I think it’s safe to say everyone at some point has complained about trying to lose weight, how they can’t lose weight, or that they just don’t know how to lose it. We’ve all heard about the latest and greatest diets popping up every other month that claim to do what most people have trouble doing…losing that unwanted weight. Well the thing with all these “latest and greatest” diets is that (and I’m not saying they are all bad) 99% of the time it’s a waste of money and/or extremely unhealthy. Losing weight is only as hard as you make it. Really, if you want to lose weight, it’s not even as close to as hard as most people think it is. Use the K.I.S.S (Keep It Simple Stupid) way of thinking when it comes to weight loss. I will try and make you understand how simple it is to lose weight. If you do not somewhat understand how to lose weight after reading this article, I will do my best to create a time machine and refund your time.

There are two parts to losing weight (diet and exercise). The first and most important part of losing weight is diet. You can live in the gym, but if you’re diet is not in check you aren’t going to make much progress. This is by far the hardest part of losing weight, and by hard, I mean easy. The concept is simple:eat under your “maintenance” and you will lose weight (calories out > calories in)

But you are now probably confused as to what I am talking about so I am going to do my best to make you understand what “maintenance” means and how you figure it out.

Your maintenance in terms of dieting, is the amount of calories you need to eat in order to maintain your current weight. By eating over maintenance you will gain weight and by eating under maintenance you will lose weight. Seems simple, right? That’s because it is.

To find your maintenance is the hardest step. The guideline I use for determining maintenance is 15 calories per 1lb of bodyweight. So if you are 200lbs, your maintenance calories would be around 3,000. Since we all have different metabolisms, bodyfat %, age, genes, etc, you may or may not need to eat 3,000 calories to maintain 200lbs. The baseline of using 15 calories X 1lb bodyweight is just what you should start with. To accurately find your maintenance you will need to weigh yourself in the morning and eat whatever you think your “maintenance” is for 1 full week. If your weight stays the same for the most part, then you have found your maintenance.

Now that you’ve found your maintenance the hardest part is over. To lose weight, you will now have to eat under maintenance. The key is to not eat too much under maintenance or this will compromise your metabolism, which in-turn will cause you to not lose weight and/or lose a lot of muscle. I recommend losing no more than 1-2lbs/week. There are other factors that go into this equation (if you are extremely overweight or are holding a lot of water weight you will lose much more weight at first than the average person trying to shed a few pounds) but for most people, you will want to aim for 1-2lbs.

To eat under maintenance you simply want to lower your calories by 4-500. So if you are 200lbs and maintaining at 3,000 calories a day, you would want to lower your calories to 2,500-2,600 to effectively lose ~1-2lbs/week. You will want to check every 2^nd week to see if you are still losing weight. If weight loss has stopped I recommend dropping your calories by 250-350 and continuing with the diet. If you are losing an extreme amount of weight, you will want to add more calories into your diet in order to not lose muscle mass. I suggest adding 150-200 calories.

Quick tip: A scale is sometimes not the best indicator of fat loss. You may be losing fat while gaining muscle (thus lowering your bodyfat %), so use a mirror and/or pictures to also monitor your progression.

You may now be wondering what you should eat. The thing with this is, it’s all about you for the most part. If you can stay with-in your macros, you will pretty much be able to eat whatever you want. No, that doesn’t mean you can gorge on unhealthy desserts, fast food, etc. It just simply means that you won’t be limited to what “healthy” foods you can eat.

Your “macros” are your daily intake of fats, carbs, and protein.

The macros I have most people follow are 30% Fat, 35% Carbs, and 35% Protein. This means that if you are trying to eat 2,500 calories a day:

• 750 calories will come from fat (~83grams of fat)
• 750 calories will come from carbs (206grams of carbs)
• 1,000 calories will come from protein (206 grams of protein)

Good to know:

• 1 gram of protein has 4 calories
• 1 gram of carbohydrates has 4 calories
• 1 gram of fat has 9 calories

This macro guideline (30/35/35) is just something to follow. Some people are carb friendly and some people aren’t. Feel free to lower the carb intake and increase fat/protein intake.

You may find it hard to keep track of all the calories in your head or by constantly writing them down. There are many websites out there now that focus on tracking your calories. A couple examples would be:

• www.fitday.com (I use fitday)
• www.thedailyplate.com
• www.caloriecount.com

You can use these sites as a starting point. Once you understand what you should be eating and how much of what, you won’t need to be as strict with your tracking.

