How does this look for fat loss?

[wuddamove]

Hey I'm trying to start a new diet plan, trying to lose as much fat as possible. I tend to work harder when I see quick results, so thats what Im hoping for. Not too experienced, so I'd like some advice as to how this looks. Thanks guys


On top of this, I'll be lifting 4 days a week, with cario and ab workouts on my off days.


Meal 1 - 10:30am - 2 eggs, cucumber, milk
meal 2 - 1:30pm - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 3 - 4:00pm - turkey or tuna sandwich (white bread), cucumber or something
meal 4 - 6:30pm - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 5 - 9pm - chicken breast with a salad (light vinegrette dressing) or some corn/peas etc.

Will I get good results with that?
Any suggestions?
thank you!

I goto bed at like 2-3am, thats why I eat dinner late.

[bigdamray]

Originally Posted by wuddamove

Hey I'm trying to start a new diet plan, trying to lose as much fat as possible. I tend to work harder when I see quick results, so thats what Im hoping for. Not too experienced, so I'd like some advice as to how this looks. Thanks guys


On top of this, I'll be lifting 4 days a week, with cario and ab workouts on my off days.


Meal 1 - 2 eggs, cucumber, milk
meal 2 - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 3 - turkey or tuna sandwich (white bread), cucumber or something
meal 4 - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 5 - chicken breast with a salad (light vinegrette dressing) or some corn/peas etc.

Will I get good results with that?
Any suggestions?
thank you!

What is your height, weight, bf%, age, metabolism type, what does a typical eating day look like for you?

[wuddamove]

Right now I only eat twice a day because I get up late. I eat a sandwich at 2pm with some veggies or something, then I eat chicken or something with fries or a salad for dinner. I also tend to eat at night, I'll have a big bowl of cereal or another sandwich after 1am.

I'm 5'8 155lbs, not sure my BF% but it's probably fairly high. I've never worked out before, so I'm not muscular, most is fat.

[andrew_plamondon]

Ditch the granola. Many cals for such a low volume. You could get kashi golean crunch instead if you REALLY want too, they have more fiber, protein and you get less cals while being able to eat more.

[wuddamove]

Originally Posted by andrew_plamondon

Ditch the granola. Many cals for such a low volume. You could get kashi golean crunch instead if you REALLY want too, they have more fiber, protein and you get less cals while being able to eat more.

It's only like 200 cals per 1/2 cup.. also it's not a must, I just dont know what to put in those meals.. I thought you're just supposed to have a lil 200-300 cal meal in between to keep your system running.

[strawberryriddick]

Originally Posted by wuddamove

Hey I'm trying to start a new diet plan, trying to lose as much fat as possible. I tend to work harder when I see quick results, so thats what Im hoping for.

Dear me, that's what causes the weight gain post-diet.

You want to pick a diet you can stick with. If you could hypothetically eat this for the rest of your life and have it provide enough calories and nutrients, then it's a good diet. If you're just cutting many calories to drop weight as fast as possible, it's a "starvation diet." Once you get off of it (and you'll have to, because you're starving your body), you'll eat normally or even a little less than normally...but because you've convinced your body that food is few and far between via your starvation diet, you'll pack on fat as a defense mechanism.

Aside from a lack of calories, I'm seeing a significant lack of variety. Not only will this get boring, but you're depriving yourself of nutrition.

Your Diet
Meal 1 - 2 eggs, cucumber, milk
meal 2 - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 3 - turkey or tuna sandwich (white bread), cucumber or something
meal 4 - 1/2 cup granola, milk
meal 5 - chicken breast with a salad (light vinegrette dressing) or some corn/peas etc.


My Suggestion
Meal 1: 4 egg whites with spinach, tomatoes, mushrooms, olives. 16oz nonfat milk, or 8oz nonfat milk with a seving of oatmeal.
Meal 2: 1-2 fruits with 10oz nonfat, no-sugar-added yogurt.
Meal 3: Large spinach salad with grilled tuna or chicken, 1 whole tomato, 1 carrot, 1/2 cucumber. Balsamic vinegar (not vinegarette) for dressing.
Meal 4: 2-3 cups raw broccoli, carrots, and/or other veggies, 4oz hummus for dipping.
Meal 5: Grilled fish or chicken, 1/2 cup whole wheat cous cous, 1-2 cups steamed veggies (get a frozen veggie medley, that way it lasts longer, is easier to cook, and gives you more variety than just "corn/peas")

Depending on how you season meals 3 and 5, you can come up with a lot of stuff. For example, marinate some tuna steaks in lime, cumin, pepper, red pepper, and cilantro, then grill it and slice it. Replace the cous cous with corn tortillas (better for you than flour tortillas), and have a cup of rice + beans + veggie medley instead of the 1-2 cups steamed veggies...now you have yourself a delicious, Tex-Mex style meal.


