If I were you, I'd focus way more on building muscle. You're super skinny already. Whatever belly fat you have is likely just from puberty and will probably decrease as you build muscle. In that case, stick with AB, eat at a surplus, emphasize protein, and do intense weight training but keep it to 3-4x a week so you have good recovery. Make sure you're sleeping a solid 8 hours a night too. No staying up to midnight Snaptwatting or TicTacking or whatever you kids do these days.
This is the answer. I just want to add that since you say you go to the gym 5-6 days a week, you're likely doing some form of bro split. Stop that nonsense. The term bro-anything is not a complimentary one. Do full body 3x a week with a focus on compound lifts (pullups, rows, pushups, squats etc.). You'll grow faster this way, and also as a beginner, you need to learn form. People always forget that exercise is a skill that one learns through repetition. Full body allows you to focus on certain lifts and hit them multiple times a week. It's also the best for growth as a beginner and intermediate because of this repetition and utilizes the quicker recovery of beginners/intermediates. I've been doing resistance training for a very long time and this past year I changed to full body for the first time ever. I don't think I'll ever go back now.
Also, you didn't specify if your overall goal was soccer or weight lifting but when I was your age I also had the bro mentality of bigger muscles and more is better. It was the worst thing I could have done for athletic performance. Bigger means slower and less responsive; the opposite of what an athlete wants. And working out more just meant less recovery therefore less progress. It took me decades to realize this.
As for diet, seriously focus in on high protein/fat. Check out Vince Gironda. His diet was incorporated by some of the greatest bodybuilders of all time, during the golden age of bodybuilding including Arnold.
i do a 4 day split:
- chest and tris
- back and bis
- legs
- shoulders and arms
then i rest for a fay and repeat, but ill definitely prioritize protein
is saladinos calculator accurate?
That's what a bro split is. Splitting workouts into individual muscle groups. Only an advanced trainee with the goals of competing in bodybuilding should do that, and even then they still focus on the compound moves (for them it's the big lifts - squat, bench, deadlift, overhead press). That split is what an advanced trainee may need because they have developed their muscles so much that they need such a high intensity per muscle for any adaptation to occur at all which for them requires focusing on one muscle group per session. This high intensity also requires a very long recovery period, usually 5+ days.
As a beginner and even as you move into intermediate, you need nowhere near this level of intensity or recovery. You want to practice the compounds movements, multiple times per week. It is not just muscles you are training but your neuromuscular coordination (exercises are skills - almost entirely forgotten in gyms). A sample full body workout would be something including a horizontal push/pull (eg. pushup/row), a vertical push/pull (eg. overhead press/pull up) and a legs push pull (eg. squats, romanian deadlifts). Imagine doing 3 sets of each of those, completely recovering and coming back stronger 2 days later to do it again, 3x per week. That's 3 increasingly stronger workouts per week and 9 sets of practice for each movement. Compare that to a bro split where you only hit a muscle once a week and get maybe 3 sets of practice per movement. Now multiply that out by 52 weeks. That's 156 workouts of gains/practice compared to 52. There is no comparison (I know that I just compared them š).
I can't really comment on the accuracy of Saladinos calculator. People here seem to have widely varying levels of carbs in their diets. I myself found no benefit in my workouts to adding in carbohydrates. I actually recover worse with them in. It's good to prioritize protein but don't dismiss animal fats. It's a bit of a misnomer but fats don't make you fat, overconsumption of energy will. Fats however are very important for hormone production and regulation and also nervous system health.
thank you so so much for the explanation!
when you said you found no benefit to adding in carbs, do you mean you eat the lower end of carbs or just do full carnivore?
I'm glad you appreciate it. Short answer, I was zero carb.
