Fat Fast Redux Support Group

Training Bodybuilding
81

I had this same revalation yesterday. I said ‘hell i am already through 23 days what’s the point why not stop now.’ Well fuck it might as well just do 28 days to say I did it. In the beginning its a real shock and almost ridiculous. After a week though, I don’t miss solid food and wonder why I haven’t tried something like this more often, or previously in my life.

Even if the T-Dawg diet is a little healthier, at least I can say that I have done something so extreme that I basically lived off liquids for 4 weeks…and gained strength. No more prohormes in 5 days, kinda sad, but at least I did it.

Would I ever ever do this again? Nope. I might if I had the help of prohormones again, but I won’t, so I don’t consider the amount of strength loss that would occur to really be worth it to me.

Enriching greens by the way was really where I got most of my nutrients from, not a multi.

You were explaining that your T-Dawg diet is 2000 kcal. You have to figure that my diet while dieting was really only about 300 kcal less. You’re doing a rather extreme diet yourself, albeit you’re eating solid food and I wasn’t/am not.

I think doing a diet in and of itself is not the hard part. Having an exit diet to come off of is important. Berardi said adjust by 250 kcal. Someone most likley coming off of FF is going to want to hit up China Buffet, but its absolutely important not to do that.

In my case, I am ingesting 250 kcal worth of natural p.b. next week i’ll toss in a salad and a can of tuna and a salad and a slice of salmon along with the p.b. week after that i am going to toss in a serving of home made chili.

By the end of college (3 weeks) i’ll be on a roughly 2500 kcal diet which I plan to stick with for another month or so, slowly weening myself off of Grow! and back on to solid food.

Ok, that was waaaaaay too long.

82

I’m one week in, now… I haven’t suffered from any psychotic binges (yet), but it’s insomnia, insomnia, insomnia for me. By the time I fall asleep it’s 2-3 am and my body wakes me up for my routine 5 am gym date. I have entirely too much energy, although today I feel like I’m dragging a little. I’m going to stick with it, and in the meantime, plan exactly how I’m going to transfer to solid food/what foods, when this is over.
WEEK ONE
Weight loss: 7 lbs
Waist: -1.25 in
Abdomen: -2 in
Hips, Thigh: -0.5 in
Arm, Calf: -.25 in

83

You lost 2 inches on your stomach in 1 week? Damn! Took me three weeks to lose 2.5 inches. I have 4 abs poking through, just need to get that final layer between my package and my lower set of abs to dissapear.

Did the BF% at the gym and it said I am 15% even. I know that is BS because I have lost over 1% bf. End of next week I think i’ll be taking pictures, no need to yet as I still have a few days to go.

Have a good weekend not binging everyone.

As for insomnia, i had a hard time winding down my day in the evening and found that I had a lot of 1:30 bed times myself. It catches up with you after the second week and now that i am almost finished I fall asleep at 10:30.

I think the overabundance of energy in the beginning is what is keeping you/kept me up.

84

Well its Day 20 for me.

I chose not to hit the gym yesterday because of still feeling somewhat sore from LOTS of floor burnishing on Wednesday (left my arms worn hard, especially my forearms and biceps). However, I did make it today, and it was perhaps the best session yet on this diet. It was also though, the last, as I will be taking next week completely off, while I finish the diet, getting plenty of activity from my job and frequent walking.

I’m feeling leaner then I have for some time, perhaps ever, though, I had hoped for more out of the diet. Perhaps this coming week will make a difference as there is a 1/4 of the time to go, if one looks at it that way.

I’ve run out of St Johns wort(which has been important for my seratonin levels and mood) but I am not going to go out and buy more when in a couple days I can get it cheaper at GNC, unless my Riteaid is running another buy one/get one free sale(which they seem to almost always be doing on vitamins and herbs, am I the only one in this town that buys them maybe?). I also need to pick up some more stinging nettle.

I’ve just switched from my old multivitamin(GNC Mega Men’s) to Animal Pak. So far so good. No adverse effects, and, actually felt a little better yesteray(maybe all of the Ginsing it has), however, I am a bit concerned at the low levels of certain minerals(selenium for example) that I had not noticed before in it.

