“To say that obesity is caused by merely consuming too many calories is like saying that the only cause of the American Revolution was the Boston Tea Party.” -Adelle Davis
This quote gets to the core of a basic question that is the topic of much discussion in bodybuilding circles. What’s more important: what you eat or how much you eat? A study conducted by the Institute for Nutrition and Cancer Research (INCR) discovered that 78% of adults agreed with the statement “the kind of foods you eat is more important than the quantity of food you eat” in regards to weight management. Very good arguments can certainly be made for and against the statement. It is true that your overall caloric balance during a given day will determine whether or not your weight changes. On the other hand, food choices can influence that caloric balance by influencing metabolic rate, the thermic effect of food (TEF), and satiety. In order for one to lose weight, and hence, body fat, one’s caloric expenditure must exceed their caloric intake and this requires energy intake control, and thus the quantity of food must be controlled (1).
It is pertinent to state that one should eat healthy foods when on a weight loss diet. Fruits, vegetables, low fat meats, and the like are good sources of vitamins, minerals, and fiber (in the case of fruits and vegetables) and these can certainly impact one’s health. However, one can not simply eat as many “good” foods as they like with reckless abandon and expect not to gain weight. It is certainly easier to achieve a caloric surplus eating twinkies all day than it is to achieve that same surplus though fruits, vegetables, and lean meats, however if the person eating only twinkies makes a conscious effort to limit their twinkie intake to a caloric level that is less than the amount of calories they expend per day, they will lose fat whereas a person who eats an unlimited amount of “good” foods will still gain weight if they consume more calories than they expend. Don’t get me wrong, eating only twinkies is not a good strategy for losing fat, but it is an extreme example to support my points.
There are plenty of meatheads gurus out there who would have you believe that consuming chicken, rice, and broccoli cannot make you fat no matter how much you eat of it. They will most likely try to argue that the specific foods you eat are more important than the quantity that you eat will use the argument that “a calorie is not a calorie” to support their stance. In other words, they believe that certain foods may provide an advantage over other foods. There certainly is ample evidence to support this stance. For example, diets higher in protein are less “energy efficient” as the conversion of alanine to glucose during gluconeogenesis (production of glucose from amino acids and other substrates) requires 6 ATP molecules and the conversion of pyruvate to glucose also consumes 6 ATP molecules (2-3). Furthermore, 4 molecules of ATP are required to dispose of the nitrogen as urea (3). Now before you throw up your hands and say “what the hell does all that mean?” realize that it’s only a scientifically correct way of saying that turning protein into energy requires more energy input by your body compared to carbs or fats. Maintaining the protein turnover is also energetically very costly (4). In fact, the thermic effects of nutrients are approximately 2-3% for lipids, 6-8% for carbohydrates, and 25-30% for protein (5)! This increased thermic effect of food seems to cause increased weight loss in high protein diets compared to diets equal in calories but higher in carbohydrates (6). The fiber content of a diet is also another issue to consider. Dietary fiber contains far less metabolizable energy than starchy carbohydrates due to incomplete absorption of fiber and the amount of energy extracted from fiber is less than that of other carbohydrates (7).
This information has led many meatheads to deduct proudly that by consuming a high protein/low carbohydrate/increased fiber diet you need not concern oneself with calorie intake because there is a far smaller net energy gain when consuming such a diet as compared to a typical higher carbohydrate diet. Although the net energy gain is much smaller on a high protein/low carbohydrate/increased fiber diet, the fact remains that it is still quite possible one can consume more calories than they expend if they fail to control the quantity of food that they take in. Controlling food intake and self monitoring is crucial in any weight loss or weight maintenance regime. In fact, Hill et. al, found that the majority of people who successfully lost fat and maintained it for at least one year practiced some form of restraint, including restricting certain foods, portion sizes, and counting calories (8). So while it may require a greater quantity of food on a high protein/low carbohydrate diet to exceed one’s caloric expenditure, it can still be done, and therefore the quantity of food must be controlled. While controlling the quantity of food one eats may be more important than the types of foods one eats in regards to weight maintenance/loss, it is important to note that the types of foods that one eats will impact the quantity of foods that one will consume as well. Diets high in protein and high fiber have both shown to reduce hunger compared to a higher carbohydrate or reduced fiber diet (8,9). Additionally, research has demonstrated that high protein diets have an increased thermic effect of food, allowing for greater weight loss at ‘equal’ calorie intakes when compared to higher carbohydrate diets. The big take home points however, are that eating ‘good’ foods will allow you to keep total calories higher but eating the occasional ‘bad’ food won’t wreck your diet as long as it controlled within the context of total caloric intake. Therefore, the most successful strategy in achieve limiting fat gain/maximizing fat loss is to practice cognitive restraint while consuming a diet high in protein and dietary fiber.
