[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:
I did the GSD with great results. Lost about 1% for a few weeks, then slowed down to about .7 or so. It’s been about 2 yrs so, I’m a bit hazy.
But, it was very effective IMO.[/quote]
Thanks a lot for the feedback man!
These results sound awesome.
Don’t want to pester you with too many more questions but I was just wondering:
Did you drop your caloric intake right down to 10xBW on day 1 or ease in?
Did lose a lot of LBM in the process of dieting or were you able to get through with minimal losses?
Did you do a lot of cardio?
Thanks again![/quote]
Drop right away. No loss in LBM, did minimal cardio. 10 mins 2x week for a few weeks. I despise cardio.
Thanks for your feedback guys.
I’ll give it a shot starting Monday - 10xBW + JB’s recommended supplements - lets see how it works.
For week 1, I’ll keep cardio sessions relatively low & light (2x/week) and ramp them up as time goes by (add 1 morning cardio session per week / add 5mins. to each cardio session per week) to break through plateaus (since, as one of you mentioned, I wont be able to break plateaus by further lowering caloric intake along the way). Hope that the BCAA/Creatine drinks + continued heavy lifting will protect most of my muscle mass…
Given that I’m starting out at about 13-14% BF, I’d actually be happy if I can reach 8% over the next 8-12 weeks - the lower/the better of course but I dont have any illusions that my results will be as good as those of a guy who starts out at 10% BF. Getting into the single digits would be awesome enough for me for now.
Thanks again for your help!
E
EmEn- How much of an issue is the time frame for you? You mention in your calculations the possibility of being done in a month. Obviously my own experiences with myself and prep clients is based on several months (usually 12-16 weeks in most cases), where we try to allow ourselves time to come down as slowly as possible (ensuring QUALITY fat loss with optimal muscle preservation). I’ve had people I’ve worked with in the past question if we could speed up their progress each week, but such decisions usually bring along a certain amount of muscle loss. You have to ask yourself what’s more important to you, weighing a certain amount by a specific date, or, making quality body compositional changes.
[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
EmEn- How much of an issue is the time frame for you? You mention in your calculations the possibility of being done in a month. Obviously my own experiences with myself and prep clients is based on several months (usually 12-16 weeks in most cases), where we try to allow ourselves time to come down as slowly as possible (ensuring QUALITY fat loss with optimal muscle preservation). I’ve had people I’ve worked with in the past question if we could speed up their progress each week, but such decisions usually bring along a certain amount of muscle loss. You have to ask yourself what’s more important to you, weighing a certain amount by a specific date, or, making quality body compositional changes.
S[/quote]
Hi Stu
The 1-month thing was just an overexcited exagerration on my part based on JB’s “expect to loose up to 1% of BF per week” comment before I actually dug deeper into his diet plan. I figured that if I can really drop 1% BF/week for 4 weeks straight, I’d get into the 10% BF range within a month …sorry about that ^^
Anyway, currently, I plan to follow JB’s plan to a T (well, almost - I wont have the exact same diet but the micronutrient split & most of the food like lean beef, cauliflower…etc. will be the same) and drop my daily caloric intake to 10xBW starting Monday. I my case, that’ll be about 1980 cals/day. Also, I’ll use all of JB’s recommended supplements just as he says (for ex. 5g BCAA + 2.5g creatine pre-/post W/O + 2x more every day…etc.). Then I’ll keep my heavy 5-day training routine as it is (incl. slow 10min. post W/O cardio on the stat. bike) and start adding a pre-breakfast 30min. cardio session each week (slow incline walking, 3.5-4.5 speed, 6-8 incline on T-mill).
I plan to stay on this plan anywhere from 8-12 weeks (depending on my results) as JB suggests. So no 1-month total starvation diet or something dumb like that ^^
I’ll take weight & body compo measurements every week to track progress and catch any potential muscle loss (I’m sure there’ll be some but at this point I’m ok with it as long as I can get my whole body to look lean and cut). Obviously, I’ll adjust calories if severe muscle loss occurs - wouldn’t want to end up looking scrawny…
[quote]JLone wrote:
Since my knowledge didn’t fill enough pages… [/quote]
Out of fairness, you should at least know who you’re judging before you do so.