Right now, I’m looking eagerly foreward to my first Biotest shipment, most notably the SPIKE therein. I’m curious how it will effect the final week of the diet though, by ridding myself of the caffeine and Sudafed, so that SPIKE will have its optimal effects on me. We shall see.

85

Day 24

So where the hell did everyone else go?

I figured I’d bump this up so I have an easier time finding it when I post my final update in a few days, and also see how everyone else is doing.

My fat loss seems to be speeding in the final week, most likely because without the added postworkout steaks, my calories have dropped again, and I’ve gotten off the creatine cycle so I’m dropping some more water weight too.

Unfortunately I’m coming to realize I may have to accept one of two conclusions, which I’m faced with in the mirror. I have not “cut up” quite as much as I expected, though I feel the diet got me lower then ever before fat-wise. Now, whats the problem?

Since I don’t have pictures, and I don’t think anyone would want to see these pictures, I’m going to do my best to describe my problem area(s) and the conclusions I’ve considered drawing from them.

First we have my waist. As I’ve said before, its gotten down to 32 inches, however, there is still noticeable rounding/love handles(not drastic). I don’t really see abs but, I don’t find this surprising because I don’t have ALOT of muscle underneath, and I know I’m not going to get THAT cut. Now, the oddness begins when I sit down. There is pooling about my waist. I am not sure whether this is fat or skin(I’ve been on some crazy stupid diets before and once was 290 pounds about 3 years ago). Also, when I bend over, there is “hang” from whatever this is, however, it is not as significant as pre-diet. As I’ve mentioned before the skin/fat hangs down below my waist line but not out, and there’s a blob of it right above my penis, which could be fat or skin also.

Now, second we have my chest area. When standing, I look fine. When raising my arms for lifts or double biceps poses or what not, besides not having any droop or what not, I can actually see my ribs. However, again, when sitting or bending, there is some droop of something from my chest area, mostly underneath my upper pectoral it seems.

Lastly, there’s wrinkling/slight droopiness on the insides of my thighs that I am almost positive now is just skin, and will be fixed once I bring up my thigh size.

Now, my thoughts are firstly that I need to put on more mass(which is already queued up as my next cycle), and secondly that I may have a skin problem. However, I’d like to hear other persons’ thoughts, especially FFBs who might have insight as far as this goes, since I’m rather curious whether this is skin or fat.

Oh, the diet you say, how’s that going?

Energy is great, results have been great(though as I said above, had hoped for more), and I havn’t seriously thought about pizza in weeks, despite having to clean up after several pizza parties at work.

This is my off week, gym-wise, so not much training to report.

Best of luck to everyone else still hanging in there on this diet, and hope to hear from you guys soon.

86

Hey Moon Knight.

Since you were up as far as 290, and I assume with a low lean body mass (LBM) you could easily have loose skin.

There also is a problem that when you burn fat, your body decides where to take the fat from, and you really can?t do too much about that. So fat can be burned between other fat cells. That fat might be supporting other fat, and once that fat is gone, you lose that support.

My advice is (obviously) to lose more fat, and build muscle. By cutting more fat you should be able to get to only skin, and determine what was fat, and what is skin.

But as far as loose skin itself, there are a lot of factors, such as degree of damage, your age, and the overall health of the skin. I have heard of people partially, or completely eliminating that skin, but it can take a few years. Others are stuck with it. Pretty much if you don’t lose it after 2 years, it is unlikely you will ever lose it without surgery.

Now my knowledge is limited in this issue though, so others here might have more complete knowledge. (And I could be completely off too.)

I do think getting as much muscle as you can might help some.

Now do you know your level of body fat? If not, check out these articles:

http://t-nation.com/ALSAuthor.do?p=Jason%20Norcross&pageNo=1

I tried the three site method, and the seven site method, and got roughly the same result. So I just to the three site method. The seven site method of measuring is more accurate, and I think different people might get a wider variation if BF measurements. This is a better gauge of where you are. Oh yeah, the mirror is good too.

I just popped onto a form of the velocity diet, but I am only doing it for 2 weeks, and having a solid meal once a day, along with a cheat day on Sunday. As I said in another thread, I think it is closer to the T-man version of the slim fast diet. A shake for breakfast, one for lunch, another one later, a chicken for dinner, (ok, just half a chicken, and some salad, on some of the days,) and one more shake before bed.