References
1) Wardlaw GM, Kessel M. Energy Production and Energy Balance. In: Perspective in Nutrition 2nd Ed. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Higher Education; 2002. p. 535-537.
2) Feinman RD and Fine EJ. A calorie is a calorie violates the second law of thermodynamics. Nutrition J. 2004, 3:9.
3) Hue L. Regulation of gluconeogenesis in liver: In: Jefferson L, Cherington A, eds. Handbook of physiology: the endocrine system. Vol 2. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2001:649-57.
4) Bier DM. The energy cost of protein metabolism: lean and mean on Uncle Sam’s team. In: The role of protein and amino acids in sustaining and enhancing performance. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 1999:109-19.
5) Jequier E: Pathways to obesity. Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord 2002, 26 Suppl 2:S12-7.
6) Westman EC, Mavropoulos J, Yancy WS, Vlek JS: A review of low-carbohydrate ketogenic diets. Curr Atheroscler Rep 2003, 5:476-483.
7) Buchnolz AC and Schoeller DA. Is a calorie a calorie? Am J Clin Nutr, 2004:79(suppl): 899S-906S.
8) Nickols-Richardson SM, Coleman MD, Volpe JJ, Hosig KW. Perceived hunger is lower and weight loss is greater in overweight pre-menopausal women consuming a low-carbohydrate/high-protein vs. high-carbohydrate/low-fat diet. J. Am. Diet. Assoc. 2005 Sep;105(9):1433-7.
9) Howarth NC, Saltzman E, Roberts SB. Dietary fiber and weight regulation. Nutr. Rev. 2001 May;59(5):129-39.
Ever since Nicholas Clement defined the calorie as a unit of heat back in the 19th century, we’ve used it as a measure for the energy available to our bodies in the food we eat. The so-called “kilogram calorie” (or kilocalorie), which you see on nutritional labels, equates to the energy needed to raise the temperature of one kilogram of water by one degree Celsius.
These capital-C Calories serve as an approximation for the amount of energy we take in from our food, as well as the amount of energy we expend over the course of our day, through a combination of essential life-processes and any additional physical or mental activity we add on top of the baseline.
Later on in the 19th century, chemist Wilbur Atwater used oxidation reactions to test the energy content of various nutrients, inclusive of corrections for rates of digestion and the production of urea. Atwater’s values, roughly 4 calories per gram for protein and carbs and 9 kcals/gram for fats, remain in use today.
Lately, however, there’s been a trend towards rejecting this model. Not only are calories thought to be insufficient — or outright irrelevant — in explaining the continuing rise in obesity, but the deeper reason is that “a calorie isn’t a calorie”.
The bomb calorimeter, used by Atwater in deriving his original values, isn’t an accurate representation of the body, dissenters say. We don’t just “burn” food and extract calories from it in that way.
They’re quite right in that sense. While our cells do oxidize nutrients in a process much like burning, there’s no real analogy between those chemical processes and the image of burning a piece of bread in an open flame.
More importantly, living organisms do things with the material they ingest, independent of its energy value. Protein, for example, is a metabolically costly entity. Many things our bodies do with protein require energy, such as protein turnover in muscle, and as such it’s not always evident that the net energy derived from a gram of protein is identical to the net energy derived from a gram of carbohydrate, even though they have the same value on paper.
There are inefficiencies in digestion and absorption that distort the picture as well. Fiber and cellulose are poorly handled by our GI tract and thus we don’t obtain the on-paper Atwater value of energy for those foods.
It would seem that calories aren’t calories after all. Right?
Not quite. As a unit of energy available to our bodies, a calorie is always a calorie. The issue here isn’t really about calories, but about nutrients and the way living organisms put them to use, including the extraction of energy from them.
