Cal deficit and protein requirements on cut

[Rockslide]

Curious what kind of calorie deficits most people on here target while cutting. Both blasting and off/cruise.

also wondering how much protein you are targeting as well as body weight?

 

[Whisky]

Cutting on gear I’d sometimes be more aggressive around the deficit shooting for 500 cals, if I wasn’t on gear I’d shoot for 250 cals.

I find the key is understanding how maintenance (and therefore what is a deficit) changes during the cut.

in terms of protein, I try to stay high regardless. Even more on a cut though. 1g per lb bw is a minimum for anyone (imo), I shoot for 1.5 - 2g per lb bw. Means around 300 - 400 per day.

 

[KvanH]

Cutting on gear I’d sometimes be more aggressive around the deficit shooting for 500 cals, if I wasn’t on gear I’d shoot for 250 cals.

I find the key is understanding how maintenance (and therefore what is a deficit) changes during the cut.

in terms of protein, I try to stay high regardless. Even more on a cut though. 1g per lb bw is a minimum for anyone (imo), I shoot for 1.5 - 2g per lb bw. Means around 300 - 400 per day.

Good point on the change in metabolism and maintenance level. You have to adjust the caloric intake as you go. I allways shoot for about -500 kcal when on a cut wether using gear or not. Well I haven't done a cut without some type of ped in years so I don't actually know how I would do it now if not using any.

Wow, that's a lot of protein! When I'm on a cut I basically eat the same as when I'm not on a cut, but I decrease the amount of carbs and up the protein intake a bit. I consume about 1 g of protein per 1 lb of bw when on a cut. So I get about 200 g of protein a day.

 

[Whisky]

Good point on the change in metabolism and maintenance level. You have to adjust the caloric intake as you go. I allways shoot for about -500 kcal when on a cut wether using gear or not. Well I haven't done a cut without some type of ped in years so I don't actually know how I would do it now if not using any.

Wow, that's a lot of protein! When I'm on a cut I basically eat the same as when I'm not on a cut, but I decrease the amount of carbs and up the protein intake a bit. I consume about 1 g of protein per 1 lb of bw when on a cut. So I get about 200 g of protein a day.

yeah my protein intake is definitely on the high side, over the years I’ve established that’s the best for results for me (it satisfies me more on a cut for sure). Tough to actually hit that number though.

im like you though, when I move into a cut I basically just reduce carbs and maybe increase protein if it’s been a bit lower than normal, certainly early on that’s all I need to do.

 

[Mathb33]

First mistake people do in a cut IMO is starting in a too big deficit. That internet broscience idea where -500 calories is a good starting point is a good example of that. Why would you do that? Ideally you want to start at maintenance or 100-200 calories under maintenance allowing you the maximum room to play with food. Let’s say your maintenance is 2900. Why would you start at 2400 calories if you’d still losing weight at 2700 calories? That’s IMO an immense mistake that’s going to cost you the whole cycle. After that, as whisky said it’s simply evaluating on a weekly basis if you’re steadily losing weight and if you’re not you slowly but surely take off carbs and toy around with macros.

 

[KvanH]

yeah my protein intake is definitely on the high side, over the years I’ve established that’s the best for results for me (it satisfies me more on a cut for sure). Tough to actually hit that number though.

im like you though, when I move into a cut I basically just reduce carbs and maybe increase protein if it’s been a bit lower than normal, certainly early on that’s all I need to do.

Yeah you kind of have to find what works for you. I used to be way too scared of carbs and made my cuts a hell. I tried ketogenic -> energy like a 90 yo after a marathon and pissed off like @CroLifter on Clomid. Did several low carb diets -> again low energy, shitty workouts and just a bad time. When I did my first cut with a coach we had a lot more carbs in the diet relative to what I had eaten before on cuts and workouts and well being were a lot better! Weight dropped about the same or a little slower, but saved more muscle. After that I have been doing all my cuts with the macro balance he laid out. Works for me.

 

[Whisky]

Yeah you kind of have to find what works for you. I used to be way too scared of carbs and made my cuts a hell. I tried ketogenic -> energy like a 90 yo after a marathon and pissed off like @CroLifter on Clomid. Did several low carb diets -> again low energy, shitty workouts and just a bad time. When I did my first cut with a coach we had a lot more carbs in the diet relative to what I had eaten before on cuts and workouts and well being were a lot better! Weight dropped about the same or a little slower, but saved more muscle. After that I have been doing all my cuts with the macro balance he laid out. Works for me.

yep been there bro literally did exactly the same early on. Never keto exactly but 50-75g carbs at most.

