🌱 What If I Miss My Calorie Target?

Dan Pearson
February 13, 2024

345 words | 1 min 15 sec read

“Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.”

Earl Nightingale

Getting into the consistent routine of tracking nutrition will be one of the single biggest influences in changes in muscle and fat mass.

You manage what you measure

But, we are humans, and there will be times when we fail to hit our targets.

What happens then?

Well let me tell you a story..

Back in April 2021, the gyms had reopened after closures due to lockdown.

I had trained consistently for 3-4 years up to this point, but I still wasn’t happy with my physique.

(I’m gonna blame my big lanky frame making any muscle I did gain look underwhelming compared to my shorter, bulkier counterparts).

I decided to focus harder on my nutrition. I knew that this was the thing holding me back.

I set myself calorie and protein targets and took it a day at a time.

During the next 8 months I gained around 35lbs.

Now, I wasn’t 100% accurate everyday.

Some days I went above my calories, some days I didn’t quite hit my target.

But over a week, a month, I was within 10% of my targets.

One thing I didn’t do when tracking was miss twice, as James Clear says:

❝

Missing once is an accident. Missing twice is the start of a new habit.

James Clear

We need more than the mantra of ‘show up daily’ - this is the entry point.

What happens if we don’t get within 10% of our Calorie and Protein targets?

Well, It depends.

Your progress will be slower, be that muscle gain or fat loss.

If you’re above your calories on a given day (fat loss), don’t panic - we measure in weeks.

If anything this will only help us more in the gym to fuel us to get stronger.

Consistency is fundamental when chasing body composition goals.
Think in weeks not individual days (daily calorie target x 7)
Calories consumed above our targets will be used for fuel in the gym
But don’t use this as an excuse to eat above your calories consistently - as you’re slowing the fat loss process.

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Thank you for reading. Have a great day 🌱

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