Help me clear up some cutting confusion I am having..

[drew.haynes]

Background... I have yet to decide when I want to start cutting. I've added about 18.5lbs over the last ~4 months, which is the best progress I have ever made. My strength has made hugeeee improvements.

Anyway, I am what I would say is about 10% bf right now, as I have some fat but can still see my abs. I've never really been any higher bf% than now, as I really do not store much fat.

I need to figure out, for when I do decide to start cutting, how many cals per day to aim for initially to make sure I make progress, but still keep my muscle. Keeping my muscle is FIRST PRIORITY for me.

Also, I have about 20 ephedrine pills from a friend, and caffeine. Should I use this when I start to cut? I know it would speed it along, but is that only because of more lipolysis, or would I actually lose more muscle using an EC stack also? If you think I should use EC, then do I need to vary my calories in any way to compensate for that?

Thanks for any help... I'm not totally clueless, I just don't know some of these specifics when it comes to supplementing my fat loss, and when I really wanna hang on to muscle. Just wanna do it right.

 

[XcelKrush]

How old are you? You obviously have avery fast metabolism or good genetics for staying lean. Gaining 18 pounds and being at 10 % bf is very good. But as for cutting,if you want to preserve all your muscle dont lose more than 1 pound per week. As for cals, how many are you eating now? If your gaining right now, first cut that number by 500 for 2 weeks, then cut that by another 250-500 if your not already losing. For your macros, eat 1-1.5 grams of protein per lb of lean mass try to get some where on the higher end of that number. Around .43 grams of fat per pound of bodyweight, and the rest from whole grain/low gi carbs. Your highest carbs meals should be first thing in the morning and after your workout when glycogen is most depleted. Good luck.

Oh and Cardio too.

 

[Emma-Leigh]

You added 19 lbs in 4 months?? And you are ~10% now??? Meaning that you are either HUGE (so a gain of a few pounds of fat is not a huge gain of BF% for you)... or you started at ~4-5% BF and >85% of the gain was muscle??

Ummm.... Not sure if that is naturally physiologically possible to acheive..

Anyway.... No one can just give you a 'calorie' level. It varies depending on age, lean mass, activity, gender, genetics, your physiological state etc etc...

I first suggest you sit at maintainence for ~2 weeks and let your body adjust for a little while. This will also give you an opportunity to see how many calories you will need.

After you monitor your maintainence for 2 weeks, take this calorie total and decrease it by ~10%. That should be the amount you should start to cut on. Don't add drugs or stacks of cardio at this stage - just start with a calorie decrease.

Monitor this for ~2 weeks. If you are not starting to see changes, decrease your calories by another 5-10% (but 10% of the NEW calorie level) and continue to monitor yourself for the next 2 weeks.

As you progress you may then also need to gradually add cardio and also alter your carb level (slowly drop it over the time period). You might also want to start carb or calorie rotation plans as well (but that will not be needed just yet).

If you stall MUCH later in the process, then you should consider adding some drugs - but, remember that these are only effective if your diet, training and cardio are on track. They will not help you if you don't get the basics down first.

Make sure you stick to the basics and eat well - lots of natural, whole foods. Things like vegetables, lean proteins (seafood, poultry, lean red meats, game meats, eggs/whites, 1% cottage cheese etc) fruits, whole grains (or rolled grains like oats), legumes, nuts/seeds (esp walnuts and linseeds) and skim dairy.

Drink lots of water and stay away from the junk food.

 

[BulkMeUp]

Anyway, I am what I would say is about 10% bf right now, as I have some fat but can still see my abs. I've never really been any higher bf% than now, as I really do not store much fat.
.

How much lower do you want your bf to go? and why? are you trying for a comp?

 

[drew.haynes]

You added 19 lbs in 4 months?? And you are ~10% now??? Meaning that you are either HUGE (so a gain of a few pounds of fat is not a huge gain of BF% for you)... or you started at ~4-5% BF and >85% of the gain was muscle??

Or maybe you can see my abs above 10% bf. I always heard 10% is where you start to see them, and you can see mine, but I guess I must be above that now, because what you are saying does make sense. Idk.. all I know is I went from 155 to 173.5. My bench went from 135 to 185. My skullcrushers went from 67.5 to 97.5. Etc, etc, etc.

How much lower do you want your bf to go? and why? are you trying for a comp?

Probably wanna end up around 5-6%. No competition, just wanna be as low as I can and still look/be healthy.

 

[Dante]

10% is a healthy # to maintain..if you arent happy with how you look at 10% you are prob higher.

 

[drew.haynes]

10% is a healthy # to maintain..if you arent happy with how you look at 10% you are prob higher.

Well a friend of mine at school bikes alot and his body fat test said he was a 5.2% bf. He is almost exactly how lean I think I would like to look.

 

[Emma-Leigh]

Well a friend of mine at school bikes alot and his body fat test said he was a 5.2% bf. He is almost exactly how lean I think I would like to look.

It is REALLY hard to maintain at that kind of BF% - not without hugo-leptin and other hormonal issues....

How did he get his BF% tested?

 

[drew.haynes]

It is REALLY hard to maintain at that kind of BF% - not without hugo-leptin and other hormonal issues....

How did he get his BF% tested?

Idk what the method is called... it's in a big thing of water at my school.