Fixing 3 Strangers Fat Loss Plateaus in 20 Mins
In this 20‑minute YouTube coaching video, Eric Roberts critiques three real‑world fitness plans submitted by viewers—John (26 M, 118 kg, 3,100 kcal, 3 full‑body workouts + 3 runs), Catherine (46 F, ~215 lb, 1,200 kcal, 16,000 steps, perimenopausal) and Anna (54 F, 151 lb, 1,950 kcal, heavy cardio, weighted‑vest walks, 4 strength sessions). For each case Roberts identifies a common underlying issue: excessive training volume combined with insufficient or mistuned nutrition, leading to cravings, binge‑eating, fatigue, injury risk, and stalled fat loss. He prescribes concrete fixes: modest calorie increases (200‑500 kcal) mainly via carbs/fats, protein adjustments (raise for low‑protein cases, lower when excessive), reduce or re‑balance cardio (cut steps, swap cardio for strength, limit weighted‑vest work), implement calorie‑cycling on high‑activity days, and run short 2‑week experiments to monitor hunger, performance, and energy. He also tailors advice for perimenopausal women, emphasizing adequate protein and avoiding extreme calorie deficits. Throughout, Roberts stresses that the problem is physiological, not willpower, and encourages viewers to apply for free plan reviews or one‑on‑one coaching.
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Are you overtraining and unknowingly sabotaging your diet because of it? Recently, thousands of people applied to have their fitness plans roasted by me on this channel, and 90% of them were making the same mistakes that guarantee they stay frustrated, stuck, and not making progress. So today I'm breaking down 3 real submissions, showing you exactly what's wrong and how to fix it So you don't make the same mistakes and you can see faster progress. I've helped over 25,000 people lose fat, build muscle, and change their lives. So I know for a fact the advice I'm about to give you can work for you as well. So without further ado, let's dive in. And by the way, if you want to apply for a free review of your plan, click the link in the description of this video. Our first submission is coming from our guy John, and John is a 26-year-old male. He is currently weighing about 118 kilograms, wants to get down to about 113 kilograms, which is roughly about 12-ish pounds. And I absolutely could be wrong on that, by the way, so somebody check me in the comments. I do know 200 centimeters is like 6 foot 7, so John's pretty fucking tall. He gets about 8,000 steps a day, tracks his calories consistently, hitting 3,100 to 3,200 with 220 to 240 grams of protein per day. I know my like short girls out there that are listening are just like jaw-dropped at this right now. And, you know, he eats really clean. He doesn't drink any alcohol. You can see his day's worth of eating right here. Some of the struggles that he is having is he's not sure if he's undereating or not based on his level of activity. And he's doing 3 full-body workouts and 3 runs per week. And he also put that he's struggling a little bit with some binge eating and cravings. And here's the red flag that I'm seeing. John's eating 3,100 calories, and yet he's still struggling with binge eating and cravings. That is a sign his body is screaming at him that something is wrong, because those don't show up, especially for somebody who's eating so dialed in and eating such high protein, unless your body is being underfed. And the reason why this is bad is if John is undereating with this level of activity, Not only is he most likely not going to lose fat because he's not going to be able to stay consistent with his calorie deficit, but his risk of injury skyrockets. Because when you're under recovering like that, you're not going to be able to go into your workouts properly fueled, and your risk of injury goes through the roof. Your strength plateaus, and you're not going to be able to build any muscle as well. Your fatigue and exhaustion throughout the day is just through the roof. You always feel tired, and eventually you do just end up kind of. Binging and overeating because your body is like, you're gonna put me through this stress, I'm gonna find a way to recover, and it's gonna overeat. So how do we fix the problem for John? Well, I think number one, I would certainly go ahead and bump up his calories, which I know is crazy because he's already eating a lot, but he's a big dude, he's doing a lot of activity. So I would go ahead and bump his calories up by probably 200 to 300 per day, so probably around that like 3,300 to 3,400 500 calories per day. I would primarily do that through carbohydrates and dietary fat. He's already eating more than enough protein. He's, he's pretty good on the protein. So I would try to make it via carbs and fats because if you are somebody who's doing a lot of exercise, the carbs are going to fuel the exercise and fuel the recovery. Second, I would probably suggest putting the fat loss on hold for right now. And what I mean by that is you can still pursue fat loss, but I really wouldn't get overly obsessed with it. So if you increase your calories and maybe your scale doesn't go down— which, stick with me on that— I wouldn't say that's a bad thing because right now it doesn't matter you getting to this number. It matters you fixing all of this right here, because until you fix all of this Then the scale is never going to get to where you want to be. And the third thing I would do, looking at his daily, um, like a normal day of eating, I would try to throw in some like more fun foods, man. Like, I love that you're eating so clean and eating so healthy, but you don't have to fucking do this. