by Chris Shugart
Hey, Fatty. Yeah, You.
Are you fat? I bet you are. Chubby, porky, rotund, chunky, heavy, corpulent, powerlifter... whatever you want to call it, you're very likely carrying around some extra, life-shortening chub.
What's that? You're just in a mass phase? Listen, buddy, if you haven't been able to see your penis in three years because of your big gut, the "bulking stage" is over, okay?
I'm not being rude here; I'm just stating the facts. According to the CDC, 66.3% of the American population is either overweight or flat-out obese. Odds are, you're one of them. Yes, even if you train with weights. Because no matter how hard most people train, they'll never be able to out-train a poor diet.
Look around your gym: lots of people training regularly, very few with visible abs. Or maybe you don't need to look around in the gym. Maybe you can see the same phenomenon in the mirror.
Not happy with your physique even though you push iron several days a week? Well, it was true when I first wrote it in the year 2000 and it's still true today:
It's your diet, stupid!
The difference is mainly diet.
Now, since most Americans are fat and unhealthy, let's take a quick look at what they did to get that way. First, the mind-numbingly obvious: they ate too much and didn't exercise enough. No shit. How about we get more specific?
Most fat people overeat at night. They don't just overeat, they binge. Then, with that gigantic glut of calories in their bellies, they go to bed -- in a nutshell causing those calories to be stored as body fat instead of being used to fuel activity.
And get this, binge eating -- consuming an enormous amount of calories in one sitting -- is now considered to be the number one eating disorder in America, more prevalent than even anorexia, bulimia or that God-awful Tubway Diet. Scary, huh?
People usually overeat at night because they skip breakfast and don't eat frequently enough during the day. They claim to be too busy, too rushed, and too overworked to take the time out to eat. Well, studies show that people who skip breakfast also compensate later in the day by overeating. So as strange as it may seem, not eating a meal can lead to fat gain.
Breakfast skippers are fatties not only because they overcompensate at night, but also because they're damaging their metabolism on a daily basis. Basically, the body can begin to cannibalize muscle tissue during the night.
Since muscle is the primary determiner of your metabolic rate, skipping breakfast and staying in that muscle-wasting state until lunch leads to metabolism damage and fat gain... and usually a nice lunchtime binge and subsequent afternoon energy crash as well.
Successful people often look at unsuccessful people and do the opposite. If you want to lose fat and look good naked, then you need to do the opposite of what fat people do. In this context, that means:
1. Eating breakfast to prevent late-day overeating and end the metabolism wrecking effects of the eight-hour fast we call sleep.
2. Squashing the habit of nighttime overeating.
The simple solution for each is the same: drink a protein shake. In a way, you can think of this as the Velocity Diet Lite. Instead of drinking shakes all day, you'll consume one for breakfast and one for your final meal of the day.
A high quality shake makes it easy to control calories, plus it's fast and easy to prepare. If you have 60 seconds in the morning, then you have time for a healthy, metabolism-boosting breakfast. And for those people whose stomach does back flips at the thought of eating early in the morning, you'll find that a shake goes down a lot easier than greasy bacon and eggs.
Now, since your body "puts carbs to work" in the morning and generally handles them better at this time, I suggest Metabolic Drive Complete. Not only do you get your protein, you also get a healthy dose of fiber, a component to fat loss success that most people overlook. Metabolic Drive Complete contains 8 grams of fiber -- double the amount of fiber in a serving of oatmeal. Perfect!
Okay, breakfast is easy. For this next part you'll need some discipline.
For your last meal of the day, consume only a low-carb protein shake, not a solid meal. Yes, this is the part where you're going to have to not be such a diet wimp.
It's simple, not easy. But it could be the key to your body comp issues.
• A meal replacement shake will force you to keep your calories in check. No more consuming 1500 calories in one sitting because you're mindlessly munching garbage foods in front of the TV.
• The low-carb aspect is important here too. In an oversimplified nutshell, carbs are for energy. Do you really need that "energy" when you're about to go horizontal for eight hours? No. Carbs are meant to be used, burned up. If they're not, they're stored, usually on your belly or your increasingly wide ass. Controlling carbs at night then becomes especially important.
• The extra protein at night will also serve to prevent middle-of-the-night muscle wasting. This is especially true if you use a protein shake made with a lot of slow-digesting micellar casein. I suggest low-carb Metabolic Drive for your nighttime shake.
Combine a shake at night with a shake for breakfast and you'll see some quick and easy fat loss, even if you change nothing else about your diet and training. Try it, and maybe you can avoid becoming part of the 66.3%.
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