How to lose 8kg

BraziliaNZ

Hi. Been training pretty hard for the past couple of months and while I'm seeing good strength improvements, aesthetically it's not quite what I want as I still don't seem to be shaking the spare tyre, albeit not that huge anyway.
I'm 5'11'' and 90kg, but I used to be 82kg a few years ago and could lift as heavy, or even heavier than now. I try and keep a good diet but haven't been that focused on it, but am determined to stay on track now.
Here's what I ate yesterday, and will eat today and in future.

0830 - Bowl Porridge made with water with a few spoons of lo-cal yoghurt for flavour

1130 - Banana

1330 - 185g Can of tuna in oil wrapped in wholemeal Pitta with some tabouli and a little hummus

1530 - 40g mixed raw nuts

1930 - chicken fillet stir fried with vegetables with maybe teriyaki or hot sauce

I do hard cardio 2/3 times a week for 40 mins, and weight train 3 times a week.

Should I lose fat on this diet? I haven't been eating much more than this anyway at all so I can't figure out how I'm 90kg. Surely it's not the one pitta bread I eat? I don't mind if I lose a little strength as long as I can shake the lard.
Thanks for your help in advance.

Al_Fernz

It's not because of the one pitta you eat.

How much does your diet usually vary from this? Do you binge drink regularly and do you regularly have cheat meals? Also, how intense are your training sessions?

Without knowing your portion sizes - I would guess that following the above diet would cause you to loose weight. However, it appears quite drastic in the sense that the cals are too low and you will probably lose a greater proportion of muscle mass than you wish.

A banana is not a snack. IMO more protein, more healthy fats and leafy green veg. Also I would recommend taking fish oil supps and drinking green tea for fat loss.

I hope this helps.

Size=everything

I'm currently on a high fat high protein zero carbs diet and have noticed amazing weightloss I lost 6kg the first week prob jus water from no carbs but since then ive had a steady loss of 2kg a week been on it 3 weeks now

Colm_OReilly

Perhaps you've stalled on your current routine.

How long have you been doing it? What are the lifts/weights/reps/sets? What's the hard cardio you're doing?

How old are you? Your metabolism could be beginning to slow as well.

Lothaar

Size=everything wrote: »

I'm currently on a high fat high protein zero carbs diet and have noticed amazing weightloss I lost 6kg the first week prob jus water from no carbs but since then ive had a steady loss of 2kg a week been on it 3 weeks now

My wife had exactly the same results using a low-carb diet, which basically involved her having porridge for brekkie and then getting the rest of her carbs from fibrous green veg and a bit of fruit. Lots of protein too. And she switched to slimline milk as opposed to full-fat (way less calories).

Top it off with a bit of exercise and she had the same results as above... without having to drop carbs from her diet altogether.

She also had a couple of cheat meals a week and one meal at the weekend where she ate spuds/bread/pasta/rice with her dinner. She drank a bit of wine every week too.

She lost 8kg in 2.5 months.

'Course, I ended up losing a fvckload of weight too cos we eat the same stuff. I saw a photo of me from just at the end of her diet and I looked really thin - too thin. I was at 8% bf, but with not nearly enough muscle to carry it off. Thankfully I Christmas followed closely and extra helpings of pudding reversed the process!

celestial

Hey OP you sound exactly like me - I actually think my issue is that I prob under-eat during the week - your diet mirrors mine, while having maybe too much junk the day after a night out, plus drinking each week. I also have a tendency to rely on carbs a bit too much. I think that the answer is probably eating more, but more of the right stuff - more protein, less carbs. I find that after I eat protein I am full for ages, for example a tin of tuna will have me full for hours, whereas a bread and ham sandwich will have me hungry ten minutes later, literally. I would say that your diet is only just 2000 calories, which for your weight sound quite low. I'm 83kg and my maintenance cals is approx 2800, meaning to lose fat I should be taking in 2400kcals or so, but as I said I'm prob only managing approx 2000-2200kcals during an average day.

Have def lost fat over the past 9 months but feel it has just stalled over the past while so I'm thinking I'm gonna need to focus on diet more and I plan to add more protein and cut out bread, cutting down a lot on other starchy carbs too.

