WLC Diet for Building Muscle and Burning Fat

One example of the WLC Diet used within the WLC System will be fully discussed on this page.

Everything you need to know to implement the diet will be right here.

If you need to learn about counting calories…

How to make your grocery list OR how much water you need to drink…

Please read more throughout this website and throughout the WLC System.

If you want to build muscle and lose fat, you must have a great diet plan and that is why I've created this page for you.

We will build your base WLC diet right here…

If you're trying to lose fat, you're calories will decrease over the weeks (as needed) depending on your progress.

Your calories will increase throughout the cycle if you're trying to build muscle, and we will add more food as you go depending on your weekly assessment.

Adjusting your WLC diet will become easier and easier as you gain experience. All of this is explained below…

Pre-Requisites for WLC Diets

You must be using one of our weight lifting programs to go along with this diet plan.

I want everyone to be on a weight lifting program and a cardio program because all of your results will be in fast forward mode when implementing a good diet along with weight lifting and cardio.

You should not leave any “one” of the three out. Weight lifting, diet, and cardio are all requirements to use this diet plan.

You've also got to be willing to put some planning time in for this WLC diet. It will take us some time to go through all of this information and for you to get everything planned out.

But let me tell you something…

You WILL get the best results of your life by spending this time up front.

Get your diet right and you will be amazed at the progress. Too many people take diet for granted and assume that they're eating good enough.

Never think that there's not any room available for improvement. You can always improve and make things better. Keep your mind open and think about changes that you can make to your diet to improve it.

Every improvement you make in your WLC diet will lead to a better body.

Continuous improvement is what you should strive for each day.

Let's Plan This WLC Diet

First Step for WLC Diet – Determine Starting Calories

I want you to start out with the amount of calories in which you currently maintain your body weight.

You can figure this out by counting your calories over a few weeks to see how many you've been eating. You can weigh yourself at the beginning of the week, count your calories and get an average at the end of the week, and then weigh yourself at the end of the week.

You'll be able to estimate how many calories it took to maintain your weight. If you lost weight, you'll need to increase calories to maintain. If you gained, you'll have to decrease calories to maintain your weight.

If you're like me, you won't feel like taking a week or more to determine your maintenance calories.

I have developed some WLC guidelines for determining the number of calories I want you to start out eating per day while using the WLC System.

What I want most of you to do is eat 15 times your body weight in pounds.

So, if you weigh 200 pounds, you should start out eating 3000 calories. These are only guidelines because every single person out there will have a different metabolism and a different activity level each day.

Now, if you are the person that weighs 200 pounds and you know that 3000 calories is going to be too much or not enough, then adjust it to the level you know you can maintain your weight.

This starting number is important, but we will be re-adjusting throughout the WLC cycle so you will have a chance every week to get this number right. You'll become a pro at this after just a few months.

If you are a person who is on the extreme ends of the weight scale, you may need to adjust the 15 times body weight recommendation.

For very light people with high metabolism trying to gain muscle, I would raise the number of calories considerably.

If you are on the extreme heavier end of the weight spectrum, I would suggest that you work on losing weight if your body fat percentage is high before trying to build muscle.

Second Step for WLC Diet – Determine Calories for Workout Days and Rest Days

Now that you have your daily average that you will be shooting for from Step 1 above, you can now determine how many calories you will be having on each particular day of the week.

I like to cycle calories throughout the course of a program, and it works very well. I've been cycling calories for years now, and the results are amazing. Calorie cycling simply means taking in a different amount of calories throughout the week.

I always increase calories on workout days. I increase calories even more on the last workout day of the week. Usually, this is the tougher workout of the week on WLC and I counter that by increasing calories. You will be doing the same on your WLC Diet.

I want you to lift weights 3 days per week no matter if you're goal is to build muscle or lose fat. The other days of the week will be optional rest or cardio depending on your goals. You will choose this as you build your weight lifting schedule.

You can shift the days forward or backwards to fit your schedule, but I want the order to stay the same. Always have a day of rest between your workouts. Now, we need to know how many calories to eat on each day.

Daily Average = Calories determined from Step 1

So, if you calculated that you need an average of 3000 calories in Step 1, you're daily calorie plan for week 1 of your WLC diet program will look like this:

Example
Day 1 = 3200 Calories
Day 2 = 2800 Calories
Day 3 = 3200 Calories
Day 4 = 2800 Calories
Day 5 = 3400 Calories
Day 6 = 2800 Calories
Day 7 = 2800 Calories

Third Step for WLC Diet – Determine Number of Meals for each day

This is where I am going to need your help. I need your help because I do not know how your daily schedule is going to impact you eating your meals.

So, you will have to rely on yourself a little more in this step of the WLC diet. If you've created your daily shcedules for each day of the week, you'll know how many meals you'll be eating per day.

I personally like to schedule my meals two and a half to three hours apart because this fits into my days very well. I suggest you eat your meals anywhere from 2 to 4 hours from each other. Come up with what's best for you.

This means I have around 7 meals each day of the week on my WLC diet. Your diet plan will most likely be different to fit your needs.

