Summer shredding: Three-month cut
Week 6
More stories from Ryan Allen
Shelby Foster and Rilee Stapleton
Thinking about the most important things when on a clean cutting diet. I will be executing a healthy, three-month cut losing fat while retaining as much muscle as possible. It’s important in the cutting cycle not to crash diet (cut too many calories) and sacrifice all of the hard-earned muscle from the gym.
Week 6: 200.8 lbs. – 200.0 lbs.
This week was a bit of a rough one for “Summer Shredding” because of a few different factors.
Diet and exercise is big, but stress and anxiety can affect the progress of gains. When you’re stressed and busy. you typically get to bed a bit later or have sluggish gym sessions.
This week was a rough one due to some personal life issues and just being extremely busy. Now that we’re wrapping up the end of the school year, teachers are pushing big tests and projects.
Sleep is one of the biggest factors that can affect your gym progress and overall health. Your body needs rest in order to recover, and if you drain your muscles from the day before they won’t rebuild.
Another annoying factor of being restless is weakness, mentally and physically. When you’re drained physically, you underperform in the gym. When you’re drained mentally, you’re more susceptible to cheating your diet and binge eating. That’s where I fell short during tech week for the spring musical.
Now that I’m almost two months in on the cut, I’m starting to create some habits and routines to help reinforce my progress. I’m incorporating an afternoon cardio session to ensure that the caloric deficit is happening. I’m tracking all of the food that I’m eating so I won’t cheat. I’m weighing myself every morning and writing it down to track progress.
I’ve also made a switch to my diet that may seem a bit strange for me. I’ve been eating keto for the past two years to lose weight, which has worked well. The problem with a keto diet and a harsh cut is that it leaves you with “diet brain,” and you’re always hungry. Healthy fats don’t take up a lot of space in your stomach, so it’s hard to be satisfied after a fat heavy meal. It’s also really easy to overeat on a keto diet since it takes longer to feel full.
Since I’m in a caloric deficit and I hit the gym seven days a week, my muscles are constantly exhausted and are glycogen depleted. I switched up my diet to a high carb, low fat diet that way my muscles are replenished and I don’t overeat.
There’s a fine line with diets and fat loss. Since I’m under ten percent body fat, I’m cutting for leanness and not fat loss. Keto is mainly for fat loss and high carb, low fat is for gym hitters on a cut.
This next week should be amazing, because my weight will no longer be in the 200s and results are motivating.
On to week seven.