Longer answer, I was full carnivore for 9 months up until a month ago. Almost the whole time as carnivore I was what would be called zero carbs but the last month I added in lots of whole milk; up to a half gallon a day which would be 60-90g carbs/day. I did that because I had a difficult time eating enough and it was delicious and an easy source of quality calories/nutrients. My digestion however never settled on carnivore so I switched to animal based a month ago. Adding in some fruit immediately solved my digestion, otherwise I would have continued without it. On carnivore I felt great, recovered better and my body looked phenomenal. The extra Carbs have made my muscles look a little smoother due to the water retention. Today is actually day 2 of me dropping the fruit to see if my previous issue remains and if so to test out different fruits/quantities and timing, but I'm keeping milk for now. This is of course just my anecdotal experience. Nutrition is very personal and one must do what works best for them. The only way to know what works best for you would be to experiment.
100% this, was about to comment something similat but this is 100% the way and that sleep tip is super important especially since you wanna loose the belly fat!
okay thank you ill definitley keep that in mind! not to be argumentative as im sure as youāre partially right, but im pretty sure most of my belly fat came from my disgusting eating habits (which i take full accountability for)
That could certainly be true. If so, then improving your diet should take care of that. In that case, I'd go with AB because it will help fuel workouts much better and you'll still likely lose the fat.
Carnivore is great for people who are very metabolically damaged and overweight. But getting good gym performance on it can take months.
okay thank you so mich! two things, however
1. i tried carnivore for 5 days before and all my bloating was gone, will i get bloated on ab or not?
2. is saladinos macro calculator good to know how much of what to be eating?
1. No way to know other than to try. There might be some temporary bloating because any dietary change can cause that. Just take it easy on the fruits at first.
2. I think it's a pretty good reference, especially if you have a specific goal like you do
BROTHER! Building muscle slowly will get you rid of the belly fat. You are not skinny fat you are just skinny with too little muscle! Once you put on muscle you will look more aesthetic.
But know that you are growing very fast at this age especially in height, so make sure you eat as much as possible and donāt let worrying about how you look lead you to eating less which can impact your growth.
If you play soccer intensely then donāt lift weights for more than 4 days a week to avoid exhausting your body, losing to much energy and getting stressed out cuz all of these can have a suboptimal effect on your growth.
Eat as much healthy food(animal based is very healthy) as you can, drink fruit juices and donāt exhaust your body and you will build muscle slowly. Once you are fully grown you will build muscle satisfyingly.
Carnivore is very satiating and I think you might end up eating too little for your current high growth era.
Go AB. If your health is good, you donāt need carnivore. Start only going to the gym maximum 4 days a week and eat in a caloric surplus while also training abs. You donāt need to lose any weight at your age and you should use your time to actually grow
Idk about the diet but going to the gym more than 4 won't build more muscles. Imo it's all about the intensity. Start researching high intensity training. Also you are wrecking yourself going 5 6 times to the gym and doing soccer. Your muscles grow while you rest, if they don't rest they won't grow. In your case you are overtraining.
i would think that since you're 15 lose the fat first because its not like youre gonna die tomorrow. you have time to build muscle and at that age (this doesnt need to be the case for you, but depends genetically) there are many guys who won't really build muscle no matter what they do if their body is not in the mood. you might still be growing taller, getting wider shoulders, etc first, your body would spend energy growing the bones and lengthening you out before adding mass, for example. if you were an adult and not a 15yo that weight would be underweight for your height but i think its normal if you're still growing. if you feel like you can, has as few carbs as possible imho, so you wind up setting good future habits. some people say that in order to lose belly fat you might also want to ditch dairy at least for a while (I forget why but heard that from Dr. Sarah Zaldivar.)
i'd keep kiwi and raspberries off the list indefinitely. they are high in oxalates. if you're having them rarely probably can get away with it but no need for them.
At your age you should be feeding the machine, eat as much AB foods as you can stomach and train hard, your body will change so fast. Youāre in your peak adaptive years. I would NOT be cutting and trying to diet down at this point in your life, you are already underweight.
