Chapter 1 The Diet Priorities

There are countless diet options available these days. If you would like some evidence to back
this statement, try googling “fat loss diet”. New diets that promise to help you lose fat, build
muscle, and increase performance pop up online nearly every day. Some diets eliminate whole
food groups while others focus on consuming those same food groups solely. In reality, the
science of dieting has moved beyond the scope of just controlling food groups; you have likely
heard of concepts such as macronutrients, total calorie intake, or meal timing. The scientific
bases and reasoning behind the various available dietary regimen are not often made wholly
clear. With so many opposing options, just deciding how to diet can be a frustrating and
seemingly hopeless endeavor.

The good news is that there are five main principles, along with adherence to those principles,
that contribute to any diet’s effectiveness. Differences in the implementation of these principles
account for all variation between diets and their outcomes. We can get lost in the superficial
aspects of the many diet options available: one diet may require you to eliminate carbohydrates
from your meals, while another calls for fasting. The intended outcome of each of these is
generally weight loss. What might jump out at you is the lack of carbs or the fasting periods, but
these are just superficial aspects––both of these diet alterations are meant to achieve one goal:
a calorie deficit. It is the calorie deficit that results in the weight loss, not the lack of carbs or
meal timing. Calorie balance is the first and most important of the diet principles, and any diet
that works well will manipulate calories directly or indirectly. The other four diet principles can
also alter superficial aspects of diet. Once you have learned to see past these superficial
aspects and identify each of the five underlying diet principles, you will be able to assess their
role and predict that diet’s effectiveness.

Diets vary quantitatively across one or more of the following principles:

Calorie Balance​​: How many calories you eat per day relative to how many you burn

Macronutrient Amounts​​: How many grams of protein, carbohydrate, and fat you eat per day

Nutrient Timing: ​When and how you spread your total food intake across daily meals

Food Composition​​: The sources of macronutrients you consume

Supplement Use and Hydration​​: How much and what type (if any) dietary supplements you
consume and your level of hydration
All of these factors contribute to rates of weight loss or weight gain, as well as differences in
athletic performance. As we will learn, some of these principles are more powerful than others in
determining outcome.

Although adherence is not a programmed aspect of a diet, it is critical. If the diet were a race
car, adherence would be the driver of a race car; without a driver, the car does not race. A good
driver can get the best possible performance with any given machine, but a bad driver can crash
even the best car. Simply put, you cannot succeed on a diet you do not follow, regardless of
how good the diet is.

When we wrote the first edition of this book some years ago, we took an exhaustive look at the
research on dieting for fitness. We assessed effect sizes, which are measurements of how
much change in outcome is observed when a specific variable differs between groups. Studies
that varied calorie balance alone showed the most significant effects. Studies that manipulated
macronutrient intake (without altering calories) showed smaller but still significant differences in
body composition changes. Altering nutrient timing (without changes to calories or
macronutrients) resulted in very small differences in outcome. The effect of changes in food
composition or supplement use on fitness outcomes was undetectable in most cases. As a
testament to the fact that adherence to any diet is a prerequisite for its success; metabolic ward
studies, in which subjects do not leave the research facility and can only eat the food
administered by researchers, are the gold standard in nutrition research because of the near
perfect adherence that results from these conditions.

We qualitatively consolidated data from these investigations and came up with estimated
relative effect sizes for the five principles of dieting:

Calorie Balance ≈ 50%

Macronutrient Amounts ≈ 30%
Nutrient Timing ≈ 10%
Food Composition ≈ 5%
Supplements and Hydration ≈ 5%

Again, these percentages only apply to the extent that an individual adheres to a given diet. A
perfectly planned calorie balance for example will not have the desired effect if the dieter is not
eating those planned calories.

If you run a diet based only on calorie balance, you might expect to get about 50% of the
potential effect of the diet on body composition and performance. On the other hand, if you
based your diet on both calorie balance and proper macronutrient intake, you could get about
80% of the diet’s potential results. If you took all the right supplements and ate only healthy food
options, but did not worry about macronutrients, timing, or calories, you could not expect more
than about 10% of the potential positive outcomes from the diet. We want to make it clear that
this analysis is for body composition change and performance outcomes, ​not health. ​While
paying attention to food composition (eating healthy foods most of the time) does not have a
huge effect on appearance or performance, it does have a significant effect on health, as
detailed in our book ​Understanding Healthy Eating​ .

