In this week’s Fitness Edda, Coach Erik shares his thoughts on the use of GLP-1 agonists for weight loss. Are they cheating? Is Big Pharma colluding with the CDC to rip you off? Are the lizard people in control? Give this a listen. The transcript is below the video.

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
01:05 What is GLP-1?
03:25 How do GLP-1 Agonists Work?
03:50 Ridiculous Criticism of GLP-1’s
05:19 Legitimate Concerns Over GLP-1 Use
10:51 Conclusion

INTRODUCTION

What’s going on everybody? Welcome back to the Fitness Edda. As always, I am your host, Erik Castiglione, owner and head coach of Viking Athletics. And today we’re going to be talking about use of GLP-1 agonist drugs for weight loss. We previously done a podcast on this. So, another YouTube playlist – our Skol Sessions Podcast.  We did with Eminence Hormone and Weight Loss Center, which is located in West Hartford Center. We talked about their hormone treatments. Part of that includes GLP1s.

It’s receiving a lot of attention in the media, in the fitfluencers sphere, et cetera, et cetera. They’ve been a hot topic for a long time. So, I’ve been asked about my thoughts on the subject. If you listen to the podcast, it’s longer form. I go pretty in depth there.

WHAT IS GLP-1?

But to start, we want to talk about what is GLP1, which is the shortened term for these drugs. GLP-1 stands for glucagon-like peptide 1, which is actually naturally produced in your gut. When you eat food, your body naturally secretes this. And what it does is, it makes you feel full. The full drug is called the GLP1 receptor agonist. These are synthetic. And the goal of them is to mimic the effects of the naturally produced GLP1.

So common brand names include Ozempic, Wegovy, Zepbound. And depending on which drug you’re taking, it’s either semaglutide, which is a GLP-1 agonist, is the active ingredient, or triseptatide. Trizepatide, there we go, which is both a GLP-1 and a GIP agonist. GIP, that’s more related to insulin production. So trizepatide is actually a little bit more effective than semaglutide, because it doesn’t just make you feel full and help with blood sugar, it also helps regulate insulin a little bit better.

As far as pricing goes for these drugs, I don’t know, I have never looked into them for personal use. All I do as a fitness and nutrition coach is talk about the effects, and I can give some suggestions for how to use these drugs, but I am not a doctor. So anytime there is medical advice given, I would suggest that you talk to your doctor about this.

But the point is, as with synthetic hormones like testosterone supplementation or steroids, or anabolic steroids, I should say, on essentially what we’re doing is recreating something that naturally occurs, tweaking it a little bit so that hopefully it’s more effective, and then injecting it into the body. And that is what a GLP-1 receptor agonist is, is it’s a synthetic version of something that’s naturally produced.

HOW DO GLP-1 AGONISTS WORK?

Again, how do they work? They suppress your appetite. You feel full, so you eat less, therefore you are going to lose weight because you are burning more calories than you are consuming. It’s that simple. That’s why they’re touted as a miracle drug. Because it actually does reduce the calories that you’re going to consume. So why is it getting Criticized if it’s you know, the pharmaceutical companies are touting, “this is a miracle drug.” Why are people critical of it?

RIDICULOUS CRITICISM OF GLP-1 AGONISTS

Fitfluencers, so anyone on social media that is an influencer, and what I’m going to call incompetent coaches, who feel threatened by it, would argue that it’s cheating. You’re taking something synthetic. Therefore, you’re not doing the work. I’ll get into my thoughts on that in a minute.

 Conspiracy nuts including our Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert Kennedy Jr – they claim that big pharma is trying to get you to spend more and that these drugs are not necessary. If you look at the CDC’s website, I don’t know if that’s still the case under this administration, but towards the end of the Biden administration, the CDC was actually recommending use of these drugs for youth.

That was their preferred intervention method rather than lifestyle changes. So, it’s easy to take that at face value and say “look! The CDC is pushing for these drugs on youth! Very clearly they’re in cahoots with big pharma.” We’ll dive into that as well.

LEGITIMATE CONCERNS ABOUT GLP-1 USE

Competent coaches, and yes I am including myself in this, we argue that it is a tool and it’s part of a program rather than a standalone treatment. So, you will absolutely be successful on it, but if you take it and that’s all you do, our concerns are that you’re going to see some side effects.