Read more at Myosynthesis
Important Points:
Calorie/Macro tracking online is NOT 100% necessary. You don’t have to do it and no one is going to force you to. What matters the most is that you are eating appropriately for your goals and needs. There are several ways you can do this (eg: via portion control, via spreadsheet, via diabetic exchange lists).
Calorie/Macro tracking is only as accurate as you make it. So, if you neglect to track the foods, or leave out snacks, or only half fill in the days then it isn’t going to work or be accurate in any way.
It doesn’t really matter how accurate the tracker itself is - what matters is what you do and that the tracker gives you something to monitor and change if needed.
You don’t have to track every day. This is especially true if you eat the same thing most days. However, some people vary their diet day to day and this is where being more consistent with tracking your intake will be beneficial.
When you track your intake look at the total calories (weight change is determined by calories in versus calories out) and then the grams for fat, carbohydrate and protein. It is not about the ‘macro %’ you hit. Your body does not care what percentage comes from different macro-nutrient groups. What it cares about is that you are getting enough to support your lean mass / bodyweight.
Do not change things too quickly. If you decide to make a change to your caloric intake you might want to give yourself 3-4 weeks before you expect to see significant change. If you keep changing things ‘looking for something that works’, you’ll never see results.
Useful Links:
Calorie Counting Websites:
Comparison of weight-loss diets with different compositions of fat, protein, and carbohydrates.
Sacks FM, Bray GA, Carey VJ, Smith SR, Ryan DH, Anton SD, McManus K, Champagne CM, Bishop LM, Laranjo N, Leboff MS, Rood JC, de Jonge L, Greenway FL, Loria CM, Obarzanek E, Williamson DA.
Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, USA.
Abstract
BACKGROUND:
The possible advantage for weight loss of a diet that emphasizes protein, fat, or carbohydrates has not been established, and there are few studies that extend beyond 1 year.
METHODS:
We randomly assigned 811 overweight adults to one of four diets; the targeted percentages of energy derived from fat, protein, and carbohydrates in the four diets were 20, 15, and 65%; 20, 25, and 55%; 40, 15, and 45%; and 40, 25, and 35%. The diets consisted of similar foods and met guidelines for cardiovascular health. The participants were offered group and individual instructional sessions for 2 years. The primary outcome was the change in body weight after 2 years in two-by-two factorial comparisons of low fat versus high fat and average protein versus high protein and in the comparison of highest and lowest carbohydrate content.
RESULTS:
At 6 months, participants assigned to each diet had lost an average of 6 kg, which represented 7% of their initial weight; they began to regain weight after 12 months. By 2 years, weight loss remained similar in those who were assigned to a diet with 15% protein and those assigned to a diet with 25% protein (3.0 and 3.6 kg, respectively); in those assigned to a diet with 20% fat and those assigned to a diet with 40% fat (3.3 kg for both groups); and in those assigned to a diet with 65% carbohydrates and those assigned to a diet with 35% carbohydrates (2.9 and 3.4 kg, respectively) (P>0.20 for all comparisons). Among the 80% of participants who completed the trial, the average weight loss was 4 kg; 14 to 15% of the participants had a reduction of at least 10% of their initial body weight. Satiety, hunger, satisfaction with the diet, and attendance at group sessions were similar for all diets; attendance was strongly associated with weight loss (0.2 kg per session attended). The diets improved lipid-related risk factors and fasting insulin levels.
CONCLUSIONS:
Reduced-calorie diets result in clinically meaningful weight loss regardless of which macronutrients they emphasize. (ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00072995.)
2009 Massachusetts Medical Society
Source
You: That’s great, but will you explain it to me like I’m five?
Me: Absolutely.
The best diet for weight loss is still intensely debated and there has been very few well conducted studies which looked at this issue. Is a high protein diet better, or high carb or a high fat diet better?
What were the strengths of the weight loss study?
A recent study looked at this very issue and received a lot of good attention.
- Large number of participants: There were 811 participants from diverse backgrounds irrespective of age, income, geography and included a large percentage of men. Obviously the largest RCT related to weight loss diets.
- High rate of retention: The people who dropped out of the study were low which was a serious problem in other weight loss studies.
- Long Duration: The diet lasted for 2 years which is the longest trial for randomized weight loss trial.