Figure 1.1 ​The Diet Priority Pyramid depicts the relative importance of the diet priorities for body composition and
performance outcomes.

Avoiding Pitfalls and Using the Diet Principles to Your Advantage

The differential effects of diet principles provide useful guidelines for programming diets with
specific outcomes in mind. Prioritizing the less powerful aspects (such as meal timing and
supplements) and taking the powerful principles (such as calorie balance and macronutrient
intake) for granted are common mistakes. Someone might eat with exact meal timing and take
creatine and whey protein supplements, but if calories and macronutrients vary too much day to
day, there simply will not be substantial results. Thousands of people start new fat loss or
muscle gain diets every week, and many of them choose diets that are not based on the higher
priority diet principles and thus experience minimal results.

Perhaps the most commonly neglected of the dieting principles is calorie balance. Thousands of
people restrict various food types to consume only specific foods––unknowingly prioritizing one
of the less important diet principles, food composition. Supplements are the most
overemphasized principle. People buy countless bottles of pills and powders and take them
religiously, expecting big results. While investing so much time and energy into the minor
priorities, many of these well-intentioned dieters do not have the willpower left over to invest in
the big priorities that really matter. On a fat loss phase this can mean eating too much (very
healthy) food to create a calorie deficit. On a muscle gain phase this can mean eating
exclusively healthy food that is high in fiber and not as appetizing, resulting in a failure to create
a calorie surplus for weight gain. Both of these failures often occur despite a diet with
appropriate food composition, well planned meal timing, and supplements.

Unfortunately, these mistakes often involve every bit as much effort as a successful diet. Every
year, people find their dieting efforts largely wasted on unimpressive results, leading many to
assume they are “hard losers”, “hard gainers”, or otherwise personally flawed. The true
underlying problem is simply a misprioritization of dieting principles.

By getting to know the diet principle hierarchy we can ensure that our hard efforts are being
spent where they are most effective. As you read about each of the individual diet principles,
please keep their hierarchical organization in mind so that when it comes time to program your
diet, you can effectively manage the distribution of these factors to meet your goals.

Key Definitions and Concepts

Some key concepts and definitions that will come up throughout the book are listed below. We
will revisit many of these multiple times throughout the coming chapters, so be prepared to
return for a refresher as needed throughout your reading:

Set Points
An adult’s set point is the body weight that they are naturally inclined to maintain. Some people
have a high set point and would become obese if they just ate and exercised as they pleased.
Others have trouble maintaining sufficient body weight for best health when left to their own
devices. Set points are genetic predispositions, but your body’s preferred weight can be
changed.

Settling Points
A settling point is the weight your body is inclined to maintain, taking into account your current
and historical​ dietary and activity practices. Your settling point can be very different from your
genetic set point. Enough added fat or added muscle maintained for periods of months to years
can permanently push your settling point above your genetic set point. In contrast, there is no
convincing evidence as of this writing that settling points fall permanently below genetic set
points when weight is lost. The good news is that it is often the case that more overweight
people have actually pushed their settling point far above their genetic set point as opposed to
their having a very high genetic set point.

Muscle mass has its own independent set and settling points––some people are naturally more
or less muscular regardless of diet and training, though these points are not affected as easily
as those for general body weight. Once more muscle has been gained and maintained for a
year or longer, only a fraction of the original effort is needed to rebuild it if it is lost. Also, muscle
takes much less effort to maintain than to build, a fact we can exploit in the construction of
nutritional periodization.

Fat Loss Phase

A period of dieting for the purpose of losing fat. A common secondary goal on such a phase is
to minimize muscle loss to the greatest extent possible.

Muscle Gain Phase

A period of dieting for the purpose of gaining muscle. A common secondary goal on such a
phase is to minimize fat gain to the greatest extent possible.

