This one’s a topic that my awesome patrons on Patreons voted for.
They would like to know: what are THREE of my own personal favorite studies.
After all, my content is very science-heavy so there definitely has been a handful of
studies that stuck out more than others.
So I would love to share three of those with you today.
Now I do wanna preface that, even though I find these studies interesting, they are in
no way the end-all and be-all of studies.
Nor are they without their own flaws and faults.
My interest is more so the data it shows that really drive home points that I regularly
recommend.
Ultimately, we still need to look at the body of research as a whole rather than singular
studies.
Fortunately, these studies don’t really deviate far from what we see in the entire
literature anyway, but their findings are still fascinating, in my opinion.
So, without further ado, let’s jump right into it.
The first personal favorite study of mine is a year-long randomized control trial published
in 2018.
Called the “DIETFITS” study, researchers pit a low-fat diet versus a low-carb diet.
What first stood out to me in this study is the length.
An entire year of following subjects on their assigned diets.
Usually, when we have comparative trials like this, they’re only 8 to 12 weeks long.
That’s kind of the standard.
So, to see a more long-term trial is always appreciated.
And of course, there is the fact that it tackles a very popular subject in recent years: low-carb
weight loss.
Now, to be clear, this isn’t a keto study.
Low-carb here is defined by many well-known low-carb advocates as 132 grams of carbs or
fewer.
Might not sound very low on paper, but considering carbs take up more than half the calories
of a standard diet, this one would be low in comparison, where carbs account for 23
to 26.5%.
But the results are the fun part.
In the end, neither diet was superior to the other in terms of weight loss.
What caught my eye is that the researchers concluded that by far the most important factor
to successful weight loss is not fat and carb composition, but instead the ability to adhere
to the diet.
Those that enjoyed their diet best achieved the best results.
And it’s because of these reasons that I appreciate this study so much since those
are two things I routinely push in my videos: one, many diets can work, and two, adherence
is of highest importance.
Number two study I’m a big fan of also comes from a researcher that I’m a big fan of,
Doctor Brad Schoenfeld, an expert at the forefront of training research.
You most certainly have encountered his work too even if you don’t know him by name.
The one study, a meta-analysis rather, I wanna highlight here is his work on light-load versus
heavy-load training.
In the analysis, Schoenfeld and his colleagues found that you can very well build muscle
training with very light loads as you would heavy loads, which kind of tears down the
idea of having to “go heavy or go home.”
Much of what dictates growth is achieving a higher level of training volume and training
near to failure.
But, trends do show that lifting heavier would have more efficient benefits, and especially
a superior strength adaptation.
But ultimately, what I love about this study is that it, like dieting, there are many ways
to achieve your muscle-building goals.
It doesn’t always have to be with heavy weights.
That being said, though, going heavy is still strongly recommended in order to maximize
strength gains, but by no means it’s the only option for fitness.
A great analysis that really put training loads into perspective.
And finally, number there, no surprise that it’s about my favorite fitness topic, PROTEIN.
More specifically, a 2005 study that drove him the idea, if you’re trying to lose weight,
eating less protein is not the answer.
Instead, you should very well eat MORE.
Let’s cut straight to the results.
The findings were very clear that eating a higher protein diet, in this case 30% of your
calories coming from protein, results to you eating less throughout the day.
So much so that in this study, subjects eating the higher protein diet spontaneously consumed
441 calories fewer per day than their lower-protein counterparts.
441!
If that much was a deficit, it can hypothetically lead to a near-pound of spontaneous weight
loss per week, just by eating more protein.
Reason for this reduction is that higher protein intakes help increase fullness and lower appetite,
two things I’ve covered quite extensively in my videos.
So chalk this up as another study strongly supporting the one and only important phrase
of…
GET YOUR PROTEIN!
But that’s it!
Three studies I personally found very useful and fascinating in each of their own rights.
Please feel free to check out the studies yourself in the description below.
Let me know what you think about them.
And thank you to my awesome patrons for voting for this topic.
Let me know of other studies you might personally enjoy in the comments below.
As always, thank you for watching and once more, GET YOUR PROTEIN!