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But that fat you've burned during the fasted exercise is gone for good. Now if whatever you eat later keeps you in a caloric deficit, that's fat that's never coming back. So it helps for fat loss definitely. But if you eat a surplus afterwards, well then you are probably going to restore the fat as you've said.

Also i think you've overstated the case for ketosis and/or glyocogen depletion. You don't need to be depleted first to start burning fat!! In fact structured carb reloads are a part of good diets because they help reset hormones back to baseline to alleviate somewhat the effect of chronic dieting such as raising metabolism. LBSS knows what i'm talking about, we've read the same source material haha

that's fine, 3x a week is good. the point was just to not lose sight of what you really want to get better at.

Understood. Will keep that in mind, thank you. Tt's def a mistake i don't need to repeat again!!

Glycogen is really really heavy for how little energy it supplies.  Not a surprise that we store bodyfat.   Five pounds in three days is expected.  Now that you have some muscle you will notice bigger swings as well.  When I started cutting for the new year I got off a plane in and weighed in at 221.  I fasted completely the next day and ate breakfast the next and weighed 205 before dinner that day.   A couple of years ago I went from 195 to 215 after thanksgiving.... It happens both ways.

After you get under 200 it will really start to slow.  At that point you will have to be meticulous with your diet or do what I do and start throwing in some fasts.  But at that point you will be losing that fat. 

Wow you know i've never really experienced such big fluctuations, my bodyweight is reasonably stable in comparison! That's pretty wild though. I never though of it that way -- a guy your size and build and activity will have a daily maintenance requirement of say 3500kcal. And fast a day and you're -3500kcal, which is equivalent to the energy value of about half a kilo of pure bodyfat. Do that for a couple of days and maybe you can burn a decent amount of bodyfat very quickly. There must be some catch to it though, maybe your body will downregulate metabolism a lot harder when you're very lean or worse, start using up muscle tissue for energy. But if you're say 10-20%, i'm sure there isn't such an effect. Pretty cool. I wonder if you can 'trick' your body by only doing it 1-3x a week or so, so it doesn't have a chance to slow down metabolism? The downside is probably it will take ages to cut down to your goal bodyweight though as opposed to dedicated daily fasting. And for most people, the problem would be dealing with cravings and binges out of hunger and not being in a stable habit which makes a huge difference because we can humans deal with a lot of severe things that we become used to as opposed to regular disruptive changes. irregular hunger can be insatiable after a while, whereas you can get used to a baseline sort of hunger when dieting. Btw i am aware that daily fasting as in intermittent fasting actually shows a speed up in fat metabolism during the fasting period. Hmm.. lol anyway, something to try one day!

But right now i have to get thru the 3 week hump, after which i find things just settle into a groove and you can cruise along as you stick to the daily habit.


Btw LBSS, it stuck, bodyweight is pretty much the same today as it was yesterday!

I was going to say, Todday, i actually fasted today, i haven't eaten in 17 hours and i could probably do 24hrs too, it's not so bad on rest days, i just can't train properly on training days, i've tried it before, it kills my performance.

Bodyweight: 93.85kg/206.9lb

5 days into the cut and my progress looks like this:



Kind of incredulous finding my bw so low, so soon. I don't really believe it, might have something to do with the crazy heat wave going on. Will see over the next coupla days if it sticks. So far i've been pretty faithful to the diet. I'm eating 2 meals a day, a 100% clean breakfast. And a dinner which is pretty healthy, but perhaps I could use less fat in cooking my chicken? I had drumsticks yesterday, and i baked them in the oven w/ olive oil. Tasted pretty nice. Eventually i'll have to start limiting fat intake to 50g a day or something, like RFL. But right now i'm not going too hard to keep myself sane, because I know the road is long, and i'll gradually embrace further austerity as my caloric requirements subside.