For the most part, you can eat whatever you want as long as it fits into your macros (the 30% fat, 35% carbs, and 35% protein). Obviously you still want to stay away from foods high in sugar, saturated fats (not all fats), etc. Stick to foods you know are healthy. If some days you make room in your macros in order to eat some pizza, it’s not going to kill your diet. The key is moderation, common sense, and keeping track of your calories/macros.

Quick tip: You also want to make sure you are drinking enough water. Remember, your body will retain water if you are not drinking enough…which will cause you to gain water weight/bloat a long with a variety of other health benefits. Read my article on why water is important for the body by clicking here.

Now for the second part of the equation: exercising. This is the part that a lot of people over think. The key is to just being consistent. I personally recommend 3-4 days a week with combined cardio and weightlifting for losing weight. You don’t need to spend all day in the gym. The type of cardio you do is up to you. Whether it’s swimming, jogging, incline walking, trainers, jump rope, etc…it’s all going to do the same thing (burn calories). So why not do something you enjoy? The weightlifting portion of exercising will help you retain/build as much muscle as possible during the diet (as well as burn calories).

As for the type of routine you should do, that is all dependent on you and what you like. There is no perfect routine or exercise for anyone. The thing is to get to know your body and see which routine your body responds best to. As a Personal Trainer I have talked with people that saw their greatest results with something I saw bad results for. EVERYONE (for the most part) is different. You must always keep an open mind and ultimately find out what you like the best and what works best for you. If you hate what you’re doing (or eating), chances are you are just setting yourself up to fail.

Things to take into consideration:

• Don’t try and do everything at once. Over-doing it will make you stressed out and lead to failure. Start by slowly getting rid of junk food or soda. Then work on cleaning your diet up. You will probably lose weight just by doing this.
• Don’t over-think anything. There is so much information and mis-information out there that you could spend years researching a single topic.
• Don’t stress out. Stressing out over anything will effect your progression.
• Don’t spend your life in the gym. Your body needs rest to repair itself and for your muscles to grow.

This is just a basic guideline on how to lose weight. Once you get the hang of tracking calories and understanding your macros, you’ll never look for another “latest and greatest” diet again. It may seem confusing at first, but it is really a basic concept that you should get the hang of fairly quick.

EAT RIGHT, EXERCISE, SLEEP, and REPEAT to achieve your goals

While protein is one of the most important parts of our diets, you may be confused as to all the different types of protein/products out there. There are advantages and disadvantages of every kind. I will try my best to keep everything as simplified as possible. Lets start with:

Whey Protein (Powder)

• What it is: A natural byproduct of the cheese-making process (from milk). Around 20% of the protein that is in milk is whey protein.
• The benefits: Fast absorption, low in fat/possibly fat free, increases protein synthesis, rich in branched-chain amino acids, lactose, minerals, and vitamins.
• The disadvantages: It can get expensive. The cheaper alternatives are usually filled with unhealthy ingredients and loaded with tons of sugar.
• My recommendation: Due to its fast absorption rate, this is the type of protein you want to have pre, during, or post-workout.

Casein Protein

• What it is: 80% of milk protein.
• The benefits: Slow digesting, anti-catabolic
• The disadvantages: Not good for lactose intolerant people, sometimes high in sodium, allergies which can cause bloating, and since it is slow digesting it is not good to take pre, during, or post-workout when you are trying to get protein into your system as quick as possible.
• My recommendation: Do not take in casein when you are in need of a fast-acting protein. Take casein before bed and/or with your bigger meals in which you will have a longer period of time to digest them.

Milk Protein Isolates

• What it is: Everything non-protein is removed from the milk. This turns the powder into about 20% whey protein and 80% casesin. (which we will go over down below)
• The benefits: Has both fast and slow-acting proteins in the powder. (which makes absorption slower, thus taking longer to digest)
• The disadvantages: Absorption is slower than when just taking whey protein alone. (its only a disadvantage if you are looking for something  as fast-acting as possible)
• My recommendation: This type is good for someone looking for a slow-acting protein or those with lactose intolerance.

Egg Protein

• What it is: Comes from…wait for it…EGGS.
• The benefits: Cheap, great amino acid profile, highest quality protein source.
• The disadvantages: None. Well, maybe gas and bloating from eating too many…
• My recommendation: Eat as many eggs as you can stomach!