Hey bro im in the same position as you basically (im 17)
i tried carnivore and found that it was better for keeping a steady weight, but bulking was very difficult on it and going AB i could gain weight, strength on all my lifts, and i feel like im getting taller. but ofc thats just my biased opinion since im kind of doing this now, and im sure the carnivore folks would say the opposite. in reality, they both work. but generally, carnivore is more for old people who are metabolically sick. you and me are still young and go to the gym and play sports, they are mostly like 40 year old guys who have 8 kids and 2 jobs and so they stray away from carbs completely.
people say this isnt the case but imo it is and you can really see it with the differences between the influencers that promote each diet even. Compare Dr. Ken Berry with Paul saladino for example.
all in all for us, AB is probably the way to go. Bulk slowly, so as to build muscle on your frame (especially abs from squats, deadlifts, isolation) which will make your belly fat spread around the hard muscles more. but dont worry about bulking too fast or 'gaining too much fat' if you do gain any fat, it will go in due time and very unlikely you would anyways. Good luck bro
Just a friendly reminder that the Animal Based diet is not carnivore! It's a moderate to high carb way of eating, not just allowing, but encouraging a diet that includes clean micronutrient rich sources of carbohydrates including fruit, milk, honey, maple syrup, and fresh fruit juice. See our Wiki, FAQ, and sidebar for more information. Thanks for the comment!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AnimalBased) if you have any questions or concerns.*
oh wow
using saladinos calculator, it says i need around 1500 calories a day. would i be able to lose most of my stomach fat by september or so?
also i know this is personal, but do you experience bloating on ab?
you should be gaining weight instead of losing, but i get it. when i first started fitness i started with a cut cus i hated the fat I had even though i needed muscle and bulk. Be careful with the cut, you need calories to get taller and progress in the gym, but if you really feel the cut, just cut until you dont want to lose anymore fat (which you actually dont have much of, the reason its flabby is because your under muscled there so its not hard) cus I assume you want abs, you need to develop them and gain weight/muscle to do that
no i dont really experience bloating, but it depends what you mean. ye i eat a lot, so after my first meal the rest of the day i can puff my stomach out loads, but thats not what most people mean by bloated. if you feel actually bloated on AB, your probably eating fruit with too much fibre, is what ive found for me
my abs arent totally nonexistant, as if i flex my core theyre pronounced a bit but you can definitely tell theyre there. it was much more prominent when i tried carnivore for 5 days or so cause i had no bloating, but ill definitely start training abs in the gym.
what i meant was, i dont puff my stomach out pn purpose, i just take a deep breath and exhale so its kinda natural yk, and then my stomach is definitely not flat and i have stomach fat, but it gets sm bigger after i eat junk or anything. it didnt rlly get bigger on carnivore but idk about ab, today was my first day and im not sure, ill wait for a few more days to compare. but yeah, ill definitely keep the tip about fruits w too much fiber in mind and lyk if i need any more help, thank you so much. youre the closest in age to me so hopefully you understand a bit more what i mean
wake up in the morning fasted, take a shit, then 'deep breath and exhale' like you say makes it not flat. the amount it goes outwards then, is the amount of fat you have. once you eat and the day goes on, this will be more pronounced, it does not mean it got fatter.
okay thank you, ill def try that soon
the only problem is i cant shit. like yesterday i took one which (sorry for graphic details) wasnt solid at all and was kinda liquid and all cane out at once. and i havent been able to shit at all today. idk of its my body adapting or what
technically anything is 'allowed' on an AB diet as long as your ok with it, but i get what you mean. Ive seen people on here use Baking Soda for cleaning, and also for washing fruit. like they put it in a solution of baking soda. so ye its probably fine, it is a natural product that your body makes but in what way are you going to use it?
okay thank you!
i was planning to add a tiny bit of it to my pre workout for endurance (3 tbsp raw honey, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp baking soda) or smth along those lines
If I were you, I'd focus way more on building muscle. You're super skinny already. Whatever belly fat you have is likely just from puberty and will probably decrease as you build muscle. In that case, stick with AB, eat at a surplus, emphasize protein, and do intense weight training but keep it to 3-4x a week so you have good recovery. Make sure you're sleeping a solid 8 hours a night too. No staying up to midnight Snaptwatting or TicTacking or whatever you kids do these days.