So, the initial dosage seems high based on people that I’ve worked with that have taken these drugs. They experience constipation or the opposite, diarrhea, sometimes vomiting, basically uncomfortable digestive side effects.

So, again, I’m not a doctor, but my recommendation for that is maybe ask your doctor about cutting the dosage in half, starting a little bit low, see how you feel. If you tolerate that, you titrate up. I’ve had some patients, or I should say clients, that are patients, ask their doctor this and their doctor was receptive to it, and they built up to something that they could tolerate.

I’m not going to talk to your doctor for you, I tend to butt heads with medical doctors about a lot of things. We view things holistically, we treat the whole person, medicine is part of that. It’s getting better, but a lot of medical doctors like to stay in their field and only their field. So that is one of the things that we are concerned about when you are using these drugs is those side effects.

Number two is sarcopenia, which is a loss of muscle mass and strength. It occurs if you do not get enough protein and do not resistance strain as you age. And it is often sped up by people that are taking GLP-1 agonists. Again, they are not eating enough in general to support their entire structure. And that is how they lose weight.

The problem is they are not just losing fat mass; they are also losing muscle mass. So, if you are going to take these drugs and you don’t want what we call Ozempic butt, or Ozempic cheeks from loss of collagen, you still need to eat protein. That needs to be a focus, and you still need to resistance train.

And then for people that stop, there is concern about price. eventually it may get too expensive for some people, and they stop these drugs and then they regain all of the weight they lost just like with any crash diet that people do.

Lifestyle change is necessary. So going back to RFK Junior’s comments, yes he dives into the realm of conspiracy and the CDC being in cahoots with Big Pharma, but the reason that the CDC switched their recommendation from lifestyle change to these drugs as their initial intervention is because everybody was ignoring their recommendations for lifestyle changes.

So, what is left? If people aren’t following recommendations they tried to meet people where they’re at and they’re like, “alright if you’re not gonna cut out junk food and you’re not gonna walk and get the recommended activity, I guess you’re going on drugs. We’re trying to save your life here.” In context it makes perfect sense.

If you look at where we are as a society, average people walk 3,000 to 4,000 steps a day and eating in excess of 3,000 calories a day. This drug can seriously help people, and we talk about factors for obesity. There’s a number of them: education, access to nutritious foods, access to physical activity. Those are proven interventions. So, I do agree with RFK Jr. there that lifestyle change is necessary, but it is not that simple for a lot of people who are working multiple jobs.

For our youth, and this is where genetic factors come into play. We talked about “it’s cheating. They don’t want to do the hard work.” One of the issues that we encounter that is a genetic factor is your predisposition to fixate on foods. For some people, you go through your day, and you forget to eat. That was my mother growing up. She’d get so busy, she’s like,” I just forgot to eat.”

For other people, they are so fixated on food that they are literally thinking about their next meal as soon as they finish this one. These are the people that are habitually snacking. It is not always a matter of willpower and being able to stop this. There is a genetic predisposition to being occupied with food and thinking about it all the time. If these drugs can curb that, that is a huge win for these people.

CONCLUSION

So, it is a tool. It is not the end all be all. And they have their place in weight loss journeys. It is not the whole solution. You still need to change your life. Try to change your eating habits, but if you’re not obsessing and craving foods, these drugs can help you get to a point where a lifestyle change is more realistic.

Again, we’re concerned about dosage. If you experience side effects, talk to your doctor. That would be my suggestion. See if you can start with a low dosage and then ramp it up. You still need to focus on protein, fiber, veggies, all of that. And you still need to resistance train, especially women.

So, I am in the group of fitness professionals that support the use of these drugs provided that it is done responsibly. Let me give another plug to Eminence Hormone and Weight Loss Center here in West Hartford. If you’re looking for a place that does it right, they do.

It is part of a bigger plan. They do advocate all of these things I hope that clears things up. There’s really nothing to be scared of other than the price with these drugs. They’re not cheating, but again we don’t want you to become super dependent on them. They are a tool, and they have their place. Hope that helps. We’ll see you guys in the gym.