acragle Member

My routine is a 3 day - push/pull/leg spilt. I take a multivitamin, fish oil and an average of one protein shake a day to bring me up 1g per pound of body weight. In addition, I drink 1 gallon of water and spread my meals to average 5-6/day or every three hours. My macro split is low carb (@20%) with a refeed every fourth…

Absolutely what she said ... don't be one of those women that think they are going to bulk if they weight train .. it's the only way to recomp. and it is superior to cardio when it comes to fat loss. Learn everything you can from bb.com and follow the fitness models .. do as they do.

Hell to tha no

My advice, of course, would be to do as I do ... join a regular gym and start doing regular weight training combined with some running in your off days. Resistance training is superior to cardio when it comes to weight loss/fat burning. Xfit type training is great but like you said, it's expensive! Resistance training,…

When the time comes and you decide to get a bar for the home, I highly recommend the Easyeffort bar out of Canada. If money isn't an issue or you have a wide door frame, this is the way to go ... it has a super high quality build, generous foam, and lots of positions that make it superior to anything I have seen locally.

I see your point, and in all fairness I will admit that over the course of about three years and 50lbs of weight loss that I have almost always been at a deficit (as determined by typical maintenance calculators) and gained mass; however, I attribute these to newbie gains. In addition, my deficits were not the same as they…

Ha! This is where I get to plug my favorite read on all this debated hoop la .. Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle by Tom Venuto. There IS perfectly sound science to why you can't make gains in a deficit .. but the read is 300+ pages and well worth it.

Without ready the 200 or so responses to this widely debated topic, I will just say that I decided to focus on fat loss before building mass because I wanted to see what I was working with and didn't really want to invest the time and discipline required to build while cutting. I think it's possible to do both, but it's…

I think it probably depends on what kind of workout you're doing and how your body responds. I will eat an hour so before along with a pre-workout like Jack3d, but if you're not doing a prewkout, then your energy level (and thus your performance) might suffer if you haven't eaten in a while. I eat every three hours, so…

Oh yeah ... I forgot about smoothies because I've been on a low carb cut, but those are great w powder as well. I have a Ninja blender (because I can't afford a Vitamix) and will buy the frozen fruit at costco in the big bags ... really great with some silk or skim milk and vanilla powder! You get a carb and a protein fix.…

It's really hard to get the protein that you need without a shake, especially on a busy schedule. I buy the Muscle Milk brand of whey from Costco and drink 1-1.5 scoop with a tbls of natural peanut butter every morning on my way to work. This gives me 27-40g and the cost is $45 for a 6lb bag. You can also get 2lb tubs of…

Oh yeah ... a really great shaker bottle is the Blender Bottle bottle at Target for $7 ... it has a little springy ball inside that helps everything mix up well ..

It's really hard to get the protein that you need without a shake, especially on a busy schedule. I buy the Muscle Milk brand of whey from Costco and drink 1-1.5 scoop with a tbls of natural peanut butter every morning on my way to work. This gives me 27-40g and the cost is $45 for a 6lb bag. You can also get 2lb tubs at…

I concur. Chances are, if you're eating balanced macros throughout the day and drinking your gallon of water, then bedtime cravings should be minimal. I do 4-6 meals a day and try to never eat 2 hrs prior to bedtime. If I get a craving I will drink water and maybe eat a couple of nuts (not a full 1oz serving) or a small…

Agreed. In fact this is how I lost my first 35 lbs; however, some will hit a plateau and might need to think outside the box to get those last few percentage points of BF off. In my case, I simply could not get the scale to move unless I went down to 1200 cals and that's just too low. "At times, an aggressive calorie…

Try and get diet tonic water when you can for Vodka ... big diff in the carbs

Yes, 1g per lb IF you train and want build lean muscle mass which will help you burn more fat. A high quality shake will help get your numbers up, but real lean protein from chicken, turkey and fish is best. You just have to find the right sources ... fat free cottage cheese is good as is canned tuna and chicken breast. I…

On top of that, volume of food has also been shown to contribute to satiety, for 100g of almonds you get approx. 578 calories, while for 100g of potato you get 74 calories. Potatoes have been shown in clinical research to be more satiating than almonds. Good read, but I think I would stick with sweet potatoes/yams if…

I would think it has more to do with what your goals are and what your workout program is like. I do resistance training 3-4 times/wk and try to get 1g per pound of body weight spread over the course of 5-6 meals which puts me right at 30g per sitting. It's actually quite difficult to get too much protein unless you are…

I'm with rxj22 ... you need to keep an eye on your fat macros and not over do it just because they are 'good' fats. You might also want to mix it up a bit to regulate your fat. I have a pretty high fat/protein split and will often use raw almonds (1 oz. at a time), natural peanut butter in a shake (1-2 tbls), black olives,…

Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle is a good resource for learning about carbs and macros. I have discovered over time and by listening to my body that i am quite carb sensitive so have no hesitations on doing a low carb macro split when cutting. I went from 236 down to @ 195 before I plateaued and had to get creative ... carb…

I had the same problem after losing about 30-35 lbs. My initial weight was 236 and my goal was 185, but I could never get under 195 / 18-20% BF. The initial 35 lbs were dropped by watching calories and tracking intake combined with weight lifting ... my macros were monitored but not closely. You are basically right on with…

Fish is an awesome source of protein with almost no carbs and very little fat. I buy bags of individually wrapped tilapia filets and put in a shallow baking dish with spices sprinkled on top.

I have found that eating a rounded meal (but especially protein) every two to three hours works best to keep my metabolism where I need it to be to burn fat. Breakfast is not so tough even though I am not usually hungry first thing either. I just toss a scoop of whey, a tablespoon or two of natural peanut butter and…

Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle is a good resource for learning about carbs and macros. I have discovered over time and by listening to my body that i am quite carb sensitive so have no hesitations on doing a low carb macro split when cutting. I went from 236 down to @ 195 before I plateaued and had to get creative ... carb…

I buy most of my protein and healthy fats in bulk from Costco: 10lb bag of chicken breast, lean turkey patties (35g p!), morning star sausage, lean swiss cheese, 6lb protein powder, black olives, natural peanut butter, raw almonds, turkey breast sandwich meat or lean ham, chicken sausage, canned chicken, tuna and turkey,…