Cut Begins Tomorrow

Today I squatted 270 lbs. for 3 sets of 5 reps each. I think I'm at my physical limit for now because I can *barely* get the last rep in each set, and I have no choice but to let out a primal drawn out grunt as I drive up on the last rep. My face is beet red with veins popping out on the sides of my face. Not pretty. Then my heart is beating like a drum for a minute or two after each set. One technique I utilize is to pull the bar down against my back when I'm pushing up on that last rep. It's supposed to trigger some kind of fight or flight response and it works. You feel that bar dig into your delts and back and somehow squeeze out the last rep.

So, I'm going to stick with this weight for the next month or so. Hopefully as I cut some fat I can keep squatting this amount of weight.

It's funny to think of how difficult squatting 270 lbs. is for me when I watch videos like this one (50 seconds in) where the guy squats 215 lbs. for 40 reps in 90 seconds. "Holy shit" is about the only thing that comes to mind watching that.

Hydrostatic Weighing Results

In November my hydrostatic weighing results were:

age: 31
height: 72
weight: 175

%fat 11.00353

Fat mass: 19.25618
Lean mass: 155.7438

I kept dieting down to 163 lbs. until February. Then I slowly raised calories until I eventually reached 3600 kcal some time in April.

Today my hydrostatic weighing results were:

age: 32
height: 72
weight: 187.7

%fat 12.9653

Fat mass: 24.33587
Lean mass: 163.3641


Gains:

%fat +1.96177

Fat mass: +5.07969
Lean mass: +7.6203

Ratio lean to fat gain: 1.5 (for every 1.5 lbs. of lean mass gained, I gained 1 pound of fat).

Total weight gain: +12.69999

Not too shabby for less than three months of work!

The beauty is that if I lost five pounds of fat and kept the lean mass I've gained I'd be at 10% body fat. Losing five pounds of fat is easy and can be done in a month. However, as mentioned in a previous post I'm easing back into dieting since this will be my first post-mass gain phase cut. My first cut was just post-fat ass. The point being, I don't want to lose any strength, so I'm easing calories down slowly. Next week I'll drop down to 2500 kcal and start watching the scale more closely. If I'm not seeing any movement after another week I'll add in thirty minutes of jump rope on my off days. I'm hoping I don't have to drop calories any lower but I probably will have to, so long as I keep all my strength gains.

Hopefully by September or so I can return to another mass gain phase. I'm going to do things differently with respect to my carbohydrate consumption next time, but I'll save all of that for a post some other time.

Easing back into fat loss mode

So for the time being I'm done bulking. I've gained a lot of strength and presumably some muscle, as well as some fat. It's time to take out the blow torch and shed the fat and show off what I've created over these past few months.

I'm playing around with some ideas. Today I did an intermittent fast, so I didn't eat until 1:30 this afternoon. I'll stop eating in about thirty minutes, and tomorrow I'll do another 16 to 18 hour fast. Calories are still at 3000 but I'm going to lower them slowly while still attempting strength gains, or at least not losing any strength. I'm going to do cardio on my off days. I bought this high tech jump rope by Nike yesterday so tomorrow I'm going to give that a try. I have a heart rate monitor calorie counter so I'll be shooting for 400 to 500 calories in 30 to 45 minutes of work.

Goal will be to lose a pound a week, possibly more as long as I don't lose any strength. I'll be keeping protein high at around 250 grams per day.

I'm still doing starting strength but I'm going to reduce the volume to one work set instead of three.

I'll also be carb cycling.. so I'm excited to lose some fat and lean out.

On July 10th I'm going to be hydrostatically weighed so I'll report back with the results.. I'm 192 lbs. as of this morning.. quite a long way from my low of 163 pounds back in February.

Until next time!

-Barry