Fat Loss Diet Plan
Hi Ray. Thanks for your emails helping me with my diet plan. Your enthusiasm for my success shows through the “cold†email medium. This helps me a great deal and I really appreciate this.
Some background for you so you know where I’m coming from:
While I am excited about starting your fat to fit program, I am somewhat anxious because this is uncharted territory for me (not only a change in working out but how I change my life to live a healthy lifestyle).
My gym school gym experience (competition focused not lifetime fitness oriented) was not the best. So I disliked exercise for a long time (even though I would have benefitted from lifetime fitness gym exercises (burpees, pushups, etc.), until I got some iron in my hand after college. But my weight training came from the magazines and books without any particular focus and inconsistent results.
Of course, as you mention on your site for the ebook, my training materials provided ample information overload and confusion. So I hope I don’t overwhelm you with questions.
With those preliminaries out of the way, I have a few more questions for you.
In the book you mention that there should be no carbs at the supper meal. But the 170 lb. diet plan has sweet potatoes at the supper meal. My presumption is to follow the plan. Is this correct?
How do you cook your sweet potatoes? I ask this because I usually but frozen veggies and heat them in the microwave.
Cottage cheese: Do you like cottage cheese? I’m questioning this meal on the diet plan for taste. I know this is a matter of personal opinion but since you have dieted down for bodybuilding competitions, I am interested in you opinion.
Thanks Ray.
Andre
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Answer From Ray Burton Author Of:
The Fat To Fit Program
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I can see where you may have gotten confused. There are two very different ways of dieting in the Fat to Fit Program. The first is the one that is actually in the book. This is designed much like the Zone Diet. It is very flexible in how you can substitute foods in depending on how you are feeling on any given day.
This first way of dieting is the one most of my clients use for every day dieting. In other words, living the healthy lifestyle.
There is actually one point that has to be made clear though. There ARE carbohydrates at and after supper in the book plan. They just come from vegetables, are fibrous and not the regular starchy complex carbs that come in potatoes and whole wheat breads.
I almost exclusively use frozen vegetables in my daily diet. I understand though that this can drive some people nuts. So that is why there are other carbohydrate sources in the plan for the every day folks.
The second way of dieting with the program is VERY strict and almost pre-contest style. These diets programs like the 170 lb diet that you are on were designed for the program by Dr. John Berardi. They are just like the diets out of my competition bodybuilding book.
So to answer your question, the yams are definitely o.k. on the diet plan and from time to time I do get off the vegetables and go on a yam (sweet potato) kick. No problem at all with this, but its great that you asked.
So how do I cook my sweet potatoes? I’m a cave man when it comes to meal preparation. I get three or four yams, peal them, cut them up in chunks, boil them until soft, mash them up and stick them in a Tupperware container. When I want some, I scoop it out, weigh it on my postage scale and stick the rest back in the fridge.
A lot of people like to add some cinnamon and bake them so that they caramelize a bit. These are pretty yummy. As for how I prep my frozen veggies all I do is half fill a fry pan, get a couple of cups of frozen veggies and then I boil the suckers while I weigh out my chicken. I get almost all my meals ready in about 5 minutes.
I absolutely HATE cottage cheese. I can’t stand it one bit. It is a great food though for those that can hack the taste. When I see cottage cheese I immediately run for my protein shaker or a can of tuna. I think I have eaten cottage cheese ONCE, and I’ll never touch it again. There are lots of things you can sub in for the cottage cheese on the diet plan if you don’t like it.
You know enough now to understand what you should be doing and should trust your own judgment when it comes to making the program fit into something that you can handle day in and day out.
When I dieted down for my bodybuilding competition I didn’t really eat much different than I do now. The only difference is that I switch over to solid protein sources instead of shakes because solid sources keep me full longer. I use the shakes all year round though because they are so easy when you are running out the door.
I think that should have you pretty much covered! I hope that starting the Fat to Fit Program and talking with me has changed your opinion of exercise some what. Like all things on this earth, there are good examples and bad examples.
Fitness has been the greatest gift to my life and I couldn’t imagine living without knowing the things that I do about it and how to make my body feel the way it does.
I hope you get to that point too.
