Why can't I look like Mark Sisson!?!?! page 2

[drssgchic]

I'm wondering if you're overtraining. 45-75 minutes of lifting weights 3-4X a week might be a bit much. Have you reviewed the exercise and play part of the Blueprint?

[cori93437]

How about also that this isn't new to Mark at all...

He has been a performance athlete pretty much his whole life.

It's harder to attain at middle age that simply maintain.
Of course, best of luck!
Have some patience and enjoy the journey if 'ripped' is indeed your ultimate goal.
Being hasty is a good road to disappointment in general IME.

[ballenparks]

drssg chick i have not looked at the fitness section yet. And i can definitely say I overtrain sometimes in the heat of the moment I can sometimes push my limits further at the gym sometimes sometimes resulting in some cps fatigue

[Knifegill]

Butter is a big yes-yes around here!

Mark is a self-admitted gym rat. His PB fitness is designed to turn lard lads into functional men, not functional men into buff dudes. You can always modify it, though!

I'm a fan of lifting heavy and sprinting...but my BF% is 18% and stable there, I have no reason to get it any lower except for kicks and giggles.

[destructalux]

How about also that this isn't new to Mark at all...

He has been a performance athlete pretty much his whole life.

+1

When I was introduced to the primal blueprint by my brother, it went something like "blah blah blah.... and you should see how much lean muscle this old guy carries"

the book or diet would never gotten very far with a fat out of shape person on it. yes primal is great, but no Mark has not been primal his whole life and he makes that clear.

P.s. do you do cardio? moderate cardio is sometimes necessary to bump along through plateaus. I usually do 25 mins on the cross trainer AFTER an hour to hour and half weight session and it works.

[Ripped]

My problem is I can't seem to lose weight past this point! I hope to one day enter a bodybuilding show and reach the pinnacle of my performance. When I was following the standard high carb low fat regiment I got down to 11% body fat but have not been able to do so since.

I have a question for you, and I'd like an honest answer. Hey, at least be honest with yourself. Let me explain.

The fattest I've ever been was 226 lbs and almost 30% body fat. Now days I range from around 10-12% body fat all year long. I want to get leaner, but it hasn't happened. And I can explain why.

To lose all the weight I tried many different strategies and they all worked. I've done low carbs, low fat moderate carbs, intermittent fasting, paleo, and so on. What each and every one of these approaches have in common is that they all some how resulted in a calorie reduction, and I stuck to them long enough to see the results.

So this is why I know exactly why I haven't gotten any leaner. It was the same thing to get from 220 lbs to 207 lbs, the same to get from 207 lbs to 200 lbs, the same to get from 200 lbs down to 190 lbs, and the same to get from 190 lbs to 175 lbs. Its the same thing every time. Find a way to comfortably reduce calories for a long enough time to see significant results.

In other words, if I didn't lose any weight further than that its ONLY because I didn't bother to dedicate myself to doing so. I was doing well for a while and got down to 170 lbs at one point. My overall goal is to get down into the lower 160's or what ever I have to in order to get that ripped look.

But what happened? I ended up having to work 72 hour weeks for a while and my diet had to take a temporary set back, because I just didn't seem to have it in me to organize during that time. So, I ended up getting back to 180 lbs eventually.

However, I do know exactly what I need to do in order to finally drop the weight. I just have to dedicate myself for several weeks or more and do it.

So this is the only question I want to ask you. Did you dedicate yourself to reducing calories for several weeks just like you might have done before while on a different style diet? My bet is no. But this is what you have to do. It will work. I promise. Do it for several weeks.

I tell you what. Try it. And if you come back in 8 weeks with zero progress, I'll eat an entire pizza and ice cream just for you. LOL!!! I don't really want to do that. But I'm just saying that's how confident I am that it will work.

[Damiana]

Mark has been an athlete his whole life, being primal improved his health but he has spent years sculpting that physique before be thought of MDA. You can't just dive into primal and expect to look like that. It takes time and discipline.

[ChocoTaco369]

I have a question for you, and I'd like an honest answer. Hey, at least be honest with yourself. Let me explain.

