Then, to do a workout, you load the spreadsheet on your phone and follow along, entering your numbers as you go. Google Sheets is especially nice for this because it’s free and easy to load and edit on your phone (just get the app).
Workout Journal
There are just as many blank workout journals as there are apps, but I’ve never used one, so I don’t have anything in particular to recommend.
That said, as I mentioned earlier, I do have a journal specifically for Bigger Leaner Stronger called The Year One Challenge for Men (www.biggerleanerstronger.com/challenge).
It has a year’s worth of workouts neatly organized and laid out, so all you have to do is follow and fill out the workouts one by one, week by week, phase by phase.
•••
If you’ve brushed over this chapter because you’re itching to get started and I’ve caught your eye here, please take 10 minutes or so to go through it in detail.
Much of your future success or failure is going to hinge on how well you track your progress.
If you don’t track your body composition correctly, you’ll probably fail to register the positive or negative changes occurring and wind up confused, anxious, and demotivated.
If you don’t track your workouts correctly, you’ll probably fall into a rut of doing the exact same thing every workout and stop progressing, which is just as discouraging.
Plus, tracking your body composition and workouts just makes the whole program more fun. Make it a game! It’s exciting to see real numbers changing for the better and to review old records from time to time and see just how far you’ve come.
Key Takeaways
If you don’t track your progress correctly, it doesn’t matter how well you understand everything in this book—you will end up in a rut, and probably sooner rather than later.
There are three elements to tracking progress: body composition, diet, and exercise.
There are just three steps to tracking your body composition:Weigh yourself daily and calculate weekly averages.
Take weekly body measurements.
Take weekly progress pictures.
Your weight can fluctuate on a daily basis due to fluid retention, glycogen levels, and bowel movements (or the lack thereof), so you can expect regular ups and downs.
If your average weight is going up, you’re gaining weight. If it’s going down, you’re losing weight.
“Newbie gains” render body weight less important. If you’re new to weightlifting and have fat to lose, you can expect to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time, which means your weight may not change as much as you’d expect.
The size of your waist is a reliable indicator of fat loss or gain. Take this measurement once per week, when you calculate your average body weight, and watch it over time.
If you’re the type of person who loves tracking data and quantifying things, there are a few more measurements you can take: your chest circumference, shoulder circumference, upper-leg circumference, and flexed arms and calves.Take these measurements every week with your other weekly measurements, and make sure you measure in the same spots every time.
Take progress pictures every week when you take your weekly measurements.
Tracking your workouts—and your resistance training workouts in particular—is just as important as tracking your body composition. It’s the only way to ensure you’re progressively overloading your muscles over time.
Every time you step up to a barbell or dumbbell, you want to know exactly what you’re going for, not wondering what you did the last time.
To track your Bigger Leaner Stronger workouts, you have several options: pen and paper, app, Excel or Google Sheet, and workout journal.
Pen and paper is the simplest way to plan and track your workouts. All you need is a notebook and pen, and in it, you write out the workouts you’ll be doing and then record what you actually do in each as you go.
There are hundreds of apps for tracking your workouts, but I never quite liked any of the ones I’ve used in the past, so I made my own and use it to plan and track all my training.It’s called Stacked. Go to www.getstackedapp.com now to check it out.
An Excel or Google Sheet is a close second to an app and even preferable for more advanced programming that requires a bit more planning and math.
I have a workout journal specifically for Bigger Leaner Stronger called The Year One Challenge for Men (www.biggerleanerstronger.com/challenge).
Lebon F, Collet C, Guillot A. Benefits of Motor Imagery Training on Muscle Strength. J Strength Cond Res. 2010;24(6):1680-1687. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181d8e936; Yao WX, Ranganathan VK, Allexandre D, Siemionow V, Yue GH. Kinesthetic imagery training of forceful muscle contractions increases brain signal and muscle strength. Front Hum Neurosci. 2013;7:561. doi:10.3389/fnhum.2013.00561.
32
How to Break Through Weight Loss Plateaus
Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life.
—JERZY GREGOREK
What’s the most common gripe among dieters everywhere?
Easy: not losing weight.
They feel like they’re doing everything right and following all the rules, yet the scale flashes the same scowling, mocking number at them every morning.
You’ve probably experienced this yourself.
This plight extends to our more “enlightened” perspective of monitoring body composition as well—you can carefully apply everything you’ve learned in this book and suddenly stop losing fat.
In fact, you can count on this happening.
Fortunately, while the human metabolism is incredibly complex, breaking through weight and fat loss plateaus isn’t. You simply need to widen the gap between energy in and energy out.
To do this, you first need to ensure you’re accurately measuring and recording everything you’re eating and drinking. Remember in chapter 7 where you learned how easy it is to mess up calorie counting if you’re not paying enough attention to the details?
You also need to ensure you’re not making any of the cheating mistakes we discussed in chapter 20.
