Dietary advice series...part 2

So, here's part 2 of my dietary advice series...in The Zone!

2)  A calorie is not a calorie…at least not all of the time.  On a certain level, yes, a calorie is a calorie however, when trying to devise a balanced, healthy meal plan, the differences between carbohydrates, proteins, & fats become important.  For one thing, the three macronutrients have different caloric densities (carbohydrates and proteins have 4 calories per gram whereas fats have 9 calories per gram).  This difference makes balancing the number of calories you intake with feeling satisfied with the foods you eat a tricky thing to do.  I’ve tried many diets over the years and I’ve only come to one resounding conclusion…my performance is best and I feel the best on a split that’s about 30% protein, 30% fat, and 40% carbohydrate.  Try to take in less refined carbs (think more brown rice, oats, & sweet potatoes instead of potato chips, sugar, white bread, or white rice) and make sure your fat sources are healthier fats (think more olive oil, coconut oil, & avocados instead of fried pork chops).  I've used this split over the years & have found it to be a great thing.  It's plenty of carbs for energy so you don't feel lethargic & the amount of fat & protein keeps you feeling satisfied (no late night bingeing...lol).

Dietary advice series...part 1

Greetings true believers.  I began poking around in some of my writings & found some nuggets worth putting out for the masses to consume.  This series will be some of my thoughts on diet in general, with the primary focus on losing body fat (or at least not gaining any).  The key to losing body fat or maintaining a low body fat level is calories.  To a very large extent, our body weight is the result of a sometimes complex energy equation.  There is no explicit formula for this equation but I’ve devised some general rules of thumb.
 

1)  It is a zero-sum game.  In other words, calories in – calories out = 0.  Absolutely.  It always does and always will.  The fuzzy part is determining the calories you consume (in) and the calories you burn (out) to any degree of accuracy.  Regarding calories in, there’s nutrition information everywhere (labels on all packaged foods, & there are websites like www.calorieking.com for everything else) that should make building a database of your regularly consumed foods fairly easy.  Seeking to determine your calories in accurately implies the necessity of measuring your foods.  Measuring cups, measuring spoons, and a food scale will become necessary tools to do this.  Over time, you’ll develop the ability to measure out your foods without all the tools based on experience, but until that day comes, use the tools.

     Regarding calories out, this can be harder to determine.  There are devices like Bodybugg that claim to be able to calculate your calories burned with up to 90% accuracy.  I’m not a fan of this technology b/c of the metabolic variation between individuals.  Height, weight, sweat rate, & body temperature aren’t the only factors that determine how many calories a person burns in a given time period.  The best way to determine your caloric expenditure is to instead determine your caloric needs to fall within one of three zones…losing weight, maintaining weight, and gaining weight.  Determining this involves trial & error as we all have a particular metabolic rate that’s dependent on so many factors, it would be impossible to predict.  What’s worked for me is to pick a starting number of calories that seems reasonable for someone of your stature and activity level (I started with 2000 calories per day.  I’m 6’4” with a desk job & I tend to gain weight easily) and eat precisely that many calories daily for two weeks.  If your weight goes down, you know you’re below your maintenance level.  If your weight goes up, you’re above maintenance, and if you’re weight stays the same, you’re within your maintenance range of calories.  I say maintenance range because there isn’t a particular number of calories that will make you gain weight that if you come in 1 calorie less then you’ll maintain.  Instead, I’ve found there to be a range of calories that allows you to maintain your bodyweight (for me it’s 2200-2400 calories per day).  Once your two weeks are up & you’ve determined which zone you’re in, your goals then come in to play.  If you are trying to gain weight & you maintained, you need to increase your calories until you start to gain weight.  If you are trying to lose weight and you maintained, you need to decrease your calories until you start to lose weight.  All of this is predicated on the assumption that you are on a sound strength & conditioning program.  These baseline calories need to revisited periodically as changes in body composition , age, and activity level create different caloric needs over time.

So that's part 1. Start to track your calories & get ahold of that waistline!

More to come...

PW

Transformation of Patient-Zero

Greetings fam.  As you all have read in previous blog entries, I've been training a co-worker & friend of mine named Dave.  You've seen him in various videos I've posted doing dips & running around with some of my training implements.  When I met Dave last summer he was around 360 lbs (10 or so lbs down from his heaviest weight of 373 lbs in April 2011).  At the time I was doing my normal thing eating and working out to maintain my body fat levels and he'd entered into a friendly weight loss competition with some co-workers of ours.  He didn't win the competition but he got his weight down to 353 lbs by the end of July.  Through all of this, our co-workers told him he might want to get with me on fat loss since I'd lost a significant amount of body fat over the past 8 years.  We talked & I told him to just start coming to the gym with me.  He did & took every bit of advice I had to give & executed my program perfectly.  Now I've given many, many people advice over the years about fat loss and gaining muscle, but nobody...not one...has followed it as closely or determinedly as Dave...and it shows.  Here are some before & after pics of Dave.  The "current" pics are as of 2/27/2012.  He's actually 4 lbs lighter today...233...that's 140 lbs down from his highest weight and 120 lbs down (353 to 233) in 7 months!

Since it took me 8 years of experimenting and learning how to transform myself from an obese, unhealthy person to a lean, fit, active person I call myself Project-X...and I call Dave Patient-0 since he's the first to execute The Program completely and successfully.

I'm very proud of him, his effort, and his determination.  The world should prepare to see much more of Project-X & Patient-0.