One hundred days and 22.3 lbs later, my Dad Bod to Rad Bod program is complete. My one and only true goal was to look better than my After photo from last year and I am 100% satisfied in my success doing so. I lost more weight, finished at a lower body-fat percentage, yet weighed more than I did last year thanks to the muscle I added, most of which came from this program. My biceps were what I noticed grew the most, and that’s not terribly surprising considering I did arm exercises nearly every single workout, but for me it was pretty shocking because I’m a skinny guy and it is HARD to get my arms to grow. Seeing significant growth WHILE losing 20+lbs was incredible and makes me wonder how much growth I could see on a weight-gain diet as opposed to this weight-loss one.

The Diet

If you’re at all familiar with my nutrition coaching, the strategy my weight-loss diet is going to be no surprise. But for those of you coming across me for the first time, my dieting strategy is flexible, sustainable, and quite simple really, and most importantly it follows the one and only universal law of fat loss: consume fewer calories than you burn. I followed the exact calorie recommendations that anyone who signs up for My Fitness Pal, Lose It, or most Personal Training services will receive; 1-2lbs of fat lost per week by consuming 500-1,000 calories less than they burn a day. How I break that down, and anyone with a Strength and Conditioning certification knows this, is I consume those calories 30% from protein, 40% from carbohydrate and 30% from fat. For those skimming:

• Daily Caloric Intake: 500-1,000 calories less than expended
• Macronutrient Ratio: 40% carbohydrate, 30% protein, 30% fat

No I didn’t always hit those exact numbers, and yes it was literally that simple. The difference in why that worked so differently for me than the millions of others is I committed to it and stayed consistent with it. 99.9% of people either give up, stop caring, or never even try to track their food every day for multiple weeks in a row, much less try to actually stay on their budget. There’s a million reasons why people quit, but the one thing that is true for all the people that stick it out all the way to jaw-dropping photo finish is they trust the process. They don’t always keep faith that it’s going to work, and that’s perfectly normal, but they trust it, follow the plan, and they are NEVER disappointed in the results!

The Training

I can guarantee my training regimen is nothing like anything you have ever done before, and that’s not me being cocky, it’s just being honest. Even for the relatively small amount of people who don’t train like bodybuilders (working out only one muscle group per workout), even fewer people combine olympic lifting, functional movement training and bodybuilding exercises, not to mention a few two-a-days and 5-mile runs.

Why was this my choice in exercise? Well, I love Olympic lifting, so that’s how I burned most of my calories, but that’s not the best (definitely not the safest) way to overload and hypertrophy muscles. For that reason I incorporated some bodybuilding training to target muscles like my biceps, triceps, deltoids and calves, as well as some machine exercises for the legs and chest when joints were too sore for free weights. Speaking of sore joints, that’s where the functional training came into play. I was walking a fine line between normal soreness and tendonitis from overuse, so including movements like the Glute Ham Raise, I’s Y’s & T’s, Single Leg RDLs and a pretty spectacular warmup all helped keep my joints ready to go day in and day out.

The Results

These should speak for themselves:

Not bad for a 33 year old soon-to-be-father huh?

Want the complete Dad Bod to Rad Bod Program yourself with video instruction of every movement and the exact amount of sets, reps and customizations I made to each exercise? Well I have made it available to purchase in the Recycling Bin of my Personal Training Packages! Check it out or click here to skip directly to it.