Body Fat % & VO2 Max - Half-year Update
The plan I've followed to lose 7 lbs of fat & gain 7 lbs of muscle year-to-date
👋Hello, my friend. Sorry for my recent absence from your inbox. My free time as of late has mostly been taken up with coaching 12U baseball. But the season has just come to an end with a once-in-a-lifetime trip to play in an 86-team tournament in Cooperstown, NY. We did pretty well, going 4-2 over 5 days and I survived living in a bunk room with eleven 12-year-olds for the better part of a week. (How many times do you think the words “bro” “skibidi” or “sigma” were uttered during that time? I guarantee your estimate is too low. If you don’t know what that means, join the club). Now that that’s behind me, I’m re-focusing my efforts on Intentional Wisdom and where I take it next. More to come on that soon. In the meantime, I wanted to provide you with an update on my efforts to improve my VO2 max and body fat percentage in the hopes that you may find something here you can apply yourself.
Let’s do it!
The two metrics I’m optimizing for
Back in January, I wrote an article titled The 2 health metrics I really care about in which I explained why my fitness efforts in 2024 would be focused on improving two metrics: VO2 max and body fat percentage.
For full context and explanations of why I chose those metrics, I’d encourage you to go back and read that original article. But if you don’t feel like doing that, here’s the basics of what you need to know:
VO2 Max - is a measure of how efficiently our bodies use oxygen. It’s probably the best metric we have for how “in shape” we actually are. It also happens to be the metric that correlates most closely with longevity in many research studies. At this point, enough experts that I trust have basically said: If you want to live longer, get your VO2 max higher. So I’m focused on improving it. I’ll explain how in a minute.
Body fat percentage - Our body composition (% of fat, muscle, etc.) tends to be underrated by the medical establishment and therefore is not information that has been as readily available in the past to most people despite its importance. Here’s what you need to know: There are an endless # of benefits to having a higher % of muscle as you age and an endless list of harmful effects from having a body fat % that is too high. That BMI number (Body Mass Index) that your doctor gives you at your annual physical has almost no value… you need to know what that mass actually is… muscle? fat? bone? I’ll explain how I’m getting this measured and how I’m working to improve it.
The program I’ve followed so far this year
Good news. My plan to improve both VO2 max and body fat % is starting to work. It’s a little bit like turning a barge but I just got half-year measurements done and I lost 7 lbs of fat and gained 7 lbs of muscle. I’m very happy to see things moving in the right direction and it’s inspiring me to further improve from here. So let’s talk about the plan I’ve been implementing so far this year.
Fitness
My goal on the fitness front this year has really been to do two things:
1. Improve strength (and % of muscle in my body as a result)
2. Improve my VO2 max
As you may or may not know, I am a big “Peloton guy” and I’ve heavily leveraged their off-the-bike strength workouts this year to help me achieve my goals.
Here’s what a typical weekly routine has looked like so far this year:
Day 1: 60-min Total Strength Peloton workout (lifting weights / hitting all major muscle groups).
Day 2: 20-30min HIIT or Tabata ride. Getting heart rate up HIGH.
Day 3: 30-min Upper Body Strength Peloton workout. (Rows, chest press, overhead press, etc.)
Day 4: 45-min Zone 2 ride or run.
Day 5: 30-min Lower Body Strength Peloton workout. (Deadlifts, squats, lunges, etc.)
Day 6: 45-min Zone 2 ride or run.
Day 7: Recovery day / full body stretching. (Helpful at 46 years old).
I vary a little bit which thing I do which day (based on soreness, my other commitments, etc.) but basically I aim to get all of these workouts in during a typical week.
Finally... I've walked (or run) >8k steps/day every day this year. I'm committed to getting this streak to 365. While 8k doesn't sound like much, I think it's been huge for both VO2 max and fat loss to never miss a day of movement.
On my lifting or riding days when I might not naturally get in enough steps, I get on a treadmill for 45-mins at lunch, put it on incline and walk at a Zone 2 type pace.
And that’s really it for fitness. It’s not that hard. Just need some advance planning to make it happen. I schedule all of my workouts for the week on Sunday morning to make sure they’re in my calendar and they actually happen.
Nutrition & Supplements
On the nutrition side, I’ve been a little bit less consistent. I’ve tracked calories on and off and I’ve experimented with different amounts of carbs.
Where I’ve landed (currently at least) is taking in about 2400 calories / day on average. I use the Carb Manager app to track this… not every day, but as often as I can. You can see the macros that I’m currently targeting. This is a 30%/30%/40% split between Carbs/Protein/Fat. I don’t have a great reason why I chose that split. Like I said… I’ve been experimenting.
How did I land on 2400 calories? It’s roughly how many calories I burn per day. I know this from wearing a Whoop which gives me a daily reading of calories burned. And my goal is to maintain my weight (~173 lbs) but significantly improve my body composition… ie. more muscle, less fat.
The one thing I’ve done consistently all year on the nutrition front is take in a lot of protein. I’m basically targeting 1g of protein per lb. of bodyweight. Most days I haven’t actually hit that goal. It’s pretty hard to get there and I need to drink protein shakes, eat protein bars and yogurts, etc. to do it. But I try to get to at least 150g or more daily.