The fattest I've ever been was 226 lbs and almost 30% body fat. Now days I range from around 10-12% body fat all year long. I want to get leaner, but it hasn't happened. And I can explain why.

To lose all the weight I tried many different strategies and they all worked. I've done low carbs, low fat moderate carbs, intermittent fasting, paleo, and so on. What each and every one of these approaches have in common is that they all some how resulted in a calorie reduction, and I stuck to them long enough to see the results.

So this is why I know exactly why I haven't gotten any leaner. It was the same thing to get from 220 lbs to 207 lbs, the same to get from 207 lbs to 200 lbs, the same to get from 200 lbs down to 190 lbs, and the same to get from 190 lbs to 175 lbs. Its the same thing every time. Find a way to comfortably reduce calories for a long enough time to see significant results.

In other words, if I didn't lose any weight further than that its ONLY because I didn't bother to dedicate myself to doing so. I was doing well for a while and got down to 170 lbs at one point. My overall goal is to get down into the lower 160's or what ever I have to in order to get that ripped look.

But what happened? I ended up having to work 72 hour weeks for a while and my diet had to take a temporary set back, because I just didn't seem to have it in me to organize during that time. So, I ended up getting back to 180 lbs eventually.

However, I do know exactly what I need to do in order to finally drop the weight. I just have to dedicate myself for several weeks or more and do it.

So this is the only question I want to ask you. Did you dedicate yourself to reducing calories for several weeks just like you might have done before while on a different style diet? My bet is no. But this is what you have to do. It will work. I promise. Do it for several weeks.

I tell you what. Try it. And if you come back in 8 weeks with zero progress, I'll eat an entire pizza and ice cream just for you. LOL!!! I don't really want to do that. But I'm just saying that's how confident I am that it will work.

This.

It is entirely caloric. Mark looks the way he does for a lot of reasons:

1.) He doesn't eat a lot of food. He says it himself.

The main thing I’ve figured out from eating this way for years is that I don’t need nearly as many calories to maintain health, mass, and body fat as I once thought I did – or as the Conventional Wisdom says I do. I eat 600-1000 calories per day less than when I ate a carbohydrate-based diet, yet I maintain slightly lower body fat and slightly higher muscle mass on even less training.

How to Eat According to the Primal Blueprint | Mark's Daily Apple

This is sort of misleading because he used to be a world class marathon runner and, simply put, required a lot more calories than he does now that he doesn't run hundreds of miles each month, but he attributes a lot of his body composition to eating less food but higher quality food. Mark Sisson was a hardcore pasta and ice cream refeeder. It wasn't his "carb-based" diet that was holding him back, but rather his calorie quality was poor.

2.) Mark Sisson has never been fat. He has always been outrageously lean versus the average person. Genetics play a role in body composition, and some people store fat more efficiently than others. There are plenty of meatheads at the gym that have a terrible workout plan but thanks to wonderful genetics, they get bit, strong and lean because they naturally make more testosterone, naturally have a low level of fat cells...the list goes on and on. It would probably take Mark a lot of effort to "get fat" because he never has been a day in his life.

If you want to look more like Mark Sisson, you're going to have to really dial in your diet and workout plan. It's going to take calorie restriction and heavy lifting. And when I say heavy lifting, I mean deadlifts, squats, benchpresses, chin-ups, shoulder presses...all the good complex weight exercises. And you're going to have to track your lifts in a journal so you know you're progressing regularly. Please note that low carbohydrate is probably counter-productive at this point. Carbohydrate is a superior fuel for explosive energy, and carbohydrate is not directly stored as body fat (unlike dietary fat). Generally, the leaner you get or the harder you work out, the better you will perform and look displacing fat for carbs. You can't just add carbs - it has to come at the expense of fat.

[Neckhammer]

I tell you what. Try it. And if you come back in 8 weeks with zero progress, I'll eat an entire pizza and ice cream just for you. LOL!!! I don't really want to do that. But I'm just saying that's how confident I am that it will work.

Actually this tends to have the opposite of your intended effect I think .

[Derpamix]

Why do you want to look like Mark Sisson?