Blonde will make you STRONG

[EvilPie]

Given recent posts I thought I'd check what's really in one of the curries I make so here goes:

Numbers are calories, carbs, protein & fat.

40g wholegrain rice - 140, 28.5, 3.4, 1.1
180g chopped tomatoes - 52, 8.5, 2.3, 0.2
70g curry sauce - 75, 6.4, 1.1, 4.8
15g puree - 11, 1.7, 0.6, 0.1
5g olive oil - 41, 0, 0, 4.6
200g mixed veg - 96, 9.9, 2.4, 4.6
200g chicken - 212, 0, 48, 1
3 x pitta - 449, 72.6, 17.7, 5.1

Totals

1076 calories
127.6g carbs
75.5g protein
21.5g fat

Not the worst meal in the world by any means and easy to save a chunk of calories if I want to if I just take out the pittas.

I'm not scared of a few calories or carbs although in my mental days I'd have got rid of them and replaced with a shake somewhere to make up for the loss of protein.

I'm pleased I've done this at last as it shows me it's as good as I thought whilst still being really tasty. Happy days.

Food throughout the day is mostly a lot healthier than this so overall it's no great surprise that I'm doing quite well at the moment.

There is a ton of protein there!

It is obviously healthy, my point remains the same, for body comp purposes it is just a matter of KCALs. So skittles everyday or that every week works out almost identical! One is certainly healthier than the other, but it all depends on the rest of the day/week.

Just wrote a little blog on body comp, titled "Calories are King'. So for fat loss, it is literally just calories, for general performance and life we obviously want some good nutrient dense KCALs in there most of the time.

Putting away 700 odd grams of food is always nice tho

Really? So if I cancel my evening meal and just eat 7 bags of skittles every night instead my body composition will be exactly the same?

Sounds almost as convincing as the fenugreek video if I'm honest.

Fat loss is calories (and adequate protein). So if you have adequate protein, lets say anywhere between 1g-2g per KG, and you have 3000 KCALs a day (gives you a 500KCAL deficit), you will categorically lose weight if you stay under that. The hard part is, if I used all my KCALs on skittles, I would probably get really, really hungry and over eat.

There has been loads of people in the past that try mars bar/McDonalds/cookie diets etc with adequate protein that lose weight and maintain body comp, they just stay under their KCALs.

What I am saying, is if you keep KCALs the same, it doesn't matter if it comes from Pitta or Skittles if you are talking body composition. If your evening meal equates to say 500 KCALs with 50g of protein. You could have 50g of whey, and 300KCALs of skittles, and the end result is the same in how you look. How you perform and feel maybe a different matter. Although over one meal it shouldn't make too much difference.

I thought this was pretty obvious under flexible dieting or am I missing something? The leanest and ironically strongest I have ever got I was eating a box a day. (I am not for one second saying this is the reason, I got lean and strong despite of the skittles not because of, but they didn't hold me back at all, I had to give them up in the last 3-4 weeks as I just didn't have the KCALs to spare because I was so hungry).

Have you got a link to your 'calories are king' blog? I can't let this drop as to be honest I think what you're saying is plain wrong.

Perhaps my understanding of the term 'body comp' is different to yours because unless I'm reading it wrong you're telling me that I can scrap my eggs, tuna, chicken, veg, wholegrain rice, fruit etc. and as long as the calories and protein intake remain identical I will see no difference in my body shape, fat content, lean mass or muscle mass.

I had a quick check with a 500g packet of chocolate digestives that are in our work kitchen. Apparently I can scrap my meal tonight and just eat a packet of those with a CNP protein bar to top me up a bit and I'm good to go.

Surely you don't really believe that?

[Marky147]

I always thought it was macros, as opposed to calories.

As long as you were consistently hitting your individual protein/carbs/fat targets, you were good to go.

If not, that tin of heroes is getting decimated next week

[iRaise]

Macros are KCALS, macros make up your calories. I haven't published the blog yet, just wrote it. Its quite long so can PM it if you want?

I am not advocating it, but if you stay under your KCALs and have enough protein your body comp is the same. That is obviously all other things being equal, so training/sleep etc. You could easily argue if you just ate biscuits your sleep would suffer etc, so your body comp goes down because you aren't recovering properly.

You don't really need carb/fat targets per say. A good level of health is around 1g of fat per KG then the rest of your KCALs in carbs, but people manipulate that all the time depending on personal preference. I used to be very macro based, but KCALs and macros are literally counting the same thing, just calling it a different name.

Protein (and training) takes care of lean mass
KCALs take care of fat mass
Training takes care of muscular shape.

