Finishing a Cut

Fasted

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Hey folks. I've been on a cut for a while and am starting to lean out. I've been intermittent fasting and eating in a 2-4 hr window 5 days/week, eat healthy on Saturday skipping breakfast and do a full body lift on Sunday and eat lots. I aim for about 180 grams of protein daily, eat low carbs and keep the carbs complex with a little cheating on Sundays. I weigh 197 with a goal of about 185, should be at 12-14% fat and want to get under 10.

Lately I have been reaching an equilibrium and while I am happy with the progress I have made I want to get my abs in and lean out more. Any suggestions on how to break this plateau and finish off this cut?
Thanks

Edit to add: I do some form of cardio about 3-4times a week and am having trouble recovering from HIIT and lifting so more frequent exercise is not too feasible for me right now, but I'm open to suggestions for different ways to exercise/lift up to 5 days/week.
 
john.patterson

john.patterson

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Have you incorporated refeeds at all? Eating low carb and restricting calories for extended periods of time can cause your metabolism to slow hormone levels to decrease. Adding in a refeed every 10-14 days can be very beneficial to help your body push through a plateau. I would recommend a high carb day on your heaviest training day, and consider supplementing with a GDA or nutrient partitioner like Slinmax to help your body utilize the extra glycogen.

Also, if you find that your recovery is suffering, its possible that you're overworking yourself. You might also want to back off on frequency and intensity for a week and give your body a rest. Think of it as the 'one step backward, two steps forward' approach. If you're going all out all the time, your body will fatigue and begin to respond less to the training and caloric restriction. If you give you body a break and allow it to recover, you will have a much easier time pushing through your plateau.

What types of cardio are you currently doing?
 

Fasted

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Have you incorporated refeeds at all? Eating low carb and restricting calories for extended periods of time can cause your metabolism to slow hormone levels to decrease. Adding in a refeed every 10-14 days can be very beneficial to help your body push through a plateau. I would recommend a high carb day on your heaviest training day, and consider supplementing with a GDA or nutrient partitioner like Slinmax to help your body utilize the extra glycogen.

Also, if you find that your recovery is suffering, its possible that you're overworking yourself. You might also want to back off on frequency and intensity for a week and give your body a rest. Think of it as the 'one step backward, two steps forward' approach. If you're going all out all the time, your body will fatigue and begin to respond less to the training and caloric restriction. If you give you body a break and allow it to recover, you will have a much easier time pushing through your plateau.

What types of cardio are you currently doing?
John, thanks for the excellent response. I think you may have hit the nail on the head as well. I used to have huge cheat days on Sundays where I was free to carb up so long as I got my protien in. I have stopped doing that as a means to finish this cut but a guy who has mentored me a lot at the gym told me the same thing last night: that I should be cheating more on cheat days and even incorporating a few more complex carbs throughout the week.

I have been lifting 2x a week and my cardio usually is 5x 1-2 minute rounds with on a heavy bag, light sparring or jumping rope. I could probably use more LISS. The rounds on the heavy bag have made it difficult for my forearms to recover as between that and my 2 lift days forearms are being trashed, and not in a good way. I took a week off a few weeks ago and felt great as far as recovery. I've also taken the last 2 days off due to work demands, but it allowed my forearms to again recover completely. It makes sense I may have to adjust my workout schedule to not overtrain, but why my cut was slowing to a crawl was making me crazy. I'm very excited to incorporate some more carbs in my diet and see if that will help my cut. Maybe another rest day will have to be had weekly. The lady friend will be happy as we almost never get to see each other between our busy schedules.

Again, thanks for the thoughtful response. I'll let you know how it goes in a few weeks!
 
UnicornDrpns

UnicornDrpns

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correct me if I am wrong, but from what I read you are :
-lifting 2x/wk
-cardio 5x/wk

i can try to help you more if you give me additional details such as :

- details about your lift sessions (how long, what body parts, high rep/low weight or low weights /high reps
-average daily caloric intake? caloric intake on refeed days?
- how much protein?
-height/weight?

I think you are doing enough cardio. When i first started being serious about fitness i was obsessive about my calories. I found that i didnt refeed often enough and when I did, it wasn't enough calories. I ended up damaging my metabolism (like the previous poster mentioned could happen) and it took me almost 6 wks to repair 3 months of damage. if I were you, i would probably up my protein. im pretty small and cutting and my protein is about 130-140 right now.
 

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