So I have been following the 52 diet you setout for a few weeks and TBH its working well, loping around 1kg per week at the moment and Im finding that although I do get hungry on the fasting days, its not too bad. I especially find I can get through it as I know the following day Ill be eating normally again rather than the constant feeling of hunger from being in a slight deficit for several months.
It got me thinking, as I dont eat anything on fasting days and as no training occurs on those days, when I do eventually hit my target weight, can I just eat anything I want so long as total calories are low? I mean if Im not eating at all, then my protein intake is 0 so does it actually matter if I were say to eat a couple of low protein meals on that day as part of a “maintenence” strategy?
If my weight goes up, eat less on those days or go back to 52 diet.
Hit target weight, eat whatever on those 2 days… try and keep it overall low calorie
Repeat?
Would that work or am I really missing something here?
From a body composition standpoint, sure. If you are losing 1kg per week you can likely add 3500-4000 calories per week and maintain your weight. This could be donne adding 500-600 calories per day (in this example all of your days would have 500-600 calories more and your fasting days would have 500-600 calories).
Or you could add most of these calories on the fasting days (giving you around 1700 calories on each former fasting day).
You could also do a mixed approach. Adding 1000-1200 on the former fasting days and 300-400 calories on the other days.
From a body composition perspective it will work.
However keep in mind that you would lose the health benefits of fasting.