Dear Thib, dear Community,
I’m in need of an advice in terms of body composition change. I’m 27 years old, 180cm tall
and weigh 75 kilogram.
I’ve been training for about 7 years, using a bodybuilding approach. As enthusiastic as I’ve
always been with my training, my approach on nutrition was the exact opposite. Since
eating has always been a pain in the ass for me and gaining weight was always
very hard for me, I never really paid much attention to it and therefore, I
only progressed very slowly, but that was ok for me. My goal was to get to 80
kilogram bodyweight, which as much muscle as possible while still having some
upper abs showing and slowly I got there.
Then, about a year ago, something must have changed with my body because I started
accumulating belly fat, although I only ate a little more calories, but not
from junkfood or something like that. Before, I could feel my abs pretty close
under my skin when I put my hands on my belly but now I could feel that there
was a growing fat layer covering them, especially underneath the belly button.
By that time I had reached 78 kilogram so I decided to eat a little less and
was at 74,5 kilogram within a couple of days, my body has always dropped weight
that quickly if I didn’t eat enough. The only problem was that the fat layer
stayed the same.
After a couple of weeks without any change I decided to follow a diet for the first
time in my life and chose the “Carb Cyling Codex” by Thib. Since my primary
goal was to regain my belly leanness and then get visible abs, I calculated my
maintenance calories based on 75 kilograms, thinking I should first pursue my
leanness goal, before using the diet to get to lean 80 kilograms of bodyweight.
If been now following this diet for three months and sticked to it very
closely, only doing one cheat day per week. And that cheat day consists of
junkfood and not forcing myself to eat past my appetite, feeling full all day,
so I think I’m eating less than my daily caloric demands for maintenance on
that day. I accompanied the diet with three days of training, using a
chest+shoulders/legs/back-split. So I diet-wise I had 2 high carb days, 2
medium carb days and 2 low carb days plus one cheat day (eating 30% carbs in
the morning and 70% carbs peri-workout). I’ve now been using this approach for
about three months, my bodyweight went down to 74 kilograms and I noticed that I
look more muscular in certain areas of my body. Unfortunately, nothing changed
with the belly fat. Referring to your “Shredded in 6 days”-article, my level of
leanness is between Level 1 and 2,my goal being Level 2 (and maybe in the
future Level 3, but one step at a time). A month ago or so, I restructured my
low carb days following the Carb Backloading Approach, so I ate most of my
carbs in the evening, but still, no visible changes.
I’ve thought of many scenarios of what to do and there are probably a lot more which didn’t
come to my mind:
- adding cardio
- increasing the calories
- lowering the calories
- cutting carbs and raise fat intake
- changing the training approach (maybe to Athlete Lean Athlete Strong or The Layer
System) - doing more core exercises
So could you please give me some advice on my problem? Thanks so much in advance!