- Compliance accessed: Compliance was assessed by objective markers .For example, urinary nitrogen excretion was used to asses adherence to the protein intake.
- Intense Treatment: Treatment included individual and group instructional sessions to promote adherence.
What was the design of the study?
Eight hundred and eleven participants were randomly assigned to four different diets:
- 20% fat, 15% protein, and 65% carbs; Low fat, Average protein
- 20% fat, 25% protein, and 55% carbs; Low fat, High protein
- 40% fat, 15% protein, and 45% carbs; High fat, Average protein
- 40% fat, 25% protein, and 35% carbs; High fat, High protein
All of the diets had an average calorie deficit of 750 calories from the patients’ aggregate baseline caloric intake. Participants followed the diets for two years, during which time they were also expected to engage in 90 minutes of moderate exercise each week, keep a daily food diary, fill out a Web-based tool that monitored how closely their intake adhered to their assigned diet, and attend group and individual sessions to promote adherence
What were the results of the study?
All the diets were equally successful in promoting moderate weight loss and maintaining this loss for over 2 years. Weight loss averaged 3-4 years after 2 years.
Practical Recommendations
- Any diet which emphasizes calorie restriction will work and the specific amount of protein, fat or carbs of the diet does not matter.
- Diets should be tailored to the person based on their individual and cultural preferences than based on nutritional recommendations for long term success.
- Behavioral strategies maybe more important in weight loss diets than their composition.
Source
Calories are king.
The most important factors for weight loss are calories in vs. calories out and your ability to stick to a plan. A diet composed of moderation, in my mind, will always reign supreme due to the participants ability to still enjoy foods that they love.
Read my article titled Easy Mode Dieting for more information about following a diet fueled by moderation.
This post comes from this article on Lyle McDonald’s website www.bodyrecomposition.com and is my “go to” source to site when calculating someone’s maintenance caloric intake or their optimal caloric deficit for fat loss.
I realize a lot of you won’t read this article, but just know that you’re only hurting your chances of getting into the best shape of your life by not taking the time to read it.
Although it’s a bit lengthy and I could paraphrase the crucial information for the formula, I believe it to be a fantastic read on determining your correct caloric intakes and the science behind it.
Knowing the answer and understanding the answer are two completely different things. Understanding gives you investment into the answer and you are more apt to utilize it correctly. This is why I implore you to read the entire thing.
Question: If you would allow me a brief intro … my name is Leland Hammonds and I am a 29 year old Kinesiology professor here in San Antonio, Texas. I also own my own personal training business. For the last three years, I have spent approx three hours a day, six days a week studying nutrition and exercise research as they relate to fat loss. It consumes my every waking thought.
Although I do absolutely no marketing – I am booked solid Mon-Fri early mornings and late evenings (basically every second I am not at the college) with fat-loss clients. I believe this has more to do with my client selection/admission process and absolutely constant nagging about nutrition (I normally do not allow a client to continue training with me if they don’t get their nutrition right within the first few weeks of training). All my clients are referrals and almost all of them want fat loss.
That being said, although I read research incessantly, I was very apprehensive about using the internet and hearing what the “fitness experts” are saying and advocating. While I still believe a strong filter should be in place, I am so glad I changed my mind. Your articles, interviews, and books and been such a help to me, I felt obligated to thank you via email (I have also enjoyed Alan Aragon, Alwyn Cosgrove, and a few others but your work has really inspired me – end of dorky praise).
I have a few questions for you (sorry I am not using the forum – but basically they piss me off and I am always dumber for reading the crap in them), I know you are busy so I will just ask one (for now). First, I have read tons of your articles on the internet (I think I even found something you may have doodled on a napkin and threw away and somehow it made it to a website!) and I have only found that you mentioned multiplying a woman’s bodyweight for 14 and a man’s by 15 to calculate maintenance calories.
Because your a true nerd like me, I don’t believe that what you would actually do with a client (figured you mentioned it for simplicity and not to blow your readers minds) and was wondering if you would share what equation, formula, or what have you that you to set maintenance calories, taking age, weights, height, and current activity level into consideration.