No sweat. I didn’t mean to offend anyone.[/quote]
just so you know, you are gonna get A LOT of flack around here when you come on strong like that. if you have services you can offer, that’s fine but you have to be more subtle about it
[quote]JLone wrote:
Since my knowledge didn’t fill enough pages… [/quote]
Out of fairness, you should at least know who you’re judging before you do so.
No sweat. I didn’t mean to offend anyone.[/quote]
just so you know, you are gonna get A LOT of flack around here when you come on strong like that. if you have services you can offer, that’s fine but you have to be more subtle about it[/quote]
agreed. if you have some knowledgeable information to share for all of us, we’re all ears. but please don’t pimp your products as douche-ally (adverb) as you do.
[quote]MAF14 wrote:
just so you know, you are gonna get A LOT of flack around here when you come on strong like that. if you have services you can offer, that’s fine but you have to be more subtle about it[/quote]
[quote]MAF14 wrote:
just so you know, you are gonna get A LOT of flack around here when you come on strong like that. if you have services you can offer, that’s fine but you have to be more subtle about it[/quote]
Thanks bro. I hear you.[/quote]
awesome, now let’s do some learnin’
Well - 4 days on the GSD diet (I’m following it to the T) and I must say I’m really surprised because:
I don’t feel hungry at all (I thought I was gonna be starving) - is this normal or could my metabolism have adjusted to the drastic calorie decrease THIS quickly (note that I did drop calories from about 4k to 2k per day, so it was quite a substantial drop…didn’t think my body could adjust to it so quickly)???
No strength/LBM loss so far - just a few lbs of water weight - so this is good (although I do have to get up to take a piss at least twice per night since I’m drinking so much water…a little annoying^^)
Not sure if I’ve lost fat so far BUT the skin above my abs feels weirdly “soft” and “loose” for some reason - now, it may be because some of the fat beneath it has been burned off and it takes the skin a while to “tighten up” again but I may be mistaken…can this be right? (especially since my skin feels normal in other places like shoulders, arms,…etc.)??
Since I’m not dying of hunger and/or experiencing any other negative side effects, I’ll keep it up. LEt’s see what happens next…
I’m surprised nobody recommended the V-Diet to the OP to help him reach his goals. A lot of folks, myself included, have seen excellent results from this diet. Plus, all the information, feedback, results, etc. can be found on this site.
Alright, so I’m at the end of my third day, and I have a few minor concerns.
Firstly, I’m 19, and I still have a hard-gainer metabolism. I’ve cut my Caloric intake to about 2200-2500 Calories a day, but I’ve already dropped about five pounds. I’ve always been a pretty lean guy (at least since I was 16), so I’ve never really had a lot of experience with cutting.
I already take creatine and BCAAs, but I increased my dosage to 40g of BCAAs and 20g of creatine a day. I haven’t noticed any recognizable strength loss, and I in fact set a 10 pounds PR when I deadlifted yesterday.
The last thing I want is to lose a significant amount of muscle mass, but I’m trying to develop some great abdominal definition before I begin my long, winter bulk. Should I increase my Caloric intake so that I’m only losing 2 pounds a week, or should I just stay within the recommended BWx9-11 range and expect my body to adjust.
I’m definitely getting leaner, but I don’t want to get significantly smaller. Obviously I can’t lose weight without getting smaller, but I’d like to minimize the muscle mass that I lose in the progress.
[quote]Obisidian wrote:
Alright, so I’m at the end of my third day, and I have a few minor concerns.
Firstly, I’m 19, and I still have a hard-gainer metabolism. I’ve cut my Caloric intake to about 2200-2500 Calories a day, but I’ve already dropped about five pounds. I’ve always been a pretty lean guy (at least since I was 16), so I’ve never really had a lot of experience with cutting.
I already take creatine and BCAAs, but I increased my dosage to 40g of BCAAs and 20g of creatine a day. I haven’t noticed any recognizable strength loss, and I in fact set a 10 pounds PR when I deadlifted yesterday.
The last thing I want is to lose a significant amount of muscle mass, but I’m trying to develop some great abdominal definition before I begin my long, winter bulk. Should I increase my Caloric intake so that I’m only losing 2 pounds a week, or should I just stay within the recommended BWx9-11 range and expect my body to adjust.
