How Much Protein When Cutting?

Diet and Nutrition
1

Hi guys, basically when you are cutting should your protein intake be roughly be about .8 grams of protein per lb of lean body mass per day?

Basically in the past when I’ve tried dropping by body fat I’ve got to about 17% and then found it impossible to go lower. Now my question is, is this due to my diet?

Daily routine 5-6 times a week

Breakfast : 20g oats with skimmed milk
2.5 mile jog to gym
45-1hr weights session and HIIT 3 times a week on stepper
2.5 miles jog home
Lunch : - 4 Egg whites, 1/4 avocado. couple slices of ham or
- 150g of cottage cheese, 1/4 avocado, couple slices of ham
5 mile jog before dinner
Another weight sessions roughly 30 mins where if I trained legs in the morning I would do shoulders, back in the morning then biceps and then chest / triceps.
Dinner : 1 chicken breast around 100g with veg
I also drink around 3-4 litres of water a day.

So, was I not consuming enough protein per day to lose body fat? The problem is I dropped the calories by 500 each week till I got that because I wasn’t losing any more fat. ( I was using callipers to check my progress)

Here is a photo of me, ImageShack - Best place for all of your image hosting and image sharing needs

And these are my lifts ( all 3 sets of 8)

Incline dumbbell press - 68kg
Dead lift - 125kg
Squat - 90kg

Now can someone tell me where I am going wrong, because I have listened to advice on these forums that you should decrease calories by 500 till you start seeing results but I stopped losing body fat when I got to that point. Also is my estimate of my b.f accurate? I am 63kg and 5ft 7 btw.

Thanks in advance guys!

Best wishes

2

Also I have fucking man boobs and they won’t go away, which is very embarassing as I can not take my top off anywhere

3

It looks like your eating < 800 calories a day, which is way too low. How long have you been dieting like that before you stall on your progress? You probably have destroyed your metabolism. Start eating normally again for a while and repair your metabolism then try dieting a bit slower. I usually eat 2500 calories a day when I’m cutting weight.

4

Eat clean, start at 2500 calories. As long as your lifting hard you will fill out, no need to diet down.

5

Been eating for roughly 3 weeks like that, thing is if I eat say 2000 calories I WILL put on fat eventhough it is clean.

6

Because you’re running all over the damn place.
I don’t even put on weight with 2000 calories.

Your metabolism has slowed because of all the work that you’re doing and your inability to properly fuel your body.

Start eating more… 2500 absolute minimum. With all that work, I’d eat even more than that but whatever.
And 3 small meals a day isn’t helping either.

7

your hovering around 17 % bf at 63 kg…skinny fat is not in.

8

Please tell me that this is combined and not 68kg each dumbbell?

9

Wait hold on from the photo does it look like I am actually skinny fat??? Don’t think I am… Okay I will up the calories by 500 till I see results.
Also Is my estimate of body fat accurate?

10

Combined of course

11

Listen, eating 2500-3000 calories won’t make you gain fat. Eat 3000 calories on deadlift and squat days, then 2500 on every other day. If you get fat off 2500 calories you are not working hard enough.

That and you know more food stores more water right? When you bump up your calories you will be holding more water which makes you look like you gained fat but really didn’t.

The fat gain is all mental, your metabolism is damaged and you need to get it back to normal. If your scared of some water weight then you are weak mentally, on top of being weak physically from malnourishment.

12

Youre not skinny fat. Youre just skinny. You dont have enough muscle to get very lean. Obviously you dont have lean genetics. You need more muscle. That will make your metabolism better. It will allow you to diet while eating more calories. The more you can eat while still in a deficit the better chance you have to get raelly lean.

And yes theres a chance you have pubertal gynecomastia. But only a doctor can say for sure. It isnt bad at all though, dont fret about that.

13

[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:
Youre not skinny fat. Youre just skinny. You dont have enough muscle to get very lean. [/quote]

That’s the thing, there are guys at the gym literally twice my size and I can lift more than them. Why are mmy muscles so puny?

So yeah I’ll start eating more, see how it goes for the next 3 weeks and update you guys.

14

I honestly think it may be a case of having destroyed your metabolism from long term low calorie eating patterns. I did the same thing last year after a long term diet. When I started eating normal amounts of food (2500-3000 calories a day) I gained a little weight at first, but then it settled down and my metabolism repaired itself, and then I was able to get much leaner.

15

You answered your own question, it’s because you need to start eating more. Muscle doesn’t appear out of thin air. Gain weight to get bigger muscles.

Here is a free program that makes hitting your calorie goals kind of fun.

http://spaz.ca/cronometer/

16

[quote]K-Man32 wrote:
You answered your own question, it’s because you need to start eating more. Muscle doesn’t appear out of thin air. Gain weight to get bigger muscles.

Here is a free program that makes hitting your calorie goals kind of fun.

http://spaz.ca/cronometer/[/quote]

This program is great. There are plenty of calorie count programs out there but this tracks the vitamins, amino acids, etc. Very nice!

17

Hi guys, I’ve started eating every couple of hours now so either chicken fish or eggs. But, literally an hour after eating something I am starving . Why is this?

18

Well your body was starving before, so it is telling you that it really needed that extra food. Just eat more until you don’t get hungry, with all that activity your not going to gain fat.

19

It was already mentioned that you need to up your cals, but man you need to stop “jogging” it’s not doing anything for you but making you lose WEIGHT not FAT. If you want to lose fat do this, load the bar with 95lb front squat that 8 times rest 10sec front squat 8 times rest 10sec repeat 6 more times. That only takes four minutes and the fat will drip off once you add some muscle to that frame.