Weight Loss with the 3pm diet

Lately, I have been doing the “3pm diet”. This is not a revolutionary concept. As a matter of fact, it is not a diet at all. It is not a secret either, but someone managed to write a book, titled “The 3:00 PM Secret”. Here is the link to the publisher’s web page.
And here is the book in Amazon.

The principle is very simple: Stop eating at 3 pm. Or, as the author likes to say, eat a nutritious breakfast, a nutritious lunch, a snack at 2:30, and then you are done. It is really amazing that an entire book was written around this concept. So, basically, you are skipping dinner and go without eating from 2:30pm to maybe 7:30am, a total of 17 hours or so.

Two questions come in mind: 1) Why? 2) How?

Regarding the "why", the author goes into great lengths to prove that this kind of eating schedule has many advantages, both in terms of weight loss and in terms of a lifestyle: 1) By eating most of your calories in the morning, you can burn them later in the day, so you end up losing weight. 2) You don’t need to worry about cooking & cleaning dishes in the evening and you have more time and energy to devote to a hobby or other pursuits.

I definitely agree with #2. Most people come home from work, overeat, and then are too tired digesting to do anything productive, so they end up laying on the couch, watching TV (and snacking). Not having to worry about dinner in a sense frees you and gives you more time for productive work.

Point #1 is questionable. They are those who say, it does not matter when you eat. You can eat all your calories in one meal, eat only in the morning, eat only in the evening, or eat many small meals during the day. It is irrelevant. All that matters is how much goes in and how much goes out (via exercise). I am not sure I agree with this mechanistic view of the body, but one thing is certain: It is very difficult to overeat for breakfast and lunch. The majority of the calories are consumed in the evening. So by skipping dinner you can lose (or maintain) weight, depending on how much you eat in the morning.

I have been doing this for a week now and have already lost a couple of pounds, even though I tend to eat a lot. I work at home so after my breakfast at 7am, I usually eat a 2nd breakfast around 9am. So I eat three meals. Someone with an office work will most probably eat less and weight loss is almost certain.

Now, to the “how” My wife cannot believe that I just stop eating after 3pm. But it is very easy for me. My body is now used to this, and does not expect food. I feel fine. I don’t get hungry, and I go to bed for a good night’s sleep with my digestive system taking a break.

I expect that a lot of people have a problem with this concept, especially if they like to entertain or go out to eat, or just enjoy eating and have nothing productive to do in the evening. There are people (my wife is one) who look forward to eating dinner. These are the people who will not even agree to try this. The book says it is OK to have something light, like a soup, and it even gives you two “free days” a week. So, the 3pm is not etched in stone. I personally don’t need the freebies. It would be nice if my wife was also in the same schedule, but I don’t care. When she cooks dinner and asks me if I want to eat, I politely refuse and ask her to save my portion for lunch tomorrow.

There are people (in Greece for example) who routinely do not eat breakfast (I used to do this). So, they are going without eating for long periods, but at a different time of the day. There is even a book called “The Fast-5 Diet” which advocates skipping breakfast and lunch and only eat between 5pm and 10pm (thus a fast minus this 5 hour window). In one sense, this is exactly the opposite of the “3pm diet”, yet there is no question that both methods could work. It is difficult to eat a lot in a short window of time during the day (even though I am sure some people can do it). At the end, it might be a matter of lifestyle, and I definitely prefer eating early than late in the day.

I am also doing something that I have not done before: I eat breakfast before long morning runs (for example the Sunday trail runs for the Buckeye 50K race). I find that this gives me more energy later in the run. I would not do that for short runs or fast races, only for long slow runs.

I am happy that someone wrote a book about this. I have been interested in weight loss since I started running in 2001. It is a long story, but, briefly, I was 225 lbs in 2001 and dropped to 175 after one year, by just running and without any other adjustments in my diet. After the first year, I fell in love with running. I soon realized that I could enjoy running more, and be better at it, if I lost even more weight. But it is not easy now that I work at home and I am close to my “ideal” weight. I have tried different things, including not eating after a certain time (around 5pm). This personal version of the 3pm diet worked, but I did not keep it up. Now that I know that someone else has thought long enough about this and even wrote a book, I feel encouraged to try it again. It is not something I made up. It is now official.

Bottom line: This 3pm concept is helping me lose or maintain weight and I enjoy the lifestyle benefits I get from it. I have more energy in my long morning runs, and more time for productive work in the evening.

2 Weeks to Akron (4 to Towpath)

A nice long and very challenging run today… We started from Peninsula at 6:30 am. Up “Initiation Hill” (very steep), then straight at the “Bike & Hike” trail, then down to Boston (water break). Then to Riverview Road and turn right up Stein (hilly). Continue to Oak Hill Road, right on Riverview (briefly) and to Bolanz Rd (water break). From there to Akron Peninsula Rd and back to start. Not only it was a hard and hilly course, it was pouring rain all the way. A tough run indeed.

I tired to follow the leading group but fell behind. I am happy with my mile splits: 10:18 8:10 8:14 7:42 7:19 8:05 8:39 8:35 8:59 8:11 8:06 7:40 8:14 8:29 8:20 8:37 8:12. Average Pace: 8:19, good for the conditions. Total mileage = 16.5.

