What is a Fat Cycling Diet? Keto ish weight loss program

In order to help you understand fat cycling to the best of my abilities, I will discuss the following topics:

On this article we are discussing fat cycling in two separate definitions. Fat cycling as it pertains to riding a bicycle and fat cycling as it pertains to nutrition.

How do you lose fat cycling (the activity also related to spinning, road cycling, trekking, mountain biking)?

I’m going to cover what is fat cycling in regards to “activity” first because honestly, it’s a very short explanation and read.

When it comes to losing fat and or losing weight it comes down to one very simple equation. Calories that you burn doing activity have to be greater then the calories that you consume or eat. How many calories you burn is directly related to how much you weigh, whether you’re a male or female, and usually age but only because we lose lean mass as we get older. If you weight train you can bring that muscle back and it won’t make much a difference.

Knowing exactly how many calories you burn per workout is very difficult because there are many variables. Here are a few:

  1. How hard did you push yourself? The more you train, the better your cardio, muscular endurance, the heavier weights you can handle and when combined, the more intense the workouts.
  2. How much resistance did you put on your bike? Resistance on a bike is the equivalent to the poundage for weights. The higher the resistance the more intense the workouts.
  3. Do you take a fat burning supplement? Though the daily caloric burn using fat burns is not significant, the extra calories burned over an 8-12 week period is significant.
  4. Did you have a big meal before the workout? I always recommend eating 3 hours before your workout or training on an empty stomach. Working out full makes you feel sluggish and decreases your intensity significantly.
  5. Are you getting enough sleep? Sleep not only clears your mind, but allows your body to recover better. The better your recovery the more intense you can push on your workout. Sleep also reduces the amount of cortisol your body produces. Get at least 6 hours of sleep per night but I recommend 7-8 hours.
  6. What is your body fat percentage? Higher body fat has been shown to reduce testosterone levels in men. Higher body fat is also related to causing underlying diseases. As you get in better shape and reduce your body fat, it’s a sign that you’re getting stronger and burning more calories.
  7. Are you climbing or are you mostly flat terrain? Climbing hills or riding on an incline adds more resistance. More resistance means a higher heart rate and more stress on your muscles. In the end, this makes workouts more intense and you burn more calories.
  8. Are you doing circuits or are you steady state? Spinning is typically performed in intervals. You go fast you go slow. You increase intensity you lower intensity. This is circuit training. Steady state is when you have consistent resistance over a period of time. It’s the equivalent of a nice easy jog for runners.
  9. Are you male or female? Men usually have more muscle and weigh more then women. Men also produce more testosterone and have heavier bones. This allows men to burn more calories then women.
  10. Are you on any medications that can impact your performance? Many people with underlying conditions blame the disease for their inability to lose weight. A disease will not stop you from losing weight. They may make you more tired and your output won’t be the same as if you were 100% healthy, but you can still put in the work to the best of your abilities and improve your health and fitness. It’s about creating the right program.

These are only 10 of many more variables. The biggest advice I can give you is to wear a heart rate monitor. Even then, many times, heart rate monitors don’t consider body fat percentage, but I’ve found that the Fitbit Charge 4 asks you for bodyfat if you have it, and for me personally is very accurate.

Knowing your calories burned per day is critical to lose fat cycling!

Example:

Knowing how many calories you burn per workout is important, but even more important, is how many calories do you burn per day! Let’s say you are a 180 pound woman looking to lose weight. At 180lbs, using a very standard formula, you burn about 1980 calories without exercise. In a one hour cycling class, I’ll estimate that you’ll burn on average about 500 calories. This means per day you’re burning 2,480. Let’s round up to 2500. You need to consume 2000 calories per day in order to lose 1 pound of fat per day. As you lose weight however, you burn less calories per day. Eventually, you plateau and you need to redo your numbers.

Let me re-emphasize a point. If you hit a plateau or find yourself struggling to lose weight and keep it off you are eating too many calories and not burning enough calories. And you’d be surprised how easy it is to overshoot your caloric intake. Get yourself some nutrition counseling. I have basic packages to get you going in the right direction, check them out.