I’m definitely getting leaner, but I don’t want to get significantly smaller. Obviously I can’t lose weight without getting smaller, but I’d like to minimize the muscle mass that I lose in the progress.[/quote]
Take a deep breath, and relax.
You are THREE DAYS into your diet and you are freaking out.
If you were eating carbs before you started this program you are going to drop water weight very quickly in the opening week, that’s perfectly normal and to be expected.
If you are losing weight and GAINING strength, the likelihood that you are losing LBM is very, very low.
If, after a few WEEKS on the diet you are feeling run down and your lifting numbers are plummeting, THEN consider adding in a few calories. You have to give the refeeds a chance to do their thing (For what its worth, it is very common to do weekly refeeds on low carb diets, I see almost no diet coaches recommending biweekly.) - One could argue that the refeeds are where most of the magic happens, as they set you up for the next several days of fat loss.
The only other change I might recommend is to start at 12-13 cals/pound instead of 10 so you have somewhere to drop to after 4-6 weeks should you need to. Otherwise, I like increasing cardio over dropping calories.
[quote]Obisidian wrote:
Alright, so I’m at the end of my third day, and I have a few minor concerns.
Firstly, I’m 19, and I still have a hard-gainer metabolism. I’ve cut my Caloric intake to about 2200-2500 Calories a day, but I’ve already dropped about five pounds. I’ve always been a pretty lean guy (at least since I was 16), so I’ve never really had a lot of experience with cutting.
I already take creatine and BCAAs, but I increased my dosage to 40g of BCAAs and 20g of creatine a day. I haven’t noticed any recognizable strength loss, and I in fact set a 10 pounds PR when I deadlifted yesterday.
The last thing I want is to lose a significant amount of muscle mass, but I’m trying to develop some great abdominal definition before I begin my long, winter bulk. Should I increase my Caloric intake so that I’m only losing 2 pounds a week, or should I just stay within the recommended BWx9-11 range and expect my body to adjust.
I’m definitely getting leaner, but I don’t want to get significantly smaller. Obviously I can’t lose weight without getting smaller, but I’d like to minimize the muscle mass that I lose in the progress.[/quote]
This sounds like pretty good progress, dude!
Pretty much the same for me - lost a ton of water wight (about4-5lbs) too in my first 4 days and my lifts didn’t go down either - energy level/pump when lifting didnt go down - don’t know if it went up either tho since I kept weights constant this week to see if I lose any strength but I’ll try upping them next week to see if I can actually increase my strength while on this diet ^^ Wouldn’t that be great? - Increasing LBM/strength while shedding all the flab…
The only thing that really weirds me out is the lack of hunger so far.
Are you hungry?
I’m not…I mean, not more so than usually and this is after a caloric intake drop from about 4k to 2k per day…this is really strange to me
Fun fact - I went to a work-related speaker event yesterday and they had a crap load of good fatty food (pizzas, subs, bread sticks,…etc. u name it ^^). Usually I’d have had some food but yesterday I managed to not have any need to hold myself back. The food looked and smelled great but I had no urge whatsoever to pig out on it…even while watching my frieds stuff themselves, I was totally fine…
Really don’t know what to make of this lack of hunger (I’m not complaining of course - just weirded out…) ^^
[quote]Obisidian wrote:
Alright, so I’m at the end of my third day, and I have a few minor concerns.
Firstly, I’m 19, and I still have a hard-gainer metabolism. I’ve cut my Caloric intake to about 2200-2500 Calories a day, but I’ve already dropped about five pounds. I’ve always been a pretty lean guy (at least since I was 16), so I’ve never really had a lot of experience with cutting.
I already take creatine and BCAAs, but I increased my dosage to 40g of BCAAs and 20g of creatine a day. I haven’t noticed any recognizable strength loss, and I in fact set a 10 pounds PR when I deadlifted yesterday.
The last thing I want is to lose a significant amount of muscle mass, but I’m trying to develop some great abdominal definition before I begin my long, winter bulk. Should I increase my Caloric intake so that I’m only losing 2 pounds a week, or should I just stay within the recommended BWx9-11 range and expect my body to adjust.
I’m definitely getting leaner, but I don’t want to get significantly smaller. Obviously I can’t lose weight without getting smaller, but I’d like to minimize the muscle mass that I lose in the progress.[/quote]
Take a deep breath, and relax.
