My Keto Journey to 10% Body Fat.
How I added 2 pounds on the scales and lost 6% body fat in under 2 months.
I got on the scales. They measured my body fat.
I hit my goal of 10%. Happy. Surprised I got there earlier. Not surprised I got there — I’ve been working on it.
A lot of folks on a keto diet, or any kind of diet hit plateaus.
That happens to most of us.
That happened to me.
I’ve realized somewhat around 2 months ago, that I wasn’t moving towards my goals, I wasn’t seeing much progress in my muscle development, where I wanted to see it, where it felt “resistant” to change. I wasn’t really moving my body fat percentage anywhere — I was in a very good place, but I needed results, better results, I wanted to compete as a fitness model, I needed results — not plateaus! I needed to get it done!
But I was not going to compromise my lifestyle as a devoted ketonian, with all the benefits it gave me over the years, all the health, and for sure I wasn’t going to take some crazy fat-burning supplements, that could harm my health, and performance in other areas of my life.
So I decided to take on this challenge, and to apply my best knowledge and experience from the world of ketogenic and lowcarb diets and many other diets I’ve tried, carbohydrate cycling, macros, thermic effects of food, metabolism and digestion of nutrients from different foods, timing of meals, supplements, best training for muscle growth and fat burning, some were theories, some were hard-core science, some were my 18-year+ training and work experience with clients.
Yesterday I measured my body fat.
2 months ago it was somewhere around 15,6%.
Yesterday it was 9,7%.
My weight 2 months ago was 120 LB.
Yesterday it was 122 LB.
I probably built quite a lot of muscle, burning fat at the same time, according to numbers, my looks in the mirror, strength, muscle development and definition.
So what did I change? What did I do to get there? To break through all the plateaus finally?
Let’s get training out of the way because that’s the “easy” part.
Training.
Get a coach.
I got myself a coach, who pushed me further, than I would ever push myself, working through pain and “I can do no more” moments with me, on my lagging muscle groups, legs, back, shoulders.
If you want to make progress, definitely and precisely — you need someone working with you, keeping you accountable, seeing and evaluating your progress from outside of your own head. That’s just non-negotiable. We, humans, have troubles evaluating ourselves and our life, our progress objectively. That’s just a part of human condition. Work with it instead of denying it.
Train like a motherf*cker.
Five days a week of my own strength workouts — supersets, drop-sets, sets to failure, super heavy sets, high rep sets, splitting muscle groups — I did it all religiously. My rest days were: cardio and whole body conditioning, crossfit style workouts.
On top of that, 3 workouts with a coach for lagging body parts, sometimes I’d hit the same muscle group twice a day — but then it’ll rest at least 3 days.
Cardio?
Jump rope, sprints — HIIT, High Intensity Interval Training. ONLY.
Steady pace, slow or medium intensity cardio — waste of time.
Hit it hard, make your heart jump out of your chest, stop, rest, repeat. That’s all you need. That not only accelerates fat burning, increasing your metabolism for the next 24 hours — that preserves your muscle mass (compare physiques of the best in the world sprinters and marathoners, you’ll get the idea), and depletes your glycogen stores really fast, turning your body into a fat-burning machine for the rest of your workout and the day.
I did jump rope for 20 minutes daily. Fasted jump rope before each workout and to finish it off.
2 times a week, I’d go for 20-minute after-workout morning sprints. 1 min all-out effort, 1 min rest.
The rest of the time it would be 5–6 minutes sprints, 30 sec on, 30 sec rest.
One day a week cross-fit style cardio: box jumps, burpees with pushups, kb swings, pullups mixed in — it felt like cardio for sure!
*Want to get into ketosis fast? Fasted heavy leg workout + HIIT after, and a zero carb zero protein high fat day — you’ll get there in no time. It’s gonna suck. Unless keto/fat-adapted.
I really don’t understand, why you would want to do slow and long cardio, suffer for hours sometimes, unless you want to run marathons, or become an endurance long distance athlete (running, biking, rowing etc.)
Now the tricky part…
Nutrition and Food.
If you change nothing — nothing changes.
I want you to understand, that your body fat progress, fat loss, is not going to be a comfortable, or an easy thing, if you want to see some really cool progress, if you want to get shredded, if you want to get over plateaus — that’s just not going to happen!
You don’t have to starve yourself or eat chicken breast and broccoli every day though.
That’s just stupid suffering that compromises your health.
But you do have to eat better.
You do have to change you macros, amount of protein, fat and carbs.
You don’t have to starve yourself or eat chicken breast and broccoli every day though.
That’s just stupid suffering that compromises your health.
But you do have to eat better.
You do have to change you macros, amount of protein, fat and carbs.