Answer: Actually that’s exactly what I do and I’m going to explain not only where those values come from but why I do it this way. Assuming average activity (1 hour of exercise + normal daily activity), 14-16 cal/lb is usually a decent enough starting point for maintenance. I ignore all of the other variables since they don’t usually add much except complexity to the equations. Yes, they do affect things to be sure but, unless you’re looking at real extremes of age, body fat, height, etc. I don’t find that they add much overall.
You can prove this to yourself by comparing values spat out by the more complex equations compared to the quick estimates for a variety of different numbers. The variance usually isn’t much more than a couple hundred calories either way and you have to adjust for the real world anyhow so I just use the quick estimates and go. I have better things to do with my day than work math. I’d note that if you had a client that was at the extreme end (e.g. 80 year old woman), it might be worth working some of the more complicated equations to get a more accurate starting point.
But for the clientel most will end up working with (in a certain range of age, body fatness, etc), the below will be close enough to start. Anyhow, I base the 14-16 cal/lb on the following values which takes into account the four major variables that determine daily energy expenditure.
Resting metabolic rate: 10-11 cal/lb. Women use 10, men use 11. If you work something like the Harris-Benedict equation (which includes age, weight, etc.) for most realistic ranges, it’s always within shooting distance of this value. So I use the quick estimate. For example, I plugged my numbers (37 year old male, 5’7″, 155 lbs) into one of the online calculators and it spit out 1630 calories for RMR. 155*11 = 1705 calories.
Thermic effect of activity: This is always a crapshoot since it can range from a mere 10-20% over basal (if you sit all day) to 100% of basal if you’re involved in heavy activity. Assuming relatively average daily activity and training levels, a 30-50% multiplier is usually sufficient here. So 10-11 cal/lb becomes in the realm of 13-15 cal/lb. This assumes and includes an hour of exercise per day or so.
Thermic effect of food: Although it can vary slightly (especially if you look at extremes of diet), TEF usually amounts to about 10% of the total food intake. So add another 10% to the above. So 13-15 cal/lb becomes 14-16 cal/lb or so.
Non-exercise activity thermogenesis: Of course there’s the additional component of NEAT which can vary massively between individuals. This can’t be readily estimated so I leave it out. It also only appears to be particularly relevant during conditions of overfeeding so I’m not sure it matters much for dieting applications in the first place.
Note: if you want a more detailed look at each of the above variables, I did a rather long article about Metabolic Rate that goes into this in more detail.
In general, women or those with a ‘slower’ metabolic rate should use the lower value (14 cal/lb) and men or those with a ‘faster’ metabolic rate should use the higher value (16 cal/lb) as a STARTING POINT ESTIMATION for maintenance calories.
By the way, slower and faster above are sort of subjective decisions, usually based on previous dieting and relatively tendency to gain or lose weight. It simply represents inherent variability in the components of total energy expenditure.
Ok, I put those last three words in caps to make a point, no matter what equation you use to ESTIMATE maintenance calories, that’s all it is: an ESTIMATION. Basal metabolic rate can vary somewhat even for people with identical stats, differences in activity add up, TEF can vary a bit and NEAT is the big wild card. People tend to use the equations as holy writ when all they are are estimations.
Now, from that estimated maintenance value, say someone wants to lose fat. A reasonable reduction for a moderate deficit diet might be 20% below maintenance which is 3 cal/lb (e.g. 15 cal/lb * 0.2 = 3 cal/lb). So ~14-6 cal/lb becomes ~11-13 cal/lb. Bodybuilders have long used 10-12 cal/lb as a starting point for fat loss; turns out they weren’t all idiots after all. For mass gains, you’d add to this estimated maintenance of course but your question wasn’t about muscle gain so I won’t talk much more about that. Clearly if you used a different deficit or surplus, you’d get slightly different values.
Now, here’s the key thing that most miss: the above ESTIMATES have to be modified based on real-world body composition changes. Because it doesn’t matter in the big scheme of things what some ESTIMATE EQUATION says should be happening if that’s not what’s happening. So then you have to decide what you consider a reasonable rate of either fat loss.
On average a male may be able to achieve 1-1.5 lbs true fat loss per week on a moderate deficit diet although this will be somewhat lower if he’s very lean and somewhat higher if he’s very fat. That’s assuming no muscle or performance loss mind you. Females, by dint of their smaller size usually have to accept lower rates of fat loss without truly heroic efforts. Two pounds per month true fat loss may be all that’s realistically achievable. Sucks, huh?
