Table Of ContentTable of Contents
1 About Mark Carroll 3
2 About Clean Health Fitness Institute 4
3 Introduction 5
4 The Fundamentals of Fat Loss 10
5 What is Reverse Dieting? 12
6 The Myth of Starvation Mode & Metabolic Damage 16
7 Benefits of Reverse Dieting 20
8 Understanding Fat Cells 22
9 Understanding Metabolic Adaptation 25
10 Leptin Versus Grehlin 28
11 Efficient versus Inefficient Metabolic States 31
12 The Cost of Getting Lean 35
13 Short Term Dieting versus Long Term Under Eating 38
14 The Exit Strategy 39
15 How to Track Your Macros 41
16 How to Reverse Diet Successfully 42
17 Example System 1: The Exit Strategy for ‘Gen Pop’ 45
Transformation Clients
18 Example System 2: Not at goal body fat levels, 52
although just completed a 12 week diet
19 Example System 3: The Exit Strategy for The Long 57
Term ‘Under Eater’
20 Example System 4: Comp Prep Reverse Diet 61
21 Post Transformation Training Systems 65
22 Exit Strategy NEAT / Cardio Systems 132
23 Conclusion 135
24 Further Reading 136
25 References 137
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1
abouT
Mark
Carroll
With over a decade of experience in the fitness industry, Mark is the senior
presenter for the Clean Health Fitness Institute, regarded as the world’s leading
fitness industry education organisation.
Mark began his career working in commercial gyms, then in 2014 he joined the
coaching team at Clean Health Fitness Institute where he progressed his way up
through the ranks to the position he holds today.
Mark is regarded as an industry leader when it comes to achieving maximal results
for clients. He specializes in achieving rapid transformations with not only general
population clientele, but also elite level athletes.
Mentoring over 2,000 personal trainers, Mark is known as the ‘trainer of trainers’,
motivating and guiding those also wanting to become leaders in the fitness
industry.
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2
abouT
Clean
HealtH
Fitness
institute
Since 2008, Clean Heath Fitness Institute has been regarded as Australia’s premiere
fitness industry educators and personal training organisation. Having certified
over 10,000 personal trainers and fitness professionals in over 15 countries globally,
we have developed a reputation as pioneers in the health and fitness industry
worldwide.
Clean Health Fitness Institute was founded by industry titan, Daine McDonald. In
2012 Clean Health Fitness Institute opened their first high end personal training
studio, over the 5 years that followed the company facilitated over 100,000 personal
training sessions and developed a global reputation for results and excellence.
Over the years, Clean Health Fitness Institute has been featured throughout
numerous media publications and TV shows including Sydney Morning Herald,
GQ Magazine, Men’s Muscle & Health, Men’s Fitness, Australian Women’s Health &
Fitness, Oxygen Magazine and The Australian Biggest Loser Club.
Clean Health Fitness Institute has featured in other publications such as Channel
9 with Kerri Anne, Fitness First Magazine, Nine MSN’s Health and Well-Being site,
along with lecturing at some of the biggest health and fitness conferences globally
including Filex, the Mefit Pro Summit and the Australian Fitness Expo.
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3
introduCtion
“The world is becoming overweight”
Every year obesity levels continue to grow and grow around the world, whilst the
supplement industry is making more money than ever. There is information and
misinformation everywhere you look on how to lose weight, how to drop body fat
fast and how to get your ‘dream body in just 30 days’. Social media is overrun by
fitness accounts of bikini girls and guys with abs claiming to have the knowledge to
help you get into the best shape of your life!
As of writing this, I am 30 years old and I started my own training journey at 13!
Back then, my knowledge came from old bodybuilding magazines from the 80’s
teaching me either how to look like the Hulk, or how to have a 6 pack to win over
the ladies.
Fitness information back then was limited to bodybuilding magazines, I remember
going to the newsagent each month to buy the new ‘Muscle and Fitness’ magazine
and being embarrassed as bodybuilding was so taboo then. Now? Now the fitness
industry is very much a global powerhouse. It seems that everyone is a member
of a gym (whether they use that membership is a different story) or is following
aspirational social media accounts for guidance & ‘#inspo’.
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Today, health and fitness adverts are seen everywhere you look, there is a
supplement add on ‘building muscle’ or ‘torching body fat’ daily on your TV screen.
All over the news each night there is a new magic pill or diet to fix our body fat
levels. There are now gyms and fitness centres on every corner of town and ‘gluten
free’ and ‘organic’ products and health stores have become staples at every
shopping centre.
Despite all of this, as a society we are still fat, fatter than ever. Regardless of the
overwhelming amount of information available on how to lose weight (some
information is good while the majority is questionable at the very least and non-
evidence-based) society is becoming larger & larger. This is why it’s imperative we
understand this statement…
“The world does not have a weight loss problem.
The world has a weight management problem.”
People all over the world are losing weight faster than ever! Detoxes, juice cleanses,
fad dieting, you name it, it’s all available and it all seems to work initially! The issue
is, we all know how to lose the weight these days, but we can’t keep it off. In fact,
we get fatter and fatter each time we put the weight back on. Lose 5kg, put on 7kg,
lose 8kg, put on 10 kg and so on.
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Your solution?
tHe eXit strateGY
So with this, the concept of ‘The Exit Strategy” was born. Everywhere you look there
is a detailed plan of attack for how to lose the weight, yet there is rarely (if ever) a
plan on how to keep it off long term and sustain your result! Congratulations you
lost 10kg, now what?
