Dad bod to Grandpa bod

maronesax1972 wrote: »

What are your macros you are targeting and what’s your BF%?

I stopped targeting a weight about 6 months ago. Now I target BF%. If you want to get shred, the BF is what’s hiding it.

I think 13% BF and progressive lifting combined will get you that shred look.

Probably single digit bf to achieve my goal. I use weight because it's an easily trackable target, and I know what my body has looked like and been like at different weights over the last 35 years of pumping iron.

I plan on doing one of those dexa scans or whatever the cool kids use as I get close, right now it's just whatever the mirror says. We also did caliper measurements in December, but I don't put a lot of stock in that other than to determine relative change.

I got to 12% when I was in my early thirties, measured with the underwater weighing. I want to be a little leaner than I was then. My body weight at the time was 212. I was a lot stronger with a lot more muscle mass.

Right now I'm on a 1600 calorie a day with protein based on target lean body weight, 200 grams. So a 25 25 50 (c,f,p). Progress has been fairly steady. I only do 10 minutes/day of cardio, so I can always turn that up if needed, and I can always adjust my calories down a little if I need to.

Progressive resistance lifting has been mentioned 3 times now... I jokingly refer to what I'm doing as "regressive resistance lifting", since the weights drop each year (or vary widely), but Progressive resistance lifting (in its many forms) is what I would consider that I am doing. 😁 Always trying to do more, but basically just slowing the descent.

pierinifitness wrote: »

What I've learned in my journey, long like yours, is that if I chase athleticism, the body appearance will ride shotgun and tag along for the ride.

I agree that one's body tends to reflect one's lifestyle. Mine reflected weight training and M&M eating. I also agree with the prioritization of health/performance over looks. Most of my life I have subscribed to the theory that if you eat mostly clean, the exercise will take care of the snacks and then I wouldn't have to diet to lose fat, and it's been pretty true until the last couple years. Lots of physical activity and weight training has built a decent base of muscle for me, but adjustments for injuries and snacking covered it all with a nice protective layer.

Since I've always just "managed" my weight/bf and only worked out more, never really calorie counted and/or dieted to lose fat, I was pretty nervous when I started this process. Previous to the last couple years, as I started to get close to 225 (my upper limit) I would just eat less cold cereal before bed for a few weeks and that would take care of it for a while. Over the last year, that didn't seem to work as well. Even after I started eating better and using a protein shake again after my workouts (instead of just a breakfast drink. A coworker was training for a triathlon and so I ate a lot of the same things as him, but he was burning about 1000-2000 cal/day more than me, so I didn't see a lot of results from that. So I was nervous about the effectiveness of going "all in", even though I see successful transformations all the time at the gym, and I understand the numbers, I really wanted it to work. And thanks to MFP, proper guidance (and reminders of things I knew but didn't practice?), and the aforementioned Premier Protein shakes, success so far.

I'm glad for the progress...honestly a little surprised at the amount of fat I had to lose. Maybe a gentle tweak would have pushed me back to the low 220s...but a healthy reduction in bf wasn't going to happen on its own or by just doing more chins or dips. I had already tried that.

nowine4me wrote: »

You don’t look ANYTHING like my Grandpa. Nice job.

Thanks!

Finally broke though 195 today. New target is 185, goal remains the same lean look typically found in the 8-10% range. The last few weeks have had a few "free days" while traveling and camping, and the weight drops have all happened after these high calorie days. Interesting.

Meeting with a trainer next week for follow up measurements.

The last couple of weeks have been productive and Labor Day weekend was fun, actually hit my lowest weight since I was in my early 20s at 191.3 on Saturday. Then we ATE! LOL we spent some time at a family cabin and enjoyed a big sourdough pancake, sausage, bacon, egg, fruit breakfast and other snacks, instantly jumped to 196 then back to 194 this morning. I don't worry too much about water weight fluctuations after higher than normal carb days, but it's interesting to track. In fact, I'm planning on an instant gain of 3-5 lbs once I go into maintenance phase, since I'll mainly be eating more carbs (it's hard to imagine increasing my 200g/day protein).

Body comp goals are getting closer...just a little fat left under the pecs that needs to be gone before I'll be satisfied. Maybe it will happen between 185-190?

My heel is almost better, I've been jogging a little, but no sprints or sled pulls yet. Shoulder is still painful and squats with any more than warmup weight are hit and miss; it's very difficult to get the bar in the right spot on my traps to use any appreciable weight, so spending extra effort on the leg press. At least the shoulder will tolerate heavier deadlifts again and they are getting worked back in.

I did an "Inbody" bf% test at Vasa... anyone buying it? I personally don't think my abs are popping enough to be in the single digits. (the jury is still out on whether or not I'm going to shave to find out)