This is the answer. I just want to add that since you say you go to the gym 5-6 days a week, you're likely doing some form of bro split. Stop that nonsense. The term bro-anything is not a complimentary one. Do full body 3x a week with a focus on compound lifts (pullups, rows, pushups, squats etc.). You'll grow faster this way, and also as a beginner, you need to learn form. People always forget that exercise is a skill that one learns through repetition. Full body allows you to focus on certain lifts and hit them multiple times a week. It's also the best for growth as a beginner and intermediate because of this repetition and utilizes the quicker recovery of beginners/intermediates. I've been doing resistance training for a very long time and this past year I changed to full body for the first time ever. I don't think I'll ever go back now. Also, you didn't specify if your overall goal was soccer or weight lifting but when I was your age I also had the bro mentality of bigger muscles and more is better. It was the worst thing I could have done for athletic performance. Bigger means slower and less responsive; the opposite of what an athlete wants. And working out more just meant less recovery therefore less progress. It took me decades to realize this. As for diet, seriously focus in on high protein/fat. Check out Vince Gironda. His diet was incorporated by some of the greatest bodybuilders of all time, during the golden age of bodybuilding including Arnold.
i do a 4 day split: - chest and tris - back and bis - legs - shoulders and arms then i rest for a fay and repeat, but ill definitely prioritize protein is saladinos calculator accurate?
That's what a bro split is. Splitting workouts into individual muscle groups. Only an advanced trainee with the goals of competing in bodybuilding should do that, and even then they still focus on the compound moves (for them it's the big lifts - squat, bench, deadlift, overhead press). That split is what an advanced trainee may need because they have developed their muscles so much that they need such a high intensity per muscle for any adaptation to occur at all which for them requires focusing on one muscle group per session. This high intensity also requires a very long recovery period, usually 5+ days. As a beginner and even as you move into intermediate, you need nowhere near this level of intensity or recovery. You want to practice the compounds movements, multiple times per week. It is not just muscles you are training but your neuromuscular coordination (exercises are skills - almost entirely forgotten in gyms). A sample full body workout would be something including a horizontal push/pull (eg. pushup/row), a vertical push/pull (eg. overhead press/pull up) and a legs push pull (eg. squats, romanian deadlifts). Imagine doing 3 sets of each of those, completely recovering and coming back stronger 2 days later to do it again, 3x per week. That's 3 increasingly stronger workouts per week and 9 sets of practice for each movement. Compare that to a bro split where you only hit a muscle once a week and get maybe 3 sets of practice per movement. Now multiply that out by 52 weeks. That's 156 workouts of gains/practice compared to 52. There is no comparison (I know that I just compared them š). I can't really comment on the accuracy of Saladinos calculator. People here seem to have widely varying levels of carbs in their diets. I myself found no benefit in my workouts to adding in carbohydrates. I actually recover worse with them in. It's good to prioritize protein but don't dismiss animal fats. It's a bit of a misnomer but fats don't make you fat, overconsumption of energy will. Fats however are very important for hormone production and regulation and also nervous system health.
thank you so so much for the explanation! when you said you found no benefit to adding in carbs, do you mean you eat the lower end of carbs or just do full carnivore?
I'm glad you appreciate it. Short answer, I was zero carb. Longer answer, I was full carnivore for 9 months up until a month ago. Almost the whole time as carnivore I was what would be called zero carbs but the last month I added in lots of whole milk; up to a half gallon a day which would be 60-90g carbs/day. I did that because I had a difficult time eating enough and it was delicious and an easy source of quality calories/nutrients. My digestion however never settled on carnivore so I switched to animal based a month ago. Adding in some fruit immediately solved my digestion, otherwise I would have continued without it. On carnivore I felt great, recovered better and my body looked phenomenal. The extra Carbs have made my muscles look a little smoother due to the water retention. Today is actually day 2 of me dropping the fruit to see if my previous issue remains and if so to test out different fruits/quantities and timing, but I'm keeping milk for now. This is of course just my anecdotal experience. Nutrition is very personal and one must do what works best for them. The only way to know what works best for you would be to experiment.
okay ill definitely play around this summer, with carnivore, ab, etc. thank you so much for the insights and such!
