Hans' fat loss journey

[Hans]

Hi everyone,

I'm embarking on a journey...a fat loss journey. I guestimate myself between 15-20% BF and want to go down to 10%. It might take about 3 months or so.
The reason I'm "f-uscular" is because I've been bulking and consuming unnecessary calories. The reason for this is because when you work from home and you have nothing to do except work, it's easy to get "bored" and eat/drink something. Easy calories slip in via sugar in coffee, sugar in smoothies, eating chocolate with my wife each night (I don't even like chocolate), "having to make sure I'm stress-resilient" eating, "bored" eating/drinking, etc. So when I logged my calories on my bulk, it was about 3000, and that was without taking the sugar and chocolate (and other unplanned foods here and there) into account.
Well, calories add up over time and here we are. I'm 103kg at 5'10" (177cm) and plan to rip down to 90-95kg, not sure yet, because I go by how I'll look and not by chasing a specific weight.

Plan of action
Small deficit induced by exercise and diet.
Diet
> High protein (for satiety, keeping the metabolic rate high, thermogenesis, maintaining muscle mass, etc.)
> Moderate carbs (not below 200g daily)
> Moderate fat (coming mostly from eggs and milk)

Training
I'm going to continue training the way I did before the cut, which will be 4 days of weight training and 2 days of sprint or sprint-related style training. I don't exercise for fat loss, but for certain strength, physique and athletic goals.

Lifestyle
Doing what I've been doing before.
Sleeping at least 8-9 hours per night
Getting sunlight daily (get my vitamin D optimization guide (safely and youthfully) here, (please put 0 in the price bracket))
Earthing daily
Being active and not sitting for prolonged peroids of time

Main goals
Get lean
Stay healthy or even improve health if possible

I'll document my journey here for you guys if you want to follow along. For those that want, feel free to jump in with me on this journey. Hopefully, I can encourage and motivate others to lean down as well.
Feel free to ask questions. I'll do physique updates once a month. Here is what I look like currently (Insta post). Although I mentioned that I want to start ripping (not gas) in that post, I haven't seriously done so yet.

Finally, I'll be sharing documents on how I do/optimize many aspects that I mentioned here, so stay tuned for that as well.

 

[Pedigree]

I would go for 0% fat milk if you aren't doing that already, full fat milk can be quite fattening

 

[tca300]

I like 350 - 375 grams of carbohydrates ( My caloric needs are around 3200 without exercise ) during weight loss. I think its super important for minimizing stress during that time. I also like 60 - 86 grams of fat, from dairy, and grassfed tallow or some chocolate, if not allergic. Stearic acid is protective against liberated PUFA.

From March ish 2017 to October 2017 I lost 51 lbs on a very low fat diet ( 3 - 25 grams per day ) 375 - 400 grams of carbohydrates and about 150 - 180 grams of protein. Weight came off every week ( 1.3 - 3 lbs ) my metabolic rate never slowed nor did I need to add more exercise. I definitely clogged up my gallbladder towards the end of that and it took a while to get digestion going well again ( too low in fats ). I lost a lot of muscle and strength ( too low in fats ) and started getting bad anhedonia until I upped my fats.

Daily easy walking, and weight lifting a few times per week. Bag breathing and red light also.

Overall, was a pretty decent experience even with the foolish pace at which I lost the weight.

Best of luck! @Hans

 

[Rasaari]

Low fat diet for losing weight seems the best in terms of retaining health. Belly fat is going to add on to the fat content you eat, so eating moderate fat would end up equivalent to burning mod-high fat. Eating some saturates, E and aspirin would be good to limit the released pufa storm and everything that comes along with that.

Uncoupling with aspirin, caffeine and mb hasn't had much effect for me in terms of losing weigh, I wonder if its due to aspirins inhibition of fat burning in high doses by inhibition of carnitine pathway, or whether you need to be in a caloric surplus to get the effects. I mean I did get increased caloric burning from it, but causing a deficit and burning fat didnt happen. Ive tried dnp in the past, which was really moronic thing to do, but the effect of even low dose dnp (200mg) is magnitudes different from a,c,mb stack. Though my uncoupling failure could be from excess endotoxin and suboptimal thyroid, which Im currently in the fixing.

Been thinking of doing something similar to tca300, once the time is right. Gained stupid amount of weight when I had bad latent infection.

 

[OccamzRazer]

Best of luck, Hans! Will be following with interest.

Have you considered long-distance walking or nature hiking as part of your approach? Seems that these could be low-stress ways to burn body fat.

