Need help finishing a cut

[Jake Del]

Focus on getting strong at the 4 main lifts and the lost muscle will likely be regained. I’d say run the SSNLP minus the resets, then segueway into Starr. You’ll be surprised how well this works ;-)

You know what? You make a lot of sense! :-)
Ive never actually done the SSNLP while, you know, actually eating lol. I worked hard yesterday and as of last night I was officially announced 174, so 200 pound weight loss is achieved and I can focus on giving the lp a good run. I really want to do it right and see what I can achieve/regain. Some things I'm wondering though are:

-Should I power clean? I'm terrible at them, it's mostly me muscling the bar up (muscle clean?) but I like them nonetheless and I was moved by Ripp's statement that "The weight of history compels you to do them". Despite being bad at them I've dreamed of one day being able to clean 315...

-In terms of poundage progression would I increase by 5 pounds on squat,bench, press, clean and 10 pounds on deadlifts as long as I could and then reduce as needed or should I be more conservative off the bat?

Breakfast was a cup of oats (measured dry), 2 scoops of whey, 1 tbsp of peanut butter with 2 cups of milk seasoned with cinnamon and sweeter. It was kind of scary how good it tasted and felt but I've got to push myself to let go of the cutting mindset and focus on building up what I can do. My little brother is fond of calling me manorexic.

[Jake Del]

Man, this is a great story. If you don't mind what was your strategy for losing that much weight? Cardio and huge caloric deficit? I'm sort of in the position you were in when you started, in my 330's and just finishing NLP and wanting to drop weight without giving up all my new found strength, but the idea of dropping 120 lbs is daunting to say the least.

Dude if I can do it anyone can, believe me. The main thing is that I decided losing the weight had to be a priority and I had to break the association between eating and pleasure/stress relief. In my case I did this by getting by on just protein shakes with skim milk and vitamins for a long time. I DON'T recommend this as its not healthy or even necessary for most people but I felt I had to change my habits and break the destructive associations I had with food. I no doubt gave myself a bunch of nutritional deficiencies but for my circumstances it worked and I now see food as fuel, macros and what not, and have enough self control now when I do eat for pleasure not to go nuts. What I recommend and what I did as I hit each plateau was to just reduce carb/calorie intake as little as possible that produced further weight loss. The thinking being that with so much weight to lose, if I go nuts and reduce too much too soon, what do I do when I get stuck? So it's all about the minimal adjustment that produces results.

In terms of cardio I actually didn't really do much until I'd already lost 140 pounds or so. At that point I started pushing a progressive walking regimen. I figured it would be easiest on the joints and i5 felt really good to regain my mobility and get around under my own horsepower lol. Whenever the weight loss slowed down I'd try the same principle of inceasing my speed and or distance just enough to get losing again. The minimal change that gets results so that I can go beyond that next time I got stuck.

Again if I can do it, anyone can, it's just a matter of making it a priority and accepting that it's going to take a while so you have to get comfortable with breaking the old habits and building new ones. You can totally do this man!

[Robert Santana]

You know what? You make a lot of sense! :-)
Ive never actually done the SSNLP while, you know, actually eating lol. I worked hard yesterday and as of last night I was officially announced 174, so 200 pound weight loss is achieved and I can focus on giving the lp a good run. I really want to do it right and see what I can achieve/regain. Some things I'm wondering though are:

-Should I power clean? I'm terrible at them, it's mostly me muscling the bar up (muscle clean?) but I like them nonetheless and I was moved by Ripp's statement that "The weight of history compels you to do them". Despite being bad at them I've dreamed of one day being able to clean 315...

-In terms of poundage progression would I increase by 5 pounds on squat,bench, press, clean and 10 pounds on deadlifts as long as I could and then reduce as needed or should I be more conservative off the bat?

Breakfast was a cup of oats (measured dry), 2 scoops of whey, 1 tbsp of peanut butter with 2 cups of milk seasoned with cinnamon and sweeter. It was kind of scary how good it tasted and felt but I've got to push myself to let go of the cutting mindset and focus on building up what I can do. My little brother is fond of calling me manorexic.

At 42 you probably don't need to clean. If you want to learn the clean and are adamant about doing them then definitely go for it. As long as your deadlift is going up it shouldn't be a problem. As far as increments go the deadlift needs to get well ahead of the squat early on so that you don't run into a situation where you are squatting the same or more than you deadlift on the program. This is typically done with a combination of a bigger baseline deadlift, higher frequency (3x week in the first two weeks), and larger jumps in the first couple of weeks (~10-20). If you can continue deadlifting each time beyond the first week then definitely do so. The deadlift will stay on 10 lb jumps for a while and eventually drop to 5. The squat stays at 5 for most and sometimes drops to 2.5 for smaller males and female lifters. The press and the bench go to 2.5 lbs per workout within the first month and eventually drop down to 1-1.5 lb jumps per workout midway through. When my male lifters end LP they typically are adding 1.5 lbs to the bench and 1.0 lbs to the press. Pretty standard and you'll go far with it.