I do throw milled flaxseed into my shakes. I found it for $1.00 a pound at Hy-Vee in their Organic section. This is a new area they just built recently, so I don?t know how many of their stores have this, or how many Hy-Vee’s there are really. But I think this is a good deal. And surprisingly cheaper then the non-milled flaxseed.

Now I have found 15 oz for $7.95, and flaxseed meal, (I don?t know if the meal is different) is sold for $5.69.

Just wanted to give a heads up to anyone using milled flaxseed. (And you should because the oil sucks.)

87

Moon Knight-

Former FFG here. Yessirry bobarino, you have some excess skin. I have the same situation. Not grossly loose skin like I was 600 pounds, but annoying none the less. When I get down near 10%, no one really notices, yet I still get some “droop” when bending at the waist or when on all-4’s. Just the way it is mate, unless you want to maintain 4% BF… good luck. You may even have a very small amount of gyno (breast tissue) from previously being obese and living a pro-estrogen lifestyle.

Don’t worry though, the bigger your muscle bellies get, the more you will “fill-out” that droopy skin. Make people look at all the thick slabs of BEEF you are wearing as a coat. Most areas will look better and better as you add mass, but the lower ab will always be a bit droopy, since you can’t add several inches of USDA Choice to this area, like you can the arms and chest.

As for my dieting, who the heck has been posting the subliminal messages, damnit?! :wink: I found my diet looking ever more like the Fat Fast!! Besides one or two solid meals of eggs and/or a tuna salad, I have been consuming 3-4 Grow! shakes + peanut butter and nothing more! Kind of a T-Dawg 2.0 and Fat Fast hybrid. Oh well… I have lost 14 pounds in 4 weeks, so I’m not complaining. All though, I will rant for a second on the Omron BF analyzer. According to that thing I have lost nearly 50/50 fat to muscle. Not possible with my protein and lifting on point. Then again it’s supposed to only be an approximation. Anybody got a coupon for a free under-water weighing… ???

I’m really liking Charles’ EDT right now. Great change of pace from the norm.

Keep fighting fellas… the bigger the loser you are, the hotter the chics you can score this summer! For those of us that are engaged/married, at least we’ll get more stares…

TopSirloin

88

Thanks for clearing that up a bit. I do think there’s a bit more fat to lose(while still being healthy, since I don’t think 4% all the time would be) but, not THAT much.

I have never tried the multi-fold method. I used to have some calipers that I THINK were made by the people that make Myo-tape. They supposedly read one’s fat by a single clip slightly above the love handle point. With those I was sliding between 18 and 20% last I had checked, and I hadn’t changed THAT much before going on this diet. My weight was between 180 and 190 at the time.

This won’t change my determination to put on more muscle and minimize what fat is left, but, it certainly will remind me not to worry as much about the droop so long as I’m staying clean on my diet. I personally don’t care that much about abs, though it would have been nice to get the stuff away from hanging on my groin so much.

This has rather been the high spot of the day, since the question has plagued me continually for some time, watching my back, arms, and calves growing larger and more defined while the rest kind of stayed droopy at least on top.

Another good spot though was, when I finally nailed down what I will do for the 3 weeks while I’m eating maintenance(to encourage my body to get used to this weight level before bulking). Not sure if anyone cares but, the routine I’m planning will go something like this.

Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday
heavy overhead squats and farmer’s walks
The squats will probably be done, 10 sets of 3, with the walks being for distance or time.

Monday, Wednesday
low-moderate weight, high rep military presses and lat-pulldowns, along with some treadmill walking
I’m looking at right now doing 1 set of 50 of each, and then walking on the treadmill for 20 minutes(possibly while carrying dumbbells) and following that with another set of 50 for each.

Friday, Saterday
Off

Mage, best of luck on the diet, trust me, it only gets easier once you get over the hump.

Everyone else, hope you guys are all hanging in there and I’ll see you at the finish line.

89

[quote]The Mage wrote:

I just popped onto a form of the velocity diet, but I am only doing it for 2 weeks, and having a solid meal once a day, along with a cheat day on Sunday. As I said in another thread, I think it is closer to the T-man version of the slim fast diet. A shake for breakfast, one for lunch, another one later, a chicken for dinner, (ok, just half a chicken, and some salad, on some of the days,) and one more shake before bed.

