LOSE FAT SMARTER – Calorie Cycling For Fat Loss « CLEANBODY Fitness & Nutrition

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LOSE FAT SMARTER – Calorie Cycling For Fat Loss

Cycling your calories for better body composition (ratio of fat to muscle) can become a more effective way of achieve your goals than the typical even daily calorie deficit.

What is Calorie Cycling?

Calorie cycling is just one of many dieting methods for achieving fat-loss without losing any muscle. Instead of creating your standard 500 calorie a day deficit, you switch things up by having a mix of high calorie days and low calorie days. Basically you have "surplus" days and 'deficit" days.

Here is why?

• Speeds up Fat Loss – When your hormones are optimized via carbohydrate manipulation, then the body has the internal environment to lose more fat.
• Helps Reset Your Hunger Hormones – The sensation of "Hunger" comes from hormones like leptin and ghrelin. They are reset after periodic up-feeds; something that doesn't happen on an even (daily) caloric deficit diet.
• Improved Insulin Sensitivity – Lower calorie days can improve insulin sensitivity which can help you utilize the anabolic and energy benefits of insulin on the days you increase your carbohydrate and calorie intake.
• Mental Boost – Knowing you are able to eat more food and more calories on certain days and ultimately feel full for once, can help with your mindset during times of prolonged calorie restriction.

Look at Your Calorie Intake Over a Week – Not a Day

Most people approach fat loss by cutting a certain amount calories from their diet and then eat that same amount of calories every single day. Eventually, when the fat loss stalls, people cut down their calories even more – and then more often than not, this approach causes their metabolism to slow down and they STOP losing fat all together until they drop their calories down to starvation levels and now have metabolic damage that shuts off the fat burning process dead in its tracks.

Calorie cycling for fat loss takes a more intelligent approach. Instead of viewing fat loss and calorie intake on a day to day timeline, you instead look at it over a weekly period of time.

As an example, let's say you need 2,000 calories per day to maintain your current weight. Generally speaking, cutting your calories by 500 per day will result in weight loss of 1-2 pound over a week depending on your workout schedule. (500 X 7 = 3500 calories = 1lb of fat from dieting).

Eating 1500 calories a day means you end up eating 10,500 calories over the span of a week (1500 X 7 = 10,500). How many different ways can we get in 10,500 calories over the course of a week? There are many possibilities. Some of combinations might be:

• 2400, 1200, 2100, 1200, 1200, 1200, 1200 = 10,500
• 2100, 1400, 1400, 1400, 1400, 1400, 1400 =  10,500
• 1200, 1500, 1700, 1700, 1200, 1200, 2000 =  10,500

As a matter of fact, the combinations are endless. However, every single one of these will add up to the same 10,500 calories over the course of the week. In some people the end result on their weight could be very different from one scenario to the next because their metabolism is a changing variable. And this is the thing we are aiming to achieve – an optimized metabolism is what we are after so fat loss continues and doesn't plateau so quickly.

I do have a word of advice I would like you to consider. Do not fluctuate your caloric numbers so much that it becomes a recipe creating, cooking and food prep nightmare or hassle. I recommend having 5 even numbered deficit days and 2 even-numbered surplus days.

How to Structure Calorie Cycling for Fat Loss

A simple method to start with for calorie cycling is to have 2 caloric surplus days during the week. Calorie intake would look something like this – low, low, MED, low, low, low, HIGH.

I prefer cycling my carbohydrate intake because it makes cooking and food prep easy. To give you a better idea, here is what I do:

• Monday: 1800 calories – Protein, fat, and veggies only
• Tuesday: 1800 calories – Protein, fat, and veggies only
• Wednesday: 2500 calories – Protein, fat, veggies, and 400 grams of carbohydrates
• Thursday: 1800 calories – Protein, fat, and veggies only
• Friday: 1800 calories – Protein, fat, and veggies only
• Saturday: 1800 calories – Protein, fat, and veggies only
• Sunday: 4000 calories – Protein, extra fat, and about 500-600 grams of starchy carbohydrates (homemade pizza, cheesecake, frozen yogurt, chocolate etc…just to keep my sanity)

This (all) averages out to around 2200 calories per day. It also averages out to about 200 grams of carbohydrates per day and I make sure I am getting in no less than 1 gram per pound of body weight in protein per day. The remainders of the calories are filled with healthy fats.

You definitely don't have to cycle your carbohydrate intake when you cycle calories. I just find it works better, as I'm able to keep a better hormonal profile that is conducive to fat loss – lower insulin levels, higher growth hormone, higher leptin levels, etc.

Give calorie cycling for weight loss a try and see how it works out for you. You might just find that it fits your lifestyle better, and improves your fat loss too.