My personal quest to get ripped and stay ripped :)

[coolcolj]

Hi my first post

Not sure if I should post this here, but its diet related.

Anyway I used to bodybuild as a teen, and sorta got out of it - never really got ripped come to think of it. And at age 31 I had put a lot of fat on due to inactivity.

Anway 4 months ago I was like this

5'9" 210lbs 95kg 40inch waist - 24% bodyfat

With a wedding coming up I had to lose fat to get into my formal suit
So I started lifting weights once a week, doing interval sprints/walk a couple of times a week plus work (which is physical) and ate fairly normally (no junk food though) 5-6 times a day, plus a gallon of ice cold water. Oh yeah also downed Sudafet tablets and Guarana togther twice a day, 4 days on 3 off
I was losing fat quite rapidly, as much as 1/4 inch of my waist a day on some weeks!

after 6 weeks of this I got down to these stats and eaisly fitted in my suit

5' 9" 190lbs 86kg 35inch waist - 16.4% bodyfat


Then I kinda lapsed and put some back - went back up to 36 inches and bodyweight went back up to 88kg or 193.4lbs 18% bodyfat. When I had my drivers license renewed at this time and saw how fat my face was, I freaked!

I got stuck back into it again as above, and dropped my figures back to then ones below within a couple of weeks.

5' 9" 190lbs 86kg 35inch waist - 16.4% bodyfat


But then for the next 3 weeks I had hit a plateau. My waist wouldn't budge regardless of what I did or ate - which was lots of soy milk and cereals, rice and meat etc, with a fairly low caloric balance.

Then I thought I try an old diet I used back in my teen days - I trialed it back then for 3 weeks - it was taken from an article Diana Denise (female Bodybuilder) wrote in some mag. Its kinda like a Cycling low carb diet. Basicly a 3 low carb day to 1 carb up.
But you never go too low on carbs, basicly you keep carbs around 100 grams and basicly eat lots of meat and veges 6 times a day and then carb up for one day and back again. As a teen doing this diet for 3 weeks I lost 1.5 inches of my waist (1/8 a day) and got the lowest bodyfat levels I ever had in my life. That was good for a 28.5 inch waist! I wasn't ripped then, but was just off it

So then that was my goal today to get my waist to 27 inches!

Anyway that's what I'm doing now and hope to keep you people informed of my progress week to week. And photos once I get my digi cam

Basicly I just eat a breakfast cereal (2 weetbix biscuits and light soy milk) and chicken breast, plus veges at breakfast, and then the rest of meals are just small bits of meat/eggs with tons of lettuce and other veges, raw or cooked. I'm not really counting calories. I just nibble real slow and get amazingly full, I chew everything at least 30 times I eat anywhere from 4- 6 meals a day and off course gallons of ice cold water - helps burns extra fat from making the body heat the water to body temp.

I started the diet this week on Monday - plus a multi-vitamin, calicium tablets, fish-oil and that's it.

On Monday I workout - yeah just once a week. And the rest of other days, work is hard enough I've been doing this workout for 3 weeks already. I basicly work my whole body - basic exercises. Squats, Incline Benchpress, dumbless shoulder presses, bent over rows, curls and tricep extensions. 2 warmup sets and then 2 workout sets - I explode the weight as hard and fast as I can but slow down at the lockout position and then lower it slowly - 4 second down. I rest maybe 20-30 sec between sets if that. Its partly because I'm training for neural learning and explosiveness - gotta activate the fast twitch and speed-strength muscles.
I train at home BTW and after this workout I head down to the park and do walk-sprint interval training for 20mins - build up my calves and explosiveness and burns fat too. That's it just once a week.

Since Monday I have been on this diet for 3 days already, I'm on the 4th carb up- pig out day today
I've had amazing results so far - 1/4 inch of waist a day! No hunger as such - and no muscle loss as far as I can tell.
Stats as of today


5'9" 185lbs 84kg 34inch waist 15% bodyfat

anyway I'll report back next week or the next cycle - I need to get a digicam for pics too!
Also I'm Asian as well - not sure if that effects things
Never did roids and never will - don't need it really, never had much problems putting on muscle (within reason) - even now at 31.

My goal is to reach 27 inch waist or 5% bodyfat whichever comes first , increase vertical leap high enough to dunk and get real fast in sprinting


Colin

[coolcolj]

Just wanted to add -

I'm pretty much an ecto-meso body wise.

Since I started eatiing like this - I don't really consider it a diet since I'm never really hungry, more life-style change - my blood sugar crashes I had from the carb heavy meal eating days are all but gone, not to mention the sleepy heavy feeling after lunch...

Forgot to mention I'm eating lots of nuts and peanuts as well.

[coolcolj]

Well yesterday I did my Carb-Pig out day.

I ate a lot! At least 1000 calories over my normal amount. I must have had 8-9 meals, I was nibbling all day long. From good stuff to junk food like buttered microwave popcorn. I didn't feel too good. I'll have to cut the junk food next time

Anyway the main thing was I didn't gain any fat! Nope the waist stayed at 34 inches, but my body weight went up 2 or so pounds or 1 kg from all the water and Carbs.