You do have to change the quality of your food, consuming more foods, that require more energy to digest (higher thermic effect), foods with more fiber and protein.
You can not eat unlimited healthy foods, or unlimited anything, unless it’s something like celery or leafy greens.
You can not eat unlimited fats, especially non-whole-foods fats, oils butters etc., — at the end of the day, hitting low body fat percentage WILL come down to counting and watching portions, adjusting your fats, proteins and carbs. Your body has certain biochemistry and you can not change the law of thermodynamics.
If you want to get shredded, eating thousands of calories from fats (fat, by the way, takes the LEAST amount of energy to digest) — not gonna happen. I’m not saying you need to go low-fat, but going easy on bulletproof coffees and fat bombs, might not be a bad idea — eating your healthy fats from whole foods entirely instead — that’s what I did, eggs, avocados, fatty fish like salmon and sardines, dark 100% chocolate, some olive oil for cooking and in my salads, some walnuts and Brazil nuts.
Your calories, the amount of fats, proteins and carbs you need will vary, depending on your gender, age, metabolism and activity level, training, physique and metabolism, lean body mass, health — you got to figure that sh*t out through experiments and PRECISE TRACKING.
The perfect keto macro ratio I found, that works like magic for most people into high fat lifestyle, into health and getting shredded: 60% (fat) — 30% (protein) — 10% (carbs).
That for me ended up being:
1400 calories: 95g of fat, 100 g of protein, 30g of carbs.
I went as precise with that as possible. Carbs were usually lower. Fat would often go higher. Getting more protein always made me feel like sh*t. More is not always better.
And one day a week/10 days I’d eat as many calories as I wanted from healthy foods like nuts and seeds, avocados and fatty fish, more non-starchy veggies, I’d end up eating 4–5K of calories hitting the ratio but consuming more fiber, more carbs, more fats from whole foods.
Intermittent fasting and consuming your food before sunset helps hips! When you eat matters just as much as what you eat.
Your food, your macros, your calories, most of them should not come from shakes, juices, smoothies, oils and butters!
Most of what you eat: lots and lots of non-starchy veggies, fresh salads and cooked veggies, proteins from fatty fish, whole eggs, grass-fed meats and organ meats, all kinds of sea food, poultry.
I did my intermittent fasting on most days 14–16 hours, finishing eating by 4–6 PM.
I would have 2–3 eggs, sometimes sardines, half an avocado for fiber for breakfast.
I’d have a huge lunch (around 1000 calories and more) with lots of veggies, salads, cooked veggies with olive and coconut oil, and lots of seafood, since I’m not into poultry or meat.
The rest of the day would be black coffee in the morning and early afternoon, teas, water with lemon and electrolytes, no calories.
What gets measured gets improved!
Yes, this is a huge part of it!
You can’t guess you nutrition!
You can’t track progress, unless you track your food habits precisely!
I’ve been logging all my food in MyFitnessPal app for more than 120 days (Find me there “CreateYourselfToday”). I would track my food precisely, and if something didn’t work — I’d adjust it, because I knew exactly what I was doing.
Supplements.
I am a huge believer in whole foods as much as possible, but I also know, that some things are not that easy to get from our daily diet, I know, that we will not get all the vitamins and minerals from our diet daily, and when we put huge demands on our bodies and brains — we need support.
It’s not a theory — it’s a scientific fact.
If you want to get above-average results — you got to do things above-average.
If you want to get above-average results — you got to do things above-average.
Not a theory. A fact.
Multivitamin. Good one. The one that works for you. Non-negotiable.
Electrolytes. Cell metabolism and support, energy production and more. Non-negotiable.
(Find no-sugar one. Our body runs on electricity LITERALLY produced in our cells, because of minerals aka electrolytes. Our body does NOT run on sugar we consume)
Omega-3 fatty acids, DHA and EPA. Essential fatty acids for our brain an cell metabolism. Non-negotiable. I eat mine in seafood and pasture-raised eggs. Daily. Supplement otherwise.
Cherry Extract + Turmeric Extract. That will keep you soreness-and-inflammation free, besides all the other benefits. This combo — really makes a difference for performance and supporting your body and brain through challenging times. Trust me on that. I forgot what muscle soreness was immediately, when I started taking them.
BCAAs. Made a difference! I’d consume them during my workouts with my water, 6–8 g per day. BCAAs help to preserve muscle mass and keep your hunger at bay, to boost your muscle tissue recovery and synthesis. Proven.
And that’s how I got to build muscle and lose fat at the same time getting under 10% body fat on a ketogenic diet.
It’s totally doable. It can be designed into a nice routine that doesn’t take much thinking. But it ain’t easy.
If it was easy — everyone would do it.
Health. Foundation Series. From fasting and sleep to mindset and identity.
