Adding Lean Gains to My Simple Diet

A few weeks ago I posted My Simple Diet Guidelines. About a week ago I added intermittent fasting to the diet and I have been able to see faster results. I still follow a once a week weightlifting protocol, but I added a little walking everyday. I made these modifications to slowly move to Martin Berhkan's LeanGains Protocol. The supplements stay the same but I take them with my first meal of the day instead of breakfast like I used to.

Additions (Non-Workout Day):

• Eat my last meal of the day between 6:00PM  and 8:00PM.
• The next day take 10g of BCAA 15min before I go for a 30 to 60 minute walk at around 11:30AM.
• Eat my first meal of the day after my walk with about 50% of the calories calculated in My Simple Diet Guidelines.
• Have a snack in the middle of the afternoon if I have something available.
• And start over by eating my last meal of the day between 6:00PM  and 8:00PM.

Additions (Workout Day):

• Eat my last meal of the day between 6:00PM  and 8:00PM the day before the workout.
• The next day take 10g of BCAA 15min before I go for a 30 to 60 minute walk at around 11:30AM.
• Eat my first meal of the day after my walk with about 25% of the calories calculated in My Simple Diet Guidelines.
• Have a snack at around 3:00PM if I have something available. A very small snack.
• Take 10g of BCAA 20min before my workout.
• Take 10g of BCAA after my workout.
• Eat a large meal high in carbohydrates such as rice. Even tough I add more carbs on this day I still do not go over the total calories calculated in my guidelines.
• Take 10g of BCAA before going to sleep.
• And start over by eating my last meal of the day between 6:00PM  and 8:00PM.

I added 1 to 3 glasses of red wine and one low-fat ice-cream cone on Saturday and like Martin Berkhan says:

The Minimalist's Guide to Fitness: IF, HIT, and Much More

Book Review

The Minimalist's Guide to Fitness: Intermittent Fasting, High Intensity Training, and Much More
By Thomas Hilmersen


The author has done his research. I have read most of the material presented here in other books and some of the books referenced in this book and it is all accurate. Save yourself some time and just read this book to learn the most effective way to workout and to eat healthy.

I have been doing high intensity workouts for the past three months while following a slightly different version of the slow carb diet (mine does not include cheat days and alcohol) and I have gotten great results. I have been looking for somebody that explains IF (intermittent fasting) and HIT (High Intensity Training) and this is it.

The book even has a chapters about optimizing sleep and how to dress well. These chapters are short, but do not underestimate the power of the advice given there.

I have been able to double my strength in 13 twenty minute workouts following the advice on this book and have lost almost 4 inches from my waist eating in a similar way. I cant wait to see the results in another 3 months now that i will be adding IF.

I am very thankful to the author for taking the time to write this book.

Very Low Carb Performance

Here is an interesting video I found for those interested in running, swimming, biking, etc.

Body Fat Measuring with a DXA (DEXA) Scan

About a year ago I got a body fat test using a DEXA scan machine. I was able to get very accurate measurements and It helped me looked for other cheaper but just as accurate way to measure body fat. Check out my post on tracking progress to find out the methods that I currently use.

DXA scans are used primarily to evaluate bone mineral density. DXA scans can also be used to measure total body composition and fat content with a high degree of accuracy comparable to hydrostatic weighing with a few important caveats.

In the first picture below you can see one of the scans that shows my bones in blue, muscle in red and fat in orange. It is easy to tell that most of my body fat is in my mid-section. This comes at no surprise since, my legs and arms have always been pretty lean and most men have a predisposition to store fat in the mid-section easily and it is hard to get rid of once is there. The body fat result shown here is about 22% (I am currently around 13%).

In the second picture you can see my bone structure and a little bit of my muscles and fat.

During this time, the doctor calculated my maintenance calories to be 1,830 a day. It was close, but now I know that it is actually 2,600 calories a day on a low-carb diet.

