Keep in mind that the carb-stacking diet that’s listed is one you would gradually move to, as around 2,000 calories is the lowest level for safe, healthy fat loss (that total is around 1,700 for a woman). We’ll have more on how to gradually reduce your calories for continuous fat burn in the next chapter. At this point understand that it’s not enough to get the right macronutrient p e percentages and stack your carbs. You also have to create a calorie deficit and expend more energy than you take in to lose fat.
What About Protein and Fat?
protein intake, like carbs, is also activity-dependent. If you do lots of work that breaks down muscle tissue like lifting weights or wrestling alligators you need many more grams of protein than sedentary individuals. A good rule of thumb is about one gram per pound of body weight, and you want to spread it out over the course of your day. Try to get about 20 to 40 grams at each meal so that the building blocks are readily available at all times for muscle growth.
Calorie Purge vs. Activity Surge
As far as our preferences go, Jonathan uses only one or two calorie cuts during our entire ripping phase (about 12 weeks). He prefers to gradually ramp up his cardio work. He has an exercise bike in his living room, and he’s pretty diligent about doing it daily as our target date for our final photoshoot approaches. He begins by riding his exercise bike about twice a week in April and increases his time and frequency from there. When the shoot is about a month away, he will be riding his bike twice a day for 30-minute stints.
New re s e an rc h, h o w e v e r, shows that walking on a treadmill burns more calories than an exercise bike because walking is a weight-bearing activity you have to move your body weight as opposed to sitting on your duff and pedaling. That research has Jonathan considering outdoor walking or treadmill walking along with e x e rcise-bike work to speed up his fat burning.
Carb Countdown
Right around 150 grams of carbs a day on training days appears to be an adequate amount that keeps our bodies functioning in a healthful manner, with enough glycogen to replenish muscle-tissue deficits created by hard weight training. ( Re m e m b e r, your body holds a total of 300 to 400 grams of carbs, so a weight-training workout depletes less than 100 grams 400 calories.) On non-training days, you should 28 X-treme LEAN substitute a meal replacement drink or a lower-carb meal for your postworkout drink.
X-treme Lean Diet: Your Next Step to Ripped
allow Jonathan’s lead and begin to gradually ramp up your activity. Start with two 20-minute cardio sessions a week and build on that (see his X-treme Lean Cardio Surge schedule in Chapter 3). Or you may want to follow Steve’s lead and begin cutting calories, primarily from carb sources. What do we recommend? A little of both. Here’s how we suggest you make this diet work as quickly as possible.
Fat-Burning, Muscle-Building Occlusions
U n f o rt u n a t e l y, using a blood-pre s s u re cuff or a tourn I q u e t above the working muscle isn’t very practical (how are you going to stop blood flow to your pecs?), and it can be painful, p e perhaps even dangerous. But you can get similar, safer occlusion effects with standard exercises and perhaps get close to replicating some of those amazing gains in only a few workouts. Here’s how