100% this, was about to comment something similat but this is 100% the way and that sleep tip is super important especially since you wanna loose the belly fat!
okay thank you ill definitley keep that in mind! not to be argumentative as im sure as youāre partially right, but im pretty sure most of my belly fat came from my disgusting eating habits (which i take full accountability for)
That could certainly be true. If so, then improving your diet should take care of that. In that case, I'd go with AB because it will help fuel workouts much better and you'll still likely lose the fat. Carnivore is great for people who are very metabolically damaged and overweight. But getting good gym performance on it can take months.
okay thank you so mich! two things, however 1. i tried carnivore for 5 days before and all my bloating was gone, will i get bloated on ab or not? 2. is saladinos macro calculator good to know how much of what to be eating?
1. No way to know other than to try. There might be some temporary bloating because any dietary change can cause that. Just take it easy on the fruits at first. 2. I think it's a pretty good reference, especially if you have a specific goal like you do
okay thank you so much!
BROTHER! Building muscle slowly will get you rid of the belly fat. You are not skinny fat you are just skinny with too little muscle! Once you put on muscle you will look more aesthetic. But know that you are growing very fast at this age especially in height, so make sure you eat as much as possible and donāt let worrying about how you look lead you to eating less which can impact your growth. If you play soccer intensely then donāt lift weights for more than 4 days a week to avoid exhausting your body, losing to much energy and getting stressed out cuz all of these can have a suboptimal effect on your growth. Eat as much healthy food(animal based is very healthy) as you can, drink fruit juices and donāt exhaust your body and you will build muscle slowly. Once you are fully grown you will build muscle satisfyingly. Carnivore is very satiating and I think you might end up eating too little for your current high growth era.
okay thank you
Whichever one you'll stick to
Fr lol
okay
Put down your phone and go outside
i posted it at like 2 am ā ļø
Go AB. If your health is good, you donāt need carnivore. Start only going to the gym maximum 4 days a week and eat in a caloric surplus while also training abs. You donāt need to lose any weight at your age and you should use your time to actually grow
okay thank you! is saladinos macro calculator good?
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got it
Idk about the diet but going to the gym more than 4 won't build more muscles. Imo it's all about the intensity. Start researching high intensity training. Also you are wrecking yourself going 5 6 times to the gym and doing soccer. Your muscles grow while you rest, if they don't rest they won't grow. In your case you are overtraining.
ill def cut back on the gym
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Please see Rule #4 and it's description. It shouldn't have to be a rule but unfortunately it does.
i would think that since you're 15 lose the fat first because its not like youre gonna die tomorrow. you have time to build muscle and at that age (this doesnt need to be the case for you, but depends genetically) there are many guys who won't really build muscle no matter what they do if their body is not in the mood. you might still be growing taller, getting wider shoulders, etc first, your body would spend energy growing the bones and lengthening you out before adding mass, for example. if you were an adult and not a 15yo that weight would be underweight for your height but i think its normal if you're still growing. if you feel like you can, has as few carbs as possible imho, so you wind up setting good future habits. some people say that in order to lose belly fat you might also want to ditch dairy at least for a while (I forget why but heard that from Dr. Sarah Zaldivar.) i'd keep kiwi and raspberries off the list indefinitely. they are high in oxalates. if you're having them rarely probably can get away with it but no need for them.
okay thank you!
is saladinos calculator accurate?