In conclusion, to lose one pound of fat per week, you need to be on a 500 calorie deficit per day for 7 days. You can also do 700 calorie deficit 5x’s per week and do maintenance twice a week. Read this entire article as the second half is about understanding nutrition. It’s very a very ketogenic high fat diet friendly second half, but I’m not a 100% keto diet proponent. I actually believe carbs are very necessary!

My advice to cycling enthusiasts:

Stretch your hip flexors, quads, hamstrings and calves on a daily basis. Tight hip flexors and tight hamstrings can cause a lot of back pain. Tight calves can cause knee pain. This is especially true if you work at a desk.

What is fat cycling in regards to nutrition?

Fat cycling is very similar to a ketogenic diet. It can improve satiety, reduce inflammation, and improve insulin sensitivity. The first thing to understand if you’re trying to lose weight or lose body fat is that the fat you eat has very little to do with the fat you’re trying to “burn”. Let me explain myself, many of my clients get surprised when I tell them that eating more fats will not make them gain more fat if they are on the right nutrition program.

Contrary to the disastrous claims and recommendations some people were paid to make (not going to mention names or professions) and caused this diabetes epidemic, dietary fat is not the enemy!

The fat that you “eat” is what is termed a macro. When you eat macros, carbs, protein, fat, alcohol, your body breaks them down, uses them for whatever use it has for them, and excess amounts turn into body fat (lips / triglycerides). If you eat too much carbs, your both will transform it into body fat. If you eat too much protein, your body will transform it into body fat. Alcohol, yes, it turns into body fat. Fat, yes it turns into body fat.

Why? Here’s the truth, you ready? Because you are consuming way more calories then you are burning through out the day. Now to the contrary, if you burn more calories then you consume, you will lose weight and body fat no matter what your macro profile is.

If you want to learn about macros, check out my article on what are macros – How to calculate for weight loss, bulking, and cutting

Macronutrients is what food is made off. Fat is provided through foods such as oils, butters, mixed nuts, meats, and other sources.

What are the four main macros? Fats, protein, carbs, and alcohol.

Fat cycling the breakdown.

Very similar to carb cycling, fat cycling also uses the lowering and increasing of the specific macro, fats. In a carb cycle diet, you lower carbs but more often then not, fats are also low and protein is high.

In a high fat diet, carbs are either very low and nonexistent while protein is either low or programmed to allow only the amount necessary based on a couple variables such as lifting weights.

The harder and longer your train, the more protein your body needs to repair and recover.

The main idea is increase your fats and lower your fats on a cycle that may change every 2-4 weeks. Going on a fat cycling diet however is not the secret to weight loss. You must enter a state of deficit in order to lose weight. Check out my perfect body formula to figure all this out.

I previously wrote a book called the Fat Cycling Method. That basics of that method is now included in my new book, Fitness Adaptation Principles. So not only do you get nutrition advice, you get years of experience in weight training as well.

When you fat cycle, you simply increase or decrease the amount of fat you consume after a certain period of time known as a phase (4-12 weeks or longer).

However, there is a big difference between carbs and fats in terms of how many calories each contains per gram. There’s also a big difference in satiety.

Fats vs Carbs

Carbs, especially high glycemic carbs, have very little satiety. This is why people tend to snack a lot during the course of the day. Carbs increase serotonin which makes you feel happy but only temporarily. That feeling quickly subsides which is when people usually crash and need more sugar to keep going.

Even though carbs carry less then half the amount of calories per gram as fat, people gain a lot of weight because they overeat. Fats on the other hand, take longer to be used as energy, and thus, you can eat less amounts of fat but stay feeling fuller for longer. You also don’t spike insulin levels with fats making it safer for diabetics. Even though each gram of fat has over twice the amount of calories compared to carbs, you eat less total calories because you will not overeat fats.

About Calories

Carbs hold 4 calories per gram. Fats on the other hand hold 9 calories per gram. When you add up all the grams or ounces of food you eat per day, depending how many grams of each macro you consume, is how may calories you are intaking.

Example:

When you weigh your food, let’s say rice for example, boiled rice will have less calories then fried rice. Boiled rice has virtually zero fats vs fried rice that contains considerably more per bowl. When you consume food, you must understand that things like fiber and water add weigh to the food but don’t add calories, so if you were to get the calorie content of a bowl of rice, let’s say 100 grams, it won’t have 400 calories (100 x 4 calories/gram for carbs).

