From 22% to 18% body fat in 2 months: Losing fat while gaining muscle

The Results

The results were too good to be true. I was reading and re-reading my DEXA scan report, thinking “I must be missing something.”

If you haven’t heard of DEXA, it’s a test where you lay on a table for 5-6 minutes while a machine scans your body. The test provides detailed information on your body fat, lean mass, and bone density. I’ve used DEXA scans for the past 7 years to assess different nutrition and training programs.

The progress since my last scan (2 months earlier) was surprising:

• Body Fat: Lost 8.4 pounds
• Lean Mass: Gained 2.3 pounds
• Body Fat Percentage: 22.3% to 18.0%
• Visceral Fat (dangerous fat between your organs): Down 60%
  

Screenshots from my DEXA Scan Results

Below, I’ll share the training and nutrition strategies that drove these results.

Background: Focus on Fat Loss

Brief background: At the start of this process, I was 34 years old, 5’10” (178 cm) tall, and roughly 170 lbs (77 kg). I have a desk job. I was a cross country and middle distance track runner in high school and played Ultimate Frisbee in college. Prior to 2021, I had almost no experience with strength training.

During the pandemic, I’ve started training with kettlebells because I can use them at home without going to the gym. Researching kettlebells led me to the work of Dan John - his YouTube videos, podcast, and University site are phenomenal resources.

I wanted to set a goal for my kettlebell training. Dan John has a rule: Your waist (in inches/cm) should be half your height (again, in inches/cm). If your waist is more than half your height, you should focus on body composition. This common sense rule is well supported in the longevity research literature as well. I was right on the borderline, with a height of 70 inches (178 cm) and a waist measurement of 35 in (89 cm)...and 35 was on a good day 😅. That was a little too close for comfort, so I decided to focus on fat loss.

I committed to a 30-day experiment to improve body composition and specifically to lose fat. I would structure both my training and my nutrition with that objective in mind.

Training for Fat Loss (2 months)

One of Dan John’s most famous programs is Easy Strength, co-authored with Pavel Tsatsouline. In recent years, Dan has shared a modified version of this program called Easy Strength for Fat Loss (or ES4FL).

You can watch Dan’s free video workshop if you want to learn more, but here is a concise summary of the program:

Workouts should take about one hour. Train 5 days per week.

Each day, I did a warm up that included foam rolling and stretching. My specific training was:

1. Ab Wheel: 1x10
2. Kettlebell Military Press (16kg): 3 x 3 (or 2 x 5)
3. Pull-up (bodyweight): 3 x 3 (or 2 x 5)
4. Kettlebell Deadlift (32 kg or 44kg): 2 x 10 (Note that I modified the reps because I was using a kettlebell, based on this comment)
5. Kettlebell Swings (20kg): 5 x 15
6. Walk

On average, the first 5 steps took me about 20 minutes, and I would walk for another 25-40 minutes. Total time for each workout was 45-60 minutes.

Additional notes on my training:

• I was seeing a trainer weekly for general kettlebell coaching. Sometimes this was a substitute for an ES4FL workout, other times it was in addition to the ES4FL program
• My heart rate was probably too low during the walk. Dan encourages a minimum heart rate of 160 minus your age (126bpm for me). I averaged 100-105bpm most of the time.
• I had dabbled with Easy Strength for about 4 weeks before starting the “Fat Loss” portion (i.e., the long walk)
• Don’t miss step #1 of the ES4FL protocol: Get a good night’s sleep!
  

Overall, I found ES4FL extremely satisfying. It just felt good every single day. And as advertised, I gradually got stronger. Three sets of 3 for the military press and pull-up were challenging at the beginning. By the end of the first month, two sets of 5 felt pretty easy for both.

Nutrition (1 Month)

Now comes the hard part.

Based on self-experimentation over the past several years, I know that two nutrition strategies work really well for me:

• Strategy #1: Fasting
• Strategy #2: Eliminating sugar and minimizing refined carbohydrates

Strategy #1: Fasting

I followed a 5:2 fasting protocol for the second month (same month that I added the walk to my Easy Strength workout). 5:2 fasting means eating 5 days per week and fasting 2 days per week.

Specifically, I fasted Mondays and Thursdays. As an example, I would begin fasting on Sunday night after dinner and would not eat again until breakfast on Tuesday. During the fast, I would drink coffee, water, and 1-2 cups of bone broth if I got hungry.

My 5:2 Fasting Protocol

I have practiced fasting for several years, but 5:2 is still a challenge. The training made it even tougher. Here’s why:

• With ES4FL, you train in a fasted state 5 days per week
• On a typical day, this is pretty easy because it just means working out before breakfast.
  • For example, on a Wednesday morning, my training might be 12 hours after I last ate (Tuesday dinner). Then I ate a meal as soon as I finished training.
• The tough part was the fasting days:
  • Monday: Wake up, train in a fasted state. Keep fasting all day, until…
  • Tuesday: Wake up, train in a fasted state again…THEN eat (finally)

This was tougher mentally than it was physically. But it was still physically tough: the kettlebell swings are noticeably more challenging after ~32 hours of fasting.