As of this morning I'm

187lbs 85kg 34inch waist

Today I start another moderate carb 3 day cycle - 100-150 grams of crabs as before.
I hope I can replicate my 1 inch drop on my waist in the first cycle!
But I'm happy with a 1/4 inch drop per day. 33 1/4 inch waist here I come!

I guess many will question why a Carb up day is needed at all- well IMO you should never give your body a chance to adapt. Always keep it guessing and the Caeb up day prevents any metabolism slow down, and due to the lag factor, you won't put the fat back on in that one day.

I'll report back in 3 days.

[coolcolj]

Oh yeah one handy hint - buy some raw nuts like almonds, walnuts etc.

anytime your still feeling hungry, nibble on a few of these. In fact nibble of some of em before a meal. The high fat (good fat) content will kill your appetite

Also stretch you meals out as long as possible, that will make you feel much fuller. Get something to read while you nibbling on your meal, otherwise it gets boring

[bm2k]

Originally posted by CoolColJ
Oh yeah one handy hint - buy some raw nuts like almonds, walnuts etc.

anytime your still feeling hungry, nibble on a few of these. In fact nibble of some of em before a meal. The high fat (good fat) content will kill your appetite

Also stretch you meals out as long as possible, that will make you feel much fuller. Get something to read while you nibbling on your meal, otherwise it gets boring

I eat almonds regularly, especially when dieting (b/c I tend to consume more fat when dieting!). You have to be careful though - they're easy to go overboard on. I make sure I only eat a set quantity that fits into my daily ratios and cals. Almonds can be good to add to a meal of lean meat to up the fat count...

[coolcolj]

Ok thanks - yeah I'm learning as I'm going along and I already made my first mistake

Yesterday I started my 2nd low carb cycle but I made one basic but important mistake, I didn't deplete my carb stores!!! Which would be sprinting-walking interval training. So that day was wasted in a sense, marginal bodyfat loss since I wasn't near a Ketogenic state

So I'm gonna do some sprinting today. Which means I'll have to reorganise my training schedule. Since I always have to do my weights on Monday due to my work schedule, this will require some creative thinking how to setup the low carb and carb up days. I need to squeeze in a 2nd sprinting day into a 7 day schedule. Guess I have to have 2 uneven cycles per week. Perhaps a 3 on 1 off, and a 2 on 1 off. Damn why can't a week be 8 days?!

[coolcolj]

Well that sprint session I did yesterday did wonders - Im back on track! Waist is down to 33 3/4 inches this morning!! Just like clockwork 1/4 inch off every day of the low carb period....

Anyway I'm gonna stretch out this low carb period by one extra day to make up for the no show on the first day of this 2nd cycle. The sooner my waist get under 33inches the better


Woohoo!

[coolcolj]

Well today I have wrapped up my first week. Carbing up today.
The scale says just a smidgen under 84kg or 184 lbs after my morning carb pigout, not an accurate scale at all, but a 1kg drop is worthwhile. But most importantly I've managed to lose 1.5 inches of my waist!!! That's the best results of any diet system I have ever used. I figure I haven't lost much muscle if any, most probably gained some, since a 1.5 inch drop of the waist is quite a bit for only a 1kg bodyweight drop.

I'm hopeful I can continue losing at this rate next week, fingers crossed.

Stats

84kg 184Lbs 33.5 inch waist - rough guess 13.8% bodyfat

I keep thinking that the 1.5 inch drop on the waist is an illusion, but the signs are there in the mirror, all my joints look smaller, the skin is tighter on my face, cheekbones starting to push forwards. Definitely less flab around the butt too. Still along way to go though.

[coolcolj]

Well into my 2nd week now - just started the low carb cycle today with a heavy weight and sprint combo for carb depletion.

So far I've noticed some odd things -

I definitely feel 100% better on the Low carb days!! I have way more energy for some reason! It doesn't make sense. I'm eating mainly meat and nuts, with some veges, and not that many veges at that. I never get low blood sugar crashes, just one long sustained flow of stable energy from somewhere... even if I don't eat 6 hours after a meal - which I have done several times

Maybe I'm diabetic? Cause on the carb up days, I feel kinda "dizzy" and get low blood sugar blues a couple hours after a meal. Guess after I reach my goals, I'm sticking with the lower carb approach for life. I'm finally getting the energetic feeling I had in my teen years back!!!

Other odd thing is, even though I'm melting fat off real fast, I'm also putting on muscle at a good rate! And my recuperation is definitely 33% better! I'm gaining strength and explosiveness every workout, that tells me I'm gaining muscle mass.

Maybe excessive chewing of your food is one of the things that's helping, vs gulping like I used to do, and 90% of the human population come to think of it

The answers are out there somewhere...

[coolcolj]

whoop whopp - diet still works as well as it did last week!!

lost another 1/4 inch of my waist since yesterday!

Waist down to 33 1/4 inches

Oh year I no longer eat the breakfast cereal in the morning like I did last week. And I don't think my body ever enters ketosis. I guess I should buy some sticks for testing, bu no need, I'm getting results as is