If you use an app like myfitnesspal, and you look for Basmati Rice White Cooked, it’ll tell you that every 100 grams has 120 calories (25.1 grams of carbs, 0.4 grams of fat, and 3.5 grams of protein).

If you look up fried rice, and don’t get picky, just choose one that gives you grams… 100 grams of fried rice carries 161 calories (21g carbs, 5.8g fat, and 4g protein).

Notice that fried rice has less carbs per 100 grams but more fat. Fat has more then twice the amount of calories per gram then carbs, which is why you see the higher amount of calories. This simple example shows you how important it is to know what you’re eating.

If you were to switch from white rice to fried rice, just for example purposes, you are basically fat cycling. You’re also carb cycling if you think about it. If you wanted to maintain the same amount of calories, you’d have to eat less fried rice. At that point, both your carb and fat totals will go down.

Is it Fat Cycling, Carb Cycling, or just Macro Cycling?

The idea behind cycling anything is that you either greatly increase or decrease the amount of substance you will consume. In regards to nutrition, most people go into a cycling program to reduce body fat or lose weight. The first step is to know how many calories you will be intaking.

Listen to me, this is probably the most important step. Know how many calories you need to intake!

It doesn’t matter if you fat cycle, carb cycle, super cycle, shred cycle… if you consume too many calories, regardless of the macro, you will gain weight! You will not burn body fat, even if you take fat burning supplements!

Macro Cycling Simplified

When you consume high amounts of fat and moderate protein, your carbs will be extremely low. That’s just logic. You can even say you are in a low carb diet.

When you think about Macro Cycling, there are various things that can happen.  Let’s say you are going to go on a 2300 calorie diet.

If you go high fat/low carb/moderate protein, you are in a high fat low carb diet.

If you go low fat/low carb/high protein, you are in a high protein low fat low carb diet. (This is the typical bodybuilding diet but with more caloric extremes where you are asked to consume 1600 calories or less for men and 1000 calories or less for women. Honestly, this is a recipe for disaster for most people, read my book Fitness Adaptation Principles where I rant about this.)

Fat Cycling

If you cylcle fats and keep the carbs constant (low), logic says when you increase your fats you will lower the protein content in order to maintain the same caloric intake.

On the other hand, when you lower your fats, you’ll increase the protein in order to maintain the same caloric intake.

Carb Cycling and Protein Cycling

Carb Cycling is usually done with low fat as the constant. This is because protein plays such a vital role in muscular maintenance. You should do your best to always have a protein intake of about 1 gram per pound of bodyweight in pounds or 2.2 grams per kg.

There isn’t a thing as Protein Cycling just because again, the recommended intake for protein is already established. Protein is more useful for the recovery and building of muscle. Your body does not use it as a main fuel source.

Fitness Adaptations Recommended Strategy:

In my opinion, I prefer to fat cycle by first establishing my protein content. In my case that’s 175 grams minimum. I sometimes go over but that’s my average. Once I know how much protein I need to take, then I start with about 50 grams of carbs in the high fat phase of my fat cycle. The most amount of carbs you need is about 1.5 to 2x’s your bodyweight in lbs or 3-4 x’s your bodyweight in kg’s. Use that limit to calculate the low fat phase of your fat cycle.

Warning: The recommended carb intake above is for the average person. Professional athletes or people who take part in extreme activity, will require a much different profile. If you are one of those people ,you’d go based on percentages. My recommendation is 20-40% carbs, 25% protein, 35-55% fats. 

By using this approach, not only are you going to feel much better, and experience better satiety, but you are also carb cycling which has great benefits especially for diabetics and people with obesity issues.

FAQ About Fat Cycling the “activity”

Can you lose belly fat by cycling?

It’s been a known fat for quite some while now that you can’t spot reduce. There isn’t a thing as specifically losing belly fat. Genetically speaking your body is going to be born with the ability to burn more fat in certain areas. Women tend to hold more fat around the thighs and stomach area then men due to evolution. However, if you want to lose body fat focus on getting lean overall. If you have the right nutrition plan in place you will not only lose belly fat but you’ll lose fat everywhere specially your belly are

How long should I cycle to burn fat?

