Protein Interview

00:00 I've never read a study where subjects when they've increased their calories from protein alone and their resistance training, they have never gained body fat. Dr.
00:14 Bill Campbell, as someone that studies fat loss literally for a living, when you're a fat loss scientist, what would you consider the most profound stimulator for fat loss for people in
00:25 everyday life? So the the the things that come right to mind are exercise. Um I look at protein as a lipolytic nutrient, caffeine. So those are
00:40 the again in my world that I that I focus on. Of course then we can you can get into like drugs, certain you know drugs, beta adeneric um agonist like things like
00:51 that. So, but but in my world, protein, caffeine, exercise. Wow. Interesting to see like usually you see protein as like, okay, this is going to, you know, hypertrophy tool, but actually as a
01:02 lipolytic agent, actually as a fat loss tool. How does uh how have you come to find that? through research. So I re I remember specifically um I think it was around 2014 2015 I read a study um Joey
02:05 Antonio um he's a professor at Nova Southeastern. He gave resistance trained males and females really high protein. um it was like 3.3 gram per kg. He did another study where
02:19 it was up to 4.4 gram per kg. So, the highest protein intake recorded in the scientific literature that I've been able to find. And again, he did several studies around this. And in both in one
02:37 of the studies, they had increased their calorie intake by several hundred, five, six, 700 calories more than baseline, and they did not gain any body fat. in one of his
02:49 other studies also increasing calories only from protein and they lost body fat and they increased their calories by several hundred calories. So I read you know I'm
03:02 reading these studies and they weren't the best design studies but I'm like I I don't believe like this is hard for me to believe. I was taught you increase your calories you gain body fat. So
03:14 here's some studies. So I did my own study in my lab in resistance trained females where we had one group we randomized them. One group we said you cannot eat more than 1.2 gram per kg. So
03:32 do not go over this. The other group we said you have to eat at least 2.4 grams per kg. And I'm very proud of this study was is it was very well controlled. So all of the workouts were supervised in
03:45 my lab. All of the subjects had to be resistance trained. If they couldn't I think we had they had to deadlift like 1.25 times their body weight or they couldn't enter the study. So we did some
03:55 objective measures to make sure that they were at least demonstrating that they were likely um resistance training. Um they all had a personal coach that would answer
04:07 questions if they needed it on protein intake. And after the study was over, the high protein group gained more lean mass. Not surprising. That's what how we
04:19 view protein. But they lost a significant amount of body fat relative to baseline. So it didn't quite meet the threshold to be a statistically significant difference between the two
04:31 groups, but they lost significant amount of body fat relative to baseline levels. So now I'm like, okay, I didn't I had I had a hard time believing another lab's results, but now this is my lab, my
04:45 study. I we designed the study. I it was my one thing I know is my data and I trust I trust my data and then I started being, you know, a little more open-minded to this and I found another
04:59 study and then another study and this so these aren't just oneoffs. We have I think I probably at this point maybe six studies that I've identified sometimes resistance training, sometimes
05:13 not. I'll say this. Um here's here's a a um powerful statement. I've never read a study where subjects when they've increased their calories from protein alone
05:27 and their resistance training, they have never gained body fat. And I mean by hundreds of my study was 250 extra calories per day from protein alone. Um
05:42 the outcomes are one of two outcomes. They either do not lose they either do not gain body fat or they lose body fat. And um here's another study. Um
05:56 the researchers these were women post uh I think average I think the age range was 50 to 80 years old. These were women who were they had normal weight obesity. So average weight but lacking in lean
06:10 mass. The only thing the researchers did was they said to the they randomized and they said to one group you're going to increase your protein. And it went from like I don't know like.9 gram per kg to
06:22 like 1.3. And the other group, they said, "You're not going to change anything." So, no exercise. And the group that only increased their
