What Is Calorie Cycling?

Support for Calorie Cycling

Several studies support calorie cycling. Some individuals originally thought varying their caloric intake would result in less weight loss than total restriction because of the increased caloric intake, though this doesn't appear to be the case. Studies indicate cutting calories leads to a sharp decline in the amount of calories an individual's body burns each day. Restricting calories for just eight weeks can cause an individual's metabolism to burn 250 fewer calories at rest each day, which means they'll regain weight very quickly when they start eating a normal amount of food again. In one study, participants who ate a low-calorie diet for three weeks experienced a resting metabolism decrease of more than one hundred calories. But when they switched to a higher caloric intake, their metabolism became higher than when they first began the study. In some studies, the reduction in metabolism reached levels of five hundred calories each day, which means maintaining a goal weight would involve eating twenty-five percent less food per day. One study involved eleven days of calorie restriction followed by three days of high-calorie eating. Participants lost more weight and had a lower metabolic rate reduction than individuals who restricted exclusively.

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