The cut is finally over. 185 --> 140.
I cut really, really hard at first. In the first two months most of what I lost could be accounted for by glycogen/water loss. In December I did a beast mode run of about 15lb. Since December it's been about 4lb/month and in the final month, it was closer to 2lb/month.
The cut actually ended in mid to late April, but I kept going to see if I could lose any more body fat. I couldn't. It was especially frustrating to end the cut because I still have some stubborn love handle fat that's left over from when I was an obese kid.
I'm not kidding about "fat left over from childhood" by the way. I used to be the 2nd- or 3rd- fattest kid at my school, see:
And until now, this was the leanest I had ever been:
So some of that fat is
still there. But I've been approaching diminishing returns on this cut.
The bulk I did prior to this was for about five months and I probably put on about 8lb of muscle, but I definitely lost a few pounds of muscle from cutting so hard. Probably about 3-4lb. It was a
really dirty bulk; past attempts at bulking haven't been very effective because I didn't eat enough calories, so I went in excess to the detriment of what I'd have to do during the cut.
So anyway, I promised sexy arch0wl pics.
This one is mostly for abs and exaggerated lighting:
And one last thing. I dug up an old chat log, eight months ago, where I said:
I've had that picture in a "body inspiration" folder for quite some time. I first saw the picture when my girlfriend at the time had found it on a "hot guys" tumblr. I wasn't sure if I could ever look like that. I'm not sure how close I got, but I feel really accomplished either way:
Definitely the leanest I've ever been in my entire life.
I'm going to lean bulk next time. But more importantly, even a lean bulk is still a bulk.
This is how I feel right now:
http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3un4vf/