gavstransformation

Not a pretty sight is it !

The first stage of my program was to up my training volume in order to increase calorie burn, and of course to clean any
"rubbish" out of my diet. My diet at the start of the program looked like this...

6am - 250g low sugar fromage frais, 4 egg whites, scoop whey, berries, coffee.

Vits / mins / fish oils.

9am / 12 noon / 3pm / 6pm

1 off the following along with fish oils :

Chicken and egg white salad with olive oil + garlic dressing, gherkins.

Chicken and veg stir fry, 1/2 block noodles.

Lean beef and vegetable chile, loads of veg , gherkins.

Pot roasted beef with vegetables.

Braised Lambs Liver with vegetables

Chicken rolled in oatmeal and spices, baked in oven + roasted veggies.

9pm - 250g low sodium low fat cottage cheese, gherkins.

The general idea was to get protein, essential fatty acids (EFA's) and fibre into my system every 3 hours. This made it easy to
hold on to muscle mass whilst losing bodyfat. Water intake was also increased at this time to 4 - 6 litres per day. Keeping
hydrated makes fat loss faster and easier, and also (combined with the removal of all "junk" food from my diet) help clear up my
skin.

Over the course of the first 3 months I rotated a number of supplements that are either anti-catabolic (stop muscle wasting),
anabolic (aid muscle gain) or help support fat loss. These included...

Green tea extract standardised to 50% EGCG's.

Iodine

Chromium

Guarana Extract

Synephrine (bitter orange)

Panax Ginseng

Eleuthero

Licorice

Kola

Cayenne

Alpha Lipoic Acid

CO Q 10

Octacsanol

L-glutamine

Whey Protein

Creatine Mono

Phosphates

After 3 months on this regimen I lost 23Kg, you can see the changes below...

MAY 05 JULY 05

;'

At this point I felt ready to embark on a much more intense diet strategy that included quite harsh calorie deficit. In order to
prevent too much muscle tissue being lost during this phase I added in Branched chain amino acids throughout the day. BCAA's
help spare muscle tissue during periods of calorie restriction. My diet looked like this...

545am - 15g L-Glutamine in water, 3g BCAA.

615am - 3 dessert spoons whey in water, sweetener. 1 dessert spoon flax, Coffee

Training 1.

Low intensity CV (walking or stationary bike)

9am - 250g low fat low sodium cottage cheese, 3 x fish oils caps.

12 noon - 5g BCAA, 2g taurine, caffeine.

1220 pm

Training 2 - Weights.

1pm - 5g BCAA.

120pm- 3 dessert spoons whey in water, sweetener, 1 piece fruit or 1 cup raw oatmeal.

4pm - 1/2 chicken breast or 150g lean beef, veggies.

7pm - 1/2 chicken breast or 150g lean beef, veggies.

8pm

Training 3. High Intensity interval sprints, just 2-4 minutes.

9pm - 250g low fat low sodium cottage cheese, 1 tablespoon flax.

During night if wake - 5g BCAA.

This was a pretty harsh regimen, but within a few weeks it had the desired effect and body fat began to drop off me at an
incredible rate. Here's a pic from September 2005, 3 months further on in the diet, and weight around 97Kg.

Quite an improvement there !

At this point I began to cycle my overall carbohydrate and calorie intake across "intervals" of 5-10 days. In this I could lose fat
quickly whilst keeping metabolic rate elevated. "Refeeding" with high amounts of carbohydrates helped me regulate leptin levels,
so my body never adapted to the lower calorie periods, and hence fat loss just kept coming. My diet intervals looked like this...

Interval 1.

Background things (used throughout whole interval) - Mineral based test boosters (zinc) SHBG blockers.

Phase 1 - five days.

25g simple carbs before and after training.
Training volume high, loads light, 2 sessions per day+ CV.
CV sprint based HIIT.
100 - 200g other carbs per day.

Supplements - Growth Hormone encouraging amino acids + non-stimulant "fat burner" / nutrient partitioning mix (green tea,
ALCAR, r-ALA etc).

Phase 2 - 5 days to 1 week.

Zero deliberate carbs.
Fats higher and very unsaturated (lots of fish oils and flax seed oil).
3 weight training sessions per week, very low volume, very heavy loads.
CV 1-3 hours daily, very low intensity (walking mostly).
Supps - Stimulant fat burners (caffiene / synephrine etc).

3 days carb rebound in which carb intake was very high (7-900g) and fats kept very low.

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Interval 2.

As above but with background supps now leutenizing homone stimulant (tribulus) and thyroid stimulant (iodine from sea kelp).

Carb rebound lasting 2 days in between each 5 day phase, with carbs again very high on rebound days.
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Back to interval 1.

This is an example of how calorie deficit can be attained through different combinations of kcal intake and kcal expenditure. This
works much better than a diet that fixes both calorie intake and expenditure through exercise at a certain level for any long
period of time because it allows for up-regulation of metabolic rate. During the periods when you are eating a lot of carbs you
also re-set leptin levels. This hormone is partly responsible for regulating how much bodyfat you store, and if you can keep it at
"pre-diet" levels then your body will lose fat at an incredible rate throughout your diet, rather than the usual 2 weeks of fast
weight loss followed by no progress for weeks.

This approach of carb cycling whilst rotating kcal expenditure and intake along with supplement intake has brought me down to
my current weight of 88Kg; as you can see below my condition is nothing exceptional but to have lost over 30Kg of fat in 10
months is no small accomplishment.