New, Young, and Need Help Cutting

Alright, so I’m new to T-Nation in the sense that this is my first post but i have been coming on here for a while for various support.
On to the topic at hand.

I am 17 years old and a football player and strength athlete. I am going to be at the Chicago Strongest Man in April 08 along with some training partners. this past season, I suffered a Brachial plexis injury early in the season. I am now healthy and preparing for chicago strongest man in 08 and also some smaller local powerlifting competitions.

I’ve been lifting since i was about 13. During football i was taking in my huge carb loads for energy with practice and games and what not. The problem is of course i continued those big carb loads even after i got injured and wasn’t playing football or practicing. When i got injured i was weighing in at a solid 245, I now weigh in at about 255 give or take a couple pounds.

The reason I didn’t discontinue my huge carb loads was because for a solid 3 weeks my weight stayed at 245 despite how much i was eating. I made the mistake of continuing those huge carb loads and I gained weight. So heres my question. I want to cut down to about 245 for this competition in April without losing a large amount of muscle or strength.

I know this is very doable considering at the end of last season i weighed in about 265 and was able to cut all that off. i just don’t know what would be the best way to go about it. Just as a side note, this past summer I was able to cut down to my football weight of 245 by taking basically two supplements and doing alot of speed and strength training.

Heres a rundown of my diet.
Morning - glass of OJ, Vitamins, 2-6 eggs or egg whites depending on how i feel, bannana, maybe a cup of yogurt, and maybe the occasional chocolate milk.
mid morning - protein bar or shake
lunch - large salad and some sort of meat (chicken or beef)
pre workout - protein and creatine
post - protein, creatine, and BCAA’s
Dinner - high protein chicken dish with varied sauce or whatever is being cooked.

I will admit, like any high school kid I splurge and those splurges occur occasionally but not too often. And some of you may know that with the schedule of school that i sometimes don’t always have time to consume what i would wish to consume at lunch.

Supplements:
Creatine HSC = (has dgc/glutamine built into it)
Iso-blast 800 =(whey protein isolate, that i am absolutely in love with, i partially contribute my massive cuts and gains this past summer to this supplement, and of course my hard work)
Animal Pak vitamins
BCAA’s - ceased the use of these considering the animal pak has BCAA’s built in.
CLA (conjugated leonelic acid) - I have some of this but i ceased taking this about mid summer amidst rumors that it can increase the chances of getting diabetes and considering it runs in my family, I backed off.

I know I kind of rambled on but i would appreciate any positive input that could help me.
Thanks for your time.

You obviously eat more than you have listed because you could not maintain 255 on that.

To lose 10 lbs in that amount of time is easy, just cut calories slightly. Keep a food diary and actually calculate your calories each day. You really don’t know how much you eat or how much you need to maintain. Once you know that, you can adjust up or down as needed. Remember that 500 cal/day = 1 lb/week. 2 lb/week is about max without muscle loss. Staying in calorie deficit for more than a few days at a time will slow your metabolism and make it harder to cut.

Stu