We’re all different, this does not match my experience. That said, my weight has been pretty stable for the last several years
I think most people who want to prioritize weight loss would benefit more from cleaning up their diet than increasing their training volume or intensity
The caveat being that every person’s starting diet and weight will be different, as will their response to different approaches. As generic advice absent specifics, I stand by diet first
The specifics are in the first post. He appears to have a lot of “easy” weight to lose. And I recall posts about the English drinking culture. I’ve never been a heavy drinker but like strong beers.
Like @JoeX Ive got a more muscular physique and am carrying excess weight. Simply cutting back to 2 beers a week (Saturday date night with wife), plus being conscious of portion sizes will drop a fair bit of my “easy” to lose weight. Upping the calorie burn, strength training, and staying top of protein will drive it even further down.
This is where I’m at as well. If I’m not tracking calories, I cannot maintain or lower my weight in any significant or lasting amount. MacroFactor has been tremendously helpful to me, but sometimes I will go weeks without logging due to mental fatigue of having to eat “boring” foods (I love to cook) and feeling neurotic about tracking calories in social situations.
I also have an extremely busy schedule that makes it difficult to have 8-10 hours of exercise, so I really have to keep my diet in check. When I’m at 10+ hours/week of cycling or cardio, I have a much easier time slimming down.
Preach. One gut check I do (no pun intended) when I’m hungry is to ask myself if boiled potatoes or some other bland carbohydrate or really any basic food sounds good. If that sounds gross, and the only thing that sounds tempting is some kind of snack food or other ultra processed garbage, then I know it’s addiction cravings not true hunger. When I’m actually hungry, pretty much any real food sounds amazing. Very easy test, and just knowing it’s not real hunger makes it easier to avoid the garbage and eventually the “hunger” goes away until I’m truly ready to eat. The ultra processed stuff may as well be alcohol or cigarettes. We weren’t born needing them, and yet plenty of adults can’t stop themselves from partaking.
This is a good idea. I need to try this.
Great advice! I do something similar but my go to is an apple. If I want to eat an apple, I’m actually hungry. The other trick I’ve used is drinking a glass of water. Since hunger and thirst signals sometimes get mixed up, if I’m still hungry outside of a normal meal time 5 minutes after drinking a glass of water, then I’ll have something to eat.
I went back and re-read the first post, just to make sure I wasn’t missing it. I don’t see his diet specifics there or elsewhere in the thread. Totally possible I’m missing it, without knowing what he’s currently eating I still think focusing on diet clean-up first makes sense
Pretty sure we are saying basically the same thing in different words. Alcohol is part of diet, as is portion sizes for those already eating non-processed food. Alcohol can be a significant negative factor. Processed foods another.
I call this the apple trick. So far, I think the most I’ve had at once is 3 medium sized apples. 
If I’m still hungry after that, a portion of lean protein is the next thing to go down the hatch.
@JoeX are you doing any strength training? I ask b/c based on the metrics you posted above, your fat free mass index is on the low end of average and if you aren’t already lifting weights that could be some low hanging fruit to help you drop some fat.
I’m pretty strong naturally, though haven’t lifted in about five or six months. Always find it hard when doing swim bike run to lift as well. Proper heavy lifting takes out a day from the schedule but a good general health thing.
Sadly only seven days in the week.
I suppose 5x5 three days a week is much more doable on low carb diet
Where does the 5 g/kg figure come from?
I was taking to a sports dietitian recently who recommended 5 g/kg as a baseline for endurance athletes and then add 1 g/kg for every hour of exercise.
Shoot, I’m having trouble just balancing lifting and cycling. Can’t imagine adding running and swimming on top of that. If fat loss is your main goal, just two days a week of strength training could really help with that if you build some muscle and would be a good option even if it meant you had to dial back some of your other training to accommodate it.
a couple references in this post:
Check out the 2 from that post, and you could probably pull up others by searching for “endurance athlete diet carbohydrate recommendations” or something along those lines.
Yes. This might also be the reason why 4 W/kg seems so far for him (his other thread) though I haven’t reached it quite yet either. When it comes to cycling I guess you need to focus on it almost full (spare) time. I reduced my lifting to 1x 1 set per week which was enough for maintenance (or only minimal decline)
Count me as another where if I want to lose weight - low carb and lifting come first, and I have to dial back the cycling volume. With some Z2 and a couple of short HiiT sessions mixed in - but not volume to the point I really need to start fueling a bunch.
Always struggle with veggies for breakfast, I know fruit has carbs but seems to fit better.
Alright man, you do you. If “anything” sounds good to you I suspect you’re so depleted that you must eat now. It’s like only getting gas when the motor starts to rumble(look, I don’t judge, my dad liked to drive undulating lines across the highway to shake the last drops into the engine).
But eating before that is not addiction. Whatever you need to do to do you is entirely fine, but let’s not pathologize other people’s eating behavior, especially when that behavior is entirely normal and healthy. To me the bland potato test sounds miserable. 
My two cents is that you need to consistently weigh yourself everyday and track everything you take in and expend for at least several weeks. You need to establish this baseline to understand what changes make the most sense to implement. This is a gating issue and consistent behavior that should be in place to make changes. These reference points are important to then integrate with how to feel, ect., to move forward, and develop better natural feedback around food.
Losing from 38% BF should not be a major challenge unless there is a metabolic/health issue. I think you are getting lost in some details here.
I posted this a while back and forgot about it:
Tldr
Exercise better for maintaining weight loss than creating
Plus a bunch of other useful stuff
I think the scales aren’t to be trusted, but by visual gauge I look like the 30% photos you see bandied around. My GP think it’s genetic/age, given the training I do,