Howdy, gents!
Pardon the hiatus, as I have been busy working very diligently on a series of articles on the subject of modern marriage that you will see here very soon. But with summer fast approaching, I figured this one needed to be written sooner rather than later.
One of our forum members recently posted some pretty astonishing before and after photos of a recent body transformation. He had purchased a fairly simple workout program, and went from “gut to cut” in a little over three months’ time.
It was very inspiring.
When I first started studying seduction, I too decided to put myself through the same type of physical transformation. In addition to eating a healthy diet, which is what we’re going to examine in detail in this article, I decided to start working out five days per week and get myself in tip-top shape.
So yes, you definitely do want to follow some type of
fitness plan. So if you haven’t happened across Ross Leon’s article “
Having six-pack abs is most certainly not an absolute requirement to seduce women. But it definitely helps, and if you’re one of the many guys out there who want the triple-B’s (Bleach Blonde Bombshells), then it is important for you to know that having a guy with great abs is definitely at or near the top of their wish list.
Many guys work out furiously five or six or even seven days per week and still cannot trim enough fat off of their bodies, and usually the reason for this is that they aren’t paying attention to what they are eating!
To Track or Not to Track? That is the Question
What units exactly do you need to track in order to keep your intake levels where they need to be in order to keep cutting fat?
If you have read any fitness blogs, I’m sure they have pointed at four big ones:
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Overall calorie consumption
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Protein
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Carbohydrates
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Fats
Serious bodybuilders and physique competitors know all of this inside and out and many of them have little timers that go “beep” to tell them when they’re supposed to eat, calculators to do all of the measurements, and even food scales to ensure those calculations are correct.
Yes, that does seem a bit overwhelming, and it is if you aren’t too concerned about spraying yourself orange and hopping up on stage in a speedo with humongous veins popping out of your neck and legs. Although, not to worry – you can still have an amazing-looking physique without going full-on Schwarzenegger about it.
There are pros and cons to just about any method you take with this. Depending on your goals, the key is to determine what approach works best for you and is the easiest for you to sustain on a long-term basis.
So, how do you need to track the various things in your diet in order to get shredded?
I’ll lay out the specifics, and allow you to determine what approach(es) work best for you. As long as you are patient with it (even many of the experienced bodybuilders you will find only lose a couple of pounds per week when cutting), you can continuously melt away body fat until you get the results you want.
Tracking for Novices
If you just started thinking about fitness and dieting, you probably fall into one of these camps:
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At some point you realized that you live a rather torpid lifestyle, and your idea of a clean and healthy diet is getting extra veggies on your pizza.
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You’ve been doing 7+ hours per week of low-intensity cardio like biking or walking and living off of salad, and wonder why you actually look worse than before you started.
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“This is too hard. Am I a candidate for liposuction?”
If any of these sounds like you, then it’s likely that you aren’t quite ready to start tracking every little unit and should stick to the bigger picture for the time being. Meticulous tracking and counting is best saved for a bit later on when you’re getting closer to where you want to be and your body hits a bit of a wall and starts fighting back to thwart your attempts at maintaining a significant daily calorie deficit.
Instead of worrying whether or not you are close to your set 450 daily calorie deficit or have hit the 225 grams of protein benchmark that you’ve set for yourself, ask yourself these basic questions instead:
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Are you able to easily determine which food items are healthiest?
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Can you force yourself to eat more reasonable portions of these foods?
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Are you drinking enough water and staying consistent with resistance training?
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Are you actually drinking water instead of other high-calorie, sugar-packed drinks?
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Can you actually enjoy a cheat meal without reverting back to bad eating habits?
If you haven’t answered “yes” to all of these, there’s really no point in getting too caught up in measuring things and trying to set exact amounts.
If you’re 20 or 30 pounds overweight like I was when I first started working out and eating healthy, then simply abiding by the simple principles will lay the groundwork for you. It’s not the first 25 pounds that is the most difficult to lose, it’s the last 5.
Additionally, I know this article is about getting six-pack abs, however, if you just want to be healthier and aren’t too worried about being freaky ripped (or just want to be able to sprint to the bus stop without hyperventilating) then there’s really no reason to worry about whether the cereal you’re buying contains 44 or 52 grams of carbs per serving.
For many of us, this looks like a regression waiting to happen. Although, for many others, that is a perfectly reasonable objective to aim for, and far better than what the average man strives for.
Mindsets and Unit Tracking
If you do want that elusive six-pack, you’re going to need to diet a lot more efficiently than just using guesswork or estimates as to what amounts and types of nutritional components each various food item that you consume provides to you.