In addition to that, I’ve been taking 5g of creatine monohydrate daily this year. I’ve read enough at this point to convince me that it’s safe. It’s helpful for muscle recovery and even supposedly has cognitive benefits. If you haven’t read up on creatine, I’d encourage you to do so. It’s been extensively studied now for 30+ years and the doctors that I follow all pretty much agree that its benefits far outweigh any potential risks.
Other than that, I still take Athletic Greens daily and I also take fish oil for inflammation, etc. but that about covers it for supplements.
Broadly on nutrition, I used to be scared to take in too many carbs as I thought they made me fat. I think that’s probably true to a point… but what I found, especially as I ramped up the lifting/running/riding was that if I didn’t have enough carbs in my body, I lacked energy. A hard 45-min ride or run would torpedo my energy for the rest of the day. No bueno when you need to be a dad, husband, competent executive, coach, etc. So I’ve gotten more comfortable with carbs. I will vary them based on what I’m doing any given day. If it’s a super light workout day, I can keep carbs to 100g or so but if I’m blowing it out, 150 or more is fine (and probably necessary).
Testing + Results
There’s a local wellness center here in Charlotte that I started going to that tests both VO2 max and body fat %. You can probably find one near you, too. A lot of academic/research institutions apparently offer these tests as well.
VO2 max is done on an exercise bike (can also be on a treadmill) while you wear an oxygen mask. Basically, they push you to failure and take a lot of measurements along the way. It takes around 5 to 15 minutes depending on your fitness level. And it’s not that fun. But it’s best to get it measured clinically as devices like the Apple Watch are not super accurate (yet) even though I do look at them for a directional indication. (Mine seems to consistently over-estimate my VO2 max for what it’s worth).
Body fat % is measured via a DEXA scan. It’s a full-body, very low-radiation scan that takes about 6 minutes to complete. The results are available instantly and you get a 5-page print-out that shows you everything you’d want to know about your body composition including how much (and what type of) fat you’ve got, same for muscle and bone. See image above for a snapshot of what mine looks like. If you’re wondering, the combined cost of both tests for me was $360. So, about $700 if you want to get them done 2x / year which I do.
So……… how did I score?
On VO2 max, I saw improvement but I still have a long way to go. When I was measured back in December (six months ago), my VO2 max was 34.5 ml/kg/min. Based on the chart below, in my mid-40’s, that put me in the “Poor” category. WTF! I was pretty shocked to see that to be honest. I thought I was in “good” shape but the #’s don’t lie, I guess. My latest reading is 36. So I’m now into the “Fair” category but still WAY below where I want to be. I am aiming for a VO2 max of 45 (in the “Excellent” category) by year-end and 50 beyond that. Will I get there? Not sure, but I’m going to start amping up my cardio even more in the 2nd half of the year to try my best to do it. This likely means substituting at least one of my Zone 2 workouts for something more intense. I’ll also be signing up for a few more races this year. I’m fired up to move the needle more here. Like I said, it’s the measure with the highest (negative) correlation with all-cause mortality so it’s not a huge stretch to say getting this right is life or death.
On body fat %, it’s a more positive story. The strength training is working. Going into this year, I was fine with my weight (~173 lbs at 6’1”) but I needed to improve body composition. Back in December, my body fat composition was 28.4%. That put me in the obese category! Again, WTF! The numbers were showing me a fact that I didn’t want to admit. I was “skinny fat.” Gross. So… like I said, good progress here. The latest reading has me at 24.4% body fat which puts me firmly in the “Average” category. Now, I’m not satisfied with this measure either. But I was astounded (in a good way) to see that my weight stayed exactly the same while I lost almost exactly 7 lbs of fat and gained almost exactly 7 lbs of muscle. That progress has given me more energy to keep going as I see what’s possible. Additionally, I lost visceral fat (the really bad kind) and I gained bone density (another helpful effect of lifting weights).
So all-in-all, I am happy to see progress in both categories but I feel like I have a lot of room to improve still… which is actually exciting. I’m a believer in the concept that “what gets measured gets managed” and for me, the first step to improvement was taking a hard look in the mirror (and at the data) and realizing that I was nowhere near where I wanted or needed to be if my goal was to live a long, healthy life. Now, I feel like I’m on the right track. Just need to execute.
I will leave it there for today because I need to head out and get some steps.
Have a great week and I’ll see you in two weeks.
Greg
Content Diet
I’m reposting here some of sources that inspired my original article on this topic.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick (FoundMyFitness) — The Longevity & Brain Benefits of Vigorous Exercise - This one really opened my eyes to the fact that I wasn’t doing enough intense exercise. I still love Zone 2 but I’m up’ing the HIIT workouts big time this year.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick x Peter Attia (FoundMyFitness) — Mastering Longevity - Insights on Cancer Prevention, Heart Disease and Aging. I’m a big Attia fan already (remember I wrote about his book Outlive?) and this episode did not disappoint. So, so much gold in here on all things health. Also, a great section for any women approaching or experiencing menopause. I sent this one to a lot of friends.
Tim Ferriss x Dr. Andy Galpin — Rebooting Tim’s Sleep, Nutrition, Supplements and Training for 2024 — I just like listening to two really smart and thoughtful guys on all things health and fitness chat about everything from optimizing sleep, to how caffeine affects your body to supplementation. Lots of gems in here. Oh, Galpin just launched his own podcast (Perform) and his first two episodes cover similar ground to what I wrote about in today’s article.
Thanks again for reading!