How To Approach Dieting Successfully
As we all know, dieting can be incredibly hard and sometimes you just feel lost – with no real guidelines for you to follow. This guide was put together in an effort to give individuals who want to lose weight some basic guidance and information. After all, knowledge is power, right?
Eat low GI food sources
You need to be eating low GI carbs – (fruits, vegetables, sweet potatoes, brown rice, oatmeal), healthy fats and lean protein sources.
Don’t starve yourself – you must eat often
This is the one people can’t grasp and if by the end of this you still don’t grasp it, don’t worry, just do what is instructed. You’ll thank me later. As in bulking you eat every 2-3 hours but you reduce the number of calories per portion. Apart from the fact your muscle still requires your protein top up to maintain a positive nitrogen balance, the process of eating, digesting and assimilating nutrients from food requires energy! This is referred to as dietary induced thermogenesis. By eating little amounts often (always including protein) you keep your metabolism ticking over nicely, burning calories and preventing your muscles breaking down.
Aim for around a 500kcal deficit at a time
Once progress has stalled then very gradually reduce your calories again. It is crucial for continued long term fat loss to not crack that nut with a sledgehammer. Use as little as needed at a time and leave the big guns for later.
You want to be consuming the majority of your calories especially carbohydrates around your workout (just before and just after)
This will help to shuttle most of those nutrients into your muscles and not get stored as fat. The pre workout window is the time when your muscles most need nutrients to fuel your weight training, allowing you to maintain high quality workouts and importantly to allow you to recover preventing sustained muscle mass!
In dieting protein is even more essential
The calorie deficit can lead to increased protein degradation in the body and so I recommend that you have between 2-3g per kg bodyweight, moving towards the 3g/kg end when calories are really restricted to ensure there is a flood of amino acids for your muscles to use. Consume high protein supplements that are low in carbs such as Impact Whey protein.
Re-feeds are needed
Don’t be a diet Nazi and never allow for a re-feed. If you do then I declare you an official diet retard! Cheat meals become of more importance the further into a diet/the lower % body fat you are. Re-feeding allows for whatever nutrients your muscles have been missing to be stockpiled up and your muscles can restore themselves. The sudden injection of increased nutrients also ramps up your metabolism. Reduced calorie intakes over time have the effect of down regulating your metabolism making it harder to burn calories and thus fat despite the fact you are in a calorie deficit! It is important not to abuse this tool. I purposefully refer to them as re-feeds and not cheat meals for that very reason.
Drink water and lots of it
Water has no calories and is an appetite suppressant, but it also helps the body to metabolize stored fat. When the kidneys do not have enough water, they cannot function properly. The liver steps in as a backup, but doing so hinders its ability to metabolize fat effectively. People who are trying to lose weight but fail to maintain hydration can’t metabolize the fat adequately! As an extra point, try to drink very cold water as the body has to heat it up to body temperature before it can be useful and this burns a few more calories. Every little helps!
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