I personally call myself moderate carbs now, cutting I’d tend to end up on 100-150g per day at the lowest. Compared to the typical western diet even my bulks at 300-400g carbs would probably be considered lowish but I definitely went from the ‘purge all carbs’ approach to realising I do better with a decent amount in me

 

[Rockslide]

So a deficit of 500 cals per day would be around 1lb of loss. Ideally all fat but realistically even blasting some muscle loss is likely to be expected. Now 8lbs of pure fat loss in someone 200lbs that is 20% BF would put ya at 192 and 16%. Pretty noticeable results if you didn’t lose any muscle . Still such a painfully slow process

i agree with the above that it can be pretty difficult to hit the moving target in regards to ones metabolic rate that changes with dieting

 

[Mathb33]

So a deficit of 500 cals per day would be around 1lb of loss. Ideally all fat but realistically even blasting some muscle loss is likely to be expected. Now 8lbs of pure fat loss in someone 200lbs that is 20% BF would put ya at 192 and 16%. Pretty noticeable results if you didn’t lose any muscle . Still such a painfully slow process

i agree with the above that it can be pretty difficult to hit the moving target in regards to ones metabolic rate that changes with dieting

So much bro science in all you said. First of all you can’t calculate simply like that 200 lbs 20% will = this. At 20% the first 10-12 lbs are going to be PURELY WATER, absolutely no fat tissue. Once the water is out you could start guesstimating at what lbs you would be at a certain % bf. Also I’ll repeat starting directly day 1 at a 500 calories deficit is a huge newbie mistake an absolutely 0 decent coaches would do that.

 

[Rockslide]

No I’m with you. But 20% at 200 is 40lbs of fat and 160 lbs of lean tissue which includes muscle, water, and bone.

in the thermodynamics world 3500 cals is a pound. Unfortunately like you said it’s not that easy. Eating 500 cals under doesn’t magically equal a pound of fat per week. If it did the math above would hold. Obviously some is water, some is muscle, and some is fat. Ideally we would like to optimize it and have it be as much fat as possible with no muscle, then water is replaceable/can be manipulated.

losing weight is easy (a lot always ends up being muscle though in most people). Losing body fat while maintaining muscle is extremely difficult (unless you are super obese).

Now I realize it will be dependent on someone’s starting body fat percentage but what do you think the best case scenario would be for someone 200lbs and 20% BF per month in terms to lbs of fat loss as well as muscle loss

 

[Mathb33]

No I’m with you. But 20% at 200 is 40lbs of fat and 160 lbs of lean tissue which includes muscle, water, and bone.

in the thermodynamics world 3500 cals is a pound. Unfortunately like you said it’s not that easy. Eating 500 cals under doesn’t magically equal a pound of fat per week. If it did the math above would hold. Obviously some is water, some is muscle, and some is fat. Ideally we would like to optimize it and have it be as much fat as possible with no muscle, then water is replaceable/can be manipulated.

losing weight is easy (a lot always ends up being muscle though in most people). Losing body fat while maintaining muscle is extremely difficult (unless you are super obese).

Now I realize it will be dependent on someone’s starting body fat percentage but what do you think the best case scenario would be for someone 200lbs and 20% BF per month in terms to lbs of fat loss as well as muscle loss

It’s entirely different for everybody. For exemple when I get on cut, my coach usually simply set back my calories to maintenance(not even in a deficit) and for the first week I’ll lose 3-4 lbs of water. Usually week 2 he proceeds to drop probably 150-200 calories down from maintenance and from this point out the idea is to steadily lose weight on a weekly basis WHILE KEEPING YOUR CALORIES AS HIGH AS POSSIBLE. Sure I’ll end up at 2000 calories week 10. But my cut will be much more effective that way compared to someone dropping too soon, too fast, which at a point will kill his metabolism, make him lose muscle and basically suffer much more during his cut. I think you should find what’s your maintenance, which itself is way harder than most people think and then I’d start possibly at like 100-150 calories under that. Every 7 days you update if needed. The first 4 weeks you could easily lose more than 2 lbs a week. After that I would aim for 2 to 2.5 lbs a week.