 

[Cloudhands]

i want to lose weight! do you do sprints on your off days or overlapping with your 4 workout days?

 

[Alex Jaramillo]

I’ll join in! Im 5’10 as well at 150 pounds but I feel best at 140. I just started working out again so this thread is right on time. What helped me most was lifting heavy 4 days a week on a upper/lower split. Aside from lifting I had a physical job that I no longer work at. I would walk/stretch on rest days or jumprope, hit the heavy bag/speed bag or go kayaking. I used to eat about 4,000 calories maybe a bit more. My protein was 130-140 grams a day and I was flexible with carbs and fats depending on if I felt like having more of one or the other.

 

[Hans]

I would go for 0% fat milk if you aren't doing that already, full fat milk can be quite fattening

I'm doing 1%, else my fat would be too low. And yes, whole milk adds up calories quickly. It's even a no go on a bulk for me because I get my fat other places.

 

[Hans]

I like 350 - 375 grams of carbohydrates ( My caloric needs are around 3200 without exercise ) during weight loss. I think its super important for minimizing stress during that time. I also like 60 - 86 grams of fat, from dairy, and grassfed tallow or some chocolate, if not allergic. Stearic acid is protective against liberated PUFA.

From March ish 2017 to October 2017 I lost 51 lbs on a very low fat diet ( 3 - 25 grams per day ) 375 - 400 grams of carbohydrates and about 150 - 180 grams of protein. Weight came off every week ( 1.3 - 3 lbs ) my metabolic rate never slowed nor did I need to add more exercise. I definitely clogged up my gallbladder towards the end of that and it took a while to get digestion going well again ( too low in fats ). I lost a lot of muscle and strength ( too low in fats ) and started getting bad anhedonia until I upped my fats.

Daily easy walking, and weight lifting a few times per week. Bag breathing and red light also.

Overall, was a pretty decent experience even with the foolish pace at which I lost the weight.

Best of luck! @Hans

Thanks man!
I've done very low fat in the past, like 5-15g daily, and it didn't do anything wonderful for me. Neither anything negative.
My main fat sources are eggs and 1% milk, which is really not a lot. My fat is around 60g daily, which is feel is perfect for now. Can really cut it any less unless I go for skim milk and/or reduce my eggs, neither of which I'd like to do. I feel good so far (I started Sunday), but see how my weight tracks.
I think the main thing I'll change is carbs. It's closer to 300g currently, but as I mentioned, I won't go below 200g.

 

[Hans]

Low fat diet for losing weight seems the best in terms of retaining health. Belly fat is going to add on to the fat content you eat, so eating moderate fat would end up equivalent to burning mod-high fat. Eating some saturates, E and aspirin would be good to limit the released pufa storm and everything that comes along with that.

Uncoupling with aspirin, caffeine and mb hasn't had much effect for me in terms of losing weigh, I wonder if its due to aspirins inhibition of fat burning in high doses by inhibition of carnitine pathway, or whether you need to be in a caloric surplus to get the effects. I mean I did get increased caloric burning from it, but causing a deficit and burning fat didnt happen. Ive tried dnp in the past, which was really moronic thing to do, but the effect of even low dose dnp (200mg) is magnitudes different from a,c,mb stack. Though my uncoupling failure could be from excess endotoxin and suboptimal thyroid, which Im currently in the fixing.

Been thinking of doing something similar to tca300, once the time is right. Gained stupid amount of weight when I had bad latent infection.

Yes definitely. I'm around 60g fat daily and can't really reduce it more, unless I cut eggs out, which I don't want to do atm. I've been eating low PUFA for years, so I don't think I have a lot of PUFA stores, so I don't use vitamin E. I do occasionally use aspirin.

I also never got any fat loss benefits from caffeine, aspirin and mb, or any other natural uncoupler for that matter. They are great for increasing temps though.
Why was DNP a bad decision?

 

[Hans]

Best of luck, Hans! Will be following with interest.

Have you considered long-distance walking or nature hiking as part of your approach? Seems that these could be low-stress ways to burn body fat.

Thanks man!
I will be walking more for sure, and then I can also bump calories even higher. As I mentioned, I don't exercise primarily for fat loss, so any additional movement will just be a way to bump up my total calories haha. Move more eat more.

 

[Hans]

i want to lose weight! do you do sprints on your off days or overlapping with your 4 workout days?

