The 40 Hour Fast - My Fat Burning Protocol Explained

Psst.

I have a secret for you…

Your body doesn't need 3 meals a day or 6 small meals a day or whatever nonsense you're buying into to be healthy.

In fact, as a 170lbs guy I find eating so often to not be natural to the body.

The reality is this…

The only reason we desire food every few hours is because we're eating carbohydrate, processed foods.

Excessive carbs do two things to us:

1. They don't satisfy our hunger and
2. They produce meaningful cravings

So no matter how much carbohydrates you eat, you never feel satisfied.

Ever ate and ate and ate until your stomach was about to explode … and then wanted dessert?

When you eat animal foods that are high in vitamins and saturated fat, it's much harder to over eat as it's quite satiating.

I'm not saying cut out carbs totally mind you.

Unless you're doing something extreme like a carnivore diet (which works for some, & others find incredibly boring) you need carbs for energy.

It's just that you need way less carbs than you think depending on your size.

For me, one serving a day of a few hundred calories of carbs in the form of sweet potato etc. is acceptable.

Fasting (Intermittent, 24 hour, 40 hour)

I typically follow intermittent fasting most days with 16 hours of no eating with an 8 hour window to eat.

Then once a week I do a full 24 hour fast (lunch to lunch) and every 6 months or so I'll pull off a full 40 hour fast where I get my body into ketosis where I will burn of 1-2 lbs of fat (it's insanely effective).

What I eat

To be clear, you need to be a person with healthy eating habits to get the most out of extended fasts (and don't do this if you have an eating disorder).

So here is what I eat on a weekly basis (not everyday):

• Steak and eggs cooked in butter
• Chicken or pork
• Sardines
• Veggies (I typically buy green juice locally made - no added fruit or sugar)
• 90% dark chocolate
• Macadamia nuts
• Rice dish 3x a week (I'm in SE Asia)
• One serving of fruit
• Coffee and tea
• Raw sweet potato

For supplements it's pretty simple. Creatine daily, protein powder after a workout, magnesium and zinc and NAC.

Now I'm NOT saying I eat all this everyday. It's just the selection of what I will eat for the 2 meals I have per day.

I'm also not super strict, yes I'll have tacos or a burrito. Pizza is fine once a month, popcorn and soda at the movies, beers with the boys.

I'm pretty strict with my eating habits most days but im not a psycho about it. You got to enjoy yourself.

40 Hour fast

For the 40 hour fast, I'll only do this when I have a huge dinner and have been a bit of a glutton overall. Think traveling, the holidays, drinking a bit too much, family visiting and eating a ton.

The type of huge dinner where you're feeling stuffed, like having a Thanksgiving day dinner. The last 40 hour fast I did was after a massive Korean dinner complete with beer and Soju with a group of friends.

Dinner wrapped up around 8pm and that's when the fast began.

12 hours

It's 8am and I'm waking up with zero hunger. I typically don't eat breakfast anyways so I had by black coffee and went about my routine like I normally do.

16 hours

12pm or so, now it's lunch time. I was not hungry at all by this point. Still a bit full from the meal from last night.

So no issue so far. Let's keep going.

20 hours

Now it's 4pm roughly.

I've finished my second cup of coffee by this point (typically around 1-2pm, 3pm latest) which helps blunt your appetite and gives you a much needed focus and energy boost.

Hunger is starting to creep in as well, with an overall feeling of fatigue due to blood sugar and glycogen reserves being depleted.

This is the point where I used to struggle with a fast because I started feeling low energy and is probably the hardest point of a 40 hour fast.

...psst, you need sodium idiot (get my recommended electrolytes).

Yea, I didn't know this until I did some research on this. Literally buy salt and pour it into a glass of water at a minimum.

Your body depletes sodium first so you need to drink water with salt in it or get quality electrolytes to maintain your energy levels.

24 hours

8pm.

Awesome, it's been a full 24 hours since dinner. By this point autophagy (which is your cells' natural cleaning and recycling process) begins to ramp up meaningfully.

I felt some hunger pains but nothing too bad. Sip on that salt and water, make a cup of green tea (like coffee, it helps suppress your appetite).

Go to sleep around 10:30 -11.

I'm the bear chronotype, so up at 7-8am and bed around 10:30-11 pm is how I naturally sleep.

36 hours

8am the next day, time for my morning coffee. Weirdly, I woke up and felt no hunger (well not exactly weird, ketones are responsible for this lack of hunger).

You should now be in a ketogenic state with your body burning that stubborn body fat for clean, stable energy.

If you've never been in a ketogenic state, I suggest doing it because it's quite fun and weird.

You're wired on black coffee and totally alert and ready to conquer the day.

Get a workout in

Once I was in a ketogenic state, time for a full body workout at the gym. I did my typical weight lifting regiment that I finished off with a 1 mile run on the treadmill.

I felt great by the way.

High energy, burning off even more fat as that was my bodies only fuel source.

40 hours

Time to finally break the fast and have lunch.

If you're feeling ambitious you could push it longer to 45-48 hours and wait for dinner, but I find doing around 40 hours fine.

I typically like to break this extended fast with some raw sweet potatoes, followed by a rib-eye steak and eggs cooked in butter.

Then I'll have fruit, a bit of dark chocolate and 3 macadamia nuts.

Results ⚡

Here is a breakdown of the results and benefits I experienced.

Fat burning

You'll burn 1-2 lbs of body fat.

If you do the workout in a ketogenic state it will likely be 1.5-2 lbs of fat. By far, a 40 hour fast is highly effective if you're looking to burn off fat fast.

Train your metabolism

Doing longer fasts occasionally also help to train your metabolism which can help make my everyday 16:8 fasts more efficient because the body becomes better at accessing and burning fat once the eating window closes.

Extended fasting (24–48+ hours) switch the body from glucose burning and storage mode to fat-mobilization mode. Growth hormone may rise too, helping preserve muscle while targeting fat.

Ketosis is fun

Being in ketosis with your body burning fat is simply fun and weird. Your energy levels are stable, you'll feel alert and ready to go.

Food tastes better & alcohol hits harder

Obviously, I DO NOT suggest drinking on the day you break your fast, but my girl at the time wanted to go to a cocktail bar.

So in the evening I had a negroni (my cocktail of choice) and the flavor tasted more complex and interesting and I had to go much slower as the alcohol hit me harder.

Also, food for that first day when you break your fast simply tasted better which was fun.

Wrap-up

So that's it for my 40 hour fast. The most difficult part is when you're sodium levels start dipping so make sure to sip on water with a bit table salt poured in or get quality electrolytes.

Also leverage coffee for is appetite suppression benefits.

If you want more reading on this, I found "The Complete Guide to Fasting" a helpful read. Maybe you'll find it useful too?