06:31 protein gained significant amount of lean mass and lost significant amount of body fat compared to the other group. No exercise stimulus. Wow. So, I mean, I would it's safe to
06:43 say that like I mean having a protein shake is probably as close to a legit probably the more effective fat burner independent of caffeine maybe. Yeah. I mean is if that protein shake is
06:54 only pro like again we have overfeeding studies where they gave a lot of protein but when they have a lot of carbs and fat that's no I haven't that data doesn't come out like like I'm saying
07:05 here um I've taken this to as I work with people trying to lose body fat like if you struggle with hunger my advice is if you're going to overeat, overeat on protein because the outcomes
07:18 are not as negative than if you're getting Takis. Does does the protein itself excess protein itself actually store as fat or does it sort of does it sort of reallocate where other
07:30 macronutrients go because it's kind of hard for protein itself to turn to fat, right? It is maybe Yep. I think so. Now, um we I do have a mechanistic study that I think it was isotopically labeled that
07:42 clearly demonstrated pro excess protein can be deposited as body fat. So it can happen, but I've not seen this in like actual applied human research. So it's it's almost like it's a nutrient
07:58 partitioning agent where the calories are being shuttled more towards lean tissue, which again, what's muscle is protein and protein is amino acid. So that makes sense. But the fat loss
08:13 aspect is I'll just say it's odd to me. But but I what am I supposed to do? Ignore these five or six studies in humans, one of them being from my lab. Yeah. And it's not and it's not like
08:24 it's just a hypertrophy thing or just a just a lean mass thing. It's like I mean obviously there's the other factors. There's the thermic effect of it. There's so many pieces and
08:34 perhaps there's things that we just don't know yet, right? where protein is clearly a very interesting piece and I think there's a physical limitation to a certain degree. So it's like kind of
08:43 probably hard to overeat protein to the degree in which it would actually it itself like if you were to just give someone let's just say something ridiculously low fat like chicken breast
08:53 all day every day like it'd be pretty hard to overeat on chicken breast like to the extreme in which the protein would actually turn to fat itself. Yeah, I think so. Yes. Yeah. What about timing
09:04 and I want to dive into I think it was that December 2023 study. What is it? I don't I don't know if it was nutrients where was it published talking about like the 100 grams in one serving. You
09:11 and I were talking about that offline a little bit. You know, there's some limitations to that study. There's some things that people should probably understand. But before we get into the
09:19 nuance of that study, like does the timing seem to matter? So, if someone has if protein is lipolytic, if someone were to have a large bolus of protein, is it a more grandiose lipolytic effect?
09:31 If someone were to say, "Hey, I'm going to finish my workout and I'm going to have 100 grams of protein right now." or perhaps having it more evenly spread throughout the day. What have you seen
09:40 to be ideal? Does it really matter? Is there a limitation there? So, if somebody were to tell me in terms of distributing throughout the day, if somebody were to tell me my primary goal
09:52 is to build as much muscle as I can, then then the the strategy is, well, we want to make sure that you get your total daily protein intake. And if you get that allin-one meal,
10:06 okay, that's not ideal. But that study we're going to talk about next, that that made me appreciate, well, that's not as a bad it's not as bad of a decision as I used to think before
10:16 reading that study. But we have other human data, one of them in I think it was a a study from Spain on male bodybuilders where what the best op the the best strategy is to approximately
10:30 equally distribute your total daily protein intake throughout the day. So whether that's three, four, five protein feedings, that is the best strategy to optimize muscle mass because we can also
10:42 I can also point the research that says when they when they didn't do that when you know if if there was if we skewed more protein to the night, which is what a typical western diet does, they've
10:54 they've not gained as much muscle. So that's the ideal if the goal is to build as much muscle as possible. Interesting. Okay. So, um, and that's an applied long-term study, not a meal to meal.
