To loose body fat we have to drop calories - basically Cals in vs cals out."
insert game show buzzer which would indicate something is incorrect or wrong “meeeeeeeeh!” and by now, you should know better than that. but i really am impressed with how muhc thought you gave this thread (no sarcasm intended). im not saying you are totally wrong here but you are barking up the wrong tree.
calories in equalling less than out does not mean weight loss. you have the math of bf loss kind of figured out but look another level up, everything we eat effects all systems in our body and esp the hormones and hormones have a pretty big effect on bodycomp. you need to start thinking less linear and open you mind to going a to c without stopping at b.
back to the books young jedi. something to think about, stop thinking calories have anything to do with body comp.
ok so I stop thinking calories… I mostly just count my carbs and protien anyways… but what should I do? im kinda new to this… well im a complete idiot can you explain more please?
Mon Wed Fri… heavy lifting days
monday-friday are my running days
… I make adjustments as I go. Im just trying to lean out I guess. but I dont really know where to start so I started with cleaning my diet up considerablely. No soda No salad Dressing No chips cookie or candy, and No condiments… and I try to get 1.5g of protien per pound of body weight (155lbs = 225g’s protien) but I dont know what to do next cut down carbs (i dont think its a good idea seeings im a sprinter) or what… I really do appreciate everyones help and input.
Master Nightmare, Young Jedi to books must return …
Ok - yes - Sorry to re-phrase …
What I meant to say was - “To loose weight we have to drop calories - basically Cals in vs cals out”
The reason I reiterated this is it is the most basic yet most important factor in ‘bodyfat loss’.
Now hang on before you weild the light-saber - You can try any macro-nutrient splitting or combinations but unless the overall calorie count observes this rule - you will never lose weight.
For example I’ve seen an athlete eating spagetti with enough mince-meat to feed half a small African nation daily for his 2nd PWO meal and yet claim that his overall calorie intake was low enough to lose weight? Doubtful.
Hmmm hormones …
Ok …. Master Nightmare talk lets hormones about ……
[This is adapted from one of my old articles on fat loss and muscle gain …]
While many think hormones are fixed bodily responses - with hormones we can manage and manipulate the hormones to do our bidding –
Lets take the hormone insulin as an example. With Insulin we can manipulate it to the extent we can maximise the bodies response to it. By working at high intensity we can deplete some fat stores and at the same time depleting glycogen we can make the body more aware of insulin.
By overfeeding we can generate a massive rebound so that the body, dehydrated from carbohydrate withdrawal symptoms, will draw in all the carbohydrates it can, thus filling the muscles and encouraging even more protein syntheses.
Again insulin is crticial here though in that it increases the release of insulin in response to the overfeeding and encourages an even more anabolic response, than would be normal on a low- carbohydrate refuelling situation.
The downside of maintaining high insulin levels are obvious in terms of diabetes, more on a more subtle level for fat gain. Faster and shorter spikes in insulin will not have any effect on fat storage, whereas high insulin levels constantly is even from a health point of view … well bad.
We also need to put together a more comprehensive picture here of the hormonal activities inside our body. While the body responds with insulin the body also releases testosterone and we all know the wonderful effects it has. Now it’s response is quite small but remember we’re glad of all the help we can get.
In recent time though I become a lot more aware of the more important effects of Leptin and the effects it can have on the body as a result of sub-calorific intake. It is also one of the main reasons I would encourage macro-nutrient readjustment rather than calorific in-take reduction in some one needing to lose bodyfat.
Leptin is one of the key elements that triggers the body into the resorting to catabolism rather than fat consumption and also needs to be managed. One way of doing this is overfeeding on a regular basis that tricks the body into believing it is being over-fed, not starved.
This is what I suspect you are doing or attempting to do N4D, with high Carbohydrate/Calorific intake on a Low-Intensity day. However I still don’t see why it is not more beneficial to overfeed on the High Intensity day and perhaps get better bang for buck – protein synthesis, insulin and Testosterone optimisation.
