On Dairy...

Before beginning, it's important to note that I am not an expert of any sort on working out and dieting. All I've had is some success with changing my body to the way I want it to look through relatively efficient means.

So take my advice with a grain of salt if you're asking! What works for me may not necessarily work (or even be good) for you.

With that said, my friend Tina just asked me about whether she should be stop taking dairy (drinking milk etc.) to accelerate fat loss. In a nutshell, I told her she should, pretty much citing the 4 hour body's reasonings for why dairy is bad.

However, this is one issue in the fitness and dieting world that has strongly opposing views. Other sources say that diary is an absolute necessity, and the general consensus is that calcium intake is a powerful fat loss accelerator.

Without further ado, I bring to you these opposing views.

Why dairy is bad, according to Timothy Ferriss in 4 Hour Body:

"It’s true that milk has a low glycemic index (GI) and a low glycemic load (GL). For the latter,

whole milk clocks in at an attractive 27. Unfortunately, dairy products paradoxically have a

high insulinemic response on the insulinemic index (II or InIn) scale. Researchers from Lund

University in Sweden have examined this surprising finding:

Despite low glycemic indexes of 15–30, all of the milk products produced high

insulinemic indexes of 90–98, which were not significantly different from the insulinemic index of the reference bread [generally white bread].… Conclusions: Milk products appear

insulinotropic as judged from 3-fold to 6-fold higher insulinemic indexes than expected

from the corresponding glycemic indexes.

Removing even a little dairy can dramatically accelerate fat-loss, as Murph noticed:

OK, it’s been a week since taking Tim’s advice and cutting the dairy. I’m down 6 more

pounds. And what’s unbelievable to me is that I wasn’t even consuming that much

beforehand. Maybe a handful of cheese on my breakfast eggs, and a glass of milk per day."

On the flip side:

"In detail, researchers found that supplemental calcium (800mg/day) or high dietary intake of calcium (1200mg/day) promoted a greater fat loss (38-64%) compared to subjects on a low calcium diet (500mg/day)

Furthermore, it's been seen that dairy sources of calcium promotes 50-100% more fat loss than supplemental calcium. Researchers hyopothesize that diary calcium is more effective for fat loss than supplemental calcium most likely for the bio-active ingredients contained in dairy products such as: whey protein peptides, conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) and branched chain amino acids (BCAA)" - Francesco Casillo from bodybuilding.com

It should be noted that in addition to this, calcium is a crucial nutrient for women when considering bone loss and osteoporosis in later years.

So there you have it, two opposing views on dairy. If you ask for my opinion, I think that calcium supplementation is an important aspect of fat loss and a crucial nutrient for women of all ages. However, in keeping with Ferriss's reasoning, I'd probably take Caltrate chews for calcium and just lose the dairy for the women out there.

When deciding whether to add or eliminate dairy from your diet to accelerate fat loss, do so at your own peril!