What is the ‘best’ weight loss strategy? | Peter Attia, M.D. & Layne Norton, Ph.D.
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March 23, 2025
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"Harmony in Every Heartbeat
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I stopped drinking all alcohol and I only eat 1200h-2000h. It’s very easy for me to maintain except the rare occasion I’m in a hotel where I’ll grab breakfast. Otherwise in 8 months I’ve lost 18kg, from 99 to 81. (I’ve been 98-108kg for 30yrs). Now at 53 I’m running for the first time ever and have a RHR of 44 and great blood pressure so much I’ve stopped meds for the first time in 25+ years.
Diet and training routine is easy. ADHD might help hyper focus on times and structures.
170g low fat protein, plenty of veg, some fruit, green tea, low calories, no ultra processed foods, your welcome ❤
Snacking can be a downfall!
I got lean by rucking 3-4 hours a day at work, 30 mins cross trainer and weights every day, diet was half healthy half trash, week days in a deficit, weekends surplus. I’ve tried restricting calories down and being less active and all I can think about is food until it sends me to the point of eating 6000 calories worth of sweets, cardio is the way with slight diet tweaks imo
I’m doing all three – CR, DR, and TR – and coupled with exercise – cardio zone 2 and light weight lifting – I met my primary goals. In order to assure sustainability, I pursued all of these steps on the margin (no heroics) and cheerfully cheated on occasion. Although not a rules guy, I dropped sweetened beverages, found time to walk every day, and committed to sleep. I made a lifestyle shift, not a program commitment. Focused on Yeses, not Nos.
-I'm starting to realize that each person needs to find their method. Turns out, for me, 2MAD and going very long term without sugar works well, I don't feel deprived at all. But when I do eat those two meals I feast. This strategy works very well for me to feel great and keep my bodyfat at ideal levels. WHAT I see is that people are unwilling to try different methods. They won't even try IF, low carb. They keep trying calorie restriction with a high carb diet and keep failing.
I lost weight for 18 weeks in a row by eating the same thing every day. I don't think many people can do that, but it made life much easier.
Simply put: you do you and create a calorie deficit.
Three cleans, ample greens and in betweens. That’s the diet that has helped this lifelong fat guy keep his weight in check over the last decade or so. That’s three mostly clean whole food meals, ample greens just means lots of produce and then in-betweens which is just a little bit of the bad stuff one or two small snacks per day.
S
imple and direct, thanks. It was great
To balance out the keto eaters in the comments – I do best at getting and keeping at goal weight with high carb low fat. Suits my current life as I run and live in Asia where life is rice based and the dehydration from keto is a killer in tropical heat. Fruit, rice and fish keep me full and happy and give me the energy to run. But back when I was recovering from thyroid medication in the U.K. Atkins got rid of three stone of fat. I think we all know which is the healthiest method of weight loss. The CVD risks of long term keto are higher than high (whole foods) carbs and low saturated fat.
Layne is bang on about the snacks. Snacks tend to be junk food and easy to mindlessly overeat.
I do 5 days of calorie counting and 2 days of trying to make decisions which are not too bad. So Sunday to Thursday I count, Friday I plan to stay largely on track but if theres a social event in the evening I might take a few more calories, and on Saturday the same.
Encourage healthy habits but don't claim you can help people lose weight until you can prove you have a high success rate (and you also account for how many people drop from your program because it's not sustainable for them). Given the almost universal lowering metabolism and increasing of hunger hormones accompanying weight loss long term weight loss is the exception. Sadly most claiming to help people lose weight without fairly drastic intervention (medication or surgery) long term are at best misguided and at worst fraud. I hate that's how it is as those drastic interventions have considerable risk but so many have been misled and made to feel guilty about weight rebound when they are fighting biological obstacles that are almost unsurmountable.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation:
00:00 🍽️ The best weight loss strategy varies for individuals; there's no one-size-fits-all answer.
01:39 🏋️♂️ Consistency is key; if you have an indulgence or miss a workout, focus on getting back on track immediately.
02:35 📋 Weight loss requires some form of restriction, whether it's calorie counting, carb restriction, or fasting.
03:33 💡 Choose the form of restriction that feels least restrictive to you individually; what works for one person may not work for another.
04:14 🥗 Claims about specific diets should be taken with caution; individual experiences can differ from general guidelines.
05:07 🚫 Snacking may be less satiating; reducing snacking can help with weight loss.