Now unless I am missing something Master Skywalker, this young Jedi is still for the Darkside destined.
you are getting warmer, and almost over thinking the whole process. im not going to argue the cal in cal out thing as it can be beaten to death as berardi says “to fatten themselves up, sumo wrestlers eat 1 meal a day” so if you were to eat 2000 cals at one meal and “burn” 2500 the whole day, i have a hard time believing that you would lean out. i dont count calories and havent for years, i dont even pay much attention to grams other than protein per sitting and sometimes grams of carbs pw.
now this isnt to say you shouldnt or no one should, but the long term goal is to move away from it. i have put in my time counting everything and anything and now i have my body figured out. getting regular BF tests are important in my eyes as you can make adjustments and fine tune your eating patterns.
another thing i will encourage everyone to do is try different things, even things that make no sense on paper. remember the body doesnt read text books, so step out of traditional thinking and roll the dice. this summer i was having a tough time falling asleep and i have used sedatives a little too much in the past so since my goal at that time was also trying to increase muscle mass i thought i would try something completely out of the box.
30 mins before bed i drank a 50gms dextrose 10gm glut 5gm cre drink to trigger a insulin response and then a nice blood sugar crash that would knock me out cold. just before getting to bed i would have some slow release proteins and off to dream of jessica simpson i went. did this for a couple weeks, helped alot with muscle volume and i had a great 2 weeks of training while re-programing my sleep patterns.
as for the once every 5 day over eating past 5pm, think thyroid function. i eat all day, low GI meals (now even pw…but thats for another thread) and i need to kick start my thyroid to keep it from down regulating. over a 28 day cycle, i will be leaner and train better by using this pattern as my thyroid will function more efficently the other 4 1/2 days becuase of the litle kick start i give it. also, mentally its easier to eat cleaner the rest of the days as i have either just had a cheat session or about to.
i should comment on the CT article on t-mag. loved it! pretty close to how i am eating now, i still use berardi’s system and it has worked great, and i agree 100% with making sure your carbs dont get too low. 40/30/30 over the whole day (with changing the ratio at each meal) is still a good system/goal to start with.
“the body doesnt read text books” I couldn’t agree more - and not just diet but also with regard to training.
I agree with what you say about the Cal-in vs Cal-out argument to a certain degree - true.
Perhaps it’s too simplistic to be taken as Gospel - but it should not be forgotten is probably the one overall pricinple that need to be observed (I think I might publish those ‘The No23 Principles’ … or has that been done before? )
I used to count every cal like you, [probably becuase of you - now that I think of it ] - and I do watch it still - but more in an overall sense.
I’ve a few thoughts you might comment on …
I’ve started to consider that each of us has a basic calorie time frame.
This is based on a number of factors including GI sensitivity, training load, training type etc.
What I mean is that we have a time frame in which the Cal-in vs Cal-out formula works - it is not just 24 hrs which is the traditional sense.
I can’t expand on it in a very enlightening sense - other than a conviction that based on training for example you could go lo-carb for shorter periods depending on load variables
or you could increase calories over a longer periods without worrying about bodyfat - this of course is closely linked to Carb GI rating.
I also think that carb content and protein content should vary alot more based on rep counts and TUT.
While TUT is old school to many I still feel it has a vital role for determining cal intake pwo and ppwo (Post-post workout).
Who said 2 scoops of Surge PWO is the correct protocol for everyone?
I also feel Hi-GI carbs have been tried (and do work) but perhaps we need to look closer at Lo-GI intake combined with BCAAs over a braoder period preWO and PWO?
Do we need Hi-GI? - Even protein itself will elicit an insulin response.
(hersay - lo-carb PWO!!!) - But I see that’s what you’re doing.
I haven’t researched it but I do think form a pure health point of view lo-GI carbs
These are just things I am thinking/thru and working on myself.
I used also think protein was the basis of all meals but I now consider both proetin and fat as the 2 key elements in meals - but not from a calorific point of view but more from a health consdieration.
Carbs will generally take care of themselves once you’re eating clean.
While I agree with CT too to a degree - it is funny I feel the diet question all comes almost full circle again to more or less the Zone.
However I do think that at times CT can push the Carb intake quite low, too low sometimes for athletes - but of course his main ‘market’ is BB, for athleets a wider range or greater emphasis must be put on carbs.
One other point:
I think that the key to fat loss lies in understnding each individual bodies reactions to exercise, food and the overall well-being of the person.
I do not think enough energy or time is spent by people trying to loose weight on diagnosing their actual body health/status.
