Coming to end of goal.. now what..?

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ZakWray
ZakWray Posts: 20 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I just need some advice with my diet plan as I have nearly completely my weight loss goal.

Just over 5 weeks ago I was 193 lbs, now I am 176 lbs. My goal is 171 lbs. So i've got 5 more lbs to lose. I was fiddling around with my goal and i'm not sure whether to lower my weekly goal of -2lbs to maybe -1lb? The goal is rigid to a 5 week plan, so do I:

a). maintain a diet of 1300 calories per day and aim to reach my goal in approximately 2.5 weeks, or
b). increase my diet to 1800 calories per day and aim to reach my goal within the 5 week plan?

Is it necessary to have a 'parachute landing'? Or is eating 1300 on my final day then reverting to 2000 a day from then on equal?

Ideally I want to reach my goal as quickly as possible, i'm just curious as to whether I will be better off in the longer term stretching out these final stages?

In addition I've also noticed that different apps. are giving me different BMR results. I'm 27, male and 183cm (6ft 0) in height and some app's are telling me I need 2200 a day to maintain my current weight, some are as low as 1800-1900. That's quite a big difference, is there one app. out there which is official or the most accurate? I have a sedentary lifestyle it that helps.

Looking forward to your advice, thanks for reading Zak <3

Replies

  • melsinct
    melsinct Posts: 3,512 Member
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    I am within 2 pounds of goal but switched my loss to 0.5 pounds/week a while ago. This has given me time to adjust to eating more and when I do reach goal, I am only in a 250 calorie/day deficit. That means I only need to add 250 calories a day to maintain once I hit goal. It will be rough if suddenly you need to eat 700 calories more per day, so I suggest backing down your weekly weight loss goal and easing into maintenance.

    Congratulations on getting so close to goal!
  • melsinct
    melsinct Posts: 3,512 Member
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    I also should have added, MFP is not exactly truth. Another benefit of easing into goal is tweaking what your maintenance calories will be. MFP actually undershoots what I should be eating so what they say is my maintenance is actually below what I need to maintain and I would still loose weight. By making the deficit smaller for the last 5-10 pounds, you can figure this all out instead of increasing your daily calories by 700 to maintain then suddenly find out you are gaining weight.
  • njoithomp
    njoithomp Posts: 61
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    its probably better to stretch it out so that you can make it "stick". And one thought I had as I was reading your question - why are you going to go to a 2000 calorie diet? Perhaps you can do the research on how many calories at man of your goal weight should eat and set it a little lower than that so you avoid weight gain in the future.
  • grassette
    grassette Posts: 976 Member
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    My advice is to go slow, and then work hard during the maintenance stage. You don't want to trigger a response where you will be famished as soon as you stop dieting. That bottomless pit feeling is what leads to the weight gain of yo-yo dieting. Seeing you are so close to goal, take your time, go slow, and let your metabolism adjust gradually. You'll probably be fighting weight gain as soon as you stop, so you still have a long challenge ahead of you.
  • julzmm
    julzmm Posts: 43 Member
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    i read this from the BBC this morning, I wouldnt just jump back up to normal calorie intake
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14882832
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,293 Member
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    with less than 10lbs to go you should set your goal at 0.5 lbs/week. Too large of a deficit will cause you body to burn lean muscle as fuel if you don't have a large enough amount of fat stores. So you have to ask your self do you want to lose weight or lose fat. If you goal is to lose fat you should change your goal to 0.5lbs loss/week.
  • Purvey
    Purvey Posts: 13 Member
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    Zak, lose the rest of the amount you have to lose eating the way you are now. Then don't just aim for that higher amount of calories all at once. Start out adding a small amount every couple of days. Weigh yourself to be sure you are not gaining any of the weight back. When you hit the max amount for maintaining I would stop there even though you are not gaining. With your being sedentary you don't need a lot of carbs for energy so keep an eye on those, too. Congrats on the weight loss!!
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,293 Member
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    Zak, lose the rest of the amount you have to lose eating the way you are now. Then don't just aim for that higher amount of calories all at once. Start out adding a small amount every couple of days. Weigh yourself to be sure you are not gaining any of the weight back. When you hit the max amount for maintaining I would stop there even though you are not gaining. With your being sedentary you don't need a lot of carbs for energy so keep an eye on those, too. Congrats on the weight loss!!
    2 lbs/week is too aggressive, he will lose lean muscle with such a large deficit. OP change you intake now to avoid losing any more muscle.
  • AnneGenevieveS
    AnneGenevieveS Posts: 441 Member
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    when you reach your goal, set a new goal!! stay in a certain weight range with nutrition goals, then comes the fun part... you don't need to lose, so you can do fun things to challenge yourself and your fitness level! run a half/whole marathon, bulk up muscles, triathalon, run a tough mudder/warriordash/spartan (SO FUN!), swimming, enjoy life and work out and have fun with it :)