Other news: I started my diet this week with a semi-fast on Monday (I only ate a couple of fruits). After reaching 168.5 lbs on Sunday, I was down to 162 on Thursday, but ate a bit more on Thursday and Friday and I was fine in the long run on Saturday. I know some people say that this (taper = 3 weeks before a marathon) is not a time for a diet, but that's what I did for Cleveland and it worked.

Goal or Target? I mentioned previously that my goal for the Akron marathon is 3:30. Actually, this is a target time. What is the difference? I think goal is something you really want to achieve and you either make it or not. Target is a time you aim for. You can be off and that’s not a big deal. Since I don’t really care for my time (having quality for Boston earlier), I think I can call 3:30 my goal. I will not be disappointed if I don’t meet this target time. I am taking it easy. The following day Lea wants us to run a 5K in Toledo. Two weeks later I will run the Towpath marathon.

Total for the week: 50 miles, 165 lbs

Detox Diet – Works for me!

<--- Since 2001 I have kept data like this one. I weigh myself every morning and then average the numbers every week. I plot this weekly weight in a graph as you see here (for 2005 in this case).

Back in 2001 I had ballooned to 225 lbs. I then started running, to lose weight. In one year I was down to 175 lbs and fell in love with running. I never really dieted. Weight got off as I was running. Since then, I have tried to lose weight (so I can run better) without any success… I tried different things: Calorie counting, fasting, not eating after 5 pm. Each method worked for a while, but I was soon back to where I started.

Things changed about this time last year my wife introduced me to the Detox diet. Here is what I wrote about this diet last year (4/07):

----- My wife put me in this 11 day (Detox) diet, 11 days ago. She told me what to eat (and what not to eat) and she even prepared the food for me. All I had to do was eat what I was served (that's easy) and resist the temptation to snack (I cheated, of course, but only a little bit and mostly with healthy foods, and none of the forbidden sugar-loaded snacks!)
At 175 lbs 5'10" I do not really need to lose weight for health reasons but I WANT to lose weight so I can run faster. My running friends are 132 and 140 lbs. So I started with a 7 day diet, followed a fast (last Tuesday - did not eat anything, that was tough, but I made it), followed by 3 more days of diet. The last day was yesterday.
I started at 174 lbs and ended up at 168 lbs. That might not sound too much, but I was not overweight to start (I have heavy bones :)) and I have never been steadily under 170 for as long as I can remember. So it feels great!
I don't think there are any great secrets in this diet (even though the author of the book/plan puts a lot of emphasis in the "detox" part and avoiding gluten (I don't know what it is but I know I could not eat bread.)) I ate (and will continue to eat) two (organic :)) eggs for breakfast, salads & lean meat for lunch & dinner and I did not snack in-between (just drinking lots of water). We did switch to organic fruits & vegetables and filtered water. I stopped drinking the whole milk cocoa that I love (as a matter of fact, I stopped chocolate completely and I don't miss it) and sugar-loaded products. And I ate smaller portions. I think this is a change for life. In this diet I was eating something like 2,000 calories a day instead of the standard 3,500-4,000 calories I would normally eat. ------


<--- 2007 weight graph. The first drop is the first Detox Diet that help me permanently lose 6 lbs. I started at 174 lbs and ended up at 168 and managed to keep the weight off. This is the first time I was under 170 lbs. My running improved and was able to PR in every distance I raced. I tried the diet again in September but did not manage to keep off the weight.

While I was in this diet, I was of course losing weight, and was not feeling particularly hungry, but my running was definitely affected. I could not run long runs, or run fast, due to lack of energy. In the end, I lost 6 lbs (from 174 to 168 lbs) and I emerged a stronger runner, going on to improve my PR in every distance I raced, except for the Marathon.

I tried the same diet in September of last year (after my marathon) and even though I lost weight while on the diet, I gradually gained all the weight back, maybe because I returned to my old eating habits (chocolate, etc) right when the diet ended.

Spring forward one year. I decided to do the diet again... Some people might question the wisdom of dieting and losing weight 3 weeks before a marathon. I figured, a diet (aimed to lose weight, including a fasting day) is like a long training run. It would be a mistake to diet the week before the marathon. But if I do it 3 weeks ahead of time (just like the last long run), I still have time to "recover" (from the diet, meaning to regain strength and restore my glycogen supplies, not necessarily regain weight - OK, maybe a pound or two)


<--- Recent round of Detox diet has helped me lose 5 lbs. Hopefully, this loss will stick.

So I started Monday two weeks ago. My weight was 169 lbs (I had reached a peak of over 171 lbs just a week or two before). I did a fast 10 mile training run last Wednesday and I felt surprisingly strong. I was busy in a conference last weekend so I could not do a very long run and did not eat much. Tuesday was my fast day, and I went for a 10 mile run without problems. The morning after the fast I was 161 lbs!

Like last year, the thing I like about this diet is that I am not hungry. Yes, when I go to bed at night I feel a bit hungry (since I am not snacking in the evening) but overall I am fine during the day. This year, I am seeing something new: My running has not been affected, while on the diet. Of course, I have not run over 10 miles, but I feel fine running 10 miles relatively fast.

Bottom line: I lost 5 lbs (from 169 to 164) and I hope to keep it off by eating sensibly. I also hope that this weight loss will help me get closer to my goal of a 3:30 marathon.