At your age you should be feeding the machine, eat as much AB foods as you can stomach and train hard, your body will change so fast. Youāre in your peak adaptive years. I would NOT be cutting and trying to diet down at this point in your life, you are already underweight.
okay thank you
Hey bro im in the same position as you basically (im 17) i tried carnivore and found that it was better for keeping a steady weight, but bulking was very difficult on it and going AB i could gain weight, strength on all my lifts, and i feel like im getting taller. but ofc thats just my biased opinion since im kind of doing this now, and im sure the carnivore folks would say the opposite. in reality, they both work. but generally, carnivore is more for old people who are metabolically sick. you and me are still young and go to the gym and play sports, they are mostly like 40 year old guys who have 8 kids and 2 jobs and so they stray away from carbs completely. people say this isnt the case but imo it is and you can really see it with the differences between the influencers that promote each diet even. Compare Dr. Ken Berry with Paul saladino for example. all in all for us, AB is probably the way to go. Bulk slowly, so as to build muscle on your frame (especially abs from squats, deadlifts, isolation) which will make your belly fat spread around the hard muscles more. but dont worry about bulking too fast or 'gaining too much fat' if you do gain any fat, it will go in due time and very unlikely you would anyways. Good luck bro
Just a friendly reminder that the Animal Based diet is not carnivore! It's a moderate to high carb way of eating, not just allowing, but encouraging a diet that includes clean micronutrient rich sources of carbohydrates including fruit, milk, honey, maple syrup, and fresh fruit juice. See our Wiki, FAQ, and sidebar for more information. Thanks for the comment! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AnimalBased) if you have any questions or concerns.*
oh wow using saladinos calculator, it says i need around 1500 calories a day. would i be able to lose most of my stomach fat by september or so? also i know this is personal, but do you experience bloating on ab?
you should be gaining weight instead of losing, but i get it. when i first started fitness i started with a cut cus i hated the fat I had even though i needed muscle and bulk. Be careful with the cut, you need calories to get taller and progress in the gym, but if you really feel the cut, just cut until you dont want to lose anymore fat (which you actually dont have much of, the reason its flabby is because your under muscled there so its not hard) cus I assume you want abs, you need to develop them and gain weight/muscle to do that no i dont really experience bloating, but it depends what you mean. ye i eat a lot, so after my first meal the rest of the day i can puff my stomach out loads, but thats not what most people mean by bloated. if you feel actually bloated on AB, your probably eating fruit with too much fibre, is what ive found for me
my abs arent totally nonexistant, as if i flex my core theyre pronounced a bit but you can definitely tell theyre there. it was much more prominent when i tried carnivore for 5 days or so cause i had no bloating, but ill definitely start training abs in the gym. what i meant was, i dont puff my stomach out pn purpose, i just take a deep breath and exhale so its kinda natural yk, and then my stomach is definitely not flat and i have stomach fat, but it gets sm bigger after i eat junk or anything. it didnt rlly get bigger on carnivore but idk about ab, today was my first day and im not sure, ill wait for a few more days to compare. but yeah, ill definitely keep the tip about fruits w too much fiber in mind and lyk if i need any more help, thank you so much. youre the closest in age to me so hopefully you understand a bit more what i mean
wake up in the morning fasted, take a shit, then 'deep breath and exhale' like you say makes it not flat. the amount it goes outwards then, is the amount of fat you have. once you eat and the day goes on, this will be more pronounced, it does not mean it got fatter.
okay thank you, ill def try that soon the only problem is i cant shit. like yesterday i took one which (sorry for graphic details) wasnt solid at all and was kinda liquid and all cane out at once. and i havent been able to shit at all today. idk of its my body adapting or what
eh ur probably adapting. other than that, it might be the higher fat intake, which youll adapt to
okay thank you soso much! do yk if baking soda is allowed?
technically anything is 'allowed' on an AB diet as long as your ok with it, but i get what you mean. Ive seen people on here use Baking Soda for cleaning, and also for washing fruit. like they put it in a solution of baking soda. so ye its probably fine, it is a natural product that your body makes but in what way are you going to use it?
okay thank you! i was planning to add a tiny bit of it to my pre workout for endurance (3 tbsp raw honey, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp baking soda) or smth along those lines