For example, I work from 6:30 AM to 4:00 PM every day of the week. I like to eat my daily meals in this manner:

Cardio Days – Tuesday and Thursday for me
Meal 1, 6:30 AM – On the way to work
Meal 2, 9:00 AM – Quick meal at my desk at work
Meal 3, 11:30 AM – Lunch time
Meal 4, 2:00 PM – Quick meal at my desk at work
Cardio, 4:30 PM – 15 minutes high intensity cardio
Meal 5, 5:00 PM – After cardio is completed
Meal 6, 7:00 PM – Dinner
Meal 7, 9:30 PM – Eat right before I go to bed

Weight Lifting Days – Monday, Wednesday, Friday for me
Meal 1, 6:30 AM – On the way to work
Meal 2, 9:00 AM – Quick meal at my desk at work
Meal 3, 11:30 AM – Lunch time
Meal 4, 2:00 PM – Quick meal at my desk at work
Pre-Workout, 4:30 PM – Pre-Workout Drink as soon as I get home
Lift Weights, 5:00 PM
Post Workout #1, 6:30 PM – Right after I finish workout
Post Workout #2, 6:45 PM – 15 minutes after post workout #1 drink
Meal 5, 7:15 PM – 30 minutes after post workout #2
Meal 6, 8:00 PM – Dinner 45 minutes after Meal 5
Meal 7, 9:30 PM – Pre Bedtime meal

Rest Days – Saturday and Sunday for me
Meal 1, whenever I wake up

Depending on when I wake up, I plan the rest of my day when I wake up. I like to sleep as much as possible on my rest days so I can be fully rested when Monday comes back around.

Planning the rest of your day when you wake up becomes very easy. You just eat your meals 3 hours apart and divide the total calories you need into the number of meals you can fit in for the day. Write all of this down in your diet log book and check it throughout the day.

If you are planning your off days to be on days that you work, you will plan these days like you did the other days. Have a set schedule and your meal plans in place.

Fourth Step for WLC Diet – Determine Number of Calories at each meal for each day

This is the part that you're going to have to put some work into for designing your WLC diet. You have several different options you can go with here. Your final goal is to reach the targeted amount of calories for each day of the week.

Reaching the targets will become very easy for you and you'll start to learn very quickly.

Let's go through a typical WLC diet day so I can help you learn how to reach your target calories.

Let's say that we're trying to design meal plans for one of your workout days. We'll start with the things that we know for that day. We know that our target calorie intake is going to be 3400 calories, for example.

We know that we're going to eat breakfast, and we know what we usually like to have for breakfast. We know that we will have a pre-workout drink, two post workout shakes, and a post workout meal about an hour after we finish the workout.

We know that we will have lunch and a dinner. We know when we're going to workout. Let's look at all the meals we know we'll have:

6:00 AM – Eat breakfast
2 scoops whey protein
2.5 cups milk
1 whole grain bagel
butter
3 fish oil capsules
700 Calories

11:30 AM – Lunch
1 can of tuna
1 tbls full fat mayo
2 slices whole grain bread
1 apple
bag of mixed vegetables
500 calories

4:45 PM – Pre Workout Drink
2 scoops BCAA energy drink
100 calories

6:00 PM – Post Workout Shake #1
20 grams BCAAs
100 grams Waxy Maize
400 calories

6:30 PM – Post Workout Shake #2
1 scoop whey isolate protein
40 grams maltodextrin/dextrose
300 calories

7:00 PM – Post Workout Meal/Dinner
6 oz 92% lean beef
1 baked potato
1 cup steamed broccoli
400 calories

Okay, now that we have the pieces of the day that we know, we can go back and look at the holes. We know what we need for our calorie intake and we see that we already have 2400 calories for the day.

We look at the times and see that we need another meal around 9:00 AM and another around 2:00 PM. We also need a smaller meal loaded with protein before we go to bed at night.

Now, let's design those meals so that we meet our calorie intake for the day.

9:00 AM, liquid meal at work
2 scoops whey protein
1 tbls olive oil
small bag of veggies
370 calories

2:00 PM, liquid meal at work
2 scoops whey protein
1 tbls olive oil
small bag of veggies
370 calories

9:00 PM, slow digesting protein meal
1/2 cup cottage cheese
salad with ranch dressing
3 fish oil capsules
260 calories

Add up the calories and you'll see we've made it to exactly our calorie goal of 3400 calories for the day. You design for what you know, add in the unknown meals so that they come close to your calorie target, and adjust meals to meet that goal.

Some of the things you need to do for each and every meal is ensure that protein is your number one focus. Design your meals around the protein source. Depending on your calorie intake, you may have to adjust your protein levels down from the example I've given above.

This is for a 3400 calorie a day plan that I use for myself. I weigh 230 pounds. So, please adjust accordingly. If you need some help, let me know.

I know you're probably wondering what I recommend with regards to protein intake, carb intake, and fat intake.

Here's what I recommend. I have no set levels or exact percentages. If you eat balanced meals with protein, carbs, and fat from good sources, you'll do fine. You can manipulate certain things in your diet, and I discuss all of that in the WLC System Manual.

You will do great if you eat good sources of food and extra protein to your diet.

A Quick Summary of the WLC Diet

A diet plan is not hard to develop yourself if you put some time into it.

Follow the steps laid out on this page and choose the best sources of food and a good variety to get the best results.

Use supplements to fill in the holes — but try not to have any holes.

I eat a good variety of veggies and different fruits throughout the week. I do not like to have too many liquid meals as I believe in whole food as the best source of vitamins, minerals, and nutrients.

I add in a liquid vitamin supplement to make sure I'm covered. I use liquid meals when I need more calories and for when I don't have much time to eat a whole food meal.

I also use a few liquid meals for pre and post workout. Post workout is a very important time period, so I try to get my body the stuff it needs to build muscle as quickly as possible. You can do fine with whole meals, but I like to take advantage of the opportunity.

Don't forget that the entire day is just as important as the post workout period. Don't slack off the whole day and only worry about post workout.

Good luck with planning your WLC diet and please let me know if you need any help. I'll clarify and help as much as I can. Go through diet planning a few times, and it will become easy for you. It might seem tough at first, but you'll get it!!!

And be sure to use the WLC System Manual to get everything correct.