11:06 That's true. That's true. And I don't think most people are looking necessarily, you know, meal to meal, unless you're doing some extreme crash diet, in which case there's a lot of
11:13 other factors there. So, okay, with this study that looked at 100 grams of protein in in one sitting, um, I'll let you describe it, but I mean, in essence, it was yeah, 100 grams of one of protein
11:23 one sitting found that like it was just delayed absorption throughout the course of a 12-h hour period after that. Yes. But what did this study teach you? But what were the limitations of the study?
11:34 Because I don't want people to just think that that's they can just get away with doing that all the time. Yeah. And I'm curious to what you thought like I I want to also hear what you thought the
11:43 limitations were. And I'm trying to think right now and I I covered this in my research review and I always list limitations of the study, but maybe it'll come to me. But I let me just say
11:54 I really love that study. It was the best acute protein study I've ever read because they traced every practical question I would ever have as a scientist. And I don't know
12:08 how many times throughout my career I've been asked, hey, more than 30 grams is a waste. Like you don't eat more than 30 grams. And now I can say, well, you know, here's the here's the receipts.
12:19 That's not true. So the the study gave subjects um 25 zero grams or 25 grams of protein or 100 grams of protein immediately after a resistance training workout. And
12:34 what they did was they said they followed this through all of the steps that are important because when we eat protein it doesn't all go to muscle. We have something called splatnic
12:47 sequestration and then we have peripheral availability. So as somebody who wants to build muscle, I want all of the amino acids that I eat. I want it all going to my blood and all going to
12:59 my muscles. But that's not what happens. What happens is our digestive system will absorb a lot of these amino acids when we eat protein. And again, that's called splatnic sequestration. And by
13:12 the way, as we get older, we've heard of the term anabolic resistance. This splatnic sequestration increases so that when we eat protein, more of it is directed to the, you know, intestines,
13:24 organs and does not make it to the blood to go to our muscles. So that's one of the reasons why as we age, we need more protein to get the same anabolic benefit. So what they did was they they
13:38 traced the amino acids and this was milk protein. They traced them and said hey this is how much got sequestered from the digestive system. This is how much made it into the peripheral circulation.
13:51 And then the two other parts of this and again I love this study. They actually were able to tell us how many of the amino acids in terms of grams actually made it into the muscle. And
14:06 the just because they go to the muscle doesn't mean that that's building muscle. So now we have to have another measure which is muscle protein synthesis. But you're only going to have
14:17 muscle protein synthesis levels go up if you have amino acids make it to the muscle. So the 25 gram dose got I think it was 4 and a half grams of the 25 grams made it to the skeletal
14:33 muscles and I think that was an estimate of whole body muscle uptake. They only took biopsies from the vasis lateral. So that's one of the limitations right now. Um they only took they measured one
14:44 muscle and then I think they had to estimate what what what does this look like throughout the entire body. Um, so it was 18% of the amino acids of the 25 gram dose made it to the muscles. The
14:59 100 gram dose, it was something like 13 12 g, let's just say 13 g out of the 100 made it to the end point of skeletal muscle. So 18% versus 13%. So we do have evidence,
15:16 which this backs up what I've already known about protein. The more and more protein you take, the less and less of an anabolic benefit there is. Doesn't mean there's not more of an anabolic
15:28 benefit, but there's a rate of diminishing return. Yeah, there's a there's a line there. And yes, the interesting thing about this study though is that it was I mean the the
15:36 researchers and I think the lead author said it was uh I mean there might be no tolerable upper limit. Like I mean it's like it's like yeah that was a little a little extreme but it's uh I mean you