 

[Rockslide]

That’s solid advice.

also agree that finding true maintenance is very hard. Even harder if you do a lot of cardio as well as different intensities of cardio. Wearable tech provide some advantage but is still grossly inaccurate on the absolute number and really only shows a trend as the absolute number can be misleading

 

[KvanH]

So much bro science in all you said. First of all you can’t calculate simply like that 200 lbs 20% will = this. At 20% the first 10-12 lbs are going to be PURELY WATER, absolutely no fat tissue. Once the water is out you could start guesstimating at what lbs you would be at a certain % bf. Also I’ll repeat starting directly day 1 at a 500 calories deficit is a huge newbie mistake an absolutely 0 decent coaches would do that.

To be fair he said "8 pounds of pure fat loss". So IF shredding 8 lbs of fat while not loosing muscle mass and when getting back to maintenance and back to normal hydration level/full glycogen storages etc. and the scale is at 192 lbs and starting point was 200 lbs with bf of 20%, then the end result would be 16,66% -> 17% bf. Highly theorical and not really important on a practical level, but not incorrect per se.

About the calorie deficit starting point I agree with you, but it's allways an estimate anyways on what is your maintenance level. And the calorie usage (for a lack of better term) varies from day to day also, while with planned diets the caloric intake is usually the same everyday, so theres differences on the amount of deficit day to day.

I think the amount of water weight lost in the beginning depends on how fast the weight drops and a bit on the diet also. I would bet my left nut that as a approx 200 lbs dude I have lost at least 1 or 2 pounds of fat before I have lost 10 lbs of weight.

So in general I agree and think you bring up good points here, but you're being a bit blunt and over simplifying on some of these statements, imho.

 

[Rockslide]

Yeah purely theoretical calculations. Ya know it’s funny that so much of the exercise physiology literature just says... 3500 cals= 1 lbs. Eat 500 below maintenance and you will lose 1 lbs a week. Just doesn’t work that way. And even if it did a lot is muscle so body fat percentage doesn’t drop much.

I do think the above thermodynamic principle holds a little truer when trying to add mass... but again won’t discriminate between fat and muscle and the higher you go above maintenance when adding the more of what you add will be fat. When talking about losing though in the super obese people who are 40-50% BF I think it holds a little truer because being sedentary at 350lbs and 50% BF you just don’t have muscle to lose.

 

[Mathb33]

To be fair he said "8 pounds of pure fat loss". So IF shredding 8 lbs of fat while not loosing muscle mass and when getting back to maintenance and back to normal hydration level/full glycogen storages etc. and the scale is at 192 lbs and starting point was 200 lbs with bf of 20%, then the end result would be 16,66% -> 17% bf. Highly theorical and not really important on a practical level, but not incorrect per se.

About the calorie deficit starting point I agree with you, but it's allways an estimate anyways on what is your maintenance level. And the calorie usage (for a lack of better term) varies from day to day also, while with planned diets the caloric intake is usually the same everyday, so theres differences on the amount of deficit day to day.

I think the amount of water weight lost in the beginning depends on how fast the weight drops and a bit on the diet also. I would bet my left nut that as a approx 200 lbs dude I have lost at least 1 or 2 pounds of fat before I have lost 10 lbs of weight.

So in general I agree and think you bring up good points here, but you're being a bit blunt and over simplifying on some of these statements, imho.

Indeed everything is simplified but I am talking to someone who’s obviously new to the subject And It’s easier to understand that way. Plus, we are not talking about a competitive bodybuilding who’s looking to go from 8% to 4%. We are talking about a guy at 20% that’s looking to get in decent shape at 15%. No need to dig very deep

 

[jrock645]

Whatever deficit allows me to lose weight at .7-1% of BW per week.

 

[jrock645]

Yeah purely theoretical calculations. Ya know it’s funny that so much of the exercise physiology literature just says... 3500 cals= 1 lbs. Eat 500 below maintenance and you will lose 1 lbs a week. Just doesn’t work that way. And even if it did a lot is muscle so body fat percentage doesn’t drop much.

I do think the above thermodynamic principle holds a little truer when trying to add mass... but again won’t discriminate between fat and muscle and the higher you go above maintenance when adding the more of what you add will be fat. When talking about losing though in the super obese people who are 40-50% BF I think it holds a little truer because being sedentary at 350lbs and 50% BF you just don’t have muscle to lose.

That’s the other thing... this whole 3500 cals is the approximate amount of energy in BODYWEIGHT. It doesn’t translate directly to fat, or more importantly adipose tissue. Pure fat, given that we know a gram of fat contains 9 cals is a little over 4,000 calories. Adipose tissue isn’t pure fat, it contains water, protein and even some glycogen. Adipose tissue actually contains a little over 3700 calories.