Additional notes on my fasting:

• To stay motivated, I track my fasts with Zero (just the basic functionality). I’ll open up the app to look at my progress for motivation when I start to get hungry.
• I experimented with kimchi AND bone broth on fasting days, but this seemed to slow down my fat loss based on my daily weigh-ins and waist measurements

Strategy #2: Eliminating sugar and minimizing refined carbohydrates

I have experimented with several low-carb diets over the years, including Slow Carb, Paleo, and Keto. My ideal diet is basically Slow Carb, though I do include some dairy in the diet (e.g., full fat Greek Yogurt), which is not “technically” allowed.

Here was a typical day during my 30-day experiment:

• Coffee. Black coffee, typically Ethiopia from Dogwood Coffee, brewed with a Hario V60 pourover
• Breakfast: Eggs topped with smoked salmon, guacamole, and Cholula hot sauce (all from Costco). Plus a high fiber food: either lentils (Costco) or steel cut oats (made in a rice cooker and topped with berries and/or Greek Yogurt)
• Second Coffee
• Lunch: Burrito Bowl (no rice)
• Dinner: Salad with steak, crumbled bacon, feta cheese, olive oil, and red wine vinegar. Side of roasted vegetables (brocolli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts) with Cholula hot sauce
• Dessert: 100g Full fat Greek yogurt and 40g natural peanut butter

A few more notes:

• I did not do any portion control on the non-fasting days
• My primary drinks were water and coffee.
• I did drink some alcohol - either bourbon on the rocks or vodka/soda - at a few work dinners.
• I followed Dan John’s recommendation of a “gut biome break” at least once per day. I bought kimchi from Costco and ate a small bowl before one of my meals.

Overall, this diet would be challenging to maintain for a year, but was pretty do-able for a 30-day period.

Measuring Progress

Feedback mechanisms really help improve the odds of successful behavior change. Here were the ones I used:

Daily Feedback Mechanisms:

• Calendar/Workout Journal. This was posted on my bedroom door so I saw it every day. I outlined my plan for each day then marked an X on a day once it was complete. I also recorded the details of each workout on a separate piece of paper.
• Waist Measurement. I recorded my waist in inches at its widest point every morning before I showered.
• Body Weight. I also recorded my body weight every morning.

Calendar on my Door

Daily Measurements of Bodyweight and Waist

These daily practices are a huge help with motivation. Sometimes I had to make changes like shifting a fast to a different day in the week, and these systems helped me from falling off the wagon.

Overall Feedback Mechanism: DEXA

Ultimately, I wanted an accurate measurement of body composition to assess the results of this experiment. I used the DEXA scan to go beyond the weight / waist measurements and truly understand the impact on lean mass and fat loss. I scheduled the DEXA scan weeks in advance to keep me motivated and focused on the goal.

The Big Day

Based on my daily measurements, I knew that I had lost 5+ pounds of total mass based on my daily weigh-ins.

But heading into my DEXA scan at the end of the 30 days, I was worried about body composition. With past diet experiments, I’ve typically lost both fat and lean mass (note: I had not been strength training). As an example, in 2019 I did a strict low-carb diet for 5 weeks and I lost 8.2 pounds. But that was losing 5.3 pounds of fat, and 2.9 pounds of lean mass. I was worried that something similar would happen again.

The results were much better than I expected. Lean mass had increased by 2.3 pounds (largely in my arms and trunk), and fat loss (8.4 pounds) exceeded my most optimistic projections coming into the 30-day experiment. You can see the details at the top of this post.

Decrease in Visceral Fat (0.66 to 0.25 pounds)

This experience re-taught me an important lesson: when possible, be sure to measure the true outcome that you care about, not a proxy. In my case, I cared about body composition. This is harder to measure than a proxy - like body weight. But by measuring body composition, I learned that I had lost significantly more fat than the scale showed, and I had gained muscle. I would have totally missed that if I had only measured my weight, and I also would have missed valuable insights on like the impact on visceral fat (see the image above).

What I Would Do Differently

Overall, I was thrilled with the results, especially in such a short time frame. This is the first time I have ever gained muscle and lost fat at the same time. I would absolutely do this program again.

That being said, I would make a few tweaks next time:

• Increase my heart rate during the walk. The goal would be to increase fat burning by getting my heart rate to at least 160 minus age. Two potential approaches: 1) Hand/ankle weights: Dan recommends walking with light weights (hand weights, ankle weights, or both) to get the heart rate up, or 2) Substitute for indoor cycling: Walking can be treacherous on icy sidewalks in the winter, so I might hope on the indoor bike. I’ve tried this a few times and found it very easy to keep my heart rate around 180 minus age.
• Go heavier on deadlifts
• No kimchi on fast days. This seemed to negatively impact fat loss vs. fasting only
• Eliminate alcohol. I would do this primarily to improve sleep; even small amounts of alcohol have a noticeable impact on sleep quality

Summary

I reduced my body fat percentage in 2 months by more than 4 percentage points by losing fat and gaining muscle. The protocol was:

1. Easy Strength for Fat Loss
2. 5:2 Fasting
3. Low-carb diet

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