Advice for last phase of weight loss

gizmo

So, as the subject suggests, I'm looking for advice on the last phase of weight loss which is proving to be trickier than I imagined. Bit of background, I'm a 5'10" male who, over the last two years, has gone from 116kg to 83kg, toned and upped my strength a bit along the way and completely cleaned up my diet. My rough goals in terms of scales is 80kg, strength wise is the usual 2x/1.5x/2.5x for the main 5x5 exercises (longer term, obviously) and in the mirror just something I'm happy with. It's been a long process but I've been delighted with my progress thus far.

The last phase, as I call it, is losing the last 10lbs or at least whatever equates to the remaining flabbiness I have as I continue towards my strength goals. This is what I'm having trouble shedding and I assume it's down to my diet. For the past couple of months I've been aiming at 1800kcals per week and unfortunately seeing very little in the way of progress, at times even seeing the scale go the other way or completely stalling.

With the summer and a bunch of weddings coming up, I'd like to get my game plan in place for the coming months so I have something to concentrate on. My aim is to loose around 1lb or so per week while continuing with my regular training. Sticking to things isn't really a problem any more so I thought I'd ask you guys whether my numbers make sense, especially my calorie intake and goals in general, so I can really nail things down.

Here's a sample diet...

10am - Breakfast
40g oats w/ 5g ground flax seed & 200ml almond milk

1pm - Lunch
Varies between...
- Chicken breast w/ lettuce, half bell pepper, carrot, spring onion
- Leftovers e.g. Half portion of dinner with 30g brown basmati rice
Accompanied by an apple and two Banana Oat Protein Muffins

4pm - Snack
Either...
200g Pineapple or Banana w/ 125g pot of natural yogurt
Homemade protein bar from this forum.

7pm - Dinner
Generally either Chilli Con Carne, Chicken, Sweet Pototo & Coconut Curry or Turkey Casserole (minus the chorizo)
White fish with light, plum tomato and herb-based dressing.
Various Chicken or Rump steak strip stir fries in homemade, chilli/garlic/ginger & soy/oyster/ sauce-based sauces
Carb sides are generally either 60g brown basmati rice, 250g Sweet Potato with Spinach or a nest of egg noodles
Veg sides are asparagus, tenderstem broccoli, carrots, corn on the cob or bell pepper/mangeout/beansprout stir-fries.

9pm - Snack
Either...
MP Protein Dessert
125g raspberries & Protein Powder Fluff
Apple with 2tbsp peanut butter

I hit the gym three times a week doing a combination of 5x5, crossfit-style work and finishing with some low intensity cardio on an incline over the course of ~60mins.

On those gym days I'd add in a protein shake when I get home before breakfast.

Water intake is around 3 liters per day, more on the gym days.

The rest of the day involves sitting in front of a computer for long hours and to be honest, not getting as much sleep as I should, generally averaging around six hours.

Booze wise, these days I stick to vodka and diet coke and only do so every second weekend or so. When I do it's not to what one would call excess and I always taken the calorie intake into consideration. By some miracle I also manage to avoid any kind of fast food afterwards so that's a plus too.

uberalex

I guess the best route might be to look at the TDEE calculator like the one here: http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/

1800 is probably not far off your BMR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_metabolic_rate) for your current weight.

I think you might want to get a handle on your body fat % (which is very hard to get an accurate reading for, but can still be illustrative) to try and work out how much of your current weight is lean (26.25 BMI probably means you have some fat, but it varies a lot).

I have found that paradoxically an increase in calories can sometimes kickstart the metabolism after a long weight loss, so can a reduction. 250 calories can do it. The other question is levels of salt / carbs and sleep. If you're not sleeping enough and/or eating added salt, you could well have a bunch of water weight carried too. That can make up a pound or two at least. Weight training can also cause this.
http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/weight-loss/in-depth/weight-loss-plateau/art-20044615

It's a shark-infested web out there for sources. I'm constantly having to check and re-check the authors for any 'advice'. Take this reply with a pinch of salt too

gizmo

uberalex wrote: »

I guess the best route might be to look at the TDEE calculator like the one here: http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/

1800 is probably not far off your BMR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_metabolic_rate) for your current weight.

Well I've used the calculator here, the one on MFP and the general rule of thumb (bodyweight in lb x 12) used by some folk around here. Each gave different results obviously, the MFP being way off as confirmed by others in previous threads so just looking for something approaching consensus on what my target should be.

uberalex wrote: »

I think you might want to get a handle on your body fat % (which is very hard to get an accurate reading for, but can still be illustrative) to try and work out how much of your current weight is lean (26.25 BMI probably means you have some fat, but it varies a lot).

