Diet question from newbie eager to learn!

[pghirish]

Hi everyone, I just joined this site because I have been working out regularly now for a few years, but have not been making the progress I want to be making towards having a leaner, more muscular body. I don't necessarily want to try to have a body like Arnold - perhaps more like what you'd see in Men's Health magazine. Here are my stats:

Age:39
Height: 6'
Weight: 192
Body Fat% 20
BMR: 1926

My goal is to reduce my body fat% to around 12-14% and hopefully have nice abs before I turn 40. I normally work from 5am-1pm and go straight to the gym after work. My workout consists of 1.5 hours of weight training followed by 1 hour of cardio. I normally go to the gym 5 days a week - I do a different body part each day: 1) chest, 2)back, 3) shoulders, 4)arms, and 5) legs I try to do abs each day. For my cardio, I do HIIT running 2-3 times a week, and the rest of the times I may do elliptical, jogging, swimming, or the stairmaster.

I have tried to keep to a high protein/low-ish carb diet, but it is not working very well. I know I have been drinking too many diet cokes/coke zero's. So, I have decided to make a concerted effort to only drink water from now on, and I am looking for the best diet routine to help me achieve my goals.

I would really appreciate any suggestions you all may be able to offer. While looking at this site, I saw one diet routine that looked interesting, but I wonder if it would be good for me to achieve my goals:

5:00 A.M – 8 Egg Whites and 1 cup rolled oats, 25g protein shake

11:00 A.M. – 4-6 Oz Chicken Breast/shrimp

1:30 P.M. – Preworkout meal – 8 Egg Whites, ½ cup brown rice

2-4:30 PM – Weight Lifting/ Cardio

4:30 P.M – Post Workout meal – 1 cup grinded oats with ½ protein shake with water (2 to 1 Ratio), Fish Oil Tab

5 P.M - 6-8 oz grilled chicken w/ lettuce and tomato, TBSP on olive oil and redwine vinegar.

8 P.M. – 4 Hard Boiled Egg White with lettuce and tomato. TBSP of olive oil and red wine vinegar. Fish Oil Tab




Thank you very much!

[maxwkw]

First of all, welcome to the forum.

To address your diet, I think you should look at the primer and try to start measuring your calorie and macronutrient intake.

From what you have said is your workout, you don't look like you are eating nearly enough.


How long have you been dieting like this, and what kind of progress have you made?

[pghirish]

Thank you very much, Maxwkw. By the primer, do you mean the "unofficial how to cut thread"? I looked at that and it was very helpful. To be honest, I have never really measured my calories and nutrition intake, but I am going to start doing so now. I have basically been trying to follow the Atkins diet for the past couple years, but have slipped from time to time. Thus, I have made modest progress, but not the type that I am striving for. Just looking at what is written there, it definitely appears that I have not been eating nearly enough and definitely not the right stuff. According to that, I should be consuming 255-340 grams of protein a day - is that correct?