I do throw milled flaxseed into my shakes. I found it for $1.00 a pound at Hy-Vee in their Organic section. This is a new area they just built recently, so I don?t know how many of their stores have this, or how many Hy-Vee’s there are really. But I think this is a good deal. And surprisingly cheaper then the non-milled flaxseed.

Now I have found 15 oz for $7.95, and flaxseed meal, (I don?t know if the meal is different) is sold for $5.69.

Just wanted to give a heads up to anyone using milled flaxseed. (And you should because the oil sucks.)[/quote]

That’s interesting Mage –

I just started something very similar. I’m doing two solids a day, lunch and dinner – though lunch is a salad with a can of tuna kind of like the T-Dawg “Mess o’ Greens”.

My plan works out thusly:

Work out M/W/F with 20 min. cardio warm up then weights, Tu/Th/S 45 min./1hr. cardio rotating between elliptical, stair climber, rowing machine and seated bike, Sun off.

On days with weights I take BCAAs while lifting, then a serving of Surge afterward, then 1 shake (2 scoops Low-Carb Grow!, ~ 2 tablespoons milled flax), then lunch, then shake, then dinner, then shake with no flax but with fish oil caps. Cardio days are the same but without the Surge (minus 350 kcal).

After week one I’m going to incorporate twice weekly carb ups on Wednesday and Sunday, a la “Cheater’s Diet”.

Basically, after reading this thread I thought going all-out Velocity would be too hard core.

Anyway, it’s only been a few days, but I know I’m already shedding the water weight – my watch, of all things, fit more loosely this morning. Noticed it in the waist too, but the watch thing was amusing.

Good luck to the Velocity folks – I’ve been following the exploits and I look forward to seeing the successes.

90

Hey BB, nice to talk to you off the political forum.

Anyway it is interesting trying to get used to drinking 4 shakes a day. In fact the people at Dairy Queen are starting to wonder why I come in so often.

But seriously, I have been mixing flax into every shake, except one with natural peanut butter, and I take 2 extra strength fish oil caps with each shake. At least I intend to take the fish oil caps with each shake, but for some reason I keep forgetting, and take extra the next time, or the times I took four with my first shake of the day because that was what I was doing when on the T-Dawg diet, when I had a shake for breakfast.

And Shugart is right about all the excuses for giving up on a diet. My motivation is really high right now, but I have to admit that it has been real low for a while due to events in my life. I kept going on diets, and they worked, but any stress put me over the edge, so I never kept any diet up for too long.

Not really a good excuse, especially with everything I know from being here so long, and seeing others make such great progress with a lot more weight to lose then I have.

When I was drinking a shake, an acquaintance started asking me about it, then asked why I thought I needed to lose weight. At least that made me think maybe I didn?t look as chubby to others as I thought I did. Or then again it could be because I had already done 3 weeks on T-Dawg, and my clothing may have helped reduce how noticeable the fat is on my body.

Also having a decent sized back helps make my waist look smaller. Nowhere near the size of lets say Flex Wheeler, of course. But it helps.

As far as cheating, I have done fairly good. But today one of the people I was visiting made rum cake. I get the idea if I don?t at least eat a small piece, then I would be offending her. At least the piece was a little bigger then an inch square. It also helped that the piece I took partially fell apart, so I only had to eat a little of it.

It was good, and I was in shock at how much rum was in it. I think that if I ate a piece the size of a normal cake it would have required a designated driver for me to get home.

But cheating on Sunday helps quite a bit. I do believe that it does help both mentally and physically too. Also since I do my weekly official weight on Monday, I think that the carbohydrates might add a little water weight back. (I had my biggest cheat last Sunday with Cake, Ho Ho’s, and plenty of bread while eating out, plus a glass of regular Coke, which I have not had in a long time, and actually tasted funny to me, so when offered a refill, I asked for water.)

To tell the truth this is the easiest diet I have ever done, even though I have done it in the past, and switching over to velocity has not seemed to affect me whatsoever. I almost think the three weeks on T-Dawg gave me time to settle into a diet first, and have really had no trouble so far with the Velocity, or at least my form of it. Then again it is only the third day.