I really wish I felt fresher today, but those ab wheels i did thrashed my abs anyway despite my lamentations for conservation. I feel as though I must PR my front squat by 2-2.5kg this week before my RSR peaking cinderella strength gains vanish. Maybe i'll wait til friday now. And this is why I don't like doing abs, cause they ruin my squat ambitions. But i know if i stick to it, eventually the turntables will turn.

Training
FSBS 4x100, 3x122.5, 1Fx137.5
BS 1x140, 1x145, 2x140, 1Fx140

FSBS notes:
Was a horror show when 122.5kg feels hard you know somethings up. And i actually failed a front squat, can't remember the last time that happened. This was ominous for what was to come..

BS notes:
I was planning on doing 6 doubles with 140kg. It wasn't in the cards, i haven't recovered yet from monday/sunday.

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I feel like shit, i can't remember the last time i had such a bad workout. I guess there will be more of these to come Totally regretting those ab wheels now. But truth is, it's probably only one part of the jigsaw for why this was a bad training day. I was to do upper body, i'm gonna skip it and hope to be recovered for friday.

So i tried it out. As bad as it is to be upright, when i do the whole getting low wide thing, i feel stapled to teh floor. And i can't react to opponent. So it makes me even more useless on defense. Blah.

I did the footwork drill, same, ran some laps of the court, c-t-c layups.  And played a pickup game. I felt like a complete useless piece of immobile stone on the court. i was slow, sluggish, couldn't shoot, couldn't defend or do anything right. Passed ok. Just ok though, nothing special. Forget about dunking in games, i am not even quick enough to get an easy layup.

I think i'll play basketball on sundays.  Then maybe take monday and tuesdays off to rest. And lift weights weds, fris, sunday. Is that the way to do it? training 4 times a day is fine, but not when fucking cutting. In fact, ideally i'd be playing zero basketball and just lifting and resting while cutting. i got this so so wrong. but i think 1x a week is ok. if i can make it work. lets see.

edit. I'm just gonna suck it up and train hard. eventually the dark times will pass, and my body will have adapted.

Thanks guys. In october, I practiced once with a wide stance. But to the point that I was being told it was too wide. Possibly it was. I need to experiment and find the ideal one and then drill it in. Also ChrisM i wasn't setting my chest/core, i didn't realise i needed to do that on defense lol. Will try that next time. Wider than my usual one but not so wide that it is encumbering for me and with chest up and core rigid.
 

I really don't know anymore lol. Thanks for your post, i'm reconsidering my approach. I'll think over it LBSS. I can accept most of your reccomendations but i don't think i can put my squats on the backburner and go back to being weak and feeble and struggling with 2 plates again. I want to keep pushing towards 4 plates, and then i will maintain that and switch focus to other areas. I feel as though that will be enough strength.

But i've been pretty depressed about my quads. I have 27.5" thighs and yet my quads can't absorb enough force it makes sense though, my femur leg segment is longer than average so i need more cross sectional muscular area to make it look less stick like. I think of powerlifters and their massive thighs and if that's what i need to squat a lot then maybe it's something i'm going to have to live without. Basketball players don't usually have big thighs ..



And i'm pretty sure there is a photo of wilt somewhere too



I forgot to mention last night when I went for my walk, I came across this beauty



it was just sat there on the branch completely still. i dunno how i spotted it, but it was completely camouflaged. So so cool. So I spend a good part of today reading about it on wikipedia. It's called a tawny frogmouth which i think is a wholly unflattering name for such a beautiful creature.

So there are benefits to going outside more often

Plan for the summer (2014)
I have 90 days to the bball tournament exactly. My bodyweight is 96kg/211lb (17th Jan). I'd like to play at 80kg/175lb, but i don't think I have enough time. Still I should be able to get 80kg≤bw≤85kg. It really depends how quickly I can get out of the 90s. If it takes over month, then foggetaboudid. But if it takes, idk, a coupla weeks, then it's in the realm of possibility. My metabolism right now is roaring, so i'll be able to get off a good start at least. And how much is postbulk bloating, water weight and how much actual adipose? Well that all remains to be seen.