Post-diet Maintenance Phase

Also known as a “diet recovery phase,” this phase occurs after a fat loss or a muscle gain phase
and its purpose is to maintain the changes made to body composition during the preceding diet.
This period involves easing back into normal eating, slowly moving out of the deficit or surplus
created by the previous phase. The purpose of this phase is also to reset metabolic and
psychological homeostasis at a new body weight and establish new settling points. Post-diet
maintenance begins at the end of a fat loss or muscle gain diet and its duration will depend on
the degree to which body weight and metabolism were changed by the previous phase. At the
conclusion of post-diet maintenance, one can begin another weight changing phase or move
into long term maintenance of the current weight.

Long Term Maintenance / Balance Phase

In this phase of dieting, the individual’s physiology and psychology have adapted to the current
state of the body. This phase typically starts after the post-diet maintenance phase and can last
as long as the individual would like to maintain their results and live a healthy, active, and
balanced life.

High Volume Hypertrophy Training

High volume hypertrophy training is needed to maintain muscle mass on a fat loss diet or
increase muscle mass on a muscle gain diet. It consists of resistance training composed of
multiple sets of exercises (8-20+ sets per bodypart per week), mainly in the 6-30 repetition
range. This resistance training is ideally mainly composed of compound basics like squats,
bench presses, rows, and so on––lifts that engage multiple joints and whole muscle groups.

Low Volume Strength Training

Low volume strength training increases strength and power without changing muscle size. It is
composed of fewer sets (5-15 per bodypart per week), usually in the 1-8 repetition range. This
type of training is conducive to maintaining muscle during isocaloric periods (post-diet or long
term maintenance phases). This type of training has the added benefit of making the muscles
more sensitive to the muscle growth effects of high volume hypertrophy training for another fat
loss or muscle gain diet.

Mesocycle
Mesocycle is a term used to describe training on a ‘month to month’ basis––periods of
dedicated training usually lasting between 4-8 weeks. The mesocycle is comprised of a series of
microcycles, or ‘week to week’ training phases. Mesocycles are strung together to form
macrocycles of training, which are long term periods dedicated to progressing towards a
particular goal. Mesocycles (or several mesocycles with the same goal sequenced together) are
also colloquially known as ‘blocks’ or ‘phases’ of training.

Fractional Synthetic Rate of Muscle Growth (FSR)

FSR refers generally to the rate at which a certain amount of amino acids from dietary protein
are incorporated into skeletal muscle. In other words, this describes how much of the protein
you eat is used to grow muscle and how fast.

Fractional Breakdown Rate of Muscle Growth (FBR)

FBR refers generally to the rate at which a certain amount skeletal muscle protein is broken
down for use in the body. In other words, this describes how much muscle tissue is lost during
periods of insufficient training, insufficient energy availability, or insufficient circulating amino
acids and how fast.

Partitioning-Ratio
The P-Ratio describes the ratio of fat to muscle gained or lost on a diet. A favorable P-Ratio on
a muscle gain phase would mean gaining larger amounts of muscle and very little fat. One of
the reasons to periodize diet phases for muscle gain is to maximize the P-Ratio of each gaining
phase so that more muscle than fat is gained over the long term.

Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced Lifters

In this book we will define beginners as having around 0-3 years of structured lifting experience,
intermediates as having roughly 3-6 years of experience, and advanced lifters as having 6+
years of experience. These are not precise timelines, but serve as a rough guide to classify
lifting experience. In general, beginners gain muscle and lose fat more readily than intermediate
and advanced lifters. Advanced lifters need more voluminous training to gain even a small
amount of muscle compared to less experienced counterparts. While genetics and other factors
play a large role in muscle growth responses, the relative differences between levels of
experience are consistent. In other words, there may be outlier individuals who gain more
muscle as advanced lifters than less genetically inclined beginners, but on average those early
in their lifting career will have better responses to training than their more experienced
counterparts.
Chapter Summary

● Diets to improve performance and body composition can be evaluated based on how
they address the diet principles of calorie balance, macronutrient amounts, nutrient
timing, food composition, and supplement use.

● Individual diet principles do not contribute to success equally, and diets that prioritize the
less powerful factors are either less effective or doomed to failure.

● Better adherence increases any diet’s effectiveness. Adherence is imperative for

success.