Soy Protein

• What it is: Comes from the soybean.
• The benefits: Has been known to reduce cholesterol and also prevent heart problems. Good for lactose intolerant people.
• The disadvantages: Lack of research. Some studies show it can possibly enhance the chance of cancer. Lower quality protein.
• My recommendation: Limit your intake on soy. It is least favorable amongst those trying to build muscle as the quality of soy protein is far below whey, casein, or egg.

Rice Protein

• What it is: Extracted from rice.
• The benefits: Good for those people who have allergies to the other protein sources. Good for vegetarians, and it is easily digestible.
• The disadvantages: Not the best quality protein. Not as good as the other protein sources out there.
• My recommendation: Personally I would use this as a last resort but for those considering it (people with allergies, vegetarians, etc) it is a respectable source of protein.

1. Avocados - besides having a variety of benefits for your health (including helping people with problems in the bedroom). Avocados are great source of healthy fats and fiber.

2. Sweet Potatoes – one of the best vegetables you can eat. Loaded with carotenoids, vitamin C, potassium, and fiber. A great source of carbohydrates.

3. Blueberries – a low-calorie source of fiber, antioxidants and phytonutrients. They are also known to help short-term memory and reduce cell damage that comes with aging.

4. Lean Ground Turkey – usually lower in fat, calories, and cholesterol while being higher in protein than beef. Tastes like a burger while having more health benefits.

5. Olive Oil – a wide variety of health benefits and a great source of healthy fat.

I’m sure you’ve all read the article I put up yesterday regarding why and when to eat before you exercise. Now we’ll get to post-workout eating. We will call this “recovery nutrition”. This is the most important meal of the day by far. It may seem confusing to most, but it is really very simple once you understand how the body works. The number one thing you need to understand is that after working out, you want your muscles to recover. Recovering requires you to replenish muscle glycogen. To keep it simple, muscle glycogen is basically carbohydrates that have been stored in the body to use for fuel.

After working out your muscles become more receptive to producing new glycogen. This usually lasts a few hours. During this time muscle cells will “eat” up glucose as if it were it’s last meal because blood flow to the muscles is much greater. Another thing that happens at this time is muscle cells become more sensitive to the effects of insulin. Insulin promotes glycogen synthesis.

What does this all mean? Basically that you should take in carbohydrates as well as protein as soon as possible after your workout. As to what type of carbohydrate you should take in, many say it should be something that is fast digesting. Personally my take on this, from my experience, and from what I have read, it doesn’t matter whether the carb is low or high gi (slow or fast digesting), as long as your pre-workout nutrition is fine. This means, for the most part, eat whatever type of carb you want after the gym. I don’t mean go gorge on bad food. Make sure the carb source you are eating is low in fat and has some nutritional value. Carbohydrates are not the devil like most people are led to believe, the carbs ingested post-workout will be used to restore muscle glycogen. Not eating after the gym may make your body look towards muscle tissue for energy, which would promote muscle loss. Not something you want to promote after working out, right? As far as what type of protein to take in post-workout, I would opt for whey protein. Whey protein is fast digesting which is beneficial, but as with carbs, I believe any source of protein is fine (whey, egg whites, lean beef, chicken, tuna, etc). You should stay away from foods high in fat at this time. In short, fat (both good and bad fats) slow down digestion. As I said in the previous article I will post one going over fats in detail in the future. There is a time and place for fats, but that time and place is not pre or post-workout.

As far as what you should eat post-workout. In a mass building phase, I suggest around .3-.5 grams of carbohydrates per pound of body weight and .25-.4 grams of protein per pound of body weight. This would mean that if you are 200 pounds you would intake roughly 60-100 grams of carbohydrates (240-400 calories) and 50-80 grams of protein (200-320 calories) post work-out. In a cutting phase, I suggest .2-.4 grams of carbohydrates per pound of body weight and .2-.3 grams of protein per pound of body weight. Again, this would mean that if you are 200 pounds you would intake roughly 40-80 grams of carbohydrates (160-320 calories) and 40-60 grams of protein (160-240 calories) post work-out. I would stick more to the middle end of these numbers, and for women the lower end. Protein is the key to building muscle after exercises; carbohydrates are more about refueling. For and example of what eat, I suggest eating with-in 60 minutes after working out. The meal should be based off your carb/protein needs and low in fat. After this meal has been eaten, move on to your next scheduled “normal” meal for the day. I usually wait 1-2 hours between my post-workout meal and post post-workout meal. As I said before, this may not suit your individual needs. Depending on the type of diet you’re on, intensity, etc, you may want to lower or raise the intake.