Far too often peoeple are attempting to lose weight and are fighting illnesses such as IBS, CFS etc. and are putting this down to a poor exercise regime or diet.
JB once said ‘the first stop on any program - diet or exercise is the clients health’ and those words are very true.
The after 5pm refeed - would earlier not ensure less calorie overflow?
(I know this is where JB and LL disagree early vs late carbs)
Would Earlier refeed not ensure the overflow would be used true daily activity or is it a practical consideration and the crash pre-low-intensity training?
I had a guy/athlete come to me and say he wanted to lose weight fast for the season (doesn’t matter what sport really) - and he had printed out the The T-mag Velocity Diet and he was ‘doing’ this.
Now here we go -
I had a serious time debating with this guy - but he said look the basic facts are I can drop 16 pounds in 4 weeks.
Now - I don’t like very low-carb diets for athletes and I think don’t the V Diet was a success.
Any Low-Carb diet will involve the loss of weight straight away with water loss. Lets say about 4 or 6 pounds for a 200lb guy? Certainly 4 lbs.
Any idiot should be able to drop 2lbs a week on a sensible diet and increased activity plan? Should they not?
So after 4 weeks of sensible dieting and increased energy expenditure (i.e. good training!!!) you should be able to drop 8 lbs. Include the 6 lbs or so from the water weight and the only extra weight loss was 4 lbs
16 - (8 + 4) = 4
4 freaking pounds!!!
And that’s assuming only a 4 lbs lost on water weight.
… or if we go for 6 water weight pounds thats only 2 lbs more
… only 2 Pounds of fat
2lbs extra
That’s not enough of a difference for 4 weeks of ‘torture’ and Biotest supps IMO to label the Velocity Diet even a ‘diet’ and certainly not a success either.
And we have no way of deciding on whether that is actually LBM or fat - even the most stringest of V-diet believers would have to agree that there was some LBM loss? No?
That’s not taking into account that by the end of the 1st week the athlete can’t even get the energy together to rack the bar let alone do the extra squat, the adrenals are kacked up on every stimulanat (tyrosine etc.) to get energy together and the day job is being sleep walked through.
That’s not even mentioning the dangers of high acidity and gout.
I think the No-Carb diets are dangerous for athletes
Why is it that cookie cutter weight programs are decried yet individual diet approaches aren’t as closely examined. Yes there are certain principles that work but IMHO you gotta figure out what works for you…it may be quite different to what you expect :eek:
I agree as well… I increased my protien intake to about 1.5ish g per lbs of body fat and only so realy leaning and tone in my legs and arms a and my mid section never changed. But i talke to my nutirtion coach and she told me the extra is being stored and isnt really helpping me much and to cut back to about 150 total grams and eat dark color leafy vegis… fruits. try to get most of my carbs from vegis and fruits. and load complex carbs after a intense cardio workout. So far this is working alot better. everyones bodys different and if you use the same basic principles, just tweak them a little bit to make them work for you body everything will set in place
Milk and bananas yes, but oranges are low glycemic. Since I like to get as many nutrients as I can I do keep fruits in my diet but I always stick with the lower glycemic ones, and usually only in the mornings.
Cycling your carbs is great. I get a phenomenal hormone response from carbing up post workout and throughout the day, on high intensity days. With a much smaller amount of simple carbs only post workout on tempo days. The amount depends on my volume and intensity of workout. I was a football player and I lost 40lbs and 9% bodyfat without losing any strength ,and of course gained speed from an increase in relative strength, incorporating this cycled type diet into my program.
I read this whole thread, very interesting. Nobody hinted to caffiene or coffee in terms of fat loss. A few people have recommended the use of coffee/caffiene when trying to lose weight, what are people’s thoughts regarding that? The one thing that pouts me off, is that if you wanted to supplemnet caffiene before racing, you get less of a benefit as your body obviously adapts to it.
im going over this thread rehashing it and i feel like shit on low carbs, although i do load up every 5 days like mentioned. Man im finding that im really carbs sensitive.
im trying to understand cycling the carbs for athletes i get the feeling im missing something i keep my carbs low and eat every 5 days i eat fruits like half a banana a few oranges, and strawberries being the only ones which i eat with my cottage cheese. I rarely drink milk i prob drank it once in 3 months so far.
] - and I do watch it still - but more in an overall sense.