Can I lose 10% body fat in 3 months?

SnicciFit

Money is one of my main problems because I can't really afford to buy more protein in my weekly shop as food here is very expensive and I can't afford to have more than 1 protein shake per day either as I just haven't got the cash for it.

Three things:

First, I think 10% is totally doable!

Second, eggs are cheap protein

Third, I've found that eating a lot of fat has helped me lose fat %. I eat apprx. 65% of my calories from fat and lost 2.9% in 26 days! Not just any fat though. I eat a lot of animal fat (organic grassfed), avocado, olive oil, coconut oil and butter. I steer clear of vegetable oils and "spreads".

I should add that my protein is generally around 20% and my carb 15%

strikerjb007

10% body fat in 4 months? I am shocked at how many people are saying this is no problem. She isn't droping from 40% to 30%, she is droping from 30% to 20%, I dont see that being as east as 4 months. I can see you getting close...maybe 23-24, but 10%? wow.

It's doable. She needs good training and 100% commitment on nutrition.

ambervaldez79

I dropped 1 % of fat within 2 months. i had lost inches and some weight but I was very disappointed to see the fat barely coming off... I was working out about 4 times a week doing machines and some cardio. I was also eating much better but not perfectly. I haven't checked my fat percentage since Mid January. I'm curious to see if it has gone down more but I doubt it will be a big drop.

JAT74

I am conscious of the fact that since 2nd January when I joined MFP I have been trying to lose body fat but so far it's only budged around 1-2% so I need to change something. I have been trying to follow the rules you set below but for at least 3-4 weeks I think I was eating at maintenance by eating back my exercise calories so I didn't see much movement in the scale, inch loss or fat loss.

Now I'm eating less and I am seeing movement on the scale and a little inch loss so I am more hopeful than I was before!

Tetonia

I dropped 8% BF (from 37% to 29%) in five months. My goal is to get to 20% by the end of the summer. My starting weight was 127 and I am currently 111 pounds. I don't want to go lower body weight if I can help it but I do not like how heavy my legs still are, so on we go.

Diet is a big part. I aim for 80-100 grams protein, 150 grams or less carbs, and ideally less than 60 grams of fat but I don't let the fat percent freak me if it is high. I eat 1400-1700 calories a day.

Workouts are 3-4 mornings doing a bootcamp type workout class, 2 weight lifting nights a week, 2 yoga nights a week, and 2-3 miles of cardio 3-5 times a week.

If you would like a friend drop me a request and let's compare best practices.

TimmyToskas

Yes you can lose/drop 10% body fat. You won't enjoy the 2-4 weeks diet but if you stick to it and don't cheat yourself you will accomplish it. You'll have to start with cutting all the bad carbohydrates: Sugar, bread, potatoes,rice anything with refined carbs/white carbs, Alcohol (that is if you drink beer or such).

If you wanna see results real quick in conjunction with your 1:30min workout a day in 2-4 weeks depending on where your stats are now, you should limit your carbohydrates to no more than 50g/day. It's gonna suck at 1st but you'll get used to it if you haven't done this already.

Stay on fat free foods/fat free milk. Milk also has sugar and carbs in it so be sure to keep it at a minimum. if you are only adding a little to your coffee then that's fine.

Add Protein to your diet, no more than 40-50grams at each meal 3 times a day. For example separate 10 large egg whites from the eggs and that will give you 40g of pure protein. Make an egg white omelet for breakfast. it has zero carbs and less than 300 calories all of which come from the protein which are utilized better. Stick to tuna fish in light water as it contains zero carbs and it has omega 3 fish oils which help break down the bad oils/fat. Also grilled chicken is an option. Look at your nutrition facts/charts/labels on each product. There are many options out there for you and if you study the labels you'll get used to the food options you have and you'll have a better sense of the portions you eat.

I would highly suggest you just do the Elliptical Trainer at your gym for cardio during that 1:30min you say you have available. You'll burn 1500 calories in that time if you have the resistance set to max. You can get better results and burn even more fat if you know your target working heart rate. If you have a heart rate monitor or one of those watches that you just touch with your finger and it tells you, wear it. When you wake up in the morning don't move or get up from bed, try to move the least by only using your arm and finger to touch the heart rate monitor and see what your resting heart rate is. It should be anywhere between 42-62 depending on your age. Once you have this you can use the Karvonen Heart Rate Method to figure out your target working heart rate, which then you can monitor on the elliptical every 5 minutes or so and keep your heart rate bpm in that range and you will be burning only body fat during your workout. I just gave you a rough point out on things here. I can get really detailed but would type pages here. My current body fat % is at 16% down from 28% last month. If I did it, anyone can do it. it's all will power and thinking positive always no matter how hard. Hope this helps you.

You can have green carbs which are complex and utilized/burned better for energy by your body such as Kale, Spinach for example.

ksavy

I will give my opinion that it is doable, but will be difficult. Even more so since you are trying to get down into the athletic range for a female. I dropped from 37.6% to 27.8% over 3 months last spring/summer. Over the 3 following months I only dropped 5% down to 22.7%. This was working out for an 30-60 min 4-6 times a week and really watching what I ate. Once you are getting into the lower half of the 20's for a female it will become difficult.