15:47 you probably could go above 100 but I mean again like I would be interested to see it actually because like okay you go from 18 to 13% with a 75 gram delta between the two and then perhaps that
16:00 accelerates even if you get higher above 100 right so it's like maybe if you start getting to 150 maybe then it's going to take a sharp drop down 4% right and I would imagine at a certain degree
16:09 someone's relative amount of skeletal muscle mass would determine that too. Would like there's a demand for it. Yep. Um did you did you think though that when I read that title I was like it was
16:19 clicky for sure. Yeah. And I mean I'm like maybe I should be more clicky in my titles like that was like that brings up a whole different discussion for another day. But it's kind of find it kind of
16:28 funny that even now like even if you're looking on PubMed you can just see it. It's like you're getting a little bit these titles are getting they're playing the game too. It's kind of funny. I
16:38 guess it fil the culture filters to the nerdy scientists. Yeah, exactly. But you asked me about the limitations. I you know what you study design, I don't think there was a lot of limitations,
16:48 but I think the one thing that would just pop to mind is that okay, well where it opens up maybe additional questions is um when people look post-workout, they're not usually
16:59 looking at milk protein. They're usually talking like whey protein, something. So that would be something that would be interesting, something that is rapid absorbing. Uh because you know talked to
17:08 like Mike Israel about it. He was like I don't think that study's that anything that amazing because yeah it's like of course like it's just all it did is like drip out you know digestion or
17:16 absorption over the course of 12 hours. He's like of course that's going to happen. He's like people just don't usually give it an opportunity for that. I'm like well yes and no. I also feel as
17:26 though like post-workout um there's probably not a lot of people that are are doing straight milk protein. Like most people post-workout they the questions that came up are okay
17:35 well can I have a 100 gram whey protein shake and I'm like okay that's a little bit different because that is different maybe we're not going to hyper absorb all of that in one sitting because if we are
17:43 talking sustained release over the course of 12 hours that would apply a little bit more if you're looking at like an equal part or you know 25% whey and 75% casein or something like that.
17:52 So there's a lot of people said, "Well, this is nothing new. We know that case and digests slow." I'm like, "Okay, yes, but we're not talking just about digestibility here. We're talking about
18:01 what is, you know, uh I think they radioisotoped it, right?" I mean, like it was like all the way down to like what, you know, what's getting to the muscle. So it's less limitation
18:11 on the study design and more about okay, how can we maybe add additional arms to this where people can it can silence some of the people that were still naysayers on it? because I'm with you.
18:20 That was one of the best design studies I've probably ever seen. And uh so when people were kind of like poking holes in it, I'm like, you're just grasping for straws a little bit here just to be um
18:31 have something to talk about because this is as far as with what they were given, it was one of the best design studies I've ever seen. But I would say if I were to do it again, yeah, maybe
18:37 add an arm with whey, maybe add an arm with meat, right? Let's see what happens like in something that's a little slower digesting. I found it particularly interesting as someone that really
18:46 enjoys like a lot of my brand talks about fasting, right? So, it was very liberating for people that watch my channel because they're just like, "Oh, cool. I can do two meals a day and get
18:55 my protein in." Like, because you've got people like, again, I love them to death. Peter Tia, Ronda Patrick, like, "Yeah, we stopped fasting because we weren't able to get our protein needs
19:04 met." Like, well, now we can. like yeah that study was a big boost to time restricted feeding intermittent fasting like I that's that is one of my takeaways from that study. Yeah.
