My wife can’t believe the progress I’ve made with my weight and fat loss. I’d set a goal to get down to 80kg from initially being 90.7kg, in which most of it was fat. I weighed myself on October 8th, 2018 and I was too embarrassed to take a picture, so I only have some images from my cruise where I’ve covered myself up because I was self-conscious about how big my stomach was.
It was also embarrassing not being able to fit into some of my pants. I mean, I’ve seen it on TV shows and in comedies, but I’d never thought that I would go through that experience in real life!
It will be November 15th and my body weight is 83.7kg. And I’ll be honest with you, I am feeling pretty good physically and mentally.
I wanted to share my progress. I still plan to get to 80kg, however to get lean, I do feel I may need to get down to 75kg and then re-evaluate my strategy.
What has allowed me to lose this much weight in a short space of time?
Nutrition and diet.
I cannot stress this enough. Out of all of the things that I’ve implemented, my diet has had a profound effect on my results. You cannot outwork a bad diet.
Knowing what to eat, what portions you should be eating, and being accountable by tracking the calorie and macro consumption really makes a difference.
I’d originally minimised my carb intake (I used to eat alot of rice and flour. I then minimised it to brown rice).
I’ve actually cut rice and starchy carbs out of my diet. If I do eat it, it will be less than 5% of my daily carb intake. And even if I do have it, it will either be brown rice or sweet potato.
I’ve switched to fibrous carbs.
This is pretty much leafy greens or other green vegetables. I’m not a salad kind of guy. I like to eat delicious food, so I actually try to find creative ways to enjoy the green vegetables. So here are a few things that I’ve done.
I find the vegetables that I naturally enjoy eating.
This makes it much easier. I can then look at the ways I can prepare them for my meals. So the types of green vegetables I like include:
- Cucumbers
- Zucchini
- Spinach
- Cooked tomatoes
- Cooked Capsicum
- Onions
- Lettuce
- Olives
- Carrots
Because these are really low in calories, I can usually stock them up on my plate and I know that I will feel full.
I aim to drink 12 glasses of water a day.
It’s really important to flush out the toxins from the body and to give the liver the cleanest system so the nutrients can actually be absorbed by the body.
I drink 1-3 black coffees a day.
To ramp up my attentiveness, I drink 1-3 black coffees. I notice that this suppresses my appetite. However I try to drink 4 glasses of water for every coffee that I consume. That way, I can get my liver to function properly and absorb the nutrients that it is supposed to.
Exercise
I commit to a minimum of 20 minutes of cardio activity per day.
I started out just walking up the stair machine because I had an injury. But as I’ve become better and fitter, I’ve now transitioned into slow jogs on the treadmill (8-10km/h on average). Running at this pace for 20 minutes seems to do the trick and I’ve seen more noticeable results.
I think one of the things that has helped me is finding those exercises and cardio routines that I enjoy. So at the moment, I am experimenting with a few different options.
- 20 minutes of running on the treadmill
- 20 minutes of walking on the stair machine.
- 10 minutes of intense skipping
- 20-40 minutes of touch rugby
In the future, I need to continue building on my speed endurance so I can run intensely and burn my body fat more quickly. 2 years prior, I was in France and I was able to run 10km in less than 1h (5-6 minutes/km pace), which allowed me to burn body fat very quickly and got my body fat down to 79kg.
I’ve been focusing on intense resistance training.
I’ve gone back to starting from scratch when it comes to my weight training to make sure that I’m using the correct form and building the strength and development in my muscles. The first 4 weeks were pretty slow in terms of strength gains, however I’ve noticed in the past week that my strength gain has increased. This allows my muscles to have more time under tension with heavier weights, which forces my body to demand more energy reserves (the fat on my body).
I’ve also focused on training correctly so I can incorporate the right muscle groups. This also triggers more demand for my body to use up energy deposits.
I still need to improve my training methods and my splits, but it has impacted my overall health and performance.
Diet plan
Calorie deficit.
I’ve been aggressively aiming for a calorie deficit of 1000 calories a day. For the first 4 weeks, it has definitely been achievable and I managed to lose around 1kg a week. As I’m getting fitter and doing more intense workouts, I’m starting to find it a bit more challenging to stick to the 1400 calorie a day target simply because I can feel my body demanding more food or energy from my body.
For example, if I do an intense leg session, the following day I will be feeling hungry all throughout the day. But at least I know my body is working correctly. I just need to work out what food to consume so I can fuel my muscles.
Next steps
These are exciting times. It’s about another 5 weeks until Christmas and it would be great if I can crack the 80kg mark in the next 4 weeks.
My goal is to be lean. So I do plan to build lean muscle. However, I do sense that I still have quite alot of body fat to lose (around 20%). But if I am patient and disciplined with my plan, I should get there.
Do you have any thoughts that you would like to share? Leave them in the comments below.
Thanks for reading.