Agreed. Last summer I got a personal trainer to re-evaluate my workout routine and while I got a lot of good from the sessions, I was also dismayed at his use of a digital scales to keep track of body fat. I've since gotten a callipers myself so I'm going to hopefully use that to keep track of progress once I'm comfortable that I'm getting the correct readings from it.

uberalex wrote: »

I have found that paradoxically an increase in calories can sometimes kickstart the metabolism after a long weight loss, so can a reduction. 250 calories can do it. The other question is levels of salt / carbs and sleep. If you're not sleeping enough and/or eating added salt, you could well have a bunch of water weight carried too. That can make up a pound or two at least. Weight training can also cause this.
http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/weight-loss/in-depth/weight-loss-plateau/art-20044615

I'm not too worried about carbs since most of my sources seem quite good. I've cut out bread outside of the odd twin slice of homemade brown bread at the weekends with some scambled egg in place of the weekly porridge, I don't eat pasta anymore and the rice that I eat is always brown basmati. The egg noodles are probably the worst source I guess?

Salt is a different issue as I'm not so used to keeping track of it. That being said, my above diet should be a good indicator of intake so it should be enough to flag anything that needs to be changed.

On a related note I should probably point out I've not kept track of my macros intake to date as I've been mainly just trying to shed the large amount of excess weight I had. At the levels I'm at now though, I imagine it'll become more important.

silverharp

Im a bit suspect of fat or BMI calcs. as they can be unreliable, might be better to just rely on weight and waste line. Your food looks fine you might just have to up your exercise routine. If you have the 3 gym days maybe do 2 to 3 half hour workouts at home on the other days using high intensity intervals, it might just boost your metabolism

uberalex

silverharp wrote: »

Im a bit suspect of fat or BMI calcs. as they can be unreliable, might be better to just rely on weight and waste line.

Yes, no single measure is sufficient. BMI is a very rough estimator, but it is useful for categorical estimation (Obest I, II, II, OverWeight, Under-, etc). The challenge with weight and waist is that they are highly affected by weight loss (excess skin) and uneven fat redistribution (common in people who lose weight, and where hormones are an issue). You have made an excellent point though: best to take an aggregate view!

Your food looks fine you might just have to up your exercise routine. If you have the 3 gym days maybe do 2 to 3 half hour workouts at home on the other days using high intensity intervals, it might just boost your metabolism

Exercise upping, or changing routines substantially might do it very well, since it might help to jolt out of a habituated metabolism.

gizmo

silverharp wrote: »

Im a bit suspect of fat or BMI calcs. as they can be unreliable, might be better to just rely on weight and waste line. Your food looks fine you might just have to up your exercise routine. If you have the 3 gym days maybe do 2 to 3 half hour workouts at home on the other days using high intensity intervals, it might just boost your metabolism

uberalex wrote: »

Exercise upping, or changing routines substantially might do it very well, since it might help to jolt out of a habituated metabolism.

Noted guys, cheers.

As for the diet, I grabbed Transform's RevFit Macro Calculator for another point of reference and that says my target calorie level for weight loss should be around 2400kcals per week. This roughly matches up with the calculations from the sticky in the Health & Fitness forum. So I take it my current target of 1800kcals will also be getting in the way of progress?

silverharp

gizmo wrote: »

Noted guys, cheers.

As for the diet, I grabbed Transform's RevFit Macro Calculator for another point of reference and that says my target calorie level for weight loss should be around 2400kcals per week. This roughly matches up with the calculations from the sticky in the Health & Fitness forum. So I take it my current target of 1800kcals will also be getting in the way of progress?

I tend not to calorie count as you never know how your body might be undermining that approach , I am sort of at your point and in my own case got down to 82kg on a general low carb diet and moderate exercise. I had hit a wall over the last month or 2. So started looking at different things, like thyroid , liver health, sleep, nutrition etc. so had lost the last 2 kg on the back of that and upping my exercise some. So now I am stuck at 80kg so the last thing I looked at is exercise again. I was doing 3 to 4 gym sessions per week but have now tweaked that just last week by starting the Insanity program on the in between days to see if doing some form of HIIT 6 days a week will drop more weight and increase fitness.

Stench Blossoms

gizmo wrote: »

Noted guys, cheers.

As for the diet, I grabbed Transform's Hanley's RevFit Macro Calculator for another point of reference and that says my target calorie level for weight loss should be around 2400kcals per week. This roughly matches up with the calculations from the sticky in the Health & Fitness forum. So I take it my current target of 1800kcals will also be getting in the way of progress?

FYP

TimeToShine

Try some HIIT twice or three times a week in conjunction with your weights program. That coupled with a low carb diet is what got me over the last 10lb hurdle in about 2 months. Also your daily intake looks like it may be exceeding 1800 calories (with all the muffins, yoghurt, desserts etc.) but I'm open to correction on that one.

