The last 10 pounds...

As of this morning, my scale is saying 189.4 lbs. I started at about 200 lbs, and I'd like to see my abs before I start my next bulking cycle.

I'm not in a rush, I have pleanty of time to stick to my one-pound-a-week system, and of course I want to maintain as much muscle as possible while I do this. Based on people's general experience, do you think I can get down to 8%-10% bodyfat by just doing what I've been doing (I know I need to do a better job of getting my cardio in every day, and I could be a little more careful about my diet), or am I going to hit a wall that will require a change in strategy (such as carb cycling or ketogenic dieting or something)?

I do know that as you get down to those last few pounds, it gets harder. But I would recommend that you go as far as you can with a clean diet and cardio 4-5x/week. Once that stops working, then maybe try something like carb cycling. I would just hate for you to mess with your metabolism if option A would work just fine for you.

Now getting that cardio in...not easy. I am shooting for 4-5 days and just not getting there.

I think that as long as you keep losing a pound a week you'll be fine. When you start to see that you aren't losing that, then you might want to look at nuitrition and cardio. If you still think you can do better at cardio, do that. If that doesn't work then switch back and try the nuitrion. It might take a little longer, but at least you'll know what works for you when you reach those last few pounds. I have heard those are the worst.

I'm with Jenn on this one. I 'm struggling just to reach 3 days of cardio and am averaging _1_!!!!! But I did have a horrible eating frenzy part of Thursday/Friday/Saturday so I probably would have been ok if I didn't "binge" like that. I discovered that I actually need to eat more at breakfast so that I am not starving at lunch and the food i eat doesnt fill me up and hten I go nuts and grab fast food after work because I'm starving.

I'm gonna try the cardio again but I'm interested to see how much I gain/lose without doing it and going back to basically the same way I was eating before the food poisoning incident because I was doing fairly good with that.

That's all bodybuilding is...trial and error. Sucks, but nobody reacts the same to any one type of fitness/diet program.

"Try and fail is the manner of losers. Try and learn is the way of the strong." -- Unknown

[image]http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/8302/opensuse2oi.jpg[/image].

Well, while you guys are of no real help whatsoever on a factual level, I deeply appreciate the moral support

Edit: ne thing I notice is working out seems to slow my short-term weight loss, but improve my long-term loss.

Hey, what do I know? I haven't lost the "last 10 lbs" yet. I'll report back when I do.

You said it yourself, though...you aren't doing enough cardio. tsk tsk

ORIGINAL: Powerhaus

As of this morning, my scale is saying 189.4 lbs. I started at about 200 lbs, and I'd like to see my abs before I start my next bulking cycle.
. . .
[D]o you think I can get down to 8%-10% bodyfat by just doing what I've been doing (I know I need to do a better job of getting my cardio in every day, and I could be a little more careful about my diet), or am I going to hit a wall that will require a change in strategy (such as carb cycling or ketogenic dieting or something)?

Keep doing what you're doing, as long as it yields results. I'm not totally adverse to a ketogenic diet for short-term weight loss, but my understanding is that the benefits are really much greater for obese people than for those trying to get rid of the last few pounds. You also don't want to sacrifice muscle, as you surely would by going to a low-calorie ketogenic diet.

Keep on going until you hit a wall, and then consider doing something else (carb cycling, tweaking your caloric intake, changing your exercise regimen, etc.). No need to anticipate problems that haven't yet arisen. As a factual matter, many, many people have reached single digit body fat levels without resorting to metabolic tricks -- clean eating and cardio will do the job.

Yes, I suspect that discipline (as in doing the cardio I know I should, eat a bit more low-density food like salads, etc.) and patience (as in losing it at 1 pound a week) is going to take me farther into the "ripped" zone than I originally assumed.

184

10 days on the South Beach diet

"Eat Less, Exericise More"

Where's MY book deal?