So any estimates of caloric intake have to then be adjusted based on whether or not that true fat loss is being seen. Losing less than that, you may need to reduce calories slightly. Losing more or losing performance, calories may need to come up. I’d note that this is a topic I address in more detail in both The Rapid Fat Loss Handbook and A Guide to Flexible Dieting, in both I give the scheme I use to adjust calories while dieting based on what’s actually happening in the real world.
I’d note that it’s not quite this simple, water retention can mask true fat loss and fat loss isn’t always linear (there are often stalls and drops that occur, a topic I’m currently looking into in some detail right now). A female who is only losing 2 pounds per month, but who retains 5 lbs of water during her cycle may think that the diet is not working when she’s actually on the perfect caloric intake.
But if someone is extremely inactive, I’ve seen them needing 8 cal/lb to lose fat effectively even if they exercise daily. This is more common than you think. Sitting at a computer all days burns crap all calories, even standing up every few minutes significantly increases this (we’ve been using the Bodybugg to track it). Add an hour of exercise per day at moderate intensities and you don’t get much. Calories have to come down (or activity has to be consciously increased in either volume or intensity) for effective fat loss.
People who are insanely active may have to go much higher calorically to avoid excessive deficits and/or performance drops. This is the exception of course and probably not a major part of your clientele. Folks who are doing 4+ hours/day of training don’t usually hire personal trainers for fat loss.
But these tend to be the exception more than the rule so 14-16 cal/lb for maintenance and 10-12 cal/lb for fat loss work as simple and effective starting points. Since they have to be adjsuted based on real-world changes anyhow, I don’t find that using more complicated equations adds very much unless you’re just trying to impress your clients with your math abilities.
Put a bit more simply: since any estimate you’re going to use will have to be modified by real world changes, and since the more complicated equations invariably give results that are at least within close shooting distance of the quick estimates, I simply choose to use the quick estimates (which I’m going to have to adjust anyway) and spend my time doing more valuable things.
The phrase If It Fits Your Macros (often abbreviated to IIFYM) refers to meeting the individual macronutrient needs relevant to one’s goals and then filling the remaining calories with foods of personal preference. Meaning, eat whatever you want as long as it fits the macros. Don’t get it?
Since it’s more common to ask about IIFYM when following a fat loss plan, also known as cutting, we will use an example that relates to it.
Example:
- 200lb man at 20% body fat wants to lose weight
- Maintenance Calories: 3000 (click the link to see how this is found)
- Calories to cut: 2400 - this is a 20% caloric deficit
- 1.5g protein per lb/LBM: (1.5 * 160) 240g
- 0.45g fat per lb/BW: (200 * 0.45) 90g
- Calories from fats + protein minimums: (240 * 4) + (90 * 9) = 1770
- Calories from reaching minimums taken from calories to cut: (2400 - 1770) 630
- He has 630 kcal left to fill with whatever foods he chooses (pancakes, pizza, cake, pop-tarts, ice cream) and still lose weight as a result of remaining in a calorie deficit.
How do I calculate my calories and macros?
Tips (some are general and do not specifically pertain to IIFYM):
- Try to get most of your macros from whole foods. They are high in micronutrients needed to maintain overall health.
- Tailor your meals to suit your individual preference. 6 meals a day is the same as 3 meals a day. There is no difference.
- Timing your nutrients is not necessary. There is no universal macro or calorie breakdown you should be eating pre and/or post-workout. Overall micronutrient, macronutrient and calorie intake relevant to your goal(s) is far more important.
Important
What “eat whatever you want as long as it fits into your macros” means is basically, eat right, but don’t get all caught up in the whole ‘clean vs dirty’ food debate that seems to still go on. If you want to eat whole grain bread, oats, brown rice, etc. etc. Then do it. If you want to eat white bread, white rice, and pop tarts, as long as it fits in with your other macronutrients and your goals in terms of caloric intake then it isn’t going to make much of a difference in the long run. It all comes down to personal preference.
So, basically don’t get into the whole “If I have ice cream I’m going to get fat” or, “I’ll never have pizza again” mentality. If you want it, you can have it, just make sure it fits in with all the guidelines above.
This blog is brought to you via posts on forum.bodybuilding.com such as http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=133634471&highlight=iifym