This is just my take on post-workout eating. There are countless “studies” that say one thing and then 50 others that say another thing. The thing everyone needs to do is try different stuff out and see what works best for you and your body. This is a base I have always gone by, what has worked for me, and what I suggest my clients do.

I will try and write a more in depth article regarding types of dieting (good, bad, and most of all fad) in the future.

Also as I noted in the last article you must always keep yourself hydrated as water is just as important as food. Keep drinking water even after you exercise.

One thing I find a lot of people get confused about, is when to eat. Specifically when to eat before and after the gym. The science behind it is pretty simple so I will do my best to help you understand both when you should eat and why.

We’ll go ahead and start with when you should eat before the gym. Many people wonder “is it a good idea to eat before the gym?“. Absolutely. As to what you should eat, how much, and how soon, that all depends a lot on what you are trying to do. In a mass building phase you will want to eat more before the gym. My recommendation is 40-50 grams (160-200 calories) of carbohydrates and 20-30 grams (80-120 calories) of protein 90-120 minutes before the gym. In a cutting phase I usually opt for about half of that, 25 grams (100 calories) of carbohydrates and 15 grams (60 calories) of protein. Obviously depending on your individual needs or what your diet calls for, you may want to intake more or less. This is just  the base I go by and what I usually follow (what has worked well for me). Working out for longer than ~90 minutes, doing lots of cardio, and high intensity training are examples in which you may want to add more calories to your pre-workout meal.

You’re probably wondering why you should eat 90-120 minutes before instead of ten minutes. Well to keep it simple, it takes the body about six hours to digest fat, three hours for protein, and two hours for carbs. Kind of get where I’m going? Our gut gets very active when digesting food, thus using more blood supply than normal to digest the food. We need that blood supply while exercising. When the body is trying to do both at once, it will not do either of them “great”. Unless you are eating something that is fast digesting or a liquid, I don’t suggest eating a “meal” that soon before the gym. I also suggest not adding fat (good or bad) to your pre-workout meal. It takes twice, and in some cases three times as long to digest. That’s the short answer on why you should not eat fat. I’ll post and article in the future that goes over fats in detail (when you should eat them and why).

Now you may be asking yourself “but why do I need to eat before the gym?“. I’ll tell you why. As you exercise your body’s main fuel source is carbohydrates that have been stored in your body (known as glycogen which is stored in the muscles and liver). Although some fat is burned, it’s main energy comes from glycogen stores. When glycogen stores become depleted (usually with-in 45 minutes-2 hours depending on intensity/other conditions it could even be sooner) it will look elsewhere for energy. Yes the body will look towards fat for energy, but fat cannot be converted into glycogen. Fat can be converted into ATP (the energy compound inside cells that power muscular contractions) but not glycogen, hence why it is so hard to lose fat. However, protein can be converted into glycogen, which means you will be burning muscle for energy (doing more negative than good).

Eating before the gym will give your body a readily available source of energy. Before carbs turn into glycogen it enters our bloodstream in the form of glucose. If our glycogen stores become low or depleted, our bodies will use glucose for energy. In some studies, the body would spare the glycogen and use the glucose for fuel first. In other words, you have not one source of fuel, you have two. If you’re driving a car in the middle of no where and are low on gas, wouldn’t it be helpful to have a second tank?

If you find yourself getting fatigued at the gym try upping your carbohydrate intake in your pre-workout meal or try taking in a liquid carbohydrate just before you workout. In more than a few studies researchers have found that taking in a liquid carbohydrate right before working out provided higher energy levels and increased strength.

Use this as a base:

• 4 hours before: You can have a normal sized meal with fat, protein, and carbs
• 2-3 hours before: Smaller than normal size – lighten up on the fat
• 60-90 minutes before: Lighten up on the protein as well as the fat
• 15-60 minutes before: Eat fast digesting carbs/liquid

Note: While eating is important, water intake is just as important. Make sure you hydrate before, during, and after the gym.

I will be following up this article with “When you should eat and why after the gym” shortly.