Breakfast looks pretty good. Getting off a cut definitely messes with your head and will take some adjusting. Keep the fat controlled and you shouldn't have a problem with excess weight gain.

[Jake Del]

That's great, thanks so much for your help.

[Kyle Martin]

Dude if I can do it anyone can, believe me. The main thing is that I decided losing the weight had to be a priority and I had to break the association between eating and pleasure/stress relief. In my case I did this by getting by on just protein shakes with skim milk and vitamins for a long time. I DON'T recommend this as its not healthy or even necessary for most people but I felt I had to change my habits and break the destructive associations I had with food. I no doubt gave myself a bunch of nutritional deficiencies but for my circumstances it worked and I now see food as fuel, macros and what not, and have enough self control now when I do eat for pleasure not to go nuts. What I recommend and what I did as I hit each plateau was to just reduce carb/calorie intake as little as possible that produced further weight loss. The thinking being that with so much weight to lose, if I go nuts and reduce too much too soon, what do I do when I get stuck? So it's all about the minimal adjustment that produces results.

In terms of cardio I actually didn't really do much until I'd already lost 140 pounds or so. At that point I started pushing a progressive walking regimen. I figured it would be easiest on the joints and i5 felt really good to regain my mobility and get around under my own horsepower lol. Whenever the weight loss slowed down I'd try the same principle of inceasing my speed and or distance just enough to get losing again. The minimal change that gets results so that I can go beyond that next time I got stuck.

Again if I can do it, anyone can, it's just a matter of making it a priority and accepting that it's going to take a while so you have to get comfortable with breaking the old habits and building new ones. You can totally do this man!

Thanks for this, it's a great story and helpful. I guess they always say that the journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. The lowest dose thing seems like particularly good advice. If I drop to 1200 cals a day and 2 hours of cardio from the beginning where can I go when I hit a sticking point?

Did you keep lifting through this or mostly just diet down and then switch to walking once you got to sticking points? I think the part that scares me the most is this irrational fear of losing weight and slowly watching my deadlift melt away from 420 to 200.

[Robert Santana]

That's great, thanks so much for your help.

You are very welcome buddy!

[Jake Del]

Thanks for this, it's a great story and helpful. I guess they always say that the journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. The lowest dose thing seems like particularly good advice. If I drop to 1200 cals a day and 2 hours of cardio from the beginning where can I go when I hit a sticking point?

Did you keep lifting through this or mostly just diet down and then switch to walking once you got to sticking points? I think the part that scares me the most is this irrational fear of losing weight and slowly watching my deadlift melt away from 420 to 200.

I stopped lifting a few times because of losing a loved one and fracturing some vertebrae in a fall. I have no doubt that if you are consistent in your training you will not lose as much stength as I did, especially if you take your time and do it right. Either way time will go by so it's worth looking at the big picture and deciding what sort of shape you want to be in down the road. The thing about being strong but overweight is that you can mostly only use that strength in the gym but if you get leaner and maintain/rebuild your strength then you can do a lot more with it in real life an get so much more out of it.

[Robert Santana]

I stopped lifting a few times because of losing a loved one and fracturing some vertebrae in a fall. I have no doubt that if you are consistent in your training you will not lose as much stength as I did, especially if you take your time and do it right. Either way time will go by so it's worth looking at the big picture and deciding what sort of shape you want to be in down the road. The thing about being strong but overweight is that you can mostly only use that strength in the gym but if you get leaner and maintain/rebuild your strength then you can do a lot more with it in real life an get so much more out of it.

This depends on your definition of overweight. Some overweight folks are pretty agile and can move quite quickly.

[Kyle Martin]

I stopped lifting a few times because of losing a loved one and fracturing some vertebrae in a fall. I have no doubt that if you are consistent in your training you will not lose as much stength as I did, especially if you take your time and do it right. Either way time will go by so it's worth looking at the big picture and deciding what sort of shape you want to be in down the road. The thing about being strong but overweight is that you can mostly only use that strength in the gym but if you get leaner and maintain/rebuild your strength then you can do a lot more with it in real life an get so much more out of it.

Thanks again Jake, nothing for it but to get going.

[Jake Del]

This depends on your definition of overweight. Some overweight folks are pretty agile and can move quite quickly.

Oh yeah, I agree some definitely can. I was speaking in regards to the strength to weigh ratio of people like me and Kyle based on the numbers he mentioned. Ah, to be built like and able to perform like say Kaz....one can dream right lol?