Review : Highly dubious about Tim Ferriss’ outlandish claims like lose 20 lbs of body fat in 30 days. Snake oil or panacea? Well, I guess I’ll have to turn myself into a human guinea pig to find out.
Notes / Takeaways / Quotes
- Ferriss’ experiment results: body fat dropped from 11.9% → 10.2% in 2 weeks
- 80/20 Principle is often much more disproportionate in practice and gravitates towards 95/2.5 (2.5% effort provides 95% of the desired results)
- Nassim Nicholas Taleb points out that 2.5% is not 2.5% of a perfect finite body of knowledge, but the most empirically valuable 2.5% of what we know now
- The 4HB tells you what that 2.5% are
- For rapid fat loss, read
➊ Fundamentals + Ground Zero
➋ Slow Carb Diet
➌ Building the Perfect Posterior - For rapid muscle gain, read
➊ Fundamentals + Ground Zero
➋ From Geek to Freak
➌ Occam’s Protocol - It also covers strength gain, total well-being a bunch of other stuff which are exluded in here cos they’re irrelevant for me for now
Fundamentals
- Employ Minimum Effective Dose (MED) : the smallest dose that will produce a desired outcome
➊ To remove stored fat : do the least necessary to trigger a fat-loss cascade of specific hormoes
➋ To add muslce : do the least necessary to trigger local and systemic growth mechanisms - 80 seconds is the dose prescription
- Focus on heat and hormones instead of calories-out as exercise dependent
- Ferris suggests 20lbs of recomposition for those who weigh >120lbs (10lbs if you <120lbs)
- 60% diet + 10% drugs + 30% exercise to reach 20lbs recomp goal
- Don’t confuse physical recreation with exercise. Recreation is for fun. Exercise is for producing changes
- Don’t confuse correlation wth cause and effect
- Forget balance and embrace cycling which is a key ingredient in rapid body redesign
- Don’t blame your genes. Don’t accept predisposition
- It’s not what you put in your mouth that matters, it’s what makes it to your bloodstream
- The hormal responses to carbs, protein and fat are different
- Different sources of calories = different result
- Digestion, protein/carbs/fat ratio and timing affect calorie alloction which can be modified for fat-loss and muscle gain
It’s impossible to evaluate, or even understand, anything that you cannot measure.
Loc 592, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss
Correlation doesn’t prove causation. Be skeptical when people tell you that A causes B
Loc 711, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss
One question you must learn to ask when faced with advice or sales pitches is : If this didn’t work as advertised, what might their other incentvies be for selling it?
Loc 750, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss
Aerobics class? The reason you’re sold : aerobics is more effective than alternative X. THe real reasons it’s promoted : there’s no equipment investment and the gym can maximise students per square foot per class. Many “new and improved” recommendations are based on calculating profit first and then working backward to jusify the method.
Ground Zero
- People suck at following advice
- Harajuku Moment is an epiphany that turns a nice-to-have into a must-have
- Take “before” circumfernce measurements : mid-bicep + waist + hips + mid-thigh = total inches
- Four principels of failure-proofing
➊ Make it conscious
➋ Make it a game : measurement = motivation
➌ Make it competitive
➍ Make it small and temporary
Pople such at following advice [… beacuse…]
➊ Most peple have an insufficient reason for action. The pain isn’t painful enough. It’s a nice-to-have, not a must-have.➋ There are no reminders. No consistent tracking = no awareness = no behavioural change.
Loc 853, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss
To replace self-discipline, how often do you need to reord things? That is, how many times do you need to log data to get hooked and never stop? […] that magic number is five
Loc 1297, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss
5 Rules of The Slow Carb Diet
- Avoid “white” carbs
‣ Except for within 30 mins of finishing a resistance training - Eat the same shit
‣ Pick one from each of the 3 groups for each meal
‣ At least 20 grams of protein per meal
‣ Each as much as you like until you’re full but keep it simple
‣ Eating frequently appears to have no enhancing effect on RMR
‣ Have your first meal within an hour of waking, preferably within 30 mins
‣ There should be no need, or physical urge to each snacks. If you’re hungry, you’re not eating enough protein and legumes at each meal - Don’t drink calories
‣ Limit diet soft drinks to 470ml as the aspartame can stimulate weight gain
‣ max 2 glasses of dry wine per day - Don’t eat fruit
‣ Except tomatoes & avoados (eaten in moderation) - One day off per week
‣ Dramatically spiking caloric intake once per week
‣ This causes a host of hormonal changes that improves fat-loss
‣ From increasing cAMP and GMP to improving conversion of the T4 thyroid hormone to the more active T3
‣ Most men can get away with one cheat MEAL, some women can’t
‣ Menstruationcan stop if leptin levels get too low. Binge day is an important reset
‣ If gain too much / get nervous, eat a high protein breakfast then binge from lunch to dinner
Damage Control
- Preventing fat gain when you binge
- Goal of binging : have as much of the crap ingested either go into muscle tisues or out of the body unabsorbed
- 3 Principles
➊ Minimise the release of insulin
‣ Make first meal high in protein (>30g) and high in insoluble fibre
‣ Consume a small qty of fructose in grapefruit juice before second meal
‣ Use supplements : AGC + PAGG
‣ consume citric juices
➋ Increase the speed of gastric emptying : thru caffeine and yerba mate tea
➌ Engage in brief muscular contraction throughout the binge : 60-90s of exercise pre- & post meal
Building the Perfect Posterior
- 5 mins workout routine
➊ Glute bridge 1×20
➋ Alt. arm/leg raises 1×15 (one set each side)
➌ Kettlebell swings 1×50 - Do it on an empty stomach in the morning
- Do it 3 times a week
From Geek to Freak
- Four basic principles from a training standpoint
➊ 1 x until failure for each exercise
➋ 5/5 rep cadence: 5 seconds up, 5 seconds down
➌ 2-10 exercises per workout
➍ Increase recovery time along with size
Occam’s Protocol
- Workout A
➊ Close-grip supinated lat pulldown
➋ Machine shoulder press - Workout B
➊ Slight incline/decline bench press
➋ Leg press
➌ Stationary bike 85+ rpm x 3mins - The objective is to fail, to reach the point where you can no longer move the weight, at 7 or more reps at a 5/5 cadence. The leg press is to be performed for 10 or more reps at 5/5
- Progressive overload with a additional 10lbs (at least) for the next workout
- Don’t drop the weight when you hit failure, hold it at the limit for 5 seconds
- Don’t pause at the top or bottom of any movement (except the bench press)
- 3 mins rest between all exercise
- Begin the programme with 2 rest days between A & B workouts. After two A & B workouts, increase rest days to 3 days. As soon as you’ve a workout where more than one exercise has stalled, increase rest days to 4.
Suggested Reading / Tools / Tricks
- Seeking Wisdom : From Darwin to Munger – on mental models
- Practice Pessimism : Stoicism as Producitivty System – Ferriss’ Harajuku Moment
- Are Your Friends Making You Fat – importance of your peer group
- Fat Replica – a digusting but effective vmotivator
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