 

[KvanH]

It’s entirely different for everybody. For exemple when I get on cut, my coach usually simply set back my calories to maintenance(not even in a deficit) and for the first week I’ll lose 3-4 lbs of water. Usually week 2 he proceeds to drop probably 150-200 calories down from maintenance and from this point out the idea is to steadily lose weight on a weekly basis WHILE KEEPING YOUR CALORIES AS HIGH AS POSSIBLE. Sure I’ll end up at 2000 calories week 10. But my cut will be much more effective that way compared to someone dropping too soon, too fast, which at a point will kill his metabolism, make him lose muscle and basically suffer much more during his cut. I think you should find what’s your maintenance, which itself is way harder than most people think and then I’d start possibly at like 100-150 calories under that. Every 7 days you update if needed. The first 4 weeks you could easily lose more than 2 lbs a week. After that I would aim for 2 to 2.5 lbs a week.

How did you find your maintenance level? What we did was I took an Inbody measurement, took the resting calorie expend + other results in to account, calculated/estimated my calorie expend based on my work, exercise and other activities during a day, then desided on a calorie amount consumed per day and adjusted from there. A lot of estimating, but had to start somewhere and he had a lot of experience, so we got to pretty good calorie level from the get go.

This was 4 years ago and now I know well enough where to start and I just adjust from there based on overall energy, WO energy, sleep quality, waist measurement, scale, mirror..

 

[Rockslide]

Resting rate can actually be exactly calculated in a lab. I know a place nearby that for a reasonable price does RMR, vo2, dexa and it’s really not that expensive. Of course then adding activities of life, plus calories burnt during exercise of varying intensities which can be very difficult unless your routine is the exact same every day

 

[Mathb33]

How did you find your maintenance level? What we did was I took an Inbody measurement, took the resting calorie expend + other results in to account, calculated/estimated my calorie expend based on my work, exercise and other activities during a day, then desided on a calorie amount consumed per day and adjusted from there. A lot of estimating, but had to start somewhere and he had a lot of experience, so we got to pretty good calorie level from the get go.

This was 4 years ago and now I know well enough where to start and I just adjust from there based on overall energy, WO energy, sleep quality, waist measurement, scale, mirror..

Actually as you’ve mentionned it’s extremely hard to pin point if not impossible. That’s why I decided as my goals were getting more serious that I needed a good coach. Toying around macros and eventually when a coach worked long enough with you he knows this type of stuff. For the most part when I did it myself I was doing exact like you stated. An approximate number and I’d start from there.

 

[jrock645]

The approximate number works fine as a starting point. Ultimately, you just adjust from there to reach(and sustain) your targeted rate of weight loss as you progress in the diet.

 

[Jinsun]

Imo a 200 kcal negative is on a practical level BS. I mean, how can you hit that with any degree of certainty? If if your days are mundane to the point where you're looking forward to your bowel movements, or reading the next @CroLifter 's post about prolactin and/or Mk (had to sry), your kcal requirements will be off by 100, 200 kcal's probably. But I do agree with the sentiment of starting slow and adjusting as you go. But I would rather add cardio then lower kcal's personally.

As for me, I loose bf to easily and I skate a lot so cardio is not a problem, rather, eating is. I guess I can go over a minus 1k kcal's some days, and other maybe only 500 ... What I'm trying to say is that I more or less wing it, by feel, until the last month where I usually count the damn calories. For me, if I'm not force feeding my self, I'm basically in a cut.

 

[CroLifter]

Imo a 200 kcal negative is on a practical level BS. I mean, how can you hit that with any degree of certainty? If if your days are mundane to the point where you're looking forward to your bowel movements, or reading the next @CroLifter 's post about prolactin and/or Mk (had to sry), your kcal requirements will be off by 100, 200 kcal's probably. But I do agree with the sentiment of starting slow and adjusting as you go. But I would rather add cardio then lower kcal's personally.

As for me, I loose bf to easily and I skate a lot so cardio is not a problem, rather, eating is. I guess I can go over a minus 1k kcal's some days, and other maybe only 500 ... What I'm trying to say is that I more or less wing it, by feel, until the last month where I usually count the damn calories. For me, if I'm not force feeding my self, I'm basically in a cut.

Hey i can always start to talk about heart enlargement from AAS and my echocardiogram before and after results.