9 Crucial Steps To Lose 20 Pounds For Good

Do you want to know how to get (and stay) lean?

Of course.

We’ve all been burned by “lose fat fast” schemes before. They work for about a week before you’re stressed, hangry, and struggling to make it through the day.

Over the last ten years, it’s become clear that most people do a great job of losing weight at one time or another.

But most people gain all the weight they lose back within a calendar year, if not sooner.

So, what gives?

There are two huge roadblocks preventing people from succeeding:

* 1. Finding correct information to sustainably lose body fat.

* 2. Forming new lean for life habits to keep weight off.

The nine tips below provide time-tested, experienced proven fat loss advice while a bonus note below will give you the chance to turn “hacks” into habits.

1. Meal timing is overrated. The advice of eating to “stoke” your metabolism is about as trustworthy as a 2020 presidential candidate's word. You can lose fat by eating 1,2,3,4,5,6+ times per day. Your metabolism increases when your total calories increase, not your meal frequency.
2. Calories are king. When protein intake is held equal (around 1g/ per 1 lb of bodyweight) research has shown there is NO benefit to going either high carb or low carb--Both work equally well. So make sure you’re in a calorie deficit and eating plenty of protein.
3. Carbs are the superior fuel source for high-intensity training like weight lifting, interval training, sprints, and the like. Eating a diet higher in carbs boosts exercise performance.
4. Ultra-low carb diets are terrible if you’re chronically stressed and anxious. And that describes most people. Low carb diets trigger a spike in cortisol (and adrenaline) to provide immediate energy. This is the “wired” feeling you get from a low-carb diet. But long term, many people experience increased anxiety and stress because their body over-produces cortisol in a feeble attempt to support metabolic function. Next comes a brutal plateau, which adds another more stress. So yeah, low carb diets can work. But they’re rarely the best option.
5.  Eat your body weight (pounds) in grams of protein per day. Research shows .82g/-1g of protein per pound of bodyweight is the sweet spot for maximizing muscle growth (if trying to bulk up) and for preventing muscle loss when dieting.
6. It’s nearly impossible to store “excess protein” as body fat. So, if you’re going to overeat one macronutrient you’re better off having another piece of chicken than a handful of nuts.
7. Fun fact: 30% of the calories you eat from protein are expended on breaking down the protein into usable amino acids. If you’re going to “overeat” one macro, protein is the one.
8. Fat should be at least 20% of your calories. Extremely low-fat diets DEPRIVE your body of crucial fat and cholesterol. Without fat and cholesterol, your body won't be able to synthesize hormones like testosterone, which drive every reaction in your body.
9. You can only lose about 1-3 pounds of fat in a week. Any more than 1-2% of your body weight and you’re losing muscle (which slows your metabolism) and water weight. Ultra-low calorie options like the 1300-1500 calorie diets you see are a terrible option because they pull the rug out from underneath your body.

When you take calories so low, you’ll see an initial drop in weight...but then what?

Your body will downregulate energy expenditure and slow down your metabolism.

The only option from here is to wallow in despair while hardly eating and not losing fat, or to increase calories and fix what you busted: your metabolism.

At Bach Performance, we take a different approach.

The key to getting and staying lean and healthy isn’t crash dieting, it’s a strategic approach based on building lean muscle (to boost your resting metabolism) and replacing the habits that keep leading you to gain weight….

With new habits that’ll keep you ripped.

If developing new habits to get (and stay) ripped is something you’re interested in, start here: https://bachperformance.com/coaching/