how much is your recovery affected on a deficit?

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  • MonsterToBe
    MonsterToBe Posts: 244 Member
    To be honest, I would not bother with refeeds. The real purpose of refeeds is to get more carbs every now and again to keep your metabolism ticking along while cutting. They are only important, and this differs individual to individual, if you are very lean, and become more important the more you have to drop calories. In any event, with the variable intake - you are effectively doing this anyway.

    Interesting. I had wondered if it might not be a little redundant for me, since I'm trying to pack the bulk of my carb intake in near workouts anyway. The main difference from what I'm already working towards would be staying low fat during the "window". So... my ice cream would get eaten earlier in the day instead. lol
    I only started doing refeeds when I had to get a bit low on calories and was sub 20% BF - but I also varied my calories as I noted above. The issue I had was that when on a low weekly average, I did not have much wiggle room so my 'high' days ended up not very high. I was varying between about 1,500 and 1,900 towards the end of my cut so had a refeed once a week. I actually only had to go that low for a few weeks so only did refeeds a couple of times. All the time before that I just varied calories based on lifting and did not bother with refeeds as my high days were at about 2,300 in any event, so I am not sure if I react positively to refeeds of not to be honest. I know I did not need them when I was at a higher BF% than about 22%.

    That brings up another question. After how much BF% loss should I recalculate and adjust my numbers? My TDEE estimates will stay fairly well up to date, because as I put new caliper estimates and weight into Fitbit it uses that date to calculate it, and I can look at the weekly averages it sends me to see if overall expenditure is changing -- should I just adjust my calorie goals to preserve whatever level of deficit I've found to be working relative to the most recent average TDEE?
  • Sarauk2sf
    Sarauk2sf Posts: 28,072 Member

    That brings up another question. After how much BF% loss should I recalculate and adjust my numbers? My TDEE estimates will stay fairly well up to date, because as I put new caliper estimates and weight into Fitbit it uses that date to calculate it, and I can look at the weekly averages it sends me to see if overall expenditure is changing -- should I just adjust my calorie goals to preserve whatever level of deficit I've found to be working relative to the most recent average TDEE?

    I would actually use your results - if your weight loss is starting to stall (looked at over a couple of weeks to account for water weight fluctuations), drop your calories by 100 - 200 calories. Your TDEE, all things remaining equal, will be decreasing slightly each week so at some point, you will see a noticeable difference in your weight loss. As a general rule of thumb, expect to have to re-assess every 10lb or so - however, this depends on the individual as dieting and weight loss impact people's metabolism differently. You will be doing this slowly so you should be minimizing the impact so the main impact will just be because you are lighter and as such have less expenditure.
  • MonsterToBe
    MonsterToBe Posts: 244 Member
    Very clear and helpful -- thank you again. :o)
  • Sarauk2sf
    Sarauk2sf Posts: 28,072 Member
    Locking as I think (hope) you got your questions answered and to help us track open/active threads better. If you want to add anything, please PM either myself or SideSteel, including the link, and we will reopen.
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