Men attempting to choose the best low-fat diet to follow may experience information overload. Low-fat diets are designed to help reduce your body fat percentage while maintaining your muscle mass. In fact, some diets have different stages to help you lose body fat or increase muscle mass, depending on your weight goals. Low-fat diets all share a caloric restriction on fats, but that is where the similarity ends. Each diet features different food compositions, preparation requirements, eating stages, exercise guidelines and more.
South Beach Diet
The South Beach Diet aims to remove heavily processed or damaged carbohydrates and fats from your diet and is useful for fat loss. It is a three-stage diet plan that puts you through a two-week detoxification, indefinite period of continued weight loss and a final maintenance phase. The detox requires men to give up carbohydrates such as bread, cereal, rice, fruit, sweets and pasta. After two weeks of detox, you can add low-glycemic carbohydrates, such as fruit and whole-grain bread and cereal, which cause the glucose in your blood to rise at a slower rate. You maintain this weight-loss stage until you reach your target weight, at which point you may increase your food selections and eat virtually anything in moderation.
The Mediterranean Diet
The Mediterranean Diet restricts your menu choices to the types of food found in Mediterranean countries like Greece and Italy. This regimen requires regular exercise and a diet focused primarily on vegetables, fruit, dairy, fish and poultry. Dieters may eat up to four eggs per week plus a little red meat and a glass of wine each night. The Mediterranean Diet reduces your daily intake of saturated fats, but according to the Bowling Green State University Dietetics Program and the University of Maryland Medical Center, there is some concern as to whether such a diet provides adequate nutrients necessary to maintain optimal health. Due to the low protein content, this diet is ineffective for muscle gain.
Fat Smash Diet
The Fat Smash Diet requires dieters to eat several small meals separated by three to four hours and recommends regular exercise as a way to augment weight loss. This diet is broken into four stages. Detox, Stage 1, lasts for nine days and allows only plant foods, dairy and egg whites. Stage 2, the Foundation, lasts three weeks and adds whole grain cereals and seafood. The Construction stage runs for four weeks, adds most breads and allows one dessert per day. The final stage, Temple, ends the diet by restoring all food choices. The plan requires 30 to 45 minutes of daily exercise during the first three stages.
Fat Flush Diet Plan
The Fat Flush Diet Plan contains three stages designed to reduce a man's weight through a combination of reducing water weight and enhancing the dieter's resting metabolic rate. The diet starts with a two-week fat flush which allows you to eat only 1,200 calories per day and removes all starches, dairy, sugar and grain-based food. The next stage allows low-glycemic whole grain foods and increases your daily caloric allowance to 1,500. Fat Flush ends by breaking your long-term diet into 40 percent carbs, 30 percent protein and 30 percent fat. You may eat dairy, sweets and starches in moderation. This diet starts as a body-fat reduction program, but the final stage provides ample protein for building muscle.
The Biggest Loser Diet Program
The Biggest Loser Diet Program focuses on heavy exercise and a restriction on high-glycemic carbohydrates and processed foods containing transaturated fats such as fried foods, some vegetable oils and sugary junk food like doughnuts. There are no stages to this diet, but rather a complete lifestyle change. You start by exercising for 30 minutes three days a week and build up to at least seven hours of medium- to high-intensity exercise each week, including both cardiovascular exercise and strength training. Avoid white foods such as rice, pasta and bread containing bleached flour. Eat lean proteins such as fish, poultry and beef. Consume at least four servings of fruits and vegetables daily, and make sure to get at least 5 g of fiber per meal. This diet is ideal for burning body fat and simultaneously developing lean muscle mass.
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