What I'm doing... Any changes needed?

[BigGuyLondon]

Hi.

I'm currently a touch over 350lbs, at 6'1". I started out a month and a half ago at almost 390lbs.

I'd like to cut 100lbs of fat and maintain as much muscle as possible. I'm strong, and I really want to stay that way.

I've cut my calories to about 1900/day, all good foods, trying to have 150g+ of protein per day. I'm eating lots of lean meats, fish, wholegrains and veg. I'm supplementing with slow release protein shakes first thing in the morning and before I go to bed. I haven't been hungry at all while on this "diet". I'm also taking a good multivitamin every night.

I'm in reasonable cardiovascular condition. I do 4km or 6km per day on an elliptical using the "fat loss 1" program (on a York X301, set to level 5), 4km times are just under 12 minutes, 6km times are just under 20 minutes. On average, I'm doing this 5 times/week.

I lift twice a week, very heavy weights, 3 sets of 5. I lift the heaviest I can that allows me to complete the 3x5. I'm still figuring out what that is, since I haven't actually managed to fail yet, and I don't want to injure myself by jumping large amounts of weight at a time, so I'm doing 10kg increases.

I'm not lacking in energy and I feel pretty good, but all of the calculators are saying I should be taking in over 4000kcal to stay at maintenance, so am I doing this wrong?

I obviously want to take in less than maintenance, but have I cut too much? Will cutting as much as I have mean that I'm losing muscle as well as fat? Is heavy lifting while at this kind of deficit a bad idea?

Looking for a little guidance before I spring for a personal trainer or visit a nutritionist.

Thanks for any advice.

 

[KaraCooks]

It sounds like you have a pretty good plan going. I would say that at your current weight and given the amoutn of exercise that you're doing, 1800 calories is awfully low for you. I weigh 175 right now and am eating around 1600 calories and losing.

I would say at your weight, you could easily lose on 3000 calories.

The idea behind eating more is to give yourself wiggle room so that as you lose weight, you can continue to drop the calorie level to adjust. When you start too low, you don't give yourself the leeway you need to continually lower calories as you go along.

Also if you drop your calories too severely, you can wind up increasing the loss of lean muscle (although keeping up the protein and the weight lifting is a good thing to help prevent that).

I think you'll probably do ok at 1800 - it's certainly not starvation level, but I'd bump it up some to help with the long term.