19:18 Yeah. Definitely it was liberating for me because for a long time I I would think that I had this upper limit of realistically like 50 60 grams you know it was probably like where I would go on
19:28 the top end for me in one sitting particularly like when I would break a fast after 24 hours or something. Mhm. I'm like, okay, I am kind of limited. And then if I want to get other
19:36 micronutrients in from other food, I'm really limited on just the amount of time that I can get food into my system in this short period of time. So, I end up very undercalored, under proteined,
19:46 and consequently weak, right? So, and maybe even losing lean mass. So, now it's like, okay, cool. I can break a fast. I can have a 50 gram whey protein shake, and then I'll follow that up with
19:56 a bunch of ground beef and I'll get myself to 125 grams. Then all I have to do is get, you know, another 75 grams throughout the next few hours and I'm kosher. I'm good. Yep. And one thing
20:07 I didn't get to it. Um and we're assuming, but there was a significant increase in muscle protein synthesis in the 100 g versus the 25 gram. So 25 gram was like 20 30% higher than zero grams
20:23 of protein and then the 100 gram was 20% higher than the 25 g. So the that's really what we have to that's the endgame of what we want to happen in the muscle. So yeah, agreed. No, it was a
20:36 cool study and it's um and I think from a fat loss perspective, you know, maybe that wasn't looked at a whole whole lot, but we can see it from, you know, your experience and your research that okay,
20:46 well, this is this is cool because if people can have like this concentrated bolus of protein post-workout, that's probably going to have a nice effect on satiety for one. Yep. And then it's also
20:57 going to if there is this lipolytic effect from it then perhaps that carries over for hours after that which could be really cool. Yeah, to me it was an OMAD study in one sense. Um yeah,
21:07 I'm I remember that study was hard. I mean I have a biochemistry background. That was a hard study to read. I remember digging into that one. Yeah, it was it was cool though. U come back to
21:18 just protein and fat loss. And actually I do I will I do want to spend a little time on on caffeine too since we mentioned it but I want to come back to the protein for a second.
21:26 Um, and this may be very elementary for you and for some people, but I want to take a minute to talk about the insulinogenic nature of protein, right? Because people think, especially with my
21:38 audience coming from a little bit of a low carb background, there's concern over, okay, well, well, protein spikes insulin, is that going to impede fat loss in a certain way? U, but can you
21:48 describe the sort of insulin and glucagon curve that kind of happens with protein versus maybe just carbs alone? Yeah. So with whey protein um it is insulinogenic that there is a
22:02 pro there when you consume whey protein there is an insulin spike and also a glucagon increase as well that we don't get with carbs. So carbs is insulin alone
22:16 not much of a movement of glucagon. Whey protein just trying to remember some studies where I'm remembering the graphs. insulin increase and a glucagon increase. And one of the things just as
22:28 a side note here, the reason why whey protein is so anabolic is because it's not only anabolic to skeletal muscle, increasing muscle protein synthesis, but insulin is anti catabolic. So that
22:41 actually tends to lower muscle protein breakdown. So that's whey protein is a really cool like a really good nutrient for everything muscle building. So did that answer the Yeah, that makes a lot
22:53 more sense. It's I think people and from my understanding the reason that you know so if you were to have carbohydrates alone you have a spike in insulin obviously you're going to have
23:02 glute forward transllocation and you're going to have you know the carbohydrates go into storage and if you if I remember correctly it's like if you were to have a protein shake for example and it was
23:14 just an insulin spike that came with protein your blood sugar would drop too much. there needs to be a subsequent increase in glucagon to protect that. Right? So it's like if you just had if
23:24 everyone was concerned with the insulinogenic nature and whey protein as it stands. If they were concerned with it because it spikes insulin and didn't have an understanding of the glucagon
23:31 piece. If whey protein worked like that would mean that you'd have an increase in insulin with no dietary carbohydrates coming in that would be a problem right. Yeah. We would have a
23:44 yeah a very low blood glucose level. Yeah. So the glucagon is there to basically protect and make sure that the you know your blood stay stable. So it's in essence it's like net neutral. You're
23:58 just like here's your curve. If you got a line here with insulin line here with glucagon it's like if you were to just have carbs it would go like this. But if you had protein it's going like this.