P.S. It's been proven that if you MUST choose one or the other, choose exercise over diet to help manage weight and bodyfat. What are you doing to exercise?

[sassy69]

It may be that you want to see results really fast, but most people didnt' gain 20 lb of fat in 2 weeks - your body just doesn't work like that. And equivalently you can't expect to drop 20 lb in 2 weeks. Your body just doens't work like that.

First myth of dieting to be blown up - you need to EAT to LOSE. (I.e. starvation diets don't work, in fact they make your body think you are in starvation situation like a drought, so it slows down metabolism in order to store as much fat as possible in preparation for the limitation of food input that it is experiencing. This is a basic survival function of your body. It doens't work to try to cheat it.)

Second rule - You don't just want to "lose fat" or worse yet just "lose weight". You are really interested in changing your body composition - i.e. bodyfat to lean muscle mass ratio. So many people are so caught up in "I have to lose fat" but they forget that they also need to at least maintain or better, increase muscle mass. This could make the scale flunctuate, go up or not move - but sincet the scale only tells you the sum total of your bone, bodyfat, muscle mass and water weights, it is an incredibly crappy way to determine "progress". Your water weight can fluctuate up to 10 lb based on what you ate, stress, all sorts of things. Bodyfat & muscle mass work together to "look" a certain way. For ex, distance runners are an extreme example of the contradiction that they look lean, but can actually have higher bodyfat ratio, not because they are fat, but rather that they don't have much muscle. (Distance / endurance training can work to consume fat AND muscle.. just the nature of the demand on your body.) Anorexics are another example of the result of the idea of starvation as a "weight loss strategy" - it consumes both muscle & and fat so they can actually have a higher bodyfat ratio than you'd really expect. Its not from the fat, its from the lack of muscle.

Third rule - Best results come from consistency, not from extreme changes in your program. I.e. a short term starvation diet may get you to "lose weight" for a while, but it simply is not a healthy maintenance state, it is usually very hard to maintain for any extended period of time just because it depletes your energy so much. Then if you do survive the starvation diet and go back to "normal" eating, it all comes back. The point is to find a diet that fits your lifestyle so its more just like "how you eat" vs a "diet".

To check any diet you are considering, use a food counts program like FitDay - Free Weight Loss and Diet Journal to know what you are REALLY eating. I.e. when you put together the diet in the first post, what did you base it on? Do you have any idea how many cals or protein / fat / carbs it has? Does it meet your energy goals for the activities you are planning to do? Or does it just look like a good combination for a diet? Better to know what you are really eating and determine if its sufficient. Most people over eat / under eat dramatically because their portions are not right or they are eyeballing what they think is a "good diet".

And lastly if you are new to training, what is your plan there? If you are all of a sudden, very active and your diet doesn't support it, you'll be catabolizing your muscles. You'll be exhausted and sore and it just won't be any fun and you'll be like 'I"m training & dieting but I don't see results". Cuz your training & your diet aren't working together for the same goal..

To help give some context to the hows & whys of nutrition & training, it can be very confusing to go thru the question & answer process on a discussion board. I HIGHLY recommend this book:

Bill Philips' BODY FOR LIFE

Its usually pretty cheap at the book store or Amazon and well worth it.

Its been around awhile, its primarily a marketing tool for Bill Philips' EAS product line, BUT it does a fantastic, very readable and very succinct presentation of nutrition & training approaches that are very much the foundation of most every fitness strategy out there.

It provides a fantastic and very flexible outline of foods to choose that fit the general diet so it is much more doable in 'real life' than a limited food plan that you have to eat every day for the next 3 months.

[wuddamove]

That's starving myself? It's like 400 cals per meal. Way more than I eat now. Right now I get up late, so I eat lunch and dinner. This is adding basically 3 more meals. Also, I dont have the time to make those meals you're suggesting every single day. Some people have lives and cant revolve their entire schedule around diet and bodybuilding. I'm trying to find simple things that can be eaten quickly.

[wuddamove]

This is my workout.. someone made it for me.

You will do at least 3 exercises for every major muscle group. Each exercise will include 4 sets. For each set you will gradually increase the weight and thus lower the reps. The first set will be 12 reps, second set 10 reps, third set 8 reps, fourth set 6 reps.



