Carb Nite Progress - Day 5

I am just about to finish up Day 5 of the Carb Nite protocol outlined in my last post and I thought I would give a bit of an update on how things are going.

For the first few days I suffered a bit of a stomach ache. I don't know if it was caused directly by the reduction in carbs or if it was something else entirely but it has since gone away and not returned. The second thing to happen in the last 5 days is a few canker sores in my mouth. It's been quite a while since I have had any of those. My energy levels have been great and any excessive hunger has been at bay. My carb intake has been at or below 30 grams for the last 5 days with no cheats. My protein intake has been around 150 grams and my fat intake has been around 120 grams. My calories have been close to 2000.

My food choices have been pretty consistent.  I eat a 4 egg omelet every morning with all natural bacon bits, diced ham, small amount of cheese, and some salsa. It comes out to about 10/grams of carbs. My lunch is either some sort of slow cooked beef or chicken on a bed of spinach with some olive oil and Caesar dressing.  Supper time is usually something quite similar.  This week I am going to introduce some protein shakes with either coconut milk, almond milk, or water. On occasion, I will take a tablespoon of crunchy peanut butter.

At Day 2 I weighed myself and was down about a pound. I have not weighed myself since then. Visually I can see that I have tightened up quite a bit. I am seeing more definition in my stomach, shoulders, and arms.  My wife has even commented that my face appears to have thinned out a bit.

So there you have it. I am at Day 5 and am suppose to take it to Day 10 although that would land on a Saturday for me. So instead I am either going to take it to Day 9 or Day 12, both of which are heavy lifting days.

I am already planning my carb nite refeed. It could be epic!

 

Carb Night Protocol

I am not a guy that follows workout programs outlined in fitness magazines. I also rarely pay much attention to the articles on nutrition. The latest Men's Health magazine has changed that a bit for me though. This months article entitled CARBS ARE NOT THE ENEMY written by John Kiefer of dangerouslyhardcore.com really grabbed my attention.  At first glance you see a fork full of spaghetti and you automatically think this is another article on how great carbs are and how everyone should be eating more of them. But it's not like that at all.

There are two carb protocols outlined in this article: one called Carb Nite and one called Carb Back-Loading. For the sake of this post, I am going to focus on my interest in Carb Nite.  Once my goals are achieved, I may look deeper into Carb Back-Loading.

What really caught my attention on the Carb Nite protocol was that it most closely resembled what I am already trying to do;  lose fat while retaining muscle mass. It just stepped up the game a little bit and gave me something more specific to follow.

It's also pretty simple to grasp. Some call it a refeed, John calls it Carb Nite. Go low carb (less than 30grams/day) for 10 days. On the 10th day make it a carb night eating pretty much whatever the heck you want. Just do it after 5pm. The next day start over with the low carb but shorten the duration. That is pretty much what I was doing before except that I was going higher carb on my workout days (100-150grams).  I am going to test John's method and see if it cannot help me to achieve some fat loss in time for this contest I involved in at work.

Day 1

Day 1 went pretty well. I calculated that I finished just a little bit above 30grams. Going that low was harder than I thought it would be. Who knew that onions and peppers had that many carbs in them!  Side effects were at a minimum. I had good energy all day. The only noticeable change to my day was a stomach ache that I attribute to some milk I had the night before. So far I am on day 2 and doing well. I should come in well below my 30grams.

Visual Inspection

I don't see a noticeable difference yet since its only been one day. I will say that doing my own version of this the last 2 weeks has brought some positive changes to my stomach area.  The little bump that was right below my belly button has now flattened out. I can only hope that my upper abs will start showing themselves within the next week.  My initial weigh in for this ten day challenge is 188.6lbs

Stick around over the next ten to see what happens.

P.S. Check out John's site over at dangerouslyhardcore.com.  I checked it out when researching his stuff and he clearly knows fitness. I left very impressed.