You are THREE DAYS into your diet and you are freaking out.
If you were eating carbs before you started this program you are going to drop water weight very quickly in the opening week, that’s perfectly normal and to be expected.
If you are losing weight and GAINING strength, the likelihood that you are losing LBM is very, very low.
If, after a few WEEKS on the diet you are feeling run down and your lifting numbers are plummeting, THEN consider adding in a few calories. You have to give the refeeds a chance to do their thing (For what its worth, it is very common to do weekly refeeds on low carb diets, I see almost no diet coaches recommending biweekly.) - One could argue that the refeeds are where most of the magic happens, as they set you up for the next several days of fat loss.
The only other change I might recommend is to start at 12-13 cals/pound instead of 10 so you have somewhere to drop to after 4-6 weeks should you need to. Otherwise, I like increasing cardio over dropping calories.
[/quote]
Thanks for the info Lonnie - very helpful!
Just have a few quick follow-up Qs.
Would you recommend a weekly re-feed day versus a bi-weekly? Berardi suggested a bi-weekly re-feed at 3-3.5 x my daily caloric intake on the diet (2000cal) which would allow me to go up to 6000-7000cal on my refeed day and eat whatever I want…Would it be better to refeed weekly at a lower caloric intake of lets say 4000-5000 instead?
Is it weird that I don’t feel any hunger spike during my first 5 days on the diet (even after a caloric intake drop from 4k to 2k per day) and does that mean that the diet is/is not working?
When you mentioned cardio, I assume you were referring to lower-intensity cardio (i.e. brisk walking on incline) versus HIIT training (which is much more intensity and catabolic)?
I’ve been doing the AD for a while, so my body didn’t really have to go through any metabolic shift. Even though I’ve been hungry occasionally, it’s definitely been bearable. IIRC, dietary fat curbs appetite because it’s so energy dense, so it’s pretty normal to not be exceptionally hungry.
[quote]Obisidian wrote:
I’ve been doing the AD for a while, so my body didn’t really have to go through any metabolic shift. Even though I’ve been hungry occasionally, it’s definitely been bearable. IIRC, dietary fat curbs appetite because it’s so energy dense, so it’s pretty normal to not be exceptionally hungry. [/quote]
Gotcha. Well that’s awesome. As long as the diet is working, I rly don’t mind not suffering from hunger…lol
Thanks for the info Lonnie - very helpful!
Just have a few quick follow-up Qs.
Would you recommend a weekly re-feed day versus a bi-weekly? Berardi suggested a bi-weekly re-feed at 3-3.5 x my daily caloric intake on the diet (2000cal) which would allow me to go up to 6000-7000cal on my refeed day and eat whatever I want…Would it be better to refeed weekly at a lower caloric intake of lets say 4000-5000 instead?[/quote]
Its tough to say because so much of dieting is about individualizing it, seeing how YOU respond, and adjusting accordingly.
Having said that, I think it is quite sensible and effective to refeed weekly instead of waiting 2 weeks. The Berardi refeed is a whole day endeavor, a “cheat day” of sorts. When you do it weekly I typically think its usually executed as a “cheat meal” where you eat one, huge, anything-and-everything-you-want kind of thing. Maybe 2 meals, but the point is its not a cheat DAY. I typically ate this as my last meal of the day so there was no excuses on my part to continue the cheat in later meals.
Again, this is very individual. Hunger is not a reliable indicator of fat burning, so don’t use that as an exact tool to determine the effectiveness of your eating plan.
Also, Hunger is largely an issue of food VOLUME so if you are eating tons of veggies you can avoid it entirely. On my last diet I was eating something like 2-3 POUNDS of veggies a day, plus my five calorie containing meals… Not exactly starvation levels of food.
Broccoli and green beans will become your friend.
[quote]- When you mentioned cardio, I assume you were referring to lower-intensity cardio (i.e. brisk walking on incline) versus HIIT training (which is much more intensity and catabolic)?
Thanks a lot!
[/quote]
Again, Highly individual. I know people who like to get lean with as little cardio as possible, some people walk, and some people do HIIT. There are unlimited ways to combine them throughout the course of the training week.
The general rule is to do AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE while still losing AS MUCH FAT AS POSSIBLE.