Once you’re certain you’re not making any energy-balance blunders, the easiest way to break through a weight or fat loss plateau is to eat less. That said, I recommend “maxing out” on exercise first because this is better for staving off the negative side effects associated with calorie restriction.1
In short, I’d rather you move more before eating less.
There isn’t a clear scientific answer as to how much exercise you can do while dieting before it becomes unhealthy and counterproductive, but it’s more than many people think.
I’ve worked and spoken with many thousands of people, and here’s what I’ve learned: 4 to 5 hours of weightlifting and 1.5 to 2 hours of high-intensity cardio per week will maximize fat loss while minimizing unwanted side effects.
And that’s exactly what I recommend you work up to as your exercise “ceiling” when you’re cutting.
What happens when you exceed those numbers and exercise even more?
Some people’s bodies are particularly resilient and do fine with more exercise, but in my experience, many don’t. If you take it much further than I recommend, it’s more likely that hunger and cravings will kick into overdrive, sleep quality will decline, energy levels will plummet, and your mood will sour.
Once you’ve reached your exercise limit and it appears you’re no longer losing fat, it’s usually due to one of the two following scenarios:
Fat loss is being obscured by fluctuations in water weight or bowel movements.Water retention can vary wildly when you’re cutting. Sometimes you can go for two or even three weeks without losing weight and suddenly, overnight, drop several pounds through frequent urination (the “whoosh effect” bodybuilders often talk about).
This overnight �
�flush” often occurs after a cheat meal or diet break because increasing calories (and carbs in particular) can significantly decrease cortisol levels, which in turn reduces water retention.2
Stool retention can also play tricks on you, obscuring both weight and fat loss by increasing body weight and bloating.
All this is why it’s smart to wait two or three weeks before reducing your calories when you’ve hit your exercise ceiling and your weight or fat loss has stalled.
Fat loss has slowed to a crawl due to the natural metabolic adaptations that occur while cutting.As time goes on, what started out as a 20 or 25 percent calorie deficit can shrink to a much smaller one that no longer results in appreciable fat loss.
So if you’ve reached your exercise limit and failed to lose any weight or fat in at least two to three weeks, the next move is to eat less and to do it gradually, not drastically.
Specifically, you should cut your daily food intake by about 100 calories every 14 days by reducing your carbohydrate intake (don’t reduce your protein or fat).
How low you can ultimately go will depend on your body, but a good rule of thumb is to stop cutting calories when you’ve reached about 90 percent of your BMR.
And then, don’t remain there for more than a couple of weeks before calling it quits on the cut.
What should you do if you’ve been slightly below your BMR for a couple of weeks but still haven’t reached your desired body fat percentage?
Your best bet in this case is to bring your calories back to your total daily energy expenditure for four to six weeks to allow your body to normalize itself, and then start cutting anew.
•••
Weight loss plateaus are nothing to be afraid of or worried about.
They’re an inevitable consequence of proper dieting, and they’re easily conquered by making minor adjustments to your meal and exercise plans and staying the course.
That’s all there is to it.
Key Takeaways
While the human metabolism is incredibly complex, breaking through weight and fat loss plateaus isn’t. You simply need to widen the gap between energy in and energy out.
To do this, you first need to ensure you’re accurately measuring and recording everything you’re eating and drinking.
You also need to ensure you’re not making any of the cheating mistakes we discussed in chapter 20.
Once you’re certain you’re not making any energy-balance blunders, the easiest way to break through a weight and fat loss plateau is to eat less.
That said, I recommend “maxing out” on exercise first because this is better for staving off the negative side effects associated with calorie restriction.
4 to 5 hours of weightlifting and 1.5 to 2 hours of high-intensity cardio per week will maximize fat loss while minimizing unwanted side effects.
Once you’ve reached your exercise limit and it appears you’re no longer losing fat, it’s usually due to one of the two following scenarios: Fat loss is being obscured by fluctuations in water weight or bowel movements.
Fat loss has slowed to a crawl due to the natural metabolic adaptations that occur while cutting.
If you’ve reached your exercise limit and failed to lose any weight or fat in at least two to three weeks, cut your daily food intake by about 100 calories every 14 days by reducing your carbohydrate intake (don’t reduce your protein or fat).
A good rule of thumb is to stop cutting calories when you’ve reached about 90 percent of your BMR.
If you’ve been slightly below your BMR for a couple of weeks but still haven’t reached your desired body fat percentage, bring your calories back to your total daily energy expenditure for four to six weeks to allow your body to normalize itself, and then start cutting anew.
Geliebter A, Maher MM, Gerace L, Gutin B, Heymsfield SB, Hashim SA. Effects of strength or aerobic training on body composition, resting metabolic rate, and peak oxygen consumption in obese dieting subjects. Am J Clin Nutr. 1997;66(3):557-563. doi:10.1093/ajcn/66.3.557; Larson-Meyer DE, Redman L, Heilbronn LK, Martin CK, Ravussin E. Caloric Restriction with or without Exercise. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 2010;42(1):152-159. doi:10.1249/MSS.0b013e3181ad7f17.