24:07 Yeah. It's just net neutral. It's just at an elevated baseline. Y uh and I just needed to have a discussion with that because it comes up in the comments all the time like okay well protein if
24:17 insulin you know impedes hormones instead of lipase then how come when we have protein it's considered a fat loss tool. Yeah. So my reaction to that is look at the the studies we were talking
24:32 about earlier. Focus on the actual like and again I think we all like mechanisms but mechanisms exist for outcomes. What do the outcome study tell us? The outcomes the outcome studies tell us
24:49 adding protein causes fat loss in some situations. And I do want to go back to that for a moment. In those studies where they gave nonresistance training women extra protein and they lost body
25:02 fat, that was a scenario where they were eating very low protein initially and they brought it up to optimal even less than optimal. So when you improve a suboptimal protein intake
25:18 and you improve their protein, that is when we saw these. So, the reason I want to say that is if somebody's already eating a gram per pound or 2.2 grams per kg and they hear me talking about this
25:28 and they say, "Oh, I'm going to double. I'm going to go to 2.4." I don't have evidence to suggest that that's going to be a fat loss stimulus. In that case, most of these studies that I'm referring
25:38 to in the sedentary population, they're eating 08.9 and getting it up to 1.3 1.6 in that area. Yeah. Yeah. which makes a I mean that's significant difference for most people you know making that bump.
25:52 Yep. Yep. If we pivot over to I don't have to spend a lot of time on it but caffeine is always interesting to me. Oh yeah. You know caffeine obviously increases
26:01 lipolysis but it's not necessar or is it I mean necessarily increasing oxidation. I have seen some papers that there's like a subtle increase in oxidation too but maybe that just comes from the
26:10 downstream effect of uh moving more as a result of caffeine right. Uh how does caffeine directly and indirectly stimulate fat loss? Um it's a beta adeneric agonist. So it will bind to the
26:23 adenuric receptor. Um the beta adeneric receptor which causes the liberation of a lipolytic agent. Um and there's a lot of other mechanisms um that I don't I can't remember um that I think are
26:37 outside of the lipolytic effects. So um what is the one I don't know if you if you remember it um just like we have also some sports performance some energy feeling like
26:50 those are other mechanisms. Got it. But in terms of fat loss because I've written about this a lot. I haven't published but I've spent a lot of time on this. Um, caffeine does everything
27:01 you want it to do to help with fat loss, but I wouldn't call it a powerful fat loss stimulus. So, at a moderate level, it does everything. So, I I can go um I the way that I teach this is I like to
27:16 use the energy balance equation. So, we have calories in. Well, what caffeine does on that is there it's a slight appetite suppressant. So we have a few studies that I'm aware of where it's
27:30 reduced calories, not by much, 5% um when we have ad liibbitum situations. So it's a mild appetite suppressant. And by the way, there's plenty of studies that show it has no effect, but we also have
27:44 a few that says it has a mild effect. I've never read a study where caffeine increases appetite. So when I read those studies I tend to say okay it's always moving in one if if it moves in a
27:54 direction it's always moving in an appetite suppressing direction modest then we have uh we know it increases the ther um lipolysis as you said it also increases b beta
28:09 oxidation we know that it when it's taken with food it increases the thermic effect of food or some people call this dietary induced thermogenesis. So, you take caffeine with food, you're going to
28:19 burn more calories than if you didn't take caffeine. Um, it also increases the energy expend uh exercise energy expenditure. So, if you're going to exercise and you take caffeine, instead
28:32 of burning 100 calories, you might burn 12 calories during that bell. The interesting thing, and this is coming from a 24-hour respiratory room um study that I remember, the only thing caffeine
28:47 didn't increase was NEAt, which to me I'm like, wow. Yeah. Um now again, NEAt's hard to measure. It's very hard to measure, but it did everything. And I can share those studies with you just
29:00 maybe you come to a different conclusion but that was the study you know they did the they took it with food they took you know they did sleep metabolism obvious they measured lipolysis so
29:10 everything but neat and I'm thinking if I take neat I'm more fidget like every so that surprised me and maybe that was a one-off but that that's my that is my memory of right don't you think you
29:21 fidget more when you take in a metabolic ward yeah so maybe it's just like maybe who knows I mean god I would think you'd fidget more, but maybe the dose wasn't high enough to actually induce that, but
29:30 I certainly am more apt to like do things around the house and be externally stimulated to do things that are more active. So, I think I think in a real world situation, it probably does
29:40 increase. That's a good point. Yeah, there's no towels to fold or trash to pick up in the metabolic board. I would also be interesting to see like uh how how much a wife plays into like
29:51 take the trash out, fold the towels, you know, like when wife's home versus wife's not home. What's this? What's the male non-ex exercise activity thermogenesis? Um, one question I've
30:00 always had on caffeine though is if you are increasing lipolysis and you have this, you know, re-estrification so to speak of does does that change at all or is it basically like okay you
30:13 take consume caffeine you have an additional liberation of fatty acids um it doesn't really change I mean the rate of oxidation is so small you're still having kind of the same
30:24 re-estrification or does that modeling change at all? um reoststerification levels are still high. Okay. But there it also does increase beta oxidation as well. So the actual burning of fat.