If I put it this way, if I eat one skittle will I gain fat? If I eat 1,000,000 will I? Its all relative. So total KCALs are the deciding factor. You can swap skittles for anything you think you shouldn't have. The problem in most cases, is people just eat more of them. If I was a tour de france rider, I could probably have 1,000 skittles a day and it will only make me fast. If I am a mum of two who walks the dogs twice a week, I probably couldn't.

Try it though, work out how much you consume in a day (I assume you are pretty consistent with what you have) swap a meal for skittles (or whatever you want, just don't go over the KCALs of the meal) and see.

[iRaise]

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/the-energy-balance-equation.html/

This is one about the principle of energy balance. Lyle is a great resource for nutrition, the blogs are a little long and sometimes use words that hurt my brain. But he is still one of the forefronts.

I have an Alan Aragon and Brad Schonfield one, but they are LOOOOONG. I might try and find one by Menno as at least his name as cropped up here before.

[iRaise]

http://www.iifym.com/why-clean-eating-fails/

Obviously biased as its taken from the website of 'if it fits your macros' and the one transformation photo clearly can't be trusted in isolation I agree. But gives you a bit about the theory of KCALs. I guess what you have to understand is the equation of energy balance, I think? Then everything stems of that?

[iRaise]

Here are a few names that you could google to read some more on, I think all have youtube channels/podcasts as well.

Danny Lenon- Sigma Nutrition, if you listen to podcasts, I would strongly listen to him
Martin MacDonald
Lyle McDonald
Layne Norton
Eric Helms
James Krieger (he really is incredibly smart)
Rich Sennewald
Gordon Greenhorn
Examine.com
Alan Aragon
Scott Baptie
Rachel Hobbs
Mike Isretal (just did a good blog)
Joe Agu

Thats off the top of my head, I am sure I am missing a few more.

Lets throw in Grenade Jay because he eats skittles too, although he is lets say a more 'get it done guy' than a 'theory' guy. But he balances it out I guess against those guys.

There isn't one route to getting there, that is clearly obvious. But a big part of what I want to do is give our correct, evidence based information for people to make informed decisions, I don't want to 'convince' you of anything. Clearly optional to read any of that, but there are way to many myths in health and fitness, but understanding the principles is how you can sieve through it (Joe Agu did a great blog on that, 'how to find the bro's' I think its called).

Someone asked me yesterday how they can trust me to anyone else, and I didn't really know what to say, I just said give me a month and assess how I speak/act etc. I try to learn from the very best, the 'evidence based' crowd, but there are 4-5 names on that list that are real life based too, which is an amazing combo. Lyle might be very theory at times, and with adherent athletes, that works fine. Martin is someone who takes the theory and makes it applicable to everyday life.

[iRaise]

4x4 on Bench today at 90. Felt good, last rep was a wobbler on all 4 sets.

Some single arm stuff.

3x8 DB press at 36 (shoulder felt that one, so will be a little cautious)
into
3x8e OAR 44 (felt good and strong, grip strength stuck with me).

[iRaise]

http://www.theptdc.com/2016/11/3-lessons-dr-oz-and-food-babe/

Last bit of spam, promise. But thats a good article in terms of balancing it out, tried to choose something that wasn't biased.

[EvilPie]

8 pints of Stella and 4 protein shakes a day it is then. Happy times ahead

[arbboy]

8 pints of Stella and 4 protein shakes a day it is then. Happy times ahead

In before Marky!  That's where i have been going wrong for 10 years then.  It was always 12 stellas and zero protein shakes.  Knew i was reasonably close to the perfect formula.  Adjustments going to be made.  Sorted.

Physio update for me.  Went last Weds regarding my lower back issue.  Is only a soft tissue injury.  He give me some treatment and i am going back tomorrow for a second meeting.  He said last week should be fully recovered in 2 weeks and i am feeling much better than this time last week already so fingers crossed it will be nothing major moving forward.

[EvilPie]

Had a bit of a shoulder problem yesterday which wasn't pleasant.

It was a bit dodgy over the weekend possibly following my attempt at 80kg OHP. Anyway I did incline bench up to 100kg which weren't too tough so guessed it must be okay. Bent over row I only went up to 60kg because I wanted to get a few reps and then it was OHP time. I always do my first set just with the bar to make sure everything's working okay and clearly it wasn't because I couldn't even do one!

Surprising how different I felt going between incline and a full over head.

Luckily I got in to physio this morning and she's straightened things out a bit and given me permission to do lower body tomorrow and upper on Friday if I feel up to it.

Hopefully fully recovered soon and it won't set me back too much. I can feel a bit of a cold possibly coming on so that might be a stumbling block as well if I don't keep it in check.