There are some mental roadblocks to navigate around when it comes to tracking your intake, though. This can make it harder to be consistent, especially when you hit the wall and can’t seem to shake off that last 5 pounds that seems to defy you no matter what you do or how hard you try.
I’m going to attack each of these problems in detail so you know precisely what you are dealing with and how to approach things to set yourself straight and get the most out of your diet.
“It’s Just a Little Bit”
If this is you, then you should know that even smaller fluctuations in your diet can absolutely make or break your resolution to shed those final few pounds and show off those abs.
For instance, for me, I know that I can maintain a healthy weight of around 170 pounds if I net a steady, healthy diet of around 2200 calories per day. But in order for me to get lean enough that my ab muscles begin popping out, then I have to cut that back to about 1900 calories per day. And if I really want to look shredded, that number falls even further to roughly 1750 calories per day.
There isn’t a huge disparity between 90 and 100 grams of anything, but even just a few extra calories here and there throughout the day can push me over the limit that I need to be to meet my goal value.
As far as physical fitness is concerned, there is really no greater frustration than looking in the mirror and being just a hair off of your target.
Like I said before, little differences can seem negligible at first, but they can add up to significant totals and throw you off big time.
Forty extra calories for breakfast, twenty-five extra calories in one snack, and fifty more at dinner (and likely more if this is your mindset, because you’ll be a repeat offender) wipes away that extra calorie deficit that you need in order to cut a specific amount of weight.
One of the things I’ve seen people do to counter this is to do extra cardio. This isn’t a good approach at all, because doing more cardio will just make you hungrier. There’s no sense in wasting another 30 minutes on the elliptical if you’re just going to eat back the 350 calories that you burned in cupcakes.
If you think you might be a “just-a-little-bit-er”, then you probably need a bit of a stricter diet plan than most would to finish off a good cut.
You Can Overdo It Too
I have seen guys who change diet plans more often than they change underwear.
They are constantly worrying about bits of protein here, scraps of carbs there, miniscule amounts of fat in this diet, and too much of something else in that diet.
I know I just told you that you need to keep a watchful eye on these things, but I also need to point out that overthinking it can cause you to lose sight of the big picture and put a screeching halt to your progress.
The hour you just spent changing from one diet to another to another to another only to finally decide the first one is the best could have been spent doing something else more productive (like some squats!).
Or maybe you are the one who changes his diet plan every week or two because you’re not patient enough to wait for results instead of simply switching to a new set of numbers. This is a different sort of wheel-spinning, but the result is the same: you’re just expending a lot of wasted energy (and probably not seeing any difference in your results).
Another form of “overdoing it” is depriving your body of too many nutrients or setting a target caloric intake that is far too low for your height, weight, and body type. If you figure that you can lose a couple pounds per week on a diet of 1750 calories, don’t go trying to speed up the process by cutting that back to 1500! You’ll lose a ton of muscle this way, and, believe it or not, your body actually needs a certain amount just to keep working.
If you are not getting enough nutrition, it will slow your metabolism down to a snail’s pace.
Tracking your diet properly allows you to balance everything perfectly. If you’re eating 2100 calories and you see you’re not losing any weight, then take that down another 100-200. Conversely, if you’re eating 1700 calories and feeling weak, up that to 1800 or even 1900. Do this until you find the right amount that will allow you to maintain a lean physique while not feeling like complete crap.
Not Getting Enough of “X”
When you cut your calorie intake down to an amount that will keep your body lean, it is of extra importance to pay attention to what, where, and how you are getting those calories.
Each type of nutrient (I’m only going to discuss three of them here) performs specific functions in the body, but interacts with other nutrients to carry out those functions.
The three I am going to talk about are referred to as “macronutrients”. These are things that our bodies need in large(r) amounts: proteins, fat, and carbohydrates. I won’t go into explaining “micronutrients” here, but, for definition’s sake, these are things that our bodies need in smaller amounts (like vitamins and minerals, for example).
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Protein
The word protein is derived from the Greek word “protos”, which means “of prime importance”. Your body is largely made up of water and protein. Protein is what your body uses to build and repair muscle tissue. Protein is made up of something called amino acids, of which 9 of these types of acids are essential to get via your diet because your body does not naturally produce them.
The number varies across the different diet plans that are out there, but I try to eat about 1 to 1.5 grams of protein for every pound I weigh (so for me, about 170-255 grams) per day.
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Carbohydrates
Due to all the fanatical low-carb diets out there, carbohydrates have gotten a bit of a black eye. For some reason carbs are blamed as the number one culprit for gaining fat. Carbohydrates are actually the preferred fuel source for your body’s energy needs. This is the same energy that fuels your workouts. However, what you want to avoid is too much of them. Make sure you are eating the right amount of these. Carbs in excess is what you want to avoid.