Example: dumbbell bench press. First set 50lbs 12 times. Second set 60lbs 10 times. Third set 70lbs 8 times. Fourth set 80lbs 6 times.



Sunday: Chest

You want to switch off using your dumbbells and your barbell (bench) to keep your muscles guessing. It looks like you can only do incline and flat presses on your bench while you should be able to do all three incline flat and decline presses with dumbbells. So here are a few potential workouts:

1.)

· Bench Press

· Incline Press

· Dumbbell Flys

2.)

· Dumbbell Bench Press

· Decline Dumbbell Press

· Incline Dumbell Flys

3.)

· Bench Press

· Dumbbell Incline Press

· Decline Dumbell Flys



Also, some chest press and two fly exercises, for example: bench press, dumbbell flys, incline dumbbell flys etc.



Mix and match these workouts



Monday: abs/cardio


Various ab workouts: situps, crunches, leglifts doing situps on that decline bench with a weight on your chest etc.



Tuesday: Back

Like with chest, you’ll want to switch off using dumbbells and your barbell (bench bar) on these. The other thing that sucks with your setup is it will be really hard to hit your lats with no lat pulldown machines etc.

1.)

· Dumbbell Rows

· Barbell rows

· Reverse grip barbell rows

· Dumbbell lat pullovers (do extra sets of these since its really the only lat workout you can do with your setup).



Wednesday: abs/cardio



Thursday: biceps/triceps

This will be your longest workout of the week since you need to try and do three workouts for both muscle groups.

1.)

· Dumbbell Curls

· Barbell Curls

· Seated Dumbbell Curls

· Dumbbell Seated tricep extensions (behind the head)

· Dumbbell tricep extensions laying down

· Barbell tricep extensions laying down (aka ‘skull crushers’)



Other workouts you can mix in:

· Barbell curls with your back and elbows against a wall

· Seated tricep extensions behind the head with two hands on the dumbbell

· Seated tricep extensions behind the head with a barbell

· Preacher curls on the decline bench or behind the incline bench

· Concentration Curls (seated, one arm with elbow against the knee)

· ‘The Roman Press’ basically a dumbbell, laying down, tricep extension with the dumbbell coming down toward your chest instead of your shoulder.



Friday: shoulders

1.)

* Dumbbell military press
* Dumbbell Front raises
* Dumbbell Side lateral raises
* Dumbbell reverse flys
* Dumbbell Shrugs



Other workouts you can mix in:



· Dumbbell ‘Arnold Press’

· Barbell military press

· Barbell front raise

· Barbell upright row

· Dumbbell upright row

· Barbell shrugs in front of you and behind your back



Saturday: abs/cardio

[wuddamove]

As for these huge meals you guys are suggesting.. there's no way I can do that. I cant eat 4 eggs in the morning, I'm lucky to even eat 2. I feel sick eating in the morning. I'm just trying to take what I normally eat and split it into 5 meals. I'm not a huge bodybuidler and Ive been eating twice a day for years. I cant eat 5 gigantic meals a day. It's not possible. Nor can I spend 5 hours a day cooking. I can barely spend 25min cooking. So please, if you're going to suggest something, make it something that is actually possible without spending 5 hours a day making. As for my meal plan up there, someone gave me the ideas. I was told granola is a good snack to get some calories in and keep things flowing. I dont hvae time to make food 5 times. I need something that you can grab and go.

[sassy69]

I think we all run into the time crunch on food prep - but what works well is to spend a little bit of time thinking about what your meal plan is and the best way to pack it. A couple days / week I grill or bake a bunch of chicken & steak & cook my sweet potatos & rice for 2-3 days. Then I spend maybe 15-20 min / night packing food and I"m ready to go in the moring.

Its not worth trying to "out busy" anyone on this board for how much time you have available to make food -- consider single working moms w/ 3 kids. I used to carry food for the whole day, from 5 am until 10 pm when I got home. I shovel down my food between meetings or work. Its all about spending a little time planning ahead & figuring out what works best for you. For me I have a medium size soft-side cooler and a bunch of tupperware & an ice pack. I'm set for the day. I keep a stash of oatmeal & almonds at my desk in case I get caught w/ no time or no food.

Some other things to note - you're making a change to how you currently eat. Your body reflects your diet so if you're saying you have high bodyfat and you've never worked before, well, that's just your body doing the best it can w/ what you give it to work with. I'm not slamming, I"m just saying your body can only do what it's designed to do, so its silly to expect it to do anything else - so give it the right things if you want to get to where you want to go. In your case it may take a few weeks of adjusting to more meals and a different schedule of eating & prep. No one is tryign to make impossible for you - its up to you to find the best way to do it that fits in your schedule.

