Cheat Day
After several months or perhaps after 1 or 2 years of training my gym clients frequent me with their doubts. Usually their concern is that they have reached a plateau in fat loss. They say that even after eating ample amount of protein and cutting down on excess carbs they lost fat initially but now they have hit a rut. My usual plan when people face a big wall is to ask them to have a free day/cheat day.
A free day or a cheat day can be used to boost your metabolism when you’ve been dieting hard. Your body hits a wall after many days of dieting. In other words, your metabolism comes to a grinding halt.
For example, since 6 months I am eating very clean. I rarely eat junk. I am also seeing that my metabolism gets sluggish when the dieting becomes monotonous. At the same time, I instinctively feel that I need to revamp my metabolism. I know that it’s time to do some serious re-feeding. What do I do? I simply eat more complex carbohydrates—more chapathis or a bigger sized ragi ball or more rice. However, note that I don’t cut down on my protein and healthy fats.
The next few days I feel more energetic, and I also see that the metabolic boost because of re-feeding has burnt some more fat. You will be amazed to know that this little trick can actually do wonders from crashing your metabolism.
Awesome…