programs who drank enough of it [milk] gained weight. Yes, everyone we’ve ever heard of.
—Dr. Randall J. Strossen
If the preceding diet and high-protein snacks don’t elicit at least two and a half pounds per week of gain, add in one liter of 2% organic milk between meals, up to four liters per day. Four liters = roughly one gallon. This is the simple and rightly venerated GOMAD (Gallon Of Milk A Day) approach to mass gain, which—along with squats—has produced monsters for more than 75 years, including the incredible Paul Anderson and some of the greatest lifters the world has ever seen.
I suggest adding a single liter per day each week (often in the aforementioned shake) and keeping a close monitor on fat gain, which can accelerate. Fat gain is not inevitable, but it needs to be monitored. Navel circumference measurements are a good estimation if you don’t have access to other body composition devices.
Reader Matt gained six pounds per week for three weeks (18 pounds total) using GOMAD as his only means of increasing calories during his “Geek to Freak” (G2F) trial, and his abdominal skinfold (two inches to the side of the navel) remained four millimeters throughout.
If you’re eating enough at your main meals, you shouldn’t need more than a liter per day to accelerate growth. Lactose-intolerant? Try incorporating one glass of organic whole milk per day into your