Calorie restriction in humans builds strong muscle and stimulates healthy aging

I did a bit of a double-take at the headline because it seems to imply that one can grow stronger while calorie-restricted, which is contrary to common practice around strength development - caloric surplus is generally understood to be necessary for muscle growth.<p>I&#x27;ve only read the abstract, but the title as I interpreted it seems misleading:<p>&gt; One study showed that individuals on calorie restriction lost muscle mass and an average of 20 pounds of weight over the first year and maintained their weight for the second year. However, despite losing muscle mass, calorie restriction participants did not lose muscle strength, indicating calorie restriction improved the amount of force generated by each unit of muscle mass, called muscle specific force.<p>So even if force per unit increased, overall mass decreased and total strength was unchanged. I guess the title is technically correct but the implication is off. This might be better phrased as &quot;calorie restriction in humans doesn&#x27;t incur as much muscle&#x2F;strength loss as previously thought&quot;, which is still an interesting result.

Any calorie based study when it&#x27;s self reported should be highly suspect of being false.

&gt; They found that during a two-year span, the goal for participants was to reduce their daily caloric intake by 25%, but the highest the group was able to reach was a 12% reduction<p>This feels like something the royal we should be talking about as well.<p>It’s clearly really difficult to restrict calories&#x2F;eat less in the US. It’s unclear if this is a US only phenomenon or not but I wouldn’t be surprised if it were.

12% reduction of what? The basal metabolism? Were the people overeating before? How many calories on average?

&gt; One study showed that individuals on calorie restriction lost muscle mass and an average of 20 pounds of weight over the first year and maintained their weight for the second year. However, despite losing muscle mass, calorie restriction participants did not lose muscle strength, indicating calorie restriction improved the amount of force generated by each unit of muscle mass, called muscle specific force.<p>If people lost 20 lbs in the first year of a 12% calorie restricted diet then that means that this study took place among people who were already obese (which seems extremely relevant). Anyone who is in good shape and not 6&#x27;8 is in no position to lose 20 lbs without serious risks to their health, aside from vastly decreased muscle strength. It is interesting, but not very surprising, that obese people with atrophied muscles don&#x27;t lose &quot;strength&quot; by cutting calories and losing some muscle mass, which is very low to begin with.

Does any one find hard to eat a lot of protein (150g) in a 8 hour feeding window? I hate to live off of protein shacks.