Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle : How to schedule meals?

[Keith]

I'm currently reading "Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle" (BFFM) by Tom Venuto and it seems very good.

Can someone who's actually on this program please clarify something for me:

BFFM says:
(1) 6 meals per day is ideal.
(2) It takes about 3 hours to digest a meal (so more than 6 meals is counterproductive).
(3) You should start your day about 6am.
(4) You shouldn't eat within 2-4 hours of sleep.

Putting all this together, I get a schedule of meals at:
1. 6 am
2. 9 am
3. 12 noon
4. 3 pm
5. 6 pm
6. 9 pm ???

That last meal is the problem. If I eat that, I can't go to bed until 11pm at the earliest - limiting myself to a maximum of 7 hours sleep per night. Maybe the polyphasics can pull that off, but I need a good 8-9 hours per night.

Can someone on BFFM please clarify this? Thanks.

[Gavin]

I think Tom suggests 3 hours for digestion as a ballpark figure. I think he also mentions that anywhere between 2-4 hours is an acceptable meal interval. I've read BFFM and Fit for Life and come to my own conclusion that 'stealing' 15-30 mins, perhaps even an hour here and there is the best way to get a good schedule.

Here's when I eat on a weekday.
1- 6AM
2- 8:45
3- 11:15
4- 13:30
5- 16:30
6- 17:30

Here's a great article by Tom Venuto himself on sleep.

[Stargirl]

It's also fine to just eat 5 meals a day. I like it better that way because 6, 9, 12, 3, 6 is easier than eating every 2 hr. 30 min IMO.

[taitouwah]

i also read his book and found out that it is the best ever sources on body building and diet style . I also faced problem figuring out the last meal thing, so what i did is i just cut out the sixth meal .

Anyways, make sure that u control the quantity of each meal . Because personally for me , i ate too much each meal compared to the normal three meal. Make sure to divide the calorie from the usual 3 meal to 5 or six meal.

Now i never follow the six meal thing because i get sick after following it for 2 weeks! Personally i think i am still not used to the diet concept yet. Its not easy to actually measure every calorie content of each meal. I just have the tendency to eat more calorie that usual 3 meal.

[kmr321]

personally i think you have to stick with it for more than two weeks since it lets your body adapt to your new eating methods. yeah i ate a bit more than i should have for the first couple weeks i think its because my body was still getting use to it. I find that having a good macro nutrient ratio is key to keeping hunger away. So no deprivation required.

I read another book 'Fire up Your Metabolism' and found this very useful as well. It provides trials of what happened to these twins who went on different diets, exercise routines, ate bad fats instead of good fats, ate 3 instead of 6 meals a day etc. It s a good read and goes well with what BTFM.