I cook my meals, don’t consume meds, drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and junk food; have no time nor wish for exercise or snacking, so here’s my input: completely cut on sugar and fat – lost some weight, gained some depression, frequent brain fog, and fear due to almost inability to study. Added back some sugar and a bit more fat – gained back some of the weight and a full ability to study, lost brain fog, fear and depression. I guess, it’s all about your priorities at a time, so go figure…
SECRETS REVEALED: Eating MORE Carbs
Can Help You Lose Weight…
Best thing for me if I want to lose a lot of weight is calorie counting with a tracker app. I’ll try to eat mostly high fiber and high protein foods, but can also fit in a couple sweet things every day which is important to me to feel satisfied.
It’s hard to stick to calorie counting for long periods of time, but if I combine with preparation for an upcoming event (bike race, vacation, etc) that gives me the motivation to stick to it.
I hate being fat
whenever i watch health-related videos, it just frustrates me incredibly because inevitably and invariably there is advice which poor people cannot apply. the info is solid, but the advice is unfortunately fairly useless for the many, many people without monetary resources.
An insane claim is that dieting is actually a reasonable treatment for obesity when the research has established that in the long run, the whopping majority of diets fail. It has the same success rate as metastatic cancer: around 3%.You won't hear this until you are in front of your bariatric surgeon. That operation, which is the only effective method to treat such disease, still has a failure rate of around 20%.
These claims must be contextualized. People should focus on not gaining weight. You are talking about reverting a somewhat slight and recent weight gain.
A person who has gained about 10 to 15 pounds in a span of 5 to 10 years and is over 30 has not a weight issue. He or she has an ageing issue.
I'm not quite sure I agree or understand what's being said here, and I'm surprised at how much they talk about diet here almost exclusively.
Let's assume someone has gained weight in the past but they now consume and burn 2200 kcal a day doing no exercise or barely any.
If they'd want to lose weight, they could just start exercizing and burn an average of 600 kcal a day (which is honestly not thaaat much for someone with that type of profile. They would lose weight at a rate of about 1.1/1.2 pound per week. Which is totally fine.
Realistacally, they COULD of course cut a calories here and there, but it's really just an option and they should not cut THAT much in order to stay in the healthy range given their new activity profile.
weight loss not just a 2nd law of thermodynamics problem due to aging ?. so do metabolic disease exist or NOT ?? wasn't crazy about your vid on oZempic. this one had a few more facts
https://youtu.be/ScBx37MBZ2s?si=IHHLS-r7tcE2q5hX
After I decided I was finished having kids I wanted to tighten things up. Abt that time they were pushing 3 meals & 3 snacks. If I was eating 1500 cal I found I was hungry. The 100 cal snacks breakfast 300-350 lunch 400-450 etc. I wasn’t eating enough at 1 meal to carry me through to next without snacks
I am an older woman who started Keto then carnivore now Ketovore with IF 2MAD for 17 months. I love this way of eating. When I grew up, we did not snack and no one around me was overweight. Look at photos of people from 50-60-70's
I like that Peter admits long term keto is difficult to sustain for him. If it works for you, great. For me after 6 months, I couldn’t do keto anymore. It did bring my diabetes under control. Now I follow a low carb, high protein diet. But when I say low carb, its not I don’t eat carbs. I eat plenty of fruits and vegetables. I don’t eat crap by limiting foods with added sugars. Also as Layne said, I don’t snack.
After trying Paleo with CrossFit, Carnivore, Keto, the only thing that started moving the scale was high protein/low fat. I had success with a vegetable juice fast, but that isn’t sustainable.
I am a rules person. I need structure. If you tell me you can eat what you want in moderation, I am lost. I cannot eat 1 cookie. If I start with cookies or any processed sweet I do not have an off switch till I make all gone with the sleeve of cookies lol….I do know that avoiding sweets is best for me. Keto way of eating is better for me. You don't snack on keto because you are always full from your last meal. If you spike insulin you store fat…that's all i had to hear. I now eat late bkfst and early dinner..
Intermittent fasting was the only thing that worked for me. I started over a year ago and just eased into the schedule only eating from 1pm-6pm window daily. This really works but if you want to really kick it up a notch, then eat more veggies, little to no sugar, and get exercise and then do larger intervals of fasting in between days. Everyone is different so you’d have to try this yourselves. ❤️
wish they clipped it later, seems like the point didnt get completed haha
100%
At the moment, for me, the thing that works is intermittent fasting with a 4 hour window.
It aggressive, very restrictive, but it's what works for me.
I tried 8/16 but I can eat too much in 8 hours. To easy to eat junk food too.
Now, the next step is to improve what I eat. I'm not that bad but I do eat too much carbs and I know it.