Gleeson M, Blannin AK, Walsh NP, Bishop NC, Clark AM. Effect of low- and high-carbohydrate diets on the plasma glutamine and circulating leukocyte responses to exercise. Int J Sport Nutr. 1998;8(1):49-59; Tomiyama AJ, Mann T, Vinas D, Hunger JM, Dejager J, Taylor SE. Low calorie dieting increases cortisol. Psychosom Med. 2010;72(4):357-364. doi:10.1097/PSY.0b013e3181d9523c.
33
How to Break Through Weight Gain Plateaus
The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills.
—ERNEST HEMINGWAY
Some guys truly believe they’re “hardgainers.”
They think that no matter how much they train or eat, they’re destined to remain scrawny and weak. Some turn to steroids, some burn themselves out, and many just quit.
While it’s true that some guys have an easier time gaining muscle and strength than others due to anatomy, hormone profiles, and genetic predispositions, nobody is doomed to be forever frail.
I’ve spoken and worked with thousands of self-styled hardgainers over the years, and every single time, they were making one or more of the following mistakes:
Eating too little
Working out too little or too much
Doing low-intensity, lightweight workouts
Doing the wrong exercises
The most common error is eating too little. In many cases, these guys think they’re eating for three, but when I have them keep a food diary, the numbers come in pitifully low.
What they don’t realize is their appetite is naturally lighter, so just 2,000 to 2,500 calories per day can leave them feeling stuffed.
Some guys can gain muscle and strength just fine on that level of calorie intake, but many naturally skinny types need to eat quite a bit more. For example, I’ve worked with scores of 170-pound guys who have to eat upward of 4,000 calories per day just to gain 0.5 to 1 pound per week.
If you follow my Bigger Leaner Stronger program as I’ve laid it out, you’re not going to make the training mistakes I listed (two through four), so if you hit a rut where you haven’t gained weight in at least three weeks while lean bulking, the solution is very simple: you just need to eat more.
There are several physiological reasons for this, but just as a lower calorie intake can eventually stop producing weight loss, so can a higher intake eventually stop producing weight gain.
To break through the plateau, you should do the following:
Increase your daily calorie intake by 150 calories by increasing your carbohydrate intake.
Weigh yourself daily for the next three weeks to see how your body responds.Increasing carbohydrate intake increases water retention and glycogen levels, so you’ll experience an immediate jump in your weight. We’re interested in what happens after that, in the week or two that follows. How does your average daily weight change?
If your weight initially jumps but then stagnates again, increase your daily calorie intake by another 150 calories by increasing your carbohydrate intake, and weigh yourself daily for the next three weeks.
Repeat this process until you’re steadily gaining weight again (until your average daily weight is moving up).
If you’re one of those rare guys who has to eat a gargantuan amount of food to consistently gain weight, then you may get to a point where you simply can’t stomach eating any more carbs. In that case, start increasing your protein intake instead.
You may also find it challenging to create a meal plan that provides the amount of food you need and is at least halfway enjoyable. While many guys say they wish they could eat 4,000 calories per day, they
have no idea how unpleasant it actually is to feel brimful of food every moment of every day.
The following tips will help.
Increase Your Meal Frequency
Many people I speak with who have trouble eating enough food eat just two to three large meals per day. Many also skip breakfast.
An easy way to increase their food intake is to have them eat a larger number of smaller meals every day. For example, some guys find that eating five 500-calorie meals per day (2,500 calories) is easier and more enjoyable than eating three 700-calorie meals (2,100 calories).
Adding snacks in between larger meals and a presleep meal can help as well, and some guys even like to wake up earlier to eat a “prebreakfast” meal.
Limit Your Intake of Low-Calorie Foods
One of the most common mistakes I see “hardgainers” make is eating too many low-calorie foods, especially ones that are also very filling, like fruits and vegetables that contain a fair amount of fiber.
You certainly should eat a few servings of fruits and vegetables per day, but the more you eat beyond that, the harder it’s going to be to gain weight.
One of the reasons for this is that satiety (fullness) is affected more by volume than calories.1
For example, a study conducted by scientists at Pennsylvania State University found that adding air to a milkshake to make it appear double the size (without changing its calories) reduced food intake at a subsequent meal by 12 percent and lowered reports of hunger.2
Other research shows that even the perception of food volume affects satiety. In a study conducted by scientists at the University of Bristol, the more fruit subjects believed was in a smoothie, the fuller it made them feel.3
This is why many fruits and vegetables are often touted as great “weight loss foods.” They don’t have any special inherent fat-burning properties, but they do provide a lot of volume for very few calories, which keeps you full and makes you less likely to overeat.
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