In order to burn fat don’t focus on how long you should cycle. The first thing you need to focus on is your nutrition. If you cycle for 2 hours and burn 1200 calories, but then go and eat 1200 calories extra during the day, you will not lose any weight or burn any fat. First figure out what your Basal Metabolic Rate is. Once you find that number, set up a diet that consists of you eating that many calories. Any amount of calories you burn after that will count towards burning fat. How many pounds of fat you want to lose per week will determine how long you should cycle. For most people, per hour of cycling every single day, they’ll lose anywhere from half a pound to one pound of fat per week depending on their sex and current body weight

Does cycling burn fat on thighs?

The answer to this question a simple yes. However, if you’re burning fat on your thighs you’ll burn fat all over your body. Burning fat is a calorie intake vs calorie output equation. With that said, the stronger your legs are the more intense your workouts can be. The more intense your workouts the more calories you burn the more fat you burn assuming your nutrition plan is designed correctly to meet your goals. Your legs are the strongest muscles in your body. They are also the biggest requiring the most oxygen consumption. Cycling depending on the intensity will help you burn more calories then simple weight lifting not so much because it’s harder but because of the constant work for whatever amount of time you cycle. How many calories you burn is dependent on how intense you go, how much resistance you use, and how long you go. This is true for all types of workouts

Is running or cycling better for belly fat?

From a professional point of view, I’d say that this is a tie. Both running and cycling are constant activity exercises. Both also use the lower body extensively. If you cycle at a low resistance for an hour you’d burn about the same amount of calories as if you went for a casual run around your neighborhood for an hour. If you incease the resistance and are able to push a constant pace on the bike for an hour, you’d increase that calorie output. If you run with a vest you’d accomplish the same goal. If you go to question #1, I discuss the truth about burn belly fat.

FAQ for the nutritional aspects of fat cycling (nutrition):

What is fat cycling from a nutritional standpoint?

The idea of fat cycling from a nutritional stand point stems from a similar nutrition stragegy called carb cycling. The idea is to focus on one macro and increase or decrease depending on the phase and the strategy. In regards to fats, the idea is lower your fats during a caloric deficit phase in order to get lean. Carbs are also dropped in order to enter a state of ketosis. In a higher caloric phase, in order to improve performance, you’d increase both fats and carbs but up to the point where you are in weight maintenance. Fat however is the most important macro to manipulate and must be kept to a minimum of 50% of your macros profile.

Is fat cycling the same as keto?

In a low carb state of the fat cycling method, you can and most likely will enter ketosis. In the higher caloric phase of the fat cycling method you most likely will not be in keto although depending how intense your workouts are and how many carbs you are actually consuming, you may remain in ketosis. In my experience, as long as your diet has a macro profile where fats make up at least 50% of your calories, if you train hard enough, you will enter ketosis.

What’s the difference between fat cycling and carb cycling?

In a traditional carb cycling diet, the ideal is to increase your protein intake and keep your fats and carbs as low as possible. This allows individuals to burn and lose a lot of weight, however, most of the time these diet’s cause extreme caloric deficits. The end result is entering starvation mode from which people eventually binge and gain all the weight back. Fat cycling very similar to carb cycling reduces carbs, but keeps protein at a moderate required amount and fats stay high. This allows individuals to better control their hunger, does not end up in starvation, and provide long lasting weight loss results. Additionally, fats are a very important part of human biology. They are essential for optimal hormonal balance.

If you want to learn more about fitness and nutrition, check out my book, Fitness Adaptation Principles where I share everything I know about health and fitness.

I previously wrote a book called the Fat Cycling Method, that method is now included in my new book, Fitness Adaptation Principles.

Learn to control your calories, hunger, and making nutrition a lifestyle by learning about my 96 hour fast weight loss results, low carb diets such as ketogenic, what is keto for beginners, get ideas through the ketogenic diet food list provided and mix that up with carbs using the Fat Cycling Method, What is a Fat Cycling Diet? Keto ish Weight loss system.

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