One thing that does help is sugar free jello. As long as I only have one I just ignore the calories, (10) and it really satisfies any sweet tooth.

91

I am still faithfully chugging down the shakes, although I have added in some solid meals like tuna or eggs. Pogress has stalled out a little, but I have been seeing a good increase in strength. Weight is at 264-down from 274, so I guess that is good. Measurements haven’t changed appreciably for a week or two. I am planning on keeping the calorie intake at its current level of 2000 to 2200 with a short “recharge” weekend this weekend. I will probably add in a lot of good carbs for the physical and physcological boost and go right into T-Dawg 2.0.
Dan

92

I started the Velocity Diet on Monday after being on a T-Dawg type diet for 3 weeks. I’m getting around 1400 calories on non-w/o days and 1630 calories on workout days. I haven’t taken any follow-up measurements, but I can tell a difference in the mirror.

I have noticed that I have some serious DOMS and cramping since starting this diet. I’m still sore from Monday’s workout. Anyone else notice this? Do I need to drink more water or will taking some potassium pills help? I’m doing a 5x5 Rough, Rugged, and Dense workout.

I’m going to do this diet for 3 weeks, switch back to T-Dawg for 3 weeks, and then bulk with Mag-10 for 3 weeks. I’ll then have another 12 weeks to continue to diet or maintain my then current gains. I’m trying to get cut for a cruise at the end of June.
My stats if interested are:
5’-9"
185 lbs(This morning, 195 Jan 10th when I started dieting)
BF%-16%? (When taking a 3 site measurement. I have no visiable abs, but that puts my LBM at 155, which seems low to me when compared to other’s pictures.)

93

I’m feeling similar DOMS after being on T-Dawg 2.0 for 4 weeks now. I believe in most case its because both carbs and cals are severely restricted. Therefore, you cannot possible recover as fast as when on a maintenance or bulking diet. You might want to make sure you are getting at least some PWO carbs. I suggest they be low glycemic like oats, but that’s just my opinion (I cut ALL sugar, even PWO, and I think it helps shed more fat). Also, watch your volume vs. intensity because its easy to over-train when cutting.

TopSirloin

94

1MeanD -
I had issue with muscle soreness, and even cramping during workouts. It could be one of two things. Either you’re not drinking enough water(I found that over 2 gallons was neccesary for me, but I’m sure the average person even not seriously sweating would want to be getting 1-1.5 a day) or you need more potassium. Potassium is very important especially if your previous diet was imbalanced sodium-wise(in other words sodium exceeded potassium intake). However, try to make sure you’re getting a little(500-1000mg) sodium somehow, which is hard on this diet.

Having written this, a third possability comes to mind, being that possibly you are flushing alot of sodium and your body has not gotten used to holding onto some yet. In that case I would add in a small ammount of baking soda with a couple shakes. It will help break up the lactic acid build up, and it will also help with electrolyte balance, however DO NOT drop a sodium bomb in one shake and go. I’ve gone from low-sodium, to cheating on high sodium foods in the distant past and wound up with such bad cramps that I was doubled over standing up.

In closing, evaluate how much sodium and potassium roughly you were getting on your previous diet. If they were balanced or potassium was higher, don’t worry about potassium pills, you’re probably getting enough from the shakes(most brands have a fair bit of potassium), and perhaps try the baking soda. If sodium was exceeding potassium then go for some potassium pills. In either case, drink lots of water.

Best of luck.

95

Hey Guys,

I’ve got another 9 or 10 days to go on the Velocity Diet. Although most of the weight I’ve dropped is likely water weight, I’ve found that the diet itself has led me to a much lower overall interest in food itself. Whereas before, being Italian, I would eat everything in sight, now it’s like there’s an automatic signal in my head that says “why bother?” The Low-Carb Grow! shakes made with 1 Tbsp psyllium husk, ice water and flax seed oil probably account for some of this. I was at the movies the other night and we went to the supermarket to stock up on snacks and where my buds loaded up on the 1 lb bags of Goobers, I took one look at the fat & sugar content, shuddered, and grabbed two bags of turkey jerky.

I’m looking forward to incorporating more clean, whole-food meals back into my nutrition profile, because the 4-5 shakes a day gig, plus the during-and-post workout Surge is starting to get old. Although I don’t have much more BF to lose (perhaps 5-6 lbs), I MISS EATING, DAMMIT. Seriously, I miss grabbing a few slices of NY thin crust pizza. Thank God for Spike.