I'll add a little background because I think you and I have similar stories; I started a little over three years ago at 5'7 and 108kg, I'm sitting at roughly 74kg now and approx 13% body fat. I got a low as 10% at one stage when I was doing the keto and sprints which is why I'm recommending you try it. Also once you get your bodyfat that low it should reset your insulin sensitivity which is always a plus.

gizmo

TimeToShine wrote: »

Try some HIIT twice or three times a week in conjunction with your weights program. That coupled with a low carb diet is what got me over the last 10lb hurdle in about 2 months. Also your daily intake looks like it may be exceeding 1800 calories (with all the muffins, yoghurt, desserts etc.) but I'm open to correction on that one.

Seems like adding in some HITT is the way to go alright. Regarding lowering carbs, I guess that would be accomplished by cutting out the porridge, rice/sweet potato and oat-based muffins? There's not much else there that screams carb heavy from what I can tell?

As for the calorie intake, well the muffins (they're more bun sized to be fair) are 100kcal each, the yogurt is 124kcal and the dessert is 179kcal so they should be fine. As I said above, I'm quite concious of my intake, everything gets weighed and tracked, but it's just the target I was unsure about.

Challo

Fruit = sugar = carbs.

I'd cut out the banana/pineapple, apple/raspberries and the banana muffins first.

silverharp

Challo wrote: »

Fruit = sugar = carbs.

I'd cut out the banana/pineapple, apple/raspberries and the banana muffins first.

the only fruit I eat during the week is 1 apple a day in a green juice and a portion of blue berries in a kale shake. I'd only eat a banana at the weekend.

Dotcomdolly

I got Hanleys calculator just now but when I downloaded it to my dropbox I can't seem to edit it to put in my figures, anyone else have this issue?

doctorwhogirl

Would love a good macro calculator, where can I get it? Think I'm signed up to revfit.

Dotcomdolly

I can't get Hanleys to work...
http://www.revolutionfitness.ie/opmacrocalculator/

But I found this one
http://iifym.com/

I don't know how different they are.

Stench Blossoms

Dotcomdolly wrote: »

I can't get Hanleys to work...
http://www.revolutionfitness.ie/opmacrocalculator/

But I found this one
http://iifym.com/

I don't know how different they are.

If you want to PM your stats I'll give you the macros/cals etc for Hanley's one.

Dotcomdolly

Thanks SB, pm sent

gizmo

Small follow up on this in case anyone else was in a similar situation.

Two weeks into the new regime and things are looking great. Calorie intake was increased to 2200 which is about 500kcal under the maintenance intake outlined in the RevFit Calculator. My macros, after looking at them via the MFP Food Diary were, for want of a better word, ****ed, however. Carb intake was way too high and fat intake was way too low so that's now been balanced out, again via the figures suggested by the RevFit spreadsheet. I also started doing more HIIT work at the end of my regular session rather than just straight up incline running as per the suggestions above.

In terms of actual food intake, I began to alternate breakfasts between the usual porridge/flaxseed combo and a scrambed egg, chorizo, grated cheese and cherry tomato plate. I cut the fruit and protein muffins for daytime snacks and replaced them with the protein bar from here and a meat-based soup in the afternoon. Dinner wise I dropped the noodles, rice and sweet potatoes and started using cabbage to bulk up certain meals. I also increased my veg portions to make up for the missing carb sources. I may re-add small portions of the Sweet Potato with Spinach recipe once I'm more comfortable with the new format. After dinner snacks are now peanut butter on a spoon rather than an apple and, if I'm low on calories or fat for the day, I'll add another 30g into a protein shake with some almond milk for a thicker, more filling drink.

The result has been a little under 4lbs dropped over the course of the two weeks. A little more than I had hoped for to be honest but I imagine it'll be closer to 3 after another two weeks if I keep things the same. If needs be I can always increase calorie intake slightly to ensure loss is a little more sustainable around the 1lb per week mark I originally aimed for.

So yea, cheers for the advice folks.

Dotcomdolly

Great post Gizmo, and well done on your success. I have been trying the revfit calculator suggestions too and am really struggling with hitting my macros correctly, you've good ideas there. I have been getting pissed off becauseI am not losing even though i have beena bit under my cals each day but the macros aren't right...must try harder!

doctorwhogirl

When I lost the main chunk of my weight I really struggled to get the last vanity stone off. Like struggled for 2 or 3 years! Since I started eating more, watching macros and weight training alongside hiit and running ive managed to get it off and keep it off.... fingers crossed anyway. It really needed a change in my food habits though. When I did ww I was on about 70 to 75% carbs! And no fat!