Hey... I don't count calories. I restrict carb. sources and count GI (glycemic index) of a carb carefully.
E.g. I'll eat German rye bread instead of whole meal bread and avoid white bread altogether. I eat oats (or oaties) every day - fantastic low GI food. I avoid anything with sugar in it, except for occassional stuff. I'll use vegetables in favour of fruit. I'll always avoid soda and even concerntrated fruit juice, that sort of thing.
I should be more careful about meal size and timing, i.e. 6 - 7 meals a day, but I couldn't keep it up and have 4 max.
You naturally restrict carb calories on a low GI diet because apart from oats (which I love) most other low GI carbs are not that tasty, unless beans and pulses are counted as carbs (tasty). Also body composition is better IMO - you don't lose much facial fat, you seem to lean without looking thin. Just my opinion though.
I thought I'd cut to 10-11% body fat. I am not sure now without strong hunger suppression supplements.
Thanks for the tip: I'll boost protein intake with 60g - 100g whey in the evening, which will give an extra 40 - 80g protein. I'll get some pea and egg white protein for this to spread the protein source. You can't go wrong on a high protein diet.
no not at all protein holds onto more muscle when dieting.
remember though, to calculate your diet say for example your bmr(thats what you would do if you stayed the same bodyweight) is (just a guess) 3,000...so you could take in 3,000 and do cardio for an hour a burn 500 calories..bam that 2,500 total intake because you burnt 500 k's on cardio..and you would lose that way....
or another option is just lower calories instead of cardio..I personally like to eat a bit more and do my cardio to burn because te cardio feels good and the health benefits.
there are many ways to gauge process and I am reasoning you know what you are doing because I remember your last log where you dropped body fat.
Obviously the mirror is the best way...another way that works for me from a logical way is the scale..I weigh every friday at 7:00 (shoes off)if the scale is not budging then i drop 200-300 more calories that week and re access next week. that is just some thing that works for myself. (same process with gaining instead of subtract add, and keeping body fat in control)
I agree about the low gi index stuff.When a person is losing body fat it is probably best to use this just to make sure. in the "off season" or calorie gaining mode I take in white rice, white potatoes,(no white bread) instead of brown rice and sweet potatoes.
remember they did the studies with the carb source only so adding fat and protein slows the gi index down..so a person probably could go into losing body fat mode with white rice and white potatoes, but I play is more on the safe side just in case.
Btw I got most of my information above from Dorian Yates.
where in Uk are you? is it close to Dorians gym? have you ever thought of going though a training session with him for him to access your form/technique? he is a master at this