BraziliaNZ

Well I really don't cheat much, at the weekends maybe my flatmates would cook something big and not that healthy and I would join them for dinner, or sometimes I'd have a few beers and then get some rubbish food on the way home, but that's what I'm trying to cut out now. I drink beers on Fri and Sat, I'm not willing to cut this out as I probably drank even more when I weighed less, I just don't think I ate as much.

Ok my current routine is as follows
Monday is back and triceps - pull ups, barbell rowing, cable rowing, machine rows, tricep extensions, and tricep pulldowns

wed squats - last time I did it this way - 8 x 60, 8 x 100, 6 x 110, 6 x 120, 6 x 110, 8 x 100, 8 x 80, and shoulders - dumbell presses, lateral raises, bent over lateral raises

fri chest - flat bench last time was 8 x 60, 6 x 80, 6 x 85, 6 x 90, 6 x 80
then I do incline dumbs with 30s, and dips
also do curls on fri, can curl about 40kg x 8 a few sets

cardio is 40 mins on cross-trainer, doing 2 mins really fast, 2 mins leisurely, it sweats the jasus out of me everything is soaked after so I can't see how I can make it harder

This answer your questions? Thanks all

Edit: Oh yeah, I'm 27 years old

celestial

BraziliaNZ wrote: »

Well I really don't cheat much, at the weekends maybe my flatmates would cook something big and not that healthy and I would join them for dinner, or sometimes I'd have a few beers and then get some rubbish food on the way home, but that's what I'm trying to cut out now. I drink beers on Fri and Sat, I'm not willing to cut this out as I probably drank even more when I weighed less, I just don't think I ate as much.

Ok my current routine is as follows
Monday is back and triceps - pull ups, barbell rowing, cable rowing, machine rows, tricep extensions, and tricep pulldowns

wed squats - last time I did it this way - 8 x 60, 8 x 100, 6 x 110, 6 x 120, 6 x 110, 8 x 100, 8 x 80, and shoulders - dumbell presses, lateral raises, bent over lateral raises

fri chest - flat bench last time was 8 x 60, 6 x 80, 6 x 85, 6 x 90, 6 x 80
then I do incline dumbs with 30s, and dips
also do curls on fri, can curl about 40kg x 8 a few sets

cardio is 40 mins on cross-trainer, doing 2 mins really fast, 2 mins leisurely, it sweats the jasus out of me everything is soaked after so I can't see how I can make it harder

This answer your questions? Thanks all

Edit: Oh yeah, I'm 27 years old

Yeah you sound just like me, I'm 27 too, would have same drinking habits except I drink just once a month, but would have the junk along with it just like you- I think that once your training is sorted you need to get real specific on diet, and I think that's what you (and I) gotta do now.

*I'd be interested to hear what g'em thinks bout our situation too. My feeling anyway is that if the flab doesn't appear to be moving much it's diet that needs to come under scrutiny. Plus it slows down the more you lose so gotta be patient.

BraziliaNZ

I really don't eat junk each time I drink, just the odd time, like once a fortnight I might have a slice of pizza or some wedges or something when down the pub, so I can't see that being the issue... It's finished now though! I'm going to strictly stick to the food outlined above for a few weeks and see what happens, maybe add in some fish oil or something. I drink green tea at work, usually about 4 cups a day.

Al_Fernz

IMO based on the training, diet and lifestyle information provided by yourself I would hazard a guess that the reason for your inability to lose this fat is that you aren't eating enough during the day. This is seriously hampering your metabolism. This cyle of undereating is compounded by 2 nights of drinking, which in turn leads to fat gain.

Your training looks OK - Lifting heavy compounds is definitely the way to go.

Potential solutions:

1- Add significant source of protein in your first two meals of the day - eggs, chicken, whey shake, fish, beef - getcreative.
2- Have a look at how much water you consume - not sure what your situation with this.
3- Reduce stress - not sure what your situation is here.
4- Limit alcohol intake to 10 units a week.

I would give this a shot for 8 weeks and see how you fare.