If you are dieting or are planning to start a diet, you need to understand the connection between bodyweight and glycogen, that is how carbohydrates get stored in your liver and muscles, so you don’t overestimate your weight loss as you cut carbs—or your weight gain if you add some back. Understand the connection and you’ll have a much better chance of keeping your cool for the long-haul when swings inevitably happen.
So what exactly is going on?
http://bradpilon.com/2009…r-shredded.html
— Below is my comment that I left on Brad’s blog —
Brad,
Thanks for the post! Quite a response you’ve garnered, which I can only assume is a testament to the truth your words contain! Your #3 comment reminds me of something you have previously said, which I’ll paraphrase as, “Eat to gain muscle and diet to lose fat.”
One method I use to somewhat reliably keep a pulse on my cutting progress is to take on a regular basis a bare chest, mirror snapshot with my cameraphone. Consistency here is important; I usually take mine after working out and before hitting the shower. Consistent lighting and distance from the mirror are also important, but pretty easy to replicate in your own bathroom. This habit (OCD?) is easy to do and hones a dieter’s ability to see where he’s making progress (or not).
Thanks to Eat Stop Eat / intermittent fasting (and heightened carb-awareness) I’ve managed to hack a lot of body fat off while putting on lean mass via kettlebell training, a three month stint with crossfit, and just general weight-lifting. Today, I am noticeably more lean than I was a year ago when I first experimented with fasting even as I only weigh about five pounds less. My weight went from about 182 to 163 and is now around 175. That’s a leaner 175 than 163!
Even so, and as I had alluded to in a prior comment, I have hit a wall on leaning out. I’ve observed firsthand how exercising more has been sine’ed away via larger meal portions, snacking (even on jerky!), cheating, or whatever. I know that with a little practice I can get everything dialed-in and finally see the coveted six-pack. It just takes a little patience. I remind myself that for most of my life (I’m 28) I’ve been soft around the edges, and it’s reasonable to assume that it may take some time and practice to whittle away the fat that’s been hanging on for the past twenty years.
Thanks again!
— And below are the bullet points on Brad Pilon’s 5 tips to get “super shredded:” you’ll have to go to his site for the details! —
- Give yourself permission to get “light”.
- Give your diet the opportunity to do the work for you.
- Avoid using Cardio to Compensate.
- Don’t let the Sine Wave get you.
- MEASURE, Measure and measure some more.
http://avidityfitness.net…ms-of-fat-loss/
There was a time a few weeks back where I started experiencing a bit of insomnia. I immediately associated my sleeplessness with dieting and quickly determined to back off the dieting. It just made zero sense to me that I should be losing sleep because I was trying to lose weight — it just seemed downright extreme and unhealthy, so I quickly backed off a bit on dieting as a result.
Enter in Leigh Peele’s recent blogpost on “symptoms” of fat loss where I learn that insomnia can result from dieting. So it’s not just me, which is reassuring, even though I haven’t had any insomnia problems in two or three weeks (though I also haven’t been losing any more fat!).
So food for thought:
NOW, imagine your body if that flashlight. As time goes on your batteries are running low. How are you going to feel?
- Less lucid, foggy
- easily emotional
- fatigue
- hunger
- harder to wake up in the morning
- muscle soreness
- sadness
- insomia
These are not symptoms of overtraining. These are symptoms of fat loss.
Think about it folks – you are removing a physical substance from your body. It was once there but you are trying to take it away. You might say, “well, I put it on easily. Taking it away can’t be that hard. ”
When is the last time you glued something? How easy was that to get on? How much of a pain in the ass was it to get off?
Just fat loss alone doesn’t feel good, it shouldn’t feel good. Anyone that tells you that either doesn’t know, or doesn’t want you to know. That doesn’t mean fat loss can’t be good for you in the long run. It just means what you have to endure while getting there is a real task to be undertaken.