What I like to do personally is to adjust calories down first, then once that “stalls” I add in cardio, then once that stalls I drop cals 1-200 a day, etc… So it looks like this (simplified of course):
[quote]Jason@Tischer wrote:
I’m surprised nobody recommended the V-Diet to the OP to help him reach his goals. A lot of folks, myself included, have seen excellent results from this diet. Plus, all the information, feedback, results, etc. can be found on this site. [/quote]
Thanks for the info Lonnie - very helpful!
Just have a few quick follow-up Qs.
Would you recommend a weekly re-feed day versus a bi-weekly? Berardi suggested a bi-weekly re-feed at 3-3.5 x my daily caloric intake on the diet (2000cal) which would allow me to go up to 6000-7000cal on my refeed day and eat whatever I want…Would it be better to refeed weekly at a lower caloric intake of lets say 4000-5000 instead?[/quote]
Its tough to say because so much of dieting is about individualizing it, seeing how YOU respond, and adjusting accordingly.
Having said that, I think it is quite sensible and effective to refeed weekly instead of waiting 2 weeks. The Berardi refeed is a whole day endeavor, a “cheat day” of sorts. When you do it weekly I typically think its usually executed as a “cheat meal” where you eat one, huge, anything-and-everything-you-want kind of thing. Maybe 2 meals, but the point is its not a cheat DAY. I typically ate this as my last meal of the day so there was no excuses on my part to continue the cheat in later meals.
Again, this is very individual. Hunger is not a reliable indicator of fat burning, so don’t use that as an exact tool to determine the effectiveness of your eating plan.
Also, Hunger is largely an issue of food VOLUME so if you are eating tons of veggies you can avoid it entirely. On my last diet I was eating something like 2-3 POUNDS of veggies a day, plus my five calorie containing meals… Not exactly starvation levels of food.
Broccoli and green beans will become your friend.
[quote]- When you mentioned cardio, I assume you were referring to lower-intensity cardio (i.e. brisk walking on incline) versus HIIT training (which is much more intensity and catabolic)?
Thanks a lot!
[/quote]
Again, Highly individual. I know people who like to get lean with as little cardio as possible, some people walk, and some people do HIIT. There are unlimited ways to combine them throughout the course of the training week.
The general rule is to do AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE while still losing AS MUCH FAT AS POSSIBLE.
What I like to do personally is to adjust calories down first, then once that “stalls” I add in cardio, then once that stalls I drop cals 1-200 a day, etc… So it looks like this (simplified of course):
Obviously your weekly cardio and cals will look different, but that’s how I like to approach the combination.[/quote]
Got it! Thanks a lot for all the great info!
Explained a lot + confirmed what I was thinking with regard to my workout/nutrition plan (keep adding cardio every week + slightly lowering calories).
I’m not eating 2+ lbs of veggies per day but I am getting all of my carbs in exclusively from cauliflower/broccoli which are very satiating. So, I guess it would be awesome if my hunger stays at its currently low level while my body keeps shedding fat throughout the 8-12 weeks of my cut (I’m only on day 5, so this may change but I sure as hell hope it doesn’t ^^).
In regards to the Broccoli and Cauli, thats exactly what I used. That and green beans. The store I was shopping at had these microwavable packages that were something like 700g (4 servings of 30 calories) and I was eating 2-3 of those daily. I was straight up FULL most of the time. Granted, its not steak and cheese cake but I eventually grew to LOVE my nightly veggies.
To make it even better, Everything I have read from the best coaches in the world say that those are basically “free” - Meaning you can eat as much as you want because the cal content is so low, fiber is high, and the body basically burns all the cals just breaking down the food. I read that Skip LaCour used to eat 10-12 bags EVERY DAY towards the end of his Team Universe Winning contest preps… You think he had hunger pains?
Eat up, brother.
Some other diet “freebies”
1 - Sugar Free Gum. Myself and other competitors I have researched chew this stuff ALL day long. We’re talking like a pack a day here if you so choose.
2 - Diet Soda. The number of diet soda’s out there should more than satisfy any need for variety in your diet. I routinely had a stocked fridge of 4 different flavors.
3 - Lettuce/greens “salads” - I bought “Salad Spritzers” which are 1cal/spray dressings and would make a bowl of lettuce with 3-5 sprays on it. Dont load it high with toppings, but you can add in some cucumber/carrots/onions
