Cutting phase

From your diary, it looks like your calorie targets are uncertain. Here is what I would do:

1. Take your weight, multiple by 10 : that's your calorie target
2. Divide your calories by 12, that's your protein target in grams
3. Divide your calories by 50, that's your fiber target
4. Eat whatever else you want to get you to your calorie target, while meeting your protein and fiber targets

Example:
Weight: 205lbs
Calories: 2050
Protein: 170g
Fiber: 40g

Things that help meet calories include:
-change the amount of times you eat per day, maybe you need less times per day and bigger meals
-prepare your own food. this might be difficult in college depending on your living circumstances, but I see a kitchen in your profile
-warm calorie-free drinks
-caffeine

Lift heavy 3x a week : follow a program like starting strength, juggernaut method, etc.
Do cardio 20-30 minutes 2x a week

Good luck!

Wait - you started at 164..."bulked" to 170, and now want to go back to 164?

You're spinning your wheels man. 6 lbs can be a 2 day water weight fluctuation for most of us.

And you don't need 179 grams of protein, much less to "go up"

jacklifts wrote: »

From your diary, it looks like your calorie targets are uncertain. Here is what I would do:

1. Take your weight, multiple by 10 : that's your calorie target
2. Divide your calories by 12, that's your protein target in grams
3. Divide your calories by 50, that's your fiber target
4. Eat whatever else you want to get you to your calorie target, while meeting your protein and fiber targets

Example:
Weight: 205lbs
Calories: 2050
Protein: 170g
Fiber: 40g

Things that help meet calories include:
-change the amount of times you eat per day, maybe you need less times per day and bigger meals
-prepare your own food. this might be difficult in college depending on your living circumstances, but I see a kitchen in your profile
-warm calorie-free drinks
-caffeine

Lift heavy 3x a week : follow a program like starting strength, juggernaut method, etc.
Do cardio 20-30 minutes 2x a week

Good luck!

I really dig this formula! Never saw it done that way before...

jacklifts wrote: »

Thanks! It's what made sense to me as the most straight forward approach, after plugging in my number into all the TDEE formulas, determining body fat percentages, reading Lyle McDonald, listening to Layne Norton talk about macro breakdowns, etc. The rest of my approach is to recalculate after every 10lbs lost. I"m going to make a blog post about it as my contribution to the MFP community.

I guess after say 12 weeks, according to Lyle you would take a diet break and eat at maintenance for a week?

I'm not sure about that. I read his book, then took a diet break after 24 weeks when I was really starting to feel stressed out. Unfortunately, I couldn't follow his instructions for my diet break (because I was eating way too little calories at that time I think), and my diet break ended up being 3 months. Anyway, my feeling now is that there's no reason to take a diet break if you don't feel you need it psychologically. But if you need it, and there's not a deadline, there's no reason not to take one (either on a weekly/monthly break as a maintenance day, or every few months for a few days). That's just my opinion based on my experience, which is much less than Lyle's experience training thousands of people.

@liveforjesus26
if you're 6'2" and weight 166lbs, in my opinion (just my opinion), you should not be cutting. the reason for not being ripped is that you don't have a lot of muscle yet. So just keep doing Ice Cream Fitness, eat a little more than maintenance calories, and do that for a year. see where it takes you. Look to start cutting in Spring 2017.

@cwolfman13
You're right. It is an aggressive multiplier. Lyle McDonald considers 12x a moderate deficit already, and this is close to 20% less. For my own personal experience, I like to see 1.5-2lbs a week off to feel like I'm accomplishing work. Additionally, the 10x multiplier allows for slip-ups, miscounting, not counting at social events, etc. while still allowing for weight loss. If you're very active, have a high metabolism, or lose weight easily, it's probably too aggressive. I'll tell you though, I had hired a nutrition coach who (after 4 months or so into the cut) had me around an 8x multiplier - which was really unstainable, and caused all sorts of psychological food issues for me. So, really, people do use lower multipliers. Even Lyle McDonald indicates that sometimes he has to go down to 8x for people who are very sedentary. Those are the reasons I chose a 10x multiplier, as well as it's a clean number.

My question is, you state this is your first "cutting".. Did you just come off a bulk? It looks like from your post above, and if so what was the program, how long did you bulk, what were your gainz during this bulk.. Did you track this during the program?

It seems that the scale has gotten the best of you here.. I say go a head and bulk and get you a program that will give you progressive overload and get them gainz going on!

Look you will probably look really good while doing your cutting after all them gainz!

juggernaut1974 wrote: »

liveforjesus26 wrote: »

I want to deceease body fat to 12% last time i checked was at 17%. Im toned now just want to keep building muscle and amd gain mass. Im 6'2 and i dont do selfies of before or after shirtless just not me and against my beliefs. I also want to be more ripped the program indo is jason blaha 3 times a week and increase weighhs everytime i work out by 5 like he says.

Then you need to step back and slow down a bit.

My advice: Cut til you're in the 12-15% BF range. Get about 0.8 grams of protein per day per pound of weight (so if you're 166, a good goal would be about 133 grams of protein). Get about 1/2 that amount in fat (say 66 grams). Set a reasonable calorie deficit. Continue lifting heavy. Get yourself down to 12-15% BF. Don't even think about bulking until you're there.

Once you're there, start reverse dieting until you find your maintenance caloric intake. You're still going to keep your protein and fat goals, and continue lifting heavy.

NOW you're ready to bulk.

Set a calorie goal about 250-500 calories above your maintenance calories.

Accept that you WILL gain some fat along with the mass.

Don't stop after only 6 lbs...

I second this. If you're not wanting to put on too much fluff -- or any more right now... then cut. Get down to a good bf%, something like 12-13% before you start to increase your calories again. Just take a methodic approach to it all and you'll get to where you want to be in due time! Keep it up, man. You've got our support!