This can be a total head f*ck for people when dieting…
How can I eat junk food and it helps me lose weight?!
So we have discussed cheat meals before, so I won’t go over it again other than to recap that its mainly for a psychological break from “dieting” & the meal would need to fit into your daily calorie allowance.
A refeed meal you may have never heard about before, essentially, it’s what people call cheat meals. This I where I believe the confusion is coming from!
At Transformation HQ we only ever recommend a client to have a refeed meal if they really need them.
So what is a refeed meal then?
A refeed meal is essential a meal that has lots of carbs, fats and protein e.g. steak and chips.
Its not the actually meal that’s doing the good work – it’s the CALORIES for that DAY that have risen (usually up to an extra 50%)
This helps top up glycogen stores in the muscles, which in turn means you can keep training hard in your next 3 or 4 training sessions. The harder you train = the quicker the results!
There is also evidence to suggest a meal high in calories will spike your thyroid and metabolism, thus burning more fat at rest over the next few days.
Refeeds are only recommend to clients if you’re training consistently, eating healthy food choices consistently, hitting calorie & macronutrient targets daily & seeing good body shape results. Then you COULD possible schedule a refeed meal into the plan as you have EARNT the right too, but it’s not something you HAVE to do just for the sake of it. If you don’t want a refeed meal – that’s also fine and will not affect results.
I hope this has cleared some confusion on cheat meals and refeed meals.
Ryan