30:39 Okay. Some people have described caffeine as a nutrient partitioning agent where you're burning of the all the calories you're burning. You're burning more of them from from your fat
30:50 stores and less from carbohydrate stores. Do you think that might have something? I mean because there's probably a a slight increase in resting heart rate too, right? So maybe is is it
30:59 negligible enough that it could just be with that or is it more monumental than like a a you know three four five increase BPM? Um well interestingly because I've done multiple studies and
31:12 and I'm and I just we just published a study I think it was last week and I'll tell you about it. It was caffeine. Um it's often it's not you'd be surprised how many studies where they've given
31:24 subjects caffeine where heart rate has not increased. You'd be surprised. Yeah, blood pressures almost always go up systolic um even diastolic. But I was shocked because and again I've I I think
31:35 we've published four different studies on the acute effects of caffeine containing thermogenic supplements. And I think in every one heart rate stayed and again
31:49 it's not these weren't odd findings but again it goes against logic right don't I would think I feel like my heart's beating a lot more but not as much as what you would think. Interesting. Yeah,
31:59 it's I mean it's much more of a probably get more nervous system stimulation than anything else. You probably just maybe just more aware of it and you're like I feel like my
32:05 heart's pounding out of my chest, you know? So, can I tell you about our study? Heck yeah. Um literally hot off the press. So, is caffeine a fat loss supplement? That's the question.
32:18 So, a couple years ago, we gave subjects a what I'm calling a thermogenic fat loss supplement. So, this is one of those common supplements that has caffeine and about 28 other ingredients
32:29 that I think do nothing. I think if some if somebody's going to have an increase in metabolic rate or if they're going to lose fat, if caffeine's in the ingredient list, I think it's the
32:40 caffeine doing it. So, we published this study years ago giving subjects um this thermogenic supplement. And like every other study where you give them caffeine, either caffeine alone or as
32:51 part of a multi-ingredient supplement, metabolic rate increased 8% over hour 1, hour 2, hour three. So that our study joined the hundred other studies that clearly demonstrates when
33:07 you give somebody caffeine, it increases their resting metabolic rate or postsupplementation metabolism. Happens every time. The question is, if you give somebody that supplement
33:20 for day after day, week after week, month after month, does it actually result in fat loss? In theory, it should, right? Because if you increase somebody's metabolism
33:32 8% for 3 hours a day and again, we stopped, most of these studies stop at three hours, but it's still above baseline. So, in theory, it should cause fat loss. But I was never able to. My
33:44 opinion was maybe the I think we have one study that said hey the body actually slows down metabolism during hours 7 8 n 10 so it offsets this. I think there's one study that
33:56 reported that. So what we did we gave resistance trained males the same supplement that we had that we had already published where it increased resting metabolic rate. We gave them one
34:09 serving per day, which was 200 milligrams of caffeine for the first four weeks of the study. And we increased it to two servings per day for the next four weeks. This is an 8-week
34:20 study. Our subjects were resistance trained males, and they worked out in my lab. So, every workout supervised and big limitation was we told them, don't change your diet. So, big
34:34 limitation. We we don't have documentation. At the end of the 8week study, the caffeine group lost significantly more body fat. So again, I was surprised. I'm thinking eh. Um now
34:48 again, limitations. Did they eat less? Well, if they did, caffeine might have been responsible for that. So I would have liked to have had diet records to do this. Um it was one I think it was
34:58 1.1% body fat where the placebo group lost nothing. Um, so the question is, is that worth is that worth the money? Is that worth
35:09 whatever risk a supplement can have? And I'll say from my lab experience, when we put subjects on a 25% caloric deficit that are resistance training, they lose about a percent of
35:20 body fat in a month. So this was much slower than that. Half the rate of that. So to me, it's like, what does a what does a bottle of this cost? You get two bottles, is it $60? So anyway, true.
