Sunday, February 10, 2013

FATBUSTER

You might be wondering (or you might not) what I've been up to the past month ... well.....it's not running. Okay I've run every week but not much, 10-15k, so what have I been doing. I decided to have a serious go and cutting body fat whilst increasing lean muscle mass. There were several reasons;

1) To increase my overall fitness.
2) To improve my body conditioning for future challenges.
3) Vanity - to look good.

I began just before Christmas with 6 HIIT's per week. These included weights as well as high intensity exercises for on average 9 to 18 mins per day. After 2 weeks I then began German Volume Training or GVT for 4 weeks. GVT is 26 sets of 10 heavy reps in 4 different exercises over 3 days in a 5 day rotation. This could take up to an hour per session. Then after this I returned to 2 more weeks of HIIT's

     The results speak for themselves. After 8 weeks of this training my Body Fat % has dropped to 8.9%. This was achieved in two ways. Firstly, the exercise routine just mentioned and secondly nutrition.
     I ate twice as much food in this period as normal and dropped weight and fat whilst increasing my lean muscle mass and yet hardly ran at all. So how was this done?
    Paddy Warwick, my coach, prepared this plan by combining Crossfit regimes, GVT and general targeted weight sessions. I stuck to this rigidly and when I visited California in January I just went to Gold's gym  and kept at it. U.S. gym's stay open 24/7 so there are no excuses.
   But what did I eat? I recently saw a picture that said:-

           'Feed the muscle.........Starve the fat!'  ... and that pretty much sums it up what I did.

Breakfast 1- One teaspoon of Glutamine, one Probiotic, two omega 3 fish oil capsules, 4 JuicePlus, One tablespoon Superfood Green Drink, 7 Almonds,5 Cashew nuts, Two eggs and Bacon with vegetables OR Chicken with vegetables Or Ham etc (Atleast 20 grams of protein) Once a week porridge with honey and cinnamon.

 Breakfast 2 -Glut -4 opening exercise routine (120 seconds), followed by one Chocolate croissant and two strong coffees.

Mid morning snack- 7 Nuts or half a greek yogurt plus half a banana.

Exercise - 2 weeks of (Weights, Hiit's 18 mins per day- 6 days per week)
                  4 weeks  of (GVT- one hour - 3 days per week)
                  2 weeks  of (Weights, Hiit's 18 mins - 6 days per week)
            After a workout a 35 gram Protein shake including Glutamine and BCAA's

Lunch -   Chicken OR Fish with LOTS of salad and a few nuts (No dressing). Some dry crackers with butter.
                  Tea with 5 squares of 70% Dark chocolate and 3 plain biscuits.

Afternoon snack - Slice of ham or chicken

Dinner- Fish eg Tuna or Salmon, OR Chicken OR Minced beef with 3 or 4 different vegetables- with 3 times per week maybe sweet potatoe or small portions of rice or pasta.
                 Tea with a few chocolate biscuits.

 Before bed- 300 miligrams of Magnesium with Vitamin B6

I drink 2.7 litres of water a day not including teas and coffees....and just for the record I don't drink or smoke....but you knew that anyway.

 If you do this for 8 weeks you will cut fat. If you just do HIIT's and no GVT you'll cut even more.

So how does it work? Its not a trick as its all science based. There is an even faster way - If you have a full Protein breakfast and NOTHING WHITE eg Bread,cakes,pasta,rice etc at all, for one month but eat as much as you want of everything else, then you will lose weight.
    My goal was not to lose weight but to cut fat whilst increasing my lean muscle mass, hence the GVT. My weight was slightly down but my body composition it radically different. For guys this means you look, feel and are stronger......and for girls the same, except you drop a dress size or two!
       High intensity exercise burns fat during AND after training for up to 24 hours, whereas long slow running burns limited calories for just the duration of the run. Hiit's also improve your overall fitness, strength and endurance. The shortest HIIT you can do is a Tabata (4 mins) and that is the equivalent of a one hour run.
   So why run at all ?......I like running in the hills, it's good for my Karma, life affirming, energizing etc etc...but as a tool to cut fat it's not the most effective thing you can do.
      I must point out that exercise is only about 35% of the fat cutting equation, the rest is what you eat. Remember if you eat right or 'clean' you can pretty much eat as much as you want. I have never, ever dieted...... It doesn't work because you are starving your body of food so in simple terms it hangs on to your stored energy (fat) and doesn't let it go. If you eat constantly throughout the day the body is not stressed and therefore lets the excess fat go into energy for your exercise......and so voila, you lose fat and weight. I get lots of comments about how people find it hard to eat a protein breakfast,it really isn't. If you had an evening meal at 7pm and then breakfast at 7am you just did a 12 hour 'fast', the body wants and needs nutrients, (Not poor quality Carbs like white toast, Cornflakes or, God forbid, waffles).
     It's really not that hard its just consistancy of effort that eventually becomes a habit.