Anyway, didn’t mean to vent, but this is starting to get to me…LoL. My lifts have suffered somewhat, but getting admiring glances from the younger girls at the gym is definitely worth it.

Stay strong guys…

MicroSlash - “Scaring the living crap out of fathers with hot daughters since 1988…”

96

Thanks for the replies. I never really paid any attention to my sodium or potassium intake. I’ve always focused on the protein, carbs, and fat.

It looks like I’m getting alot more potassium than sodium. I will definately drink more water and try some baking soda in the shakes.
Thank you,
Dan

97

Great response Moon Knight. I know I get enough salt, because I love it on chicken, and beef. And since I am still having one meal a day, I usually salt it. I am having rotisserie chicken on most of my non-workout days. (And a little Caesar salad.)

I also drink a lot of water, especially when I am on a diet, so I never really think about it myself.

Surge, and vitamin E after working, might help also. They were actually out of Surge during my last purchase, so I don’t have any right now. But I am following a suggestion that Berardi once had about just using skim milk and chocolate. (Ok, I cheat and use 1%) Not as good, but better then nothing.

98

Final Report. Its been err 4 days since off of MAG-10 anmd the fat fast diet. I’ve stayed the same weight during these 4 days with no real spike in weight which i was worried about (202 to 203.5).

I accomplished mainly what i was looking for. If you read up on this thread, it shows my inches lost. I have hit all time highs on my bench and i feel great. I think I look better than I have ever looked before. Tomorrow i’ll be doing farmer walks and will be tkaing pictures and will post them on either Saturday or Sunday. If you want a prelude to what I started at then check here.

www.rit.edu/~ito3153/sat_morning

that is what i looked like post bulk around December 15th. Two days from now i should have the rest of the pictures posted here on T-mag.

Final total was ~16.5%bf to ~13%bf.

In 4 weeks? Yea that’s pretty darn good if you ask me.

Now its maintenance time till my vacation in 25 days to the Dominican Republic. Woo Bitches.

Anyone who wants to do Velocity/Fast Fast diet…good god damned luck.

It wasn’t fun and it wasn’t pleasant, and without MAG-10 you’re going to lose a lot of strength, but its an adventure, and one I would try again sometime…probably 30 years from now to remember what fun truly is.

Later Fellas

~Lotus

99

[quote]Lotus wrote:

Anyone who wants to do Velocity/Fast Fast diet…good god damned luck.

It wasn’t fun and it wasn’t pleasant, and without MAG-10 you’re going to lose a lot of strength, but its an adventure, and one I would try again sometime…probably 30 years from now to remember what fun truly is.

Later Fellas

~Lotus[/quote]

Lotus,

I started today on the velocity diet.
1300 kcals normal days
1650 on training days

Using the following sups:
Surge
Hot-Rox
Methoxy-7 (starting wednesday most likely, depending on weigh in on monday)
Grow! Low Carb MRP

We’ll see how it goes. I hope not to lose any strength but we’ll see. Low intensity cardio sessions and a TBT lifting program so hopefully all will be well. WIsh me luck, no matter the hardships I’m on this diet until I say stop because I’m already tired of everyone(co-workers, girl, family) telling me that I can’t, or won’t stay on it. 3-5% bodyfat puts me sub 10% and probably the leanest I’ll have ever been.

Holla,
mike

100

Shiplemw,
Well, let me say this. You are going to lose strength. You are goin gto lose LBM. You are going to lose stamina. You are going to lose vascularity.

Its not going to be pleasant. Its not going to be happy when you get the cravings for anything that is in fron tof you.

Its not going to be fun during the Super Bowl when Pats and eagles fans are eating ice cream and saying how good that damn cheese cake is.

Its not going to be fun or easy when you eat 3 to 4 shakes a day and say “mmm wasn’t that the best damn shake i’ve ever had”/

With that ou tof the way, you’ll lose more fat during this time than you will doing basically any other time. Its an amazing protocol and one that deserves to be tried at least once…if not to be able to say tha tyou did the liquid diet for X amount of time. I stil brag about it.

Cheers mate,

Lotus