Well, studies show you are likely to put it back on in half the time you lost it
[McLean et al., 2015; Duloo et al., 2011; Ochner et al., 2013; Field et al., 2003] .
Yes, that’s right, if it took you 12 weeks to lose 10kg, there’s a good chance you with
gain that 10kg back in as little as 6 weeks. Crazy, I know!
In 2015 I first started to build my reputation for achieving rapid fat loss
transformations. Back then, I was training a lot of general population (gen pop)
clients and also personal trainers who wanted to learn my methods. I would sign
up a client for a 12week period, use one of my many methods to achieve their goals,
and that was it.
Over and over again, I was training clients for short periods, getting amazing results,
then we were done. But then, I was finding an interesting concept. Almost 50% of
my clients would message me within 3 to 9 months on asking me to coach them
again. Explaining, they fell off from training and particularly their ‘diet’. When I
would meet up with them again for their consult, I was finding, the majority of the
time they looked nothing like they’re ‘after” photo we achieved working together
sometime before. So, we repeated the process.
These moments, 4 years on still stay with me. It hit me that although I was good
at achieving 12 week results with my clients, I wasn’t addressing their future or the
longer term. I thought that the epic before and after transformation was a job well
done and that was it. But what I didn’t realise was, without a sound ‘exit strategy’ or,
“the diet after the diet”, I was simply contributing to the world’s problem.
I would help people get fit, healthy and the body they wanted, then they would
return to their old way of life and before we knew it, they were back at square one,
often even worse.
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“Remember, the world doesn’t have a problem
losing weight, it has a problem keeping it off.”
Yes I can achieve “from flab to abs” in 12 weeks, but can my clients look this way
long term? Can they maintain this result? Or did they simply get that before and
after transformation photo and revert back to their before status? Or even worse,
did they end up worse than they started? The majority of the time, this was an
overwhelming yes.
In this guide book, you will learn my methods to sustaining the physique we
achieved together through my transformation programs. Through this guide
book, we will dive into some of the science of fat loss and explore the metabolic
adaptations that come with dieting. I believe the further you read, the more you will
personally resonate with the concepts and scenarios in the book.
I often like to say fat loss is simple, but the execution is the hard part. Conversely,
maintaining a low body fat is not simple, as you will see. Yet, with superior
knowledge, you will be better equipped to sustain your fat loss result.
Within this book, we will break down different options post transformation.
Remember, just as fat loss diets need to be specific to the client, the “exit strategy”
should be as well. For instance, a physique competitor who dieted for 24 weeks,
completing hours of weekly cardio and consuming 1,100 calories will generally
require one approach whereas a ‘Gen Pop’ client who lost 5kg in 12 weeks on 3-4
training sessions a week will require a different method.
What about the chronic ‘under-eater’? The person who cannot lose weight despite
living off consistently very low calories. This is despite regularly tracking their
calories, training every day and still having a large amount of weight to lose. Well
this book is most definitely here to help them too. For these particular clients
(this is why I now have an initial minimum of 24 weeks) the first 12 weeks is spent
rebuilding their metabolism up, before we switch gears and drop body fat in the
second 12 weeks.
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this guide will teach you how to go backwards to go forward
in the long run
It’s now time to dive into the fundamentals of fat loss, but before we do I first want
to say congratulations and thank you! Congratulations on the decision to prioritise
your long-term health. Humans are notorious for spending enormous amounts of
money chasing short term gains at the expense of their long-term health.
Yet this often comes at a cost and ultimately it often ends up in us returning to
exactly where we started, or worse. Well done for attempting to break away from
this cycle! The thank you is for choosing me to guide you through this process. I
believe your future self will thank you. So, enjoy and please learn with an open mind.
Realistically I expect many of you will have to read and re-read these concepts
multiple times as they’re fairly complex. Yet when you finish, I believe you’ll be ready
to apply these methods to your life to achieve your ultimate sustainable result.
Now, the position from which I have written this book, is that of your coach. I am not
a scientist and I do not have a PhD, like some of the elite coaches in the industry
that I look up to have such as Layne Norton, Eric Helms etc.
I do however, have a history of some of the best fat loss results in the entire world,
combined with a love for learning. The concepts in this book are the combination
of personal experience and the knowledge I have acquired over the years. I have
had the privilege of learning from literally dozens of the leading coaches and
nutritionists.
This has provided the foundation to then experiment with, which has resulted in
my own unique methods evolving. Finally, this book will touch on the science but
not turn into a science textbook. Rather, this book is designed for those wanting a
detailed understanding of what to do when a reverse approach is required.
The focus is to provide you with a practical exit strategy to aid your future success!
This is what I specialise in.
Please enjoy,
Mark Caroll
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4
tHe
FundaMentals
of faT loss
Amazing things happen when we understand the basic, for this reason, I’m keeping
this guidebook simple. My job as a coach is to learn information and then apply it.
My success over the years has come from a firm understanding of the basics. Now,
with that, let’s once again go over the fundamentals of fat loss.
My go to resource for explaining the hierarchy system of fat loss is “The Muscle
and Strength Nutrition Pyramid” written by the great Dr Eric Helms (which I highly
recommend reading to all coaches). This guide has been my ‘go to’ system for
understanding where to focus my efforts as a coach. Without understanding this
hierarchy, it’s easy to get caught up in the factors which don’t matter all that much,
whilst not spending enough time focusing on what really matters. According
to Dr Eric Helms Nutrition Pyramid, the 5 tiers to maximising changes of body
composition are:
tHe PYraMid oF nutrition Priorities
suPPleMents
Meal tiMinG
MiCronutrients
MaCronutrients
enerGY BalanCe
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