Awesome man, how many kg/lbs do you want to lose?
I have separate days on which I do sprints. So Mon is chest and back, Tue is shoulders and arms, Wed is sprints and leggies, Thu is chest and back, Fri is shoulder and arms and Sunday is runs and leggies again.
So yeah, I exercise like 6 days a week haha. And it's because I enjoy it.

 

[Hans]

I’ll join in! Im 5’10 as well at 150 pounds but I feel best at 140. I just started working out again so this thread is right on time. What helped me most was lifting heavy 4 days a week on a upper/lower split. Aside from lifting I had a physical job that I no longer work at. I would walk/stretch on rest days or jumprope, hit the heavy bag/speed bag or go kayaking. I used to eat about 4,000 calories maybe a bit more. My protein was 130-140 grams a day and I was flexible with carbs and fats depending on if I felt like having more of one or the other.

Great stuff, good to have you join in!
Very nice man, sounds like a lot of fun activities. Eating a lot of calories is so easy and it really takes a conscious decision to not eat unnecessarily. I did a lot of unnecessary eating haha.

 

[GreekDemiGod]

I like 350 - 375 grams of carbohydrates ( My caloric needs are around 3200 without exercise ) during weight loss. I think its super important for minimizing stress during that time. I also like 60 - 86 grams of fat, from dairy, and grassfed tallow or some chocolate, if not allergic. Stearic acid is protective against liberated PUFA.

That is pretty much what I'm doing right now, except I restrict fats to under 50g, combined with a slight caloric deficit. It's working great. It's been 2 weeks and slowly dropping in weight and I can also see some abdominal definition when flexing in the mirror.

 

[equipoise]

In the end, it's all about CICO isn't it? When it comes to pure fat loss, it's all about the calories in and out. I used to think it was about "fast" metabolism. Sure, good metabolism can up the basic calorie requirement for the said day, but if you go over (surplus) you're gonna gain fat. No way around it.

 

[Hans]

In the end, it's all about CICO isn't it? When it comes to pure fat loss, it's all about the calories in and out. I used to think it was about "fast" metabolism. Sure, good metabolism can up the basic calorie requirement for the said day, but if you go over (surplus) you're gonna gain fat. No way around it.

Pretty much.
Things like inflammation, infection, serotonin, cortisol and prolactin can make a big difference in metabolism in terms of how much you eat, store and oxidize.
Foods like PUFA can also make a difference, but mostly due to appetite and blood sugar regulation and energy in the long run.

But yeah, CICO matters. It's just one person are less active than someone else and they have to eat less. Some else might be more hungry in general and not as active so it's easy to gain weight. Someone else might have little appetite and be very active and have a "fast" metabolism. CICO does matter, but it differs for everyone.

I've been thinking as to why @OccamzRazer can stay lean. And I've been wondering if his history of cycling didn't lead to a lot of mitochondria production in his type I and IIa muscles, thus he can burn a significant amount of calories by doing almost nothing. And when he actually does do something, it increases his energy expenditure even more than someone else doing the same activity.

 

[ursidae]

If I go much above 33% carbs I start losing muscle definition and accumulating more abdominal fat.

 

[jtoro]

Hans, can you share your cronometer?
Total calories? Meals?

 

[76er]

I'm around 60g fat daily

From my perspective that is low fat.

I've been consistently (about 2 months) doing slightly under 30% fat of total calories and I've been losing fat.

That usually means I come out around 100 grams of fat. I can fluctuate the total calories around 2.9K to 3.2K as long
as fat % is below 30%. Protein is always near 25%. I'm 6' 206 lbs/93 kg and I'm 50 years old.

I usually do near 2K calories before noon. I have about 5-6 meals daily, non particularly large.

6 days a week of resistance exercise (split into two 15 minute daily sessions to keep cortisol down) and they are also
completed before say 1:30 PM.

Scattered yard work and sports (backyard soccer and ice hockey w/ my kids and others) but sometimes significant depends on the week.

I'm down from 19.5 to 16.45 BF% or slight non-flexed four pack.

Awesome thread as I personally don't care much for strength goals but instead physique development. IMO having a good male physique
is 18% and under BF% plus solid (or at least "OK") muscular development.

 

[76er]

The reason for this is because when you work from home and you have nothing to do except work, it's easy to get "bored" and eat/drink something.

Yup. I've been working from home since 2002 but I don't have any magical tips.

Keep the work interesting?
Good ole fashion discipline?
Focus on the end result (in this case getting lean) and how it'll make you feel when achieved?

Note: My office is outside the main house so that does provide a barrier to the kitchen.