Week 2: Sacramento, CA

Failure.

I missed the mark this week, and there are a number of reasons why (which I’m not happy about). But before getting into any of the details/excuses, here are my numbers for this morning:

Body weight: 170.5 lbs.

Bodyfat percent: 16% (27 lbs of fat)

Total pounds lost this week: 2 lbs

Total fat pounds lost: 2lbs (about 1.2% bodyfat)

As you can see, I’m still on track if you average my fat loss from both weeks; but I should have seen extra good results this week. I was actually hoping to see an INCREASE in overall weight and a larger decrease in bodyfat. The reason? Well last week I started taking some supplements to help keep my muscle mass on while I’m dieting, and they are: DHEA, ZMA, and Tribulus. 

All 3 of these supplements are designed to promote additional testosterone production and increase muscle growth. My ‘plan’ was to take these supplements, to slightly increase my calories (though adding only ‘good’ calorie foods), and to workout a bit harder. The results would have been increasing my muscle mass, which in turn would’ve burned more calories (and thus, more fat). My problem was that I did not actually execute ‘the plan’ as I should have. Here are a few things that caused my demise this week:

1) No workouts- Except for Thursday, I didn’t work out AT ALL this week. I didn’t mean to be so lazy; I just stayed at a friend’s place and got busy doing other stuff. Later in the week when I did have time to throw in a quick workout, my neck was stiff and killing me so I didn’t feel like forcing a workout. Also the time change really knocked my on my ass. I’ve felt jet lagged for the last few days since.

2) Bad diet- Not horribly bad this week, but instead of having one cheat day like I should have, I had a few cheat meals spread over several different days. This is partly because I was eating Lloyd’s gourmet veggie food this week, and spent a day at the ‘Natural Products Expo’ in Anaheim eating lots of veggie food samples. 

3) Not enough calories- This is sort of part of ‘bad diet’; but basically my goal last week was to increase the calories that I’m eating everyday and I didn’t do a good job with that. The first week I averaged about 1700 calories a day, and this week I averaged about 1760, which is only 60 calories more. The reason I need to increase my calories is so I don’t keep losing weight. I want to lose fat; but I don’t want to weigh much less than I do now. Also if I keep eating less than my Base Metabolic Rate (BMR, which for me is 1800 calories a day), then my metabolism will start to slow down and that will slow down my progress.

So for this next week I’ll need to increase my calories to (at least) 1900 a day and keep my cheat meals consolidated to just one day. I’ll also need to do better with my workouts; which will be easier just because I can stay with family here in Sacramento and they have more room for actually doing a workout.

Luckily, I’m still on track to reach my goal of 8% bodyfat in the next 6 weeks. It does get really difficult to keep a schedule because of all my traveling but I need to keep holding on. Already 1/4th of the way there! Need to make it that last 3/4ths now.