When you are actually trying to gain mass, most diet plans call for around 2-3 grams per pound of body weight. If you have a high percentage of body fat, this amount drops to about 1.5 grams per pound (which is about where I tried to be when cutting weight).
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Fats
Fats are actually the most energy dense of the three macronutrients. They are composed of blocks of fatty acids that fall into three categories: (1) saturated, (2) polyunsaturated, and (3) monounsaturated. Most foods are made up of all three, yet have one that dominates it and therefore determines how that particular food is categorized.
The types of fats I try to limit myself to are small amounts of things like canola (or olive) oil, nuts like sunflower seeds or almonds, or even flaxseed (which can be added to various recipes or even to things you drink such as coffee or juice). If you eat “clean”, lean meats and complex carbohydrates, while limiting fats that come from things like processed vegetable oils, butter, or anything else with saturated fats, you’ll be in good shape.
Some bodybuilders even add omega-3 fatty acid supplements to ensure a source of healthy fat if they are limiting themselves to mainly proteins and carbs in their diet.
It is extremely common for people to over or under-estimate their carb intake or their protein intake or even their fat intake. For instance, most Paleo dieters may be guilty of eating way too much fat (even though they are healthy fats) and then wonder why they still cannot lean out completely.
Keeping some numbers on things like this as they relate to your caloric measurements might just be what you need in order to turn that three-and-a-half-pack into a six-pack.
Your Body is Giving You Mixed Signals
Geez... I sure hate it when women give me mixed signals. Oddly enough, your body will do this as well!
When I first started working out, I was eating about 3000 calories per day, which was much more than what my body needed to maintain a healthy weight. I had a crazy insatiable appetite for things like potato chips and cheeseburgers and pizza and anything sweet.
If that sounds like you, then you’ll probably run into situations where you have an extreme longing for a huge piece of cake and you’ll write this off as your body suffering from some weird deficiency (there’s eggs in chocolate cake; it’s gotta be that!).
Physical hunger signals are hard to interpret, but until your body gets used to the calorie deficit, you will likely experience this. The only solution that I can offer is sheer willpower – it’s how I had to overcome it.
You just have to stop making excuses for “extra” cheat meals and things that don’t fit in your diet plan.
Don’t go devouring a pint of ice cream like a rabid dog just because you can tell yourself that it has dairy in it. If your body really needs that, you can get it from a much healthier source than a big container of Häagen-Dazs.
The more you can force yourself to will off the hunger pangs, the more you will teach yourself to control your impulses and fend off that pesky Snickers bar that keeps taunting you from the grocery store checkout aisle.
Meeting Your Summer Deadline
There are a ton of ways to track your nutritional goals versus what you’re actually eating. There are even diet journal apps for smartphones nowadays that will allow you track every last calorie and/or gram of protein that you consume (MyFitnessPal is the one that I use).
After a while, this becomes somewhat unnecessary as you’ll get better and better about knowing just about what amount of each component is contained in whatever it is that you are eating.
Maybe you can glance at a chicken breast and tell me it weighs in at 129.6 grams, and then put it on a scale and get a number that’s somewhat close to that. If you are extreme about eating the same foods on a daily basis, you might be able to keep yourself consistent without much effort.
I do recommend changing up the foods you eat though, so that you can get some variety in your diet and not get burned out on eating the same things over and over again.
Also, it is still best for beginners and intermediates to keep track of this in a way that they can reference it later. Otherwise, you just end up being one of those “only a little bit” types we talked about before.
You probably want to lose as much fat as possible, as quickly as possible. Just to be completely straight-up with you, if you are 20 or 30 pounds overweight like I was, this is going to be a bit of a journey for you. Like I said before, losing about 1 or 2 pounds per week is optimal so that you aren’t losing a ton of muscle mass in the process.
If you do feel like the clock is ticking and there’s no room for error at this point, then you need to work as best you can with your numbers and keep them consistent. Not too much, not too little.
So don’t go too crazy in either direction (eating 350 grams of carbs every day is going to hinder fat loss, just as only consuming 10-20 grams of fat per day is not good either). I make sure to take a Men’s One-a-Day vitamin and a fish oil pill on a daily basis so that I am still getting all of the micro-nutrients that my body needs to counter the overall calorie deficit.
Losing enough fat to have six-pack abs is not an easy process, otherwise everyone would have them. Make sure you’re watching your water intake and getting enough sleep too. All the variables (nutrition, exercise, etcetera) are controllable things, and if you watch them closely enough you can have that body in full-on beach-mode in no time flat.
Warm weather is a coming, so go get ripped, get noticed, and get laid. Have yourself a blast this summer!
Later, taters.
J.J.
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