Wednesday, 28 January 2015

Weight Loss in 30 Days Without Exercise

1/28/2015 11:50:00 pm    No comments


    • It is possible to lose 20 lbs. of bodyfat in 30 days by optimizing any of three factors: exercise, diet, or drug/supplement regimen. I’ve seen the elite implementation of all three in working with professional athletes. In this post, we’ll explore what I refer to as the “slow-carb diet”.
      In the last six weeks, I have cut from about 180 lbs. to 165 lbs., while adding about 10 lbs. of muscle, which means I’ve lost about 25 lbs. of fat. This is the only diet besides the rather extreme Cyclical Ketogenic Diet (CKD) that has produced veins across my abdomen, which is the last place I lose fat (damn you, Scandinavian genetics). Here are the four simple rules I followed…
      Rule #1: Avoid “white” carbohydrates
      Avoid any carbohydrate that is — or can be — white. The following foods are thus prohibited, except for within 1.5 hours of finishing a resistance-training workout of at least 20 minutes in length: bread, rice, cereal, potatoes, pasta, and fried food with breading. If you avoid eating anything white, you’ll be safe.
      Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again
      The most successful dieters, regardless of whether their goal is muscle gain or fat loss, eat the same few meals over and over again. Mix and match, constructing each meal with one from each of the three following groups:
      Proteins:
      Egg whites with one whole egg for flavor
      Chicken breast or thigh
      Grass-fed organic beef
      Pork
      Legumes:
      Lentils
      Black beans
      Pinto beans
      Vegetables:
      Spinach
      Asparagus
      Peas
      Mixed vegetables
      Eat as much as you like of the above food items. Just remember: keep it simple. Pick three or four meals and repeat them. Almost all restaurants can give you a salad or vegetables in place of french fries or potatoes. Surprisingly, I have found Mexican food, swapping out rice for vegetables, to be one of the cuisines most conducive to the “slow carb” diet.
      Most people who go on “low” carbohydrate diets complain of low energy and quit, not because such diets can’t work, but because they consume insufficient calories. A 1/2 cup of rice is 300 calories, whereas a 1/2 cup of spinach is 15 calories! Vegetables are not calorically dense, so it is critical that you add legumes for caloric load.
      Some athletes eat 6-8x per day to break up caloric load and avoid fat gain. I think this is ridiculously inconvenient. I eat 4x per day:
      10am – breakfast
      1pm – lunch
      5pm – smaller second lunch
      7:30-9pm – sports training
      10pm – dinner
      12am – glass of wine and Discovery Channel before bed
      Here are some of my meals that recur again and again:
      breakfast-wince.jpg
      Scrambled Eggology pourable egg whites with one whole egg, black beans, and microwaved mixed vegetables
      lunch-wince.jpg
      Grass-fed organic beef, pinto beans, mixed vegetables, and extra guacamole (Mexican restaurant)
      dinner-wince.jpg
      Grass-fed organic beef (from Trader Joe’s), lentils, and mixed vegetables
      Rule #3: Don’t drink calories
      Drink massive quantities of water and as much unsweetened iced tea, tea, diet sodas, coffee (without white cream), or other no-calorie/low-calorie beverages as you like. Do not drink milk, normal soft drinks, or fruit juice. I’m a wine fanatic and have at least one glass of wine each evening, which I believe actually aids sports recovery and fat-loss. Recent research into resveratrol supports this.
      Rule #4: Take one day off per week
      I recommend Saturdays as your “Dieters Gone Wild” day. I am allowed to eat whatever I want on Saturdays, and I go out of my way to eat ice cream, Snickers, Take 5, and all of my other vices in excess. I make myself a little sick and don’t want to look at any of it for the rest of the week. Paradoxically, dramatically spiking caloric intake in this way once per week increases fat loss by ensuring that your metabolic rate (thyroid function, etc.) doesn’t downregulate from extended caloric restriction. That’s right: eating pure crap can help you lose fat.

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