Diet is the topic of discussion for this week. Everyday this week I will be answering your nutrition questions as well as providing you with reviews of the diet programs that I’ve followed during the past 5 years. Your diet is going to be the biggest contributor for successfully losing weight. If your diet sucks it will be nearly impossible to lose weight no matter how much you exercise.

With that in mind, if you want to achieve fast weight loss and keep it off permanently, you need to incorporate resistance training, cardio, and mindset training into your program.

Let’s kick off Diet Week with a question from a fellow Unstoppable Fat Loss reader.

Question: Scott, I really have a lot of respect for you’re opinion that’s why I’m asking for your guidance. I feel lost lately. I have lost about 50 pounds watching calories, but now I want to take it to the next step.

I’m 19% body fat and would like to be more like 15 or 17% body fat and more toned. I attached a photo so you can see where I’m at. I’m just tired of not knowing how many carbs to eat and when to eat them. I could really use a template as to how to go about my day (in terms of breakfast/lunch/dinner and snacks).

Tracey

Answer: Thanks Tracey, I appreciate your question and guarantee that you are not alone in feeling lost. I hope to provide some clarity to the issue. First of all congratulations on your success of melting 50 pounds from your body and congratulations for wanting to take it to the next level. I love to hear you say, ‘I just want to look my best!’ That’s the goal that we should all be aiming for.

Many of the diet programs available involve manipulating carbohydrate intake one way or another. There’s a good reason for this… It WORKS! Let’s take a look at how we can manipulate our carb intake…

Carb Tapering

Carbohydrate tapering implies that you reduce the amount of carbohydrates that you consume throughout the day. The easiest way to do this would be to eat starchy carbs such as oatmeal, sweet potatoes, and brown rice for your first 3 meals of the day and for your remaining 2-3 meals you replace the starchy carbs with vegetables.

Pre/Post Workout Carbs

Another method of manipulating your carbohydrate intake would be to only consume them prior to and immediately after your workout. Consuming carbs prior to your workout will provide you with the energy to perform your best during the session. Immediately after your workout is an optimal time to consume starchy carbs and they will help replenish your energy for the next workout.

Carb Cycling

This is one of the more common practices of manipulating carbs. Basically you choose a set number of days where you will significantly reduce your carbohydrate intake and follow it up with one day of increased carb feeding.

The number of days that you choose to restrict your carbs should be determined by your level of experience. If you are a beginner you may just want to go one day of low carb followed by one day of higher carbohydrate intake.

Angie prefers to go 2 days of reduced carbs and I prefer to go 3 days of reduced carbs followed by a higher carb day.

During the lower carb days I consume starchy carbs during my pre-workout and post-workout meals. The rest of the day it’s fruit and veggies as my source of carbs. On the higher carb days I will still consume starchy carbs during my pre-workout and post-workout meals and then add starchy carbs to my first two meals of the day.

Other forms of carb cycling will have you gradually reduce your carbs for a set number of days ending with one day of absolutely no carbs.

I have experimented with all forms of manipulating carbs and they have all worked for me. Some have been more effective for me than others, but that doesn’t mean that the same program that works best for me will work best for you.

I recommend that you experiment with the different varieties of carb manipulation in order to come up with the solution that works best for you. The good news is that pretty much all of them work.

It’s important to note that the diet program that is going to work best for you is the one that you can stick with.

Here’s a sample of a typical day of eating for me on a low carb day…

Meal 1: 3 whole eggs, green peppers or spinach
Meal 2: (pre-workout): 1 apple and 2 handfuls of almonds

Meal 3: (post-workout) Oatmeal, mixed berries, protein powder

Meal 4: Large Chicken Salad with light dressing or home made salsa.

Meal 5: Same as meal 4. (we always prepare enough food for leftovers)

Meal 6: 3 hard boiled egg whites. 1 handful of almonds

Here are some alternate meals…

For Meal 3: Sweet potato (medium) and 1 can of flaked white tuna

For Meal 4: 5 oz Salmon and mixed veggies such as broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, and asparagus.

I’ve got to tell you, I’m a creature of habit. I’m pretty boring when it comes to eating. I eat a lot of the same foods every day. It just makes it easier to prepare and I’m less likely to grab for junk. It’s mindless eating in a healthy way. And as I’ve mentioned, we prepare a lot of food for each meal so there is always enough for several meals.

The important thing to consider is that you must master the fundamentals of nutrition for fat loss before applying advanced techniques. If you simply reduce the amount of man made refined food to just 10% of your diet, you will be well on your way to fat loss success.

This aspect ties into your last question about not knowing where to fit beans, lentils, and squash into your diet plan. There is no need to obsess over this. These are healthy natural foods that will provide you with loads of energy and help you burn fat.

I also do not obsess over the exact percentage of my diet which is made up of carbs or protein. This would just stress me out which would make it more difficult to burn fat.

If you want to get really serious I recommend that you eat only natural foods 95% of the time. For example, I eat 6 meals each day which allows me to eat one meal per week that is not so healthy. Every Saturday I eat 7 slices of pizza and a chocolate bar. The rest of the week I don’t put a piece of man made food in my mouth.

I’ve adapted to this style of eating very easily. The one junk meal is more than enough to tie me over. Plus I love how I feel on the days that I’m eating well so it actually becomes addicting.

It’s important to note that I use to hate oatmeal, sweet potatoes, and veggies. It wasn’t easy those first few days of this healthy eating plan, but now I simply can not steer away from it as I am totally addicted to these healthy foods that I once detested.

I will provide you with more meal templates and suggestions throughout the Diet Week here at the Unstoppable Fat Loss blog. I hope that for now this gives you a starting point and at least cleared a few things up for you.

There are many diet methods that work and work well. There is no one single solution that is the end all be all. It’s up to us as individuals to follow a diet program with 100% effort and see for ourselves how our body responds to it.

I have followed diet programs that were extremely effective for me and yet I still tried new diet programs after that. For one, it’s nice to add some variety to your eating style just as it’s important to add variety to your workouts. Plus, I just love using myself as a guinea pig to see what programs truly are effective.

Be on the lookout each day as I share the top 5 diets that have worked for me.

Have an absolutely amazing day!

Empower Your Mind… and Your Body Will Follow

Scott Tousignant