[Marky147]

8 pints of Stella and 4 protein shakes a day it is then. Happy times ahead

In before Marky!  That's where i have been going wrong for 10 years then.  It was always 12 stellas and zero protein shakes.  Knew i was reasonably close to the perfect formula.  Adjustments going to be made.  Sorted.

I don't drink anymore, but really cba eating most of the time, and have been on 3 shakes a day for the last few months, lol.

Stick to the Stella, and just have a couple protein bars, that'll do it

[Steve Swift]

Doh thought that I had a video to post, on closer inspection a miscount occurred... Closssseeeee

[EvilPie]

http://www.iifym.com/why-clean-eating-fails/

Obviously biased as its taken from the website of 'if it fits your macros' and the one transformation photo clearly can't be trusted in isolation I agree. But gives you a bit about the theory of KCALs. I guess what you have to understand is the equation of energy balance, I think? Then everything stems of that?

I get the calories thing completely. It's the balanced bit I can't get my head around at all

Last night I'd forgotten to take any chicken out of the freezer so I ate some sausages that I managed to nick off my sister. I had 5 sausages chopped up on 3 pitta breads which gave the following:

5 x sausages - 610, 30.5, 35.8, 38.4
5g olive oil - 41, 0, 0, 4.6
3 x pitta - 449, 72.6, 17.7, 5.1

Totals

1100 calories
103.1g carbs
53.5g protein
48.1g fat

If we compare this to the meal I had the other night:

40g wholegrain rice - 140, 28.5, 3.4, 1.1
180g chopped tomatoes - 52, 8.5, 2.3, 0.2
70g curry sauce - 75, 6.4, 1.1, 4.8
15g puree - 11, 1.7, 0.6, 0.1
5g olive oil - 41, 0, 0, 4.6
200g mixed veg - 96, 9.9, 2.4, 4.6
200g chicken - 212, 0, 48, 1
3 x pitta - 449, 72.6, 17.7, 5.1

Totals

1076 calories
127.6g carbs
75.5g protein
21.5g fat

So I'm slightly down on the protein but I could have sorted that by scrapping the pittas and having a few more sausages instead.

9 sausages would be 1098 calories with 64g of protein so we're getting much closer.

Now I know that I can eat that curry meal every night for 3 months and stay as I am or even get bigger. If I eat 9 sausages instead you're saying I'll look exactly the same after those 3 months? Don't think we need to fall out over the odd 10g of protein.....

So really you're saying it's the ratio of calories to protein that matters? As long as my meal contains 1100 calories and 75g or so of protein it makes no difference how I obtain it?

We're obviously not counting the fact that we'd die of salt poisoning or vitamin d deficiency or some such thing at some point?

Interesting.

[zerofive]

So really you're saying it's the ratio of calories to protein that matters? As long as my meal contains 1100 calories and 75g or so of protein it makes no difference how I obtain it?

We're obviously not counting the fact that we'd die of salt poisoning or vitamin d deficiency or some such thing at some point?

This is basically the crux of it. I was going to, and probably still will, do a video about diet. It's quite simple, but the industry loves to make it complicated.

In order of importance, this is dieting 101

• Energy balance (calories in minus calories out)
• Macros (protein, fats, carbs, fibre)
• Micros (vitamins and minerals)
• Meal timing
• Supplements

We NEED to understand this list top to bottom. Juice diets are popular because they prey on people who understand micronutrients but don't understand energy balance. Weight gain powders are popular because they prey on people who understand supplements and meal timing, but don't understand macros.

"Healthy foods" are so-called because of their vitamin content and glycemic load. If you got all your calories from ice cream then your blood sugar would be all over the place, you'd be hungry and miserable all the time, but as long as calories consumed were fewer than calories burned then you would lose weight.

Body comp requires muscle maintenance, which requires adequate protein consumption. So let's make sure we hit our protein targets, then we can go ahead and get the rest of our calories from wherever you want. As mentioned above, if it all comes from ice cream then we will feel like shit, but we will still be losing weight (and because we understand our macros, we will be maximising fat loss and minimising muscle loss)

Try eating 2,000kcals worth of McDonalds (basically 4 double cheeseburgers, not ashamed to say I have run the numbers on all my junk food favourites) and then try eating 2,000kcals worth of lean meats, fruits and vegetables. Weight loss/gain will be the same in both cases, but guess which one will make you feel fuller, which one will make you feel better. Spoiler alert, it's not going to be the McDonald's diet... However, if you want to sacrifice a few kcals here and there for your favourite things, such as skittles, then this will not affect your weightloss efforts, but it will help maintain your sanity!