    Congratulations!!
  • Adsnwfld
    Adsnwfld Posts: 262 Member
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    If you need 2000 calories to maintain and that is what you eat that's it you will not gain or lose. You will have to experiment to see exactly what will maintain your weight.
    At this point in the game I would go by how your cloths fit and not your weight. Being a guy your goal should now be to put some muscle mass on and tone up a bit. You are within 5 lbs of your goal, congratulations, you have made it in my book.
    You should really judge your status by how you look, how defined your abs are, how your cloths fit, and how you feel.
    You might want to slow the loss down a bit so you don't have a will sucking rebound when you up your intake.
    For me the two or so days that I up my intake and start eating more pasta, or breads etc. my weight jumps about 5 lbs (it is just water weight). The first time that happened it was a definite demotivator.

    Let us know how it is going and good luck
  • solpwr
    solpwr Posts: 1,039 Member
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    when you reach your goal, set a new goal!! stay in a certain weight range with nutrition goals, then comes the fun part... you don't need to lose, so you can do fun things to challenge yourself and your fitness level! run a half/whole marathon, bulk up muscles, triathalon, run a tough mudder/warriordash/spartan (SO FUN!), swimming, enjoy life and work out and have fun with it :)

    Congratulations!!

    ^This! Switch to a fitness goal, or a nutrition goal. Tweak your calorie goal to 0.5 to 1.0 pounds per week, go 4 weeks and see how that works for you.

    Another incentive, get your Body Fat % measured by someone experienced, and aim for 1 % lower at goal weight. Or resting heart rate, try to get it lower by 5 bpm by this time in 2012.

    Within 5 pounds your clothes are probably fitting you well, so the number on the scale, is it just a target you are trying to hit, or what? People typically fluctuate 5 pounds, so you should be looking for a smooth transition to maintenance ASAP in my opinion.

    I'm within 10 and I've already been in that transition. My goals are now fitness and sports performance related. Hope this gives you ideas.
  • ZakWray
    ZakWray Posts: 20 Member
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    with less than 10lbs to go you should set your goal at 0.5 lbs/week. Too large of a deficit will cause you body to burn lean muscle as fuel if you don't have a large enough amount of fat stores. So you have to ask your self do you want to lose weight or lose fat. If you goal is to lose fat you should change your goal to 0.5lbs loss/week.

    Thanks everyone! Really that has helped a lot. What you have all said has made sense to me, in particular this quote. I've actually adjusted my goal to -1lb per week so my new goal is 1800 calories a day. This sounds about right to me. I'll stick to this for a week or two and then re-assess my progress then. I actually feel quite silly now asking my original question, should i stick to 1300 a day? It just makes no sense going from one extreme to the other. I'll just be asking for trouble once I hit my target and wtf, who the heck what's to lose muscle mass - not me!

    Thank you again this thread really has helped my situation Zak.

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