You don’t have to starve yourself and do excessive cardio to get results. But in case you don’t believe me, let me tell you about my client, Dani.
Dani went from eating 1900 calories to 2500 calories and is now sporting that athletic physique (hello *abs*)! She is down 11 pounds AND crushing PR’s in the gym (she just benched 140 pounds)!
Dani worked with our coaches to reduce body fat, get lean, and feel amazing in her skin. She previously worked with a trainer that put her on a low carb diet which negatively impacted her mindset/relationship with food. So it was important to Dani to maintain flexibility with her nutrition.
I knew when Dani first came to me that she could be maximizing her intake a lot more. I also knew that if we started a diet (aka: cut) at 1900 calories, we wouldn’t have much wiggle room to reduce calories.
REVERSE DIET to MAINTENANCE/METABOLISM RESTORATION PHASE
- We worked together to gradually increase her daily calorie intake from 1900 to 2500 calories (reverse diet to maintenance).
- We continued to work on improving hormones (she recently had come off birth control), and navigating life (she had some travel, covid virus, and general life).
- In the restoration phase, the scale went up 5 pounds. I mainly attribute that to things like water retention in the muscle due to higher carb intake, increased food volume in the gut, and possible muscle growth.
DEFICIT/CUT PHASE
- Dani completed a 12-week diet/cut.
- Her calories ranged from 2100-1800 calories with several refeed days of 2500 calories (wayyyy more calories than where she started).
- She integrated strength training and daily steps (we targeted 15-18k as we got into a more aggressive fat loss phase).
The end result?
- The process was a super smooth transaction and we avoided any plateaus by preventing metabolic adaptation (which usually occurs when you are dropping calories too much or you don’t spend enough time in a restoration phase).
- Dani looks damnnnnnn GOOD and feels great. She is a total badass in the gym.
- We followed a macro based approach where all foods fit. Dani was still able to integrate all of her favorite foods 🙂
- We will now continue her journey, reverse back to her (new) maintenance calories and hopefully complete another cut before her wedding next year!
Want results like Dani?
Learn HOW to fuel your body to become more badass, improve your body composition, become your strongest version of yourself, and finally diet off of over 2000 calories!
Apply for a FREE Strategy Call to learn about my personalized nutrition and fitness coaching program and see if you would be a good fit. Apply here.