That's why I recommended Bill Philips' BODY FOR LIFE book - it gives guidelines and a lot of suggestions to work within that. If you don't like one of the suggestions here, then you can figure it out for yourself w/in the resources you have available.

And as I said - the time thing -- if you want the results, you'll figure out a way to do it. Use that food counts program, FitDay - Free Weight Loss and Diet Journal - to figure out meals that really aren't that huge - min end up around 250 - 400 cals, depending. But for you, set the goal meal plan for a few weeks away and work on getting up to 5-6 meals / day. Any sudden changes and big increases in diet can make your body feel a little whacked out... so ease into it.

[Beverly McD.]

Originally Posted by wuddamove

That's starving myself? It's like 400 cals per meal. Way more than I eat now. Right now I get up late, so I eat lunch and dinner. This is adding basically 3 more meals. Also, I dont have the time to make those meals you're suggesting every single day. Some people have lives and cant revolve their entire schedule around diet and bodybuilding. I'm trying to find simple things that can be eaten quickly.

Look at it this way wuddamove, we all have the same amount of hours in each day. We find the time to do the things that are most important to us. You could pay top dollar, but you won't find better advice than what Sassy is giving you.

[xrsist]

what is it you do that you have no time to prep/cook meals when you are going to bed at 3am and not getting up till lunch time?

[strawberryriddick]

Originally Posted by wuddamove

That's starving myself? It's like 400 cals per meal. Way more than I eat now. Right now I get up late, so I eat lunch and dinner. This is adding basically 3 more meals. Also, I dont have the time to make those meals you're suggesting every single day. Some people have lives and cant revolve their entire schedule around diet and bodybuilding. I'm trying to find simple things that can be eaten quickly.

Especially considering the rather small group of nutrients you're eating, as well as the fact you'll be starting a weight-lifting routine, yes, this is most certainly a starvation diet

I dont have the time to make those meals...Some people have lives and cant revolve their entire schedule around diet and bodybuilding.

No one's asking you to. I'm not sure what you think people on this board do, but bodybuilding in and of itself doesn't pay the bills (unless you have a ton of endorsements and photo shoots, in which case that's still a job outside of being in the gym all the time). The key isn't to devote your life to bodybuilding, but to do some time management. If I was able to go to college full time, put in 21 hours of overtime at work, hit the gym and hit the pavement, spend time with family and friends and still make my meals, I think anyone can do so. The key isn't slaving over a hot stove, but cheating with time savers.

1. Instead of sticking one serving of chicken breast in the oven, put five or six. It takes approximately the same time (a little longer, but not six times as long), and you can freeze these for later in the week. You can do the same with any other meat, and also prepared dishes. Season them differently (each one, half and half, whatever) so you get a different flavor.

This works just great with eggs. Instead of grabbing a few to hardboil, do all 18 in the egg carton. This way, you always have them on-hand for breakfast or a protein-pumped snack.

2. Depending on what kind of job you have, bring some stuff to work. My previous and current jobs had a fridge available to all the employees. I brought veggies, hummus, fruit, and my frozen cooked meats to put in the fridge, and kept oatmeal, natural PB, and sweet potatoes at my desk. This way, I was able to have a full-course meal while at work...and when I was lifting like mad, believe you me, I needed it!

Another time-saver is to purchase some whole-wheat pita bread and tuna packets. Take the spinach and tomatoes out of the fridge at work, then stuff 'em in the pita pockets with the tuna.

When you use the fridge at work (or a cooler in your vehicle if you work in an area without a fridge), you'd be surprised what you can make with a little ingenuity. I made my co-workers jealous when I made this at the sink:



3. Simmer while you work. If you'll be out of the house all day, wake up a 15 minutes earlier than normal and setup your crock pot. When you get home at night, turn it off, have dinner, then freeze individual portions for leftovers. Or, if you're doing chores like laundry, make yourself a marinara to go with pretty much anything you want to have an Italian flavor.

[JayC]

Alot of good advice so far.. my 0.02 cents would be, keep it simple!! Approx what your burning each day for your body type/activity level. Then track your (intake) cal's so your at a 500-900 cal a day deficit. Fine tune your macro's (protein/carbs/fat) to what you want to acheive/goals, etc.. You can get more complicated as you master that portion. If you really want kick start, deplete carbs for 2 weeks (50grams a day or less) making up the difference in protein and some fats. then you can slowly ease the carbs back in. I've never had a novice fail when following the above.