Training will focus around basketball. My weak points are my fatness, slow/clumsy feet, fitness and conditioning and general athleticism like running and jumping. I'll be training to improve all these facets.

For fatness i'm going on a legit cut, there is no other fool proof way to drop 16kg of bodyweight. You can recomp a kilo or three, but 16kg is a job for a professional, honest to goodness diet.

Conditioning, running and jumping are to be combined into a 1x weekly court session, fridays, working up to 3x a week, as I get lighter. Start with dunk practice. Then followed by conditioning -- I like the the drill Todday suggested, timed coast to coast layups/dunks. I will prob go for a walk every day too while i'm heavy. I will also do slow jogs after every training session at the park on days i'm not going to the court. And maybe include longer sprints like 200m. For fun..

Feet - will do the BFS dot drill and line drills. How often? I am thinking I could do these every time i train. They can't be that hard on recovery as long as i'm warmed up etc. Shit I don't know how fix yet --  I play too vertical if that makes sense. When you look at a slow-mo of derek rose or something, he'll be like slanted over 45 degrees to the ground. How do you evolve that sort of body positioning on the court for someone who is always on his heels?

Gym - Use 140kg as my training weight,  til i've mastered it which means doing sets of 6 with it for backsquats. And it means hitting it any day on front squats.  Will maintain and build-on my maxes, ~160kg beltless bs (2xbw), 145-150kg fs (~1.85xbw), ~170kg belted bs(≥ 2xbw). Train calves heavy 1x a week, wednesdays. Train biceps 1x week, mondays.  Train abs 3x a week. Abs are my main weakness right now limiting my squats. Bigger, stronger abs will make me a beast. Not just in the gym but on the court as well. I need abs so strong, they are prominent thru a t-shirt. Abs so big they pop thru my bellyfat. I should do OHP 1x a week too, they make my traps grow and it will help on the court for building strength useful for rebounding, boxing out, etc.

Skills - Learn post moves, rebounding, shooting the 3 ball, midrange jumper, and dunking on fools from all angles.

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Goals that would be nice to have but not the main focus
- 155kg front squat (~1.95xbw)
- 180kg belted backsquat (purely for the ego)
- 40" vertical

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I think that about covers it, i cant think of anything else right now, if i remember i'll edit.

BRING TO BEAR YOUR BEST CRITICISM PLZ. Srs, welcome all inputs!

Training
FS 1x145 (PR)
BS 1x157.5 (PR)
BBS 0Fx170, 1x169.5 (PR)
CR 2x15x200 (PR)
DUNKS LR plant x 12
CND 30min walk, 1x100m hill sprint

BW: <96kg

FS notes:
PR is nice and all but harder than i'd like it to be. I put it down to warmups not being ideal but then again, i can't afford to optimise warmps towards FS too much when the focus is backsquats. Only got 5kg out of RSR2.

BS notes:
Finally got that 157.5kg PR. Too hard, once again. Need more abs. I'm really disappointed i only got 5kg out of this RSR cycle.

Belted BS notes:
Well, i had a choice to make going into this workout. Go all in on belted backsquats and aim for ≥170kg even maybe 175kg while eschewing any other kind of squats for this workout. Or get 3 different squat PRs albeit at the cost of a more modest belted PR. 

But in the end I decided it was better for MY TRAINING GOALS to get 3prs in front squats, beltless high bar squats and a belted BS, than a PR only in belted squats. I failed 170kg for reasons i can't understand, it just feels so much heavier and harder than anything in the 160s. Whatever. I came close enough, 169.5kg is good enough for this cycle. I'll be good for 170kg soon enough.

Jumping notes:
So I practiced LR plant again this week. I wouldn't say it's become natural, but at one stage RL plant felt unnatural. The gap is closing. I hit a couple of dunks which felt very strong off LR. I believe I need more practice to make the transition from the plant to takeoff more seemless. There is a bit of discrete jaggedness there atm. I took a video but there isn't anything amazing there to bother you guys with.

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Good news is i'm injury free!!