Working Out To Failure

I had a really good workout last Friday. It was a great example of how to workout to muscle failure. I have been doing one exercise session per week for the last 8 weeks and increasing the resistance by 5% or more every week. I have increased my strength on the leg press by 49% in just 8 workouts.

I have a trainer help me load the weights in between exercises and time each exercise and repetitions using a chronometer. Last Friday I got a new trainer named Mike because the regular one went on spring break vacation. I told him the usual instructions of how I work out  and we got started.

Leg Press

We started with the planned weight  doing one repetition every 20 seconds for a goal of six repetitions or 2 minutes of exercise. I made sure my legs where always under tension careful not to give them a rest on the positive or negative part of the repetition.

At about 90 seconds, my legs started to get a burning sensation, (this is the point where I would usually quit) there was still strength left so I kept going past the burning sensation trying to keep my pace. While the burning sensation in my legs was still there, I start to feel my legs getting warm like when you get into a hot tub. My arms start to get a tingling sensation, I'm breathing quickly and this does not feel like fun anymore. My heart monitor started sounding an alarm letting me know that my heart rate is now above 170 beats per minute (my maximum hearth rate is 188).

I kept pushing the weights as much as I could until the point where all I was doing was holding the weights and they were not moving at all. At this point I imagined the weights being a rock that is about to crush me if I don't hold it in place. After a few seconds of just holding the weight in place, the weight starts to move backwards (I can't hold it anymore), I wait a few seconds and this is where I rack the weights and finished the exercise.

I tried to stand up right after my exercise, but in between my heavy breathing and not being able to speak, my legs where not able to hold my own body weight and I had to sit down. I took a 30 second rest and I was able to stand up again. I was not able to catch my breath for the next 10 to 15 minutes.

This is one of the best workouts I have had.

Gaining Muscle On A Low-Carb Diet

I was doing some research online about whether is possible to gain muscle while on a low-carb diet and I found this interesting post.

Meetza Is The Low-Carb Pizza

I have not been able to eat pizza for a while and I ran into a recipe for a "Meetza" online, so I decided to give it a try. Surprisingly, this recipe turned out to be pretty tasty and easy to do. It makes 8 servings enough for 4 adults.

Nutrition Facts Per Serving 

• 318 calories, 19g of fat, 3g net carbohydrates and 33g of protein

Ingredients

• 2 lbs of ground beef
• 5oz of mushrooms
• 3oz of green bell peppers
• 4oz of shredded Parmesan cheese
• 2 eggs
• 6oz of low carb tomato basil (about 6 net carbohydrates per half a cup)

Seasonings

• 4oz of grated Parmesan cheese
• 1tsp of salt
• 1tsp of caraway seeds
• 1tsp of oregano
• 1tsp of garlic salt
• 1tsp of coarse ground pepper
• 1tsp of crushed red pepper 

Quick Instructions

• Pre-heat the oven at 450 degrees Fahrenheit
• Mix all the seasonings in a bowl
• Mix the ground beef with the eggs
• Add the seasonings to the ground beef and mix well
• Place the ground beef on a 12" x 17" cookie sheet. It should cover the entire cookie sheet
• Cook it in the oven for 10 minutes
• Saute the green bell pepper and mushrooms with some butter on an iron skillet, when ready put aside.
• Remove the ground beef from the oven and drain the fat carefully, put aside
• Set the oven to Broil on high
• Put a layer of tomato basil on the ground beef, then a layer of the shredded Parmesan cheese and lastly the saute mushrooms and green bell peppers evenly distributed
• Place the ground beef with all the toppings back in the oven for anywhere between 3 to 5 minutes. You need to check it often because it might burn.
• Take it out of the oven and cut it in 8 slices so that you can use the nutrition facts above

It takes about two slices per person if all you are eating is this Meetza

Photos

Ingredients

Prepared ground beef on a 12" x 7" cookie sheet

Finished Meetza

Meetza cut into 8 pieces (after we ate 3 pieces)