35:32 Caffeine caused fat loss. No question. Is it did was it practically meaningful? Well, that's up for the reader to decide. Does the I'm wondering if the impact of fat loss on from caffeine
35:44 increases um exponentially with exercise. Yep. So, it's like okay, so caffeine with no exercise, this rate of fat loss, caffeine with this level of exercise, this rate of fat loss at this
35:56 level. So, it's like, you know. Yep. And we did have them take um they took it with breakfast or lunch the first four weeks and then for the last four weeks they took it with breakfast and lunch
36:07 and workouts were after that. They didn't I think our workouts for like noon to 8 is when I could have the lab staffed. So workouts were after the supplementation. Um and after feeding
36:18 workouts were after feeding or they fasted state? Um, I'm I didn't we didn't have meal records, but I I'm fairly certain not fasted because again, noon would have been the earliest they could
36:30 have trained. Um, and nobody passed out or anything or not like they were acclimated. So, I I don't I imagine not fasting. Yeah, because that would be an interesting one to look at is like,
36:41 okay, control caffeine uh fed workout, control caffeine fasted workout. Yeah. Yeah. Like, okay, so like fasted workouts versus non-fasted workouts,
36:56 net net large outcome negligible difference, right? At least not meaningful. Um, it probably has a certain degree on someone's fat adaptation, too, I would imagine. Who
37:06 knows? and probably their diet before the diet the day before. So all these decision factors, but I'm curious is like, okay, one thing is like if you do train fasted, does caffeine increase
37:17 that even a little bit above caffeine plus food, right? That would be an interesting one to look at. Yeah. Yeah. Just in my head, I think yes, but is it like you're saying, is it enough to move
37:27 the needle or do our devices sensitive enough to detect that? Yeah. And well, and then like you said before though, but if you have caffeine with food, it's increasing the thermic effect of that
37:36 food. So, does it net out, right? Yes. Yeah. I don't know. I just I'm always uh personally I love to train. I love to train fasted. I feel better that way not to go down that rabbit hole. That's a
37:45 whole different discussion because I think at the end of the day, you just got to do what works for you when it comes to training. Yeah. But do you all do you do you ever supplement with
37:52 caffeine in your fast during your Definitely. Definitely. Yeah. Usually sip on green tea during my workout, too. I'm a big fan of that. Um, I just I I feel like I'm getting kind of a constant
38:02 stream of it. I'm not a big pre-workout guy. I don't like a huge bolis of it. Although I do occasionally find myself the energy drink kind of thing sometimes happens where it's like one one or two
38:12 bad nights of sleep like especially if like I'm on a trip or something and I'll go be like, "Okay, I can I can justify a little energy drink today. I'll drink like a quarter of it and then I like
38:21 felt kind of good, you know, and then next thing you know, then you're drinking a half of one." Then by the time I get to drinking a full can, this happens multiple times throughout
38:27 the year. Then I'm like, "Okay, I need to stop. Cold turkey. Go away from it. Cut out caffeine entirely and come back." So, it's always it's terrible. Anyway, Bill, where can
38:35 everyone find you, man? Um, my Instagram is Bill Campbell, PhD, and on YouTube, it's also Bill Campbell, PhD. Right on, man. Well, thanks for making the trek here. Thank you. too.