Elsa Pataky makes up, along with her husband Chris Hemsworth, one of the fittest couples we know. More than once she herself has spoken about the lifestyle they both follow, their routines and the diet they follow.
So much so that together they have created the Centr app, which offers workouts, recipes and other activities and help to follow a healthy lifestyle. Although the application delves into the world of recipes and healthy cooking, they do not offer information about intermittent fasting, Elsa Pataky’s eating style has assured on occasion to follow.
What is intermittent fasting
When she went to El Hormiguero for the last time, the Spanish actress said that both she and Hemsworth practice intermittent fasting in its 16/8 version. What does this mean? To start we need to know what intermittent fasting is.
To explain it simply, it is a feeding protocol – not a diet – that consists of reducing and limiting the hours in which we eat food and increase the hours of fasting. There are different ways to do this: the best known is the 16/8 that Elsa Pataky does, which consists in that we will have 16 hours of fasting and all our food intake will be done in the other 8 hours.
Other forms of intermittent fasting are 12/12, 4/20 or 24 hours of fasting in a row – more can be done, but it is not usual -. There is currently no evidence that fasting longer than 8/16 has more benefits, but choosing one or the other will depend on our needs and lifestyle.
Mistakes we can make following intermittent fasting like Elsa Pataky
One of the peculiarities of this protocol is that it does not always work for everyone and that, in the case of the people for whom it does work, it will work for each one in a different way. That is to say, we will have to adapt it to us. In addition, it is a protocol that only marks the times we eat, but not what we eat. Therefore, we can fall into making some mistakes.
- Ignore whether or not it suits our lifestyle: This feeding protocol involves important changes in our usual way of eating and does not work for everyone. It is important that we do not ignore whether it is compatible with our lifestyle or not. Because if we launch into it without thinking about it and we can’t reconcile it, it can end up causing frustration.
- Not properly planning the protocol: Closely related to this is the importance of planning our protocol well. There are different options and choose the most typical (8/16) or any other, because it sounds better to us, without thinking carefully about our schedules, our caloric needs and our way of life – if we do sports, if not, when, etc. – and without good planning it can be a mistake.
- Neglecting Hydration: One of the things we know is that during fasting hours we cannot consume caloric foods. This can lead us to make the mistake of not taking anything at all during these hours and end up neglecting our hydration. During fasting hours we can consume water, coffee or tea or other non-caloric beverages.
- Pay less attention to the food we eat: Indeed, intermittent fasting only specifies the times at which we have to eat. but it says nothing about the food we eat. Therefore, we can make the mistake of not paying attention to what we eat, its nutritional quality and the number of calories we eat. Ignoring this can cause us to end up eating high-calorie products with few nutrients.
Keys to following intermittent fasting successfully
Therefore, if we are going to try or practice intermittent fasting, there are some keys or guidelines that will make this diet a success. And not only that, but that way we get all its benefits: not only helps in weight loss, but also improves insulin sensitivity, also the use that our body makes of glucose, helps us to be more satiated, reduces our metabolic age – helping to delay the effects of aging -, has been associated with reduced mortality and improved neuronal plasticity.
these keys Can help us:
Calculate our caloric needs (it’s not about starving)
One of the first thoughts that come to mind when we think of intermittent fasting is that we are going to eat little and go hungry. The reality is that the intention of intermittent fasting is not this. Ideally, we should calculate what our daily caloric needs are and consume that number of calories during meal times.
One of the advantages of intermittent fasting is that, by limiting meal times, will make it difficult for us to exceed the number of calories needed for us – helping us to take care of our weight – but it does not pretend that we consume less. If not, precisely the ones we need each day based on our goal (lose weight, maintain it or gain it).
Try to start small
Throwing ourselves into the longest fasts first can be complicated and discourage us. Therefore, if we want to test whether it is an option that is for us or not, we can start little by little. A good idea is to start with 12/12, which will simply require us to bring dinner forward a little and breakfast a little later. If this goes well for us, and it is easy for us, we can move on to longer fasts.
Plan well, based on our life, the hours of fasting and eating
Our work schedules, if we get up early, if we don’t, if we exercise or not and at what times we prefer to do it, will inevitably mark our intermittent fasting. And it should. It is very important that we plan well our fasting hours – beginning and end – based on our way of life, in a way that suits us and is as easy to follow as possible.
Choose foods that provide good nutrients
Intermittent fasting gives us some freedom when it comes to choosing the foods we eat. However, it is extremely important that we continue to pay attention to it. It will not be the same that we cover our caloric needs with very caloric foods and very few or “bad” nutrients, that we do it with healthy foods that fill us with nutrients healthy.
Therefore, the ideal is that we continue to choose vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, wholemeal flours, and lean meats and fish as the basis of our diet. At the same time, we will try to stay away from ultra-processed products, “junk food”, etc.
Thus we will get the most benefits from this protocol feeding. Exactly the same as Elsa Pataky and her husband, Chris Hemsworth.
Pictures | @elsapatakyconfidential, Gtres, @chiaraferragni