Limits to a deficit

[lightsarefallin]

I've been cutting since March 1st. For the first 2 weeks, I was in a deficit of around 300 a day, when that didn't work too well, I went to 650 per day. Now, for my remaining 4 weeks, I dropped it down to an 800 calorie deficit a day. I lost around 1.3 pounds last week. I was planning on keeping this up until my goal date which is May 15th.

My question is, how much of a deficit can the body take without burning muscle? I'm assuming it's relative to every individual, but does anyone have any ideas or personal experiences? I'm not losing muscle at all. I've gained a little, oddly enough. I've been training more intense than I ever have. I added 1 inch to my calves in 6 weeks, and 1.5 inches to my shoulders while in a 650 calorie deficit, so I proved to myself that it is possible to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time.

I went from 204 pounds, 21% body fat and now I am at 192 pounds, body fat must be around 17%. There's a difference. I don't look like a fatass anymore, but I'm definitely not cut at all. Abs are starting to show again, arm veins a little too.

I'd appreciate some ideas. Thanks.

[MikeK46]

It's obviously specific to the individual. How much total bodyfat you have, for example, is one of the main determinants of how great a deficit you can get away with before you will start to lose lean mass. The more bodyfat, the greater the deficit you can keep before you have any significant loss of lean mass and decline of metabolic rate. How advanced you are as far as training and your current resistance training routine factors in as well.

On average, for Intermediate-level lifters who want to lose some extra flab, I would not advise being in a deficit greater than 750 calories/day.

[lightsarefallin]

I see. I've been doing 800 for a week, seems to be going fine. I'm only doing it for 3 more weeks anyways, but during my next cut I might try experimenting with more, or cardio too. I tried doing a cardio-free cut as an experiment, and I estimate that by May 15, I should be around 188-189 pounds, which means that would be around 15 pounds lost in 10 weeks. Good stuff?

[MikeK46]

Cardio is just a way to increase expenditure. It's not necessary by any means, though it does make things a lot easier when you get extremely lean (which is when you daily energy expenditure becomes much much less). However you create the deficit (exercise, diet, or any combination of both) is up to you

[lightsarefallin]

Being this much in a deficit, I decided to play it safe and avoid excessive cardio. I'm still experimenting with stuff, though, so next time I'll try something a little different. I'm wondering how many pounds of water I lost. If I went from 204 and am now 191, that's probably, what? 5 pounds of water, 6 pounds of fat?

[MikeK46]

If I went from 204 and am now 191, that's probably, what? 5 pounds of water, 6 pounds of fat?

No way for me to tell how much water you lost. It is highly variable and influenced by things like your carbohydrate intake, Na/K balance, etc.

Every -3500 calories is about a pound of bodyfat that you'll lose. If you think you've been accurate with your caloric expenditure & intake and are confident that your deficit was actually what you think it is, then you can calculate how much fat you've lost based on that.

[lightsarefallin]

I'm pretty sure it was accurate. I still have a lot of annoying stomach and arm fat, but I don't want to cut into the summer. I know that to get down to something around 10% it would probably take me an extra 2-3 months. I'm going to do a scan may 15th to see what really happened.