But as to what I did, I mainly did cardio at first, with body weight exercise. Towards the end I added in weight training. I slacked off over the winter and am just now starting to get back into it because I gained ~6 lbs over the months of Nov-Feb, so need to get back on track to get back a beach worthy body for the summer.

lacurandera1

No expert here but its not likely. If you were in the high 30s or 40s id say yes. It's just like weight loss in that the more you have to lose the faster it will come off. As you approach goal, the loss slows. I have been working on my bf % a year next week. I haven't lost 10% yet. And I train harder than most people dream of.

Don't mean to rain on your parade. You can def make lots of progress in 3 months. You may be surprised at how different you look at 28%. I know I was.... Good luck.

kellyscomeback

I'm going to rain on your parade, it's not healthy for a woman to be under 20% BF. Women naturally carry more fat because of our ability to have children. If you go below 21% you are considered Under Fat and that's not healthy:
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/library/blbodyfatcharts.htm

Aim for 25%. Lift heavy & eat clean. And set a more reasonable time frame.

UsedToBeHusky

You will be doing good to lose 5% in that amount of time. Best of luck!

BurtHuttz

I think your goal is ambitious. I say go for it, but please don't be disappointed if you find it isn't panning out. As far as results, keep going with the HIIT or intense cardio. Begin a strength program such as NROL4W or Stronglifts 5x5.

JAT74

Thanks all, realistically I'd be more than happy with around 23-24% as I've never been that low. When I was 122lbs a few years back my body fat didn't get below around 28% and now I'm at leat 31%, maybe a little more (although my home body fat scales actually tell me 37%). I think that realistically I'm 31-32% as I've used many other methods to test my body fat and that scale also includes water weight.

Anyway I'm going by my other scale which separates water and fat and that is telling me 30-32% as it varies from day to day.

In terms of diet, I can't really afford to buy things like tuna as here I pay 3 euros which is close to 3 dollars but that's only enough for 1 meal. The same for eggs, 10 eggs would cost me 1.50 euros and that would only be for one meal. I can't afford to eat like that unfortunately.

I do use skimmed milk and I only started having full fat yogurt recently because I heard that artificial sweetners are bad for you and I don't like all the additives in low fat products so I have been trying to cut them out. I do buy cottage cheese though which is low fat but there is only 1 supermarket which sells it within 30 minutes by car! Other than that I try to eat good fats like olive oil and oily fish or take Omega 3 tablets instead. I do eat too much cheese, peanut butter and meats to get my protein levels up higher but I can't seem to find cheap alternatives here.

I have a protein shake daily but that's only around 30 grams with skimmed milk.

I will do my best given my resources from now on but it is frustrating when the body fat doesn't seem to want to move. Maybe it's partly to do with age as I'm 38 but then I also struggled to drop body fat 10 years ago!

ksavy

I'm going to rain on your parade, it's not healthy for a woman to be under 20% BF. Women naturally carry more fat because of our ability to have children. If you go below 21% you are considered Under Fat and that's not healthy:
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/library/blbodyfatcharts.htm

Aim for 25%. Lift heavy & eat clean. And set a more reasonable time frame.

Actually women can be healthy in the high teens, it just takes a lot of work for them to stay in that category.

Classification
Men (bf%) Women (bf%)
Essential Fat: 2-4 10-12
Athletes: 6-13 13-20
Fitness: 14-17 21-24
Acceptable: 18-25 25-31
Obese: 25% & higher 32% & higher

*ETA That diagram came out funny but basically first range of numbers for men, second for women.

Tilran

I dropped 8% BF (from 37% to 29%) in five months. My goal is to get to 20% by the end of the summer. My starting weight was 127 and I am currently 111 pounds. I don't want to go lower body weight if I can help it but I do not like how heavy my legs still are, so on we go.

37% to 29% is much easier then 30% to 20%, and you did 8% in 5 months from a much easier range.

We are simply saying that the 30%-20% cut is much more difficult and would take longer then the 40%-30% cut.

JAT74

To be honest I don't really know what 20% would look like, a friend of mine is currently 18% and told me she's looking to drop to 10% and she's doing body building training but for me maybe 24% would look good. If I am really 31% now then that would be 7% in 90 days which sounds OK but I've never tried before.

jrmartinezb

I don't know if it's doable, but if it is it will be hard. As has been said befor going from 40 to 30 is way easier than going from 30 to 20. In my case I went from 93kilos at 32%BF to 85 kilos at 27%BF in about a month. It took a little under five months to get to 70 kilos at 17% BF.

Losing weight gets harder as you get thinner, losing fat gets even harder as you get leaner. In any case, I say go for it! Wether you reach your fat loss goal or not by summer, doing the effort will definitely bring its rewards.

Best of lucks!

jrmartinezb

To be honest I don't really know what 20% would look like, a friend of mine is currently 18% and told me she's looking to drop to 10% and she's doing body building training but for me maybe 24% would look good. If I am really 31% now then that would be 7% in 90 days which sounds OK but I've never tried before.

http://www.builtlean.com/2012/09/24/body-fat-percentage-men-women/

With enough muscle, 20% is really athletic for a female

JAT74

OK from looking at those pics I would be happy at 20-22%. 25% isn't a big enough change for my liking as I would put myself close to the 30% pic now.

19kat55

BUMP

jonilynn70

Just a quick note - 10 eggs for 1.50 euro and you said that would just be one meal. You should get 5 breakfasts out of 10 eggs - 2 a day...... that's pretty inexpensive protein - definately a great choice.