Motorway Fat Loss: From Slow And Steady To Fast And Ready

Should you be dieting? Or working on practicing habits? Doing both? Or say ‘screw it, give me all the cake’?

It’s confusing isn’t it?

Knowing what to do to lose body fat, how much to do, and, most poignantly, when to do it.

Fear not my little fat loss warrior, I’m going to take you through a simple guide that’ll show you when and how to practice your gradual, life-changing habits, and when and how to ‘diet’ that little bit harder.

But first…

Imagine yourself on the motorway.

Should you consider yourself a self-respecting, law-abiding citizen, you should be spending most of your time in the inner lane, cruising along at a solid 70 mph. This? Well this is your lifelong weight maintenance phase.

This comprises the great habits you execute every single day that are going to make sure you’re consistently happy with your body. You’re going to hopefully be here a long time.

Every once in a while, however, you’re going to want to overtake someone. You’re going to need to speed up, move into the middle or outer lane, and press down on that accelerator. How daring. We’ll compare this to a phase of intense dieting.

This could be the build up to a specific holiday or wedding that will involve a slightly more concentrated version of your lifelong weight maintenance habits.

Remember…

You won’t spend the majority of your drive in that outer lane – you will eventually end up back implementing that 70 mph approach. But that period of lifelong weight maintenance can be interspersed with specific periods of more intense dieting.

The problem? People spend their whole life in that outer lane, always dieting.

They’re never making changes to their habits or lifelong behaviours, they’re constantly depriving themselves, and they inevitably end up in a junk-food induced coma silently sobbing in the corner of the room.

The solution? To nail down that 70 mph drive, and make this form of ‘maintenance’ the norm.

When, and only when, you’ve achieved that, should you attempt to move into those faster lanes and ‘go harder’ with your diet, only for you to ultimately return to the phase of lifelong weight maintenance.

The Inner Lane: Lifelong Weight Maintenance

Welcome to lifelong weight maintenance – the foundation to the lean, strong, and sexy body you crave.

This is where you want to practice perfecting those long-lasting nutritional and training habits. This is where you’re going to be consistently happy with your body. This is where you want to spend the majority of your time.

It’s important to remember that while immersed in this stage of body transformation, change will take time. It will be a slow process, fulfilled by gradually incorporating new behaviours into your lifestyle.

Is it possible to change your body shape and lose weight along the way? Absolutely. ‘Maintenance’ in this sense doesn’t necessarily mean ‘staying the same’. While in this stage though, it’s imperative to understand that you’ll be adding and honing training and nutritional habits into your routine, to ensure long-lasting success.

You won’t be ‘dieting’. You won’t be looking for ‘quick-fixes’. You won’t be taking things at 100 miles per hour.

Taking things slowly will ensure you won’t be stuck in the perpetual cycle of weight loss and weight gain.

So how are you going to do that exactly? Well by firstly mastering these five important and sustainable habits:

– Track Your Food

‘A granola bar has how many calories!?’

You see, people just don’t have a clue how much food they’re actually devouring on a daily basis. One of the best habits you can start to incorporate into your daily routine is to start documenting your food intake.

When you quickly find out that the ‘healthy’ lunch you’d been having equates to a whopping 1200 calories, you’ll soon realise that incorporating a little logging into your routine will work wonders.

Through the magic of tracking, you’ll subconsciously reduce your calorie intake without starting any enchanted diet or forgoing any of the foods you love. When you realize how much of an effect a little recording has, you’ll soon be tracking every day.

– Master the 80/20 Principle

‘I’m going to cut out having chocolate, crisps, and sweets’.

Do you know how long that lasts? About two weeks.

Cutting out things from your diet, depriving yourself, and focusing on what you can’t have, leads to failure. Every single time.

Behold the 80/20 principle. The notion that 80% of your foods throughout the week should come from nutrient rich foods (meat, fish, eggs, fruit, vegetables etc.) and 20% should come from foods you really want to eat (chocolate, crisps, pizza etc.)

By mastering this simple formula of flexibility, you won’t feel deprived the whole time, nor will you be stuffing your face with all those hyperpalatable foods you know you shouldn’t be having.

– Lift Weights Consistently

‘I went to the gym six times last week’.

Do you know how long this monstrous way of thinking lasts? About as long as it took you to cut out all that chocolate.

Just as with your food, you need to ensure you’re lifting weights and getting stronger on a consistent basis. Going all in and blasting yourself for two weeks, only to then have four weeks off because you’ve broken your body, won’t get you anywhere.

Start by performing full body, strength based workouts just twice a week. Once that becomes part of your routine, then you can add in extra sessions slowly but surely.

From session to session your main goal should be to get stronger. Lift more, add more reps, and just simply do more over time.

– Reduce Portion Size

‘I’ll have eight potatoes please’.

Instead of eight, you’re going to have four. Instead of a whole pizza, you’re going to have three quarters. Instead of a full side of chips, you’re going to have half.

By simply practicing the habit of dramatically reducing your usual portion size, you’ll still enjoy your favourite foods, but you’ll be halving the amount of calories you’re consuming.

Slowly incorporating small changes like this into your diet will ensure you’ll consistently change your body shape without even realising it.

– Change Your Environment

‘For some reason I always find myself heading for the biscuit tin in the evenings’.

The majority of the eating decisions you make have more to do with predetermined habits, physical cues and what’s going on around you. Things like the home, the workplace, restaurants, and supermarkets are all set up to lead us down the path of the inevitable diet collapse.

The solution is as simple as not buying these items. If you don’t keep your trigger foods in the house you can’t easily head to the cupboard or fridge and sneak in another biscuit or glass of wine. The more you keep these food items in the house the more likely you are to overeat on them.

If they ain’t there, you ain’t eating them.

The Outer Lane: Intense Dieting

Well done. You’ve spent the majority of your drive in the inner lane, sharpening those sustainable habits that’ll ensure you’ll be able to change your life for longer than the usual two week diet you’re used to undertaking.

But I get it. Sometimes you want to look even better. You’ve got that summer holiday coming up after all.

This is when you can press down on that accelerator. This is when you can speed things up a bit and really go hard with trying to shed a few extra pounds of body fat.

It’s important to remember, however, that you won’t be spending all your time in this outer lane. Your behaviours, weight, and body fat percentage will eventually return back to their usual set point; the inner lane.

Dan John, who likes to term this intense phase of dieting a ‘bus-bench’ approach due to its all-out nature, says this line of attack is best suited twice a year.

Once you’ve chosen these times wisely, here’s what you’re going to do:

– A Greater Calorie Deficit

‘I’m only consuming 1000 calories a day’.

No, you’re not going to starve yourself. But in this phase of dieting you’re allowed to go a little bit harder with your calorie deficit.

This is where you can maybe cut an extra few hundred calories from your daily budget to accelerate progress. You’re still going to want to prioritise eating as much food as possible while still making progress, but don’t be afraid to drop those calories a little further.

Will you be able to sustain this type of calorie deficit? Unlikely. But we know that you’ll eventually revert back to what you were doing before, and you’re absolutely OK with that.

– A Little Bit More Cardio

‘I’m going to do two hours of fasted cardio, seven days a week’.

No, you’re not. Because, well fasted cardio is stupid, and too much will probably be detrimental to your efforts. But in this phase, you’re going to be allowed to bump up your cardio a tad.

Sticking a few high intensity intervals onto the end of your strength based training sessions is allowed. So is increasing your step count throughout the day, and including a few low intensity steady state cardio sessions into your plan.

Cardio isn’t the devil, nor is it the only answer to your problems. It’s a tool that, when utilised effectively and for the right amount of time, will allow you to drop a few extra pounds.

– Increased Protein, Decreased Carbohydrate

‘No carbs for me’.

Yes carbs for you. But in this phase you’re going to be allowed to drop them a little more so than usual. Oh, and this is only after you’ve dramatically bumped up your protein intake to maximise your chances of preserving strength and muscle mass.

Just like cardio, carbohydrates aren’t the devil. But when greater fat loss is concerned, slightly reducing this aspect of your macronutrient intake can be incredibly beneficial.

Start by working out your protein and fat requirements for each day, and fill the rest of your daily quota with carbohydrates. Only drop them as much as you feel comfortable, so you don’t end up feeling like a lethargic mess.

– Lift Heavy Weights Faster

‘I’m going to lift lighter weights for crazy reps to make sure I tone up’.

The whole light weights, big reps, for toning is a myth. And a bad one at that.

Your main goal when embarking on a more intense phase of dieting is to maintain strength and muscle mass. You can’t do this if you suddenly start dropping the intensity of your lifts.

The solution? Reduce the amount of volume you perform throughout the week, whilst still lifting as heavy as possible.

Oh, and add in some metabolic conditioning components. This typically being, lifting weights faster. You should be embracing the power of urgency, through performing as much work as possible within a determined time, using weighted exercises.

The Middle Lane: A Quick Word

So you’ve dieted for a while. You’ve been on holiday and you looked sexy AF. You know you probably won’t be able to sustain that increased level of restriction you just experienced, so you know you’ll have to return to the regular habits you spent time building in your lifelong maintenance phase.

Should you dive straight back into this phase? No, probably not.

Returning to these habits should be a gradual process. Head back to that inner lane, too fast and too soon, and you’ll end up crashing. Putting on significant amounts of body fat and feeling all depressed again, that is.

While I won’t delve too deeply into the nuances of reverse dieting, your main goal should be to slowly increase your calories back up to what they were in your ‘maintenance’ phase.

You should slowly reduce the amount of cardio you were doing, and you should take time in getting back to the stage you were before you accelerated into the outer lane.

This is typically the phase that people get terribly wrong. This is associated with the binge eating and crashing that people are so used to from depriving themselves too hard, for too long.

Now you’ve got a better understanding of when and where you should be, you hopefully won’t make this mistake.

A Final Round Up…

When it comes to fat loss, the majority of your time should be spent changing and practicing the lifelong habits that are going to serve you well for the rest of your life.

You shouldn’t be focused on ‘dieting’ and you shouldn’t fall into the typical dieters trap for the duration of your life.

There will be times throughout the year that you’ll want to go a little bit harder with your diet. This is OK. You have to understand you’ll probably return to your original state, but once you accept this, you’ll be better set to make these changes.

Good luck and drive safely.

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