It’s Sunday, AKA the BF% Measurement Day.
Bodyfat Percentage: And, it dropped again, more than planned, so I’m now almost 3 weeks ahead with respect to bf% (26.5% vs the target today was 27.2%). Of course, the numbers could be off, especially at this high of a percentage, but it’s the trend that’s important and the trend is down. Waist measurement is over 2″ less than when I started. That measurement is not off.
I’m now where I was with my weight almost exactly 1 calendar year ago, so I’ve erased one year of weight gain. Yeah, that’s a better way to think about it than, “If I’d just stuck with it a year ago, I’d be so much further ahead!” Much more positive to think of it in a negative: “I’ve erased a year of weight gain!” (Well, sort of … I’m where I was a year ago with my waist, but it’s at about 3lbs more, so I have slightly more muscle.)
So, this also means that I can look back at 8 weeks of measurements and see what’s been going on.
Way back in the day (in 2007ish), I asked on the now-closed John Stone Fitness Forum what percentage of weight loss by folks had been fat? The numbers were somewhere around 65–80%, so I have used 75% as my target. Meaning, my goal has been to lose 0.7% of my weight per week, and of that, I expect 75% of it to be fat. That’s how I get my bf% goal each week.
Looking at the last 8 weeks, assuming that the calculations are at least consistent trend-wise if not fully accurate, of the ≈10 lbs I’ve lost, ≈9.5 lbs of that have been fat. So I’m at a 90% fat loss rate (despite not doing any weights).
That means I think I can be a bit more aggressive with my goals.
I’m not going to change my weight loss goal, I have already modified that for Week 10+ to be –0.75% instead of –0.7%. It doesn’t change much, but it moves up the end of my first major cut by two weeks to mid-February.
I had also modified the %fat for the next chunk of time (so, there’s this week, next week is a maintenance, then the next “chunk” is the following 8 weeks) from 75% to 80%. The modification I’ve made is to now propagate that extra 5% through February. That change means that mid-February I had a goal of being 14.3% bf at 170 lbs, so 24.3 lbs fat and 145.7 lbs lean. Raising this to 80% means the goal at 170 lbs in mid-February is to be 13.4% bf, so 22.7 lbs fat and 147.3 lbs lean.
So, these are relatively trivial changes, especially with a 9-month forecast. But, tiny changes now, if they are achievable (and it seems to be since I’m already doing it), can mean bigger changes later since they build up.
Of course, in another 10 weeks, I will re-evaluate this for feasibility.
Calories & Macros: I mentioned this in my last post, but with an average goal weight this week of 214.6 lbs, that puts me in the 210±5 lbs range instead of 220±5 lbs. That means calories drop from 1740 to 1680 per day, fat from 58 to 56 gms, and carbs and protein from 152.2 gms to 147 gms. It’s still a 30/35/35 split, but that will change with the next drop, anticipated in 9 weeks. Right now, it’s 0.7 gms protein per 1 lb of bodyweight.
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