Sport Cutting for summer. Need advice

Sport Fitness
S

Stan

0
Alright, I'm 25 years old, male, 6 feet tall and 181lbs currently. I've been working out in a gym for five years now. I've gained considerable muscle mass, but I've always had trouble cutting and getting that defined muscular look. But I'm determined to do it this year, so I have put myself on a diet. I'm not sure of the calorie count on everything I'm eating, but I'll post what I do know.

Meal #1: A bowl of honey bunches of oats. Sometimes I eat Smart Start. I kind of switch back and forth with the two depending on what I want. I've been eating this with 1% milk. This isn't a huge bowl. Just normal average bowl.

Snack #1: 12 baby carrots

Snack #2: A handful of Almonds

Meal #2: One of the small Healthy Choice or Lean Cuisine meals. They average between 250 and 300 calories. Along with this I eat a turkey sandwich on whole wheat bread with a little tiny bit of miriacle whip light.

Snack #3: One of those quaker oatmeal bars. They are around 200 calories. With that I eat a yoplait yogert. Usually a light one. The only reason I eat both of these items is because it's right before my workout, and I really hate getting hungry during a workout.

The workout begins. I lift a lot of weight, and I do two muscle groups a day. This allows me to hit every muscle group twice a week, with 3 or 4 days of rest inbetween working individual muscle groups. I change up my routien for lifting every 6 to 8 weeks. I know how to weight lift, so I'm not looking for advice on this topic. After I lift, I've been doing cardio for around 30 minutes. I've been starting out on a stairmaster (the three step escelator type), at pretty high intensity for 12 minutes. Then I move to an elipse machine for 18 minutes. I have to tell you, this cardio workout almost kills me. I don't have a heart rate monitor so i can't tell you how many calories I'm burning, but considering how hard I'm working, it better be a lot.

When I get home, the only thing I've been eating is three hard boiled eggs. I sometimes scramble them or made an omlette with canadian bacon. The idea behind this, is I'm avoiding carbs at night. Sometimes I'll make a chicken breast or two, but I hate cooking chicken, so thats a rare occassion.

Well thats all, I'd appreciete advice on how I can make my abs stick out, and make the veins stick out of my biceps. Thats sort of thing.
 
what's happening, stan? bottom line, dude---your diet's gotta be tweaked big-time to see good results. you need a solid base for nutrition. I remember my 1st cutting problems, I troubleshooted a lot with people on the forums, but it's all about finding what your body adapts to the best. there's no set thing to eat, because everyone's body reacts differently, you dig? some people are very carb-sensitive (like me), while others thrive on the idea of consuming 250+grams of carbs daily.

some helpful ideas:

*switch to 6-8 small meals per day, spaced every 2-3 hours. if it's not convenient, pack meals. I'm a college student in school all day sometimes, and I bring mine with me to school. this will fire metabolism all day long.

*you need a LOT of protein man---I don't see too much lean protein, so you've gotten add more chicken, fish, turkey, and eggs to the mix brother.

*for cutting, you want to keep carbs primarily in the 3 meals surrounding your weight workout: pre-workout, post-workout, and post-post workout.

-->pre(PWO)- about an hour before; consume protein with a slow-burning, low-GI carbs, such as apple, brown rice, yams, or oats.

-->post(PWO)- right after your weight workout; 2:1 or 3:1 ratio of carbs to protein; fast-burning, high-GI carbs, like honey, bananas, rice cakes. look up the glycemic-index online, and consume carbs that are towards the top for after your weight workout--your body needs the insulin spike right now.

-->postpost(PPWO)- almost same idea as pre-workout; about an hour after post-workout meal; consume a lean protein with another complex, slow-burning carb.

(There's 3 meals added to the mix, and should be where mostly all of your carbs are consumed for the day. the other meals of the day are your job to fit in)

*cardio: dude...you're going overkill! there's no doubt in mind you're cutting into muscle with what you're doing right now. switch to 3 sessions/week, 20 minutes (see how you react, add more time if needed), either fasted, first thing in the morning, or after your weight workout. these are the times your body is glycogen-deprived, and your body will tap into fat stores for energy (glycogen is what gives your muscles energy). another option is HIIT training, which consists of short, but intense bursts of sprinting (30 secs/1 min), followed by a short, slower period (double that time, at a slow jog), and repeat 8 or 9 times. i.e. 1 minute sprint, 2 minutes jog---repeat. This works GREAT for burning fat, but do it either RIGHT after your weight workout, or on a DIFFERENT day then weights---it's very energy-consuming. Also, never do HIIT on an empty stomach---muscle is prime fuel at this point.

I'm sure with other members' posts, you'll be on your way! Hope this helped...

it's hard work to lose body fat man, but with some effort and dedication, you'll be there in no time!
 
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of course you have to have a calorie defecit if you want to lose weight. So you have to calculate how much your maintance calories are, and then go about 500-300 below your maintance. Truly this is the main thing to keep in mind.
 
I appreciate the advice, but I have a problem with a part of it. You say to eat carbs as my post workout meal because I need the insulin spike. Here is my problem with that. I get get done working out around midnight, and I get home at 12:30 am. I go to bed around 3:00am. Am I wrong, or should I not be eating carbs so close to the time I go to sleep. I cannot adjust the time I work out because of my work scheduale.
 
First off, your workout should take around an hour or so and by midnight it would seem that your energy would be pretty drained by the end of the day. But either way, yes, consuming carbs at that time is fine if it is post workout. Gags has some great advice to follow, I'd suggest that as a start. :)
 
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