well...i just lost the diet battle again..

[nclifter6feet6]

i was going real strict on my diet hardly any fat or carbs just protien... ive done it before and have gotten about 5 percent bodyfat one time in my life. but now i just cant diet like i used too. if i try a diet like that again i think i might try out this 5-htp stuff i hear about. i think u can get that stuff anywhere right? now ive just gone back to eating whatever i want..but now im gonna do cardio twice a day ill mix it up with sprints and 3 mile runs. ill do sprints at 5 am when i wake up then maybe sprint again after i get off work or either a 3 mile run. i will be weight training 2 times a week on top of cardio everyday. i will work each muscle group about 1 time a week....lets see how this goes.


if i do try a strict ass diet like i was before, i will defintly give this 5-htp a try

 

[Greek Freak]

sometimes you have to jump into things slowly. If you diet too hard a lot of times its really rough on you and your body cant handle it. I know the transition from eating pretty bad to being really strict took me a good few months.

 

[MrMakaveli]

NC I know what you mean, the quick fix diet is a bitch to start. It took me at least 3 tries to stick to it...keep chuggin the water like you said before.

 

[nclifter6feet6]

yeah its hard to practice what i preach lol... its just weird how i hit it down so perfectly before and i was chuggin the water like crazy too. but now when i did the diet i know i didnt drink near enough water to satisfy my hunger. this way works but damn is it hard. hope fully this other way will work that im doing now. its kinda like navy seal training, they basically do cardio as much as possible and liftweights

 

[PwB]

nclifter, start doing refeed days. trust me on this one. try this out, its fucking awesome.

Sun-Tues and Thurs-Friday stick w/ low calories/low carbs/and low fat. Don't go below 1200 cals for several reasons. Something like 200-250g protein, 20-40g fat, and 0-50g carbs.
Sample Foods:
Protein:
Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breast
Turkey Breast
Top Round Steak
Eye Round Steak
Eggs with Egg Whites
Tuna Fish

Carbs:
Green Beans
Broccoli
Spinach
Salad
Asparagus

Fats:
Fish Oil Capsules (minimum 8 per day)
Fats From Protein Sources
Olive Oil
Flaxseed Oil

Wed and Sat refeed days. High calories/High Carbs/200-250g protein/minimal fat. Start with 2.5g carbs per lb. bodyweight and try to push it a little more each refeed day, up to around 5g per lb. of carbs on a given day.

On the 2 refeed days, wake up EARLY, eat a high carb/protein breakfast, go to the gym an hour or 2 later and lift heavy. Postworkout drink high in carbs and protein, and just eat carbs/sugars all day. Some foods include:
Potatoes
Sweet Potatoes
Rice
Pasta
Oatmeal
Sweet Tarts
Smarties
Pop Tarts
Cereal
Low Fat/Fat Free Pretzels
Low Fat/Fat Free Ice Cream
Low Fat/Fat Free Cookies/Cup cakes
Snackwells
Low Fat/Fat Free Protein Bars
Jelly Beans
Candy Corn

Lifting should be geared around the diet, on the high carb days, lift after your 1st early meal, and lift heavy. Eat carbs and protein all day (low fat) which will aim at muscle recovery and may result in some anabolism. The workouts should be full body, heavy weight, low reps (4-6 reps) w/ longer rest intervals. Stick w/ your basic compound movements.
The day after each high carb/refeed day, do a higher rep, full body depletion workout. This will return the body back to burning fat at a more rapid pace. Again, full body workout, moderate weights at around 12-15 reps. Do 3-4 sets per bodypart to deplete glycogen levels. Dont go to heavy as to interfere w/ recovery from the previous days heavy workout.

The idea is that the PSMF (protein sparing modified fast) allows the fastest fat loss w/ muscle retention than any other diet. All it is is a low calorie/low fat ketogenic diet. One of the main problems is that metabolic rate begins to slow along w/ lowering of leptin after only a few days on this diet (as well as any diet), so here, we're losing maximum fat on low carb days and before a big drop in metabolic rate and leptin, do a refeed day to bump leptin/prevent a big drop, and prevent a significant drop in metabolic rate.

Besides being physiologically advantagous, its VERY easy to follow psycologically. You're only dieting for either 3 days or 2 days in a row, then allowed to eat plenty of high carb/sugar foods (although fat needs to be somewhat restricted) but this allows a great deal of flexibility and WORKS.

 

[nclifter6feet6]

your right on a point you loose fat most like when its your first day into a diet because your metabolizm is the highest. so its kinda like you just started a diet on sunday and just started a diet again that same week on thursday. sounds pretty fun too with all the carbs.

 

[MrMakaveli]

I ended up getting a book about how bruce Lee trained and ate a while back. I tried following his day to day sched to see how hard it was (basically worked out somehow either cardio or weights) for 70% of my day and ate alot of carbs and went from %2o to %15...Worked like a charm, hurt like a bitch after the first few days but the pain felt great.

Plus my uncle who went into the army with their training. Left skinny with no muscle..came back 6% ripped to shreds and ate 3 meals a day consisting mostly of cereal..go figure.

So your diet may very well work NC..good luck

 

[PwB]

1st off going based on what bruce lee used is pretty useless as he most likely had a relatively fast metabolism, and either way ended up w/ very little muscle. He was ripped, but had very little muscle and was tiny. Either way whatever he used was a long time ago and theres been a lot of advances since then, at least in research on what is optimal. Not that a high carb diet wouldnt work, any diet would once requirements are met (calorie defecit, adaquete protein and EFA's). Besides, getting from 20-15% bodyfat is cake, anyone can do it w/ little pain and pretty much any diet, once you get down to around 10% and want to go lower than that, thats when the details start to matter much more.

The reason your uncle got ripped was from extreme overtraining. A study on navy seals dieting to like no bodyfat showed almost castration hormone levels. Just b/c this approach works its far from ideal.

 

[SOLID]

NC do you have any pictures to post that are larger. You look huge and pretty lean too me. But your avatar is very small to critique. I went through a stage where I was burnt out on sticking to diet, doing cardio all the time, so I relaxed on both and let myself eat almost how I wanted. It was hard to get back to dieting but I feel 10 times better now then I did when I was puffy and smooth.

 

[Kid Dynamite]

Nice post on the diet cycling PwB, you beat me to it. Sorta what I'm doing. I was hittin maybe 1200 cals the last 4 - 5 days w/ fair amount of cardio, and I've gotten noticable fat loss. For the next 2 or 3 days I'm eating at maintenence, then right back on the diet. Kinda a pyramid weight loss routine. Lose some, stay there a few days, lose some more, stay a few etc. It's so much easier on the mind. I'd rather go extremely low on cals a few days then back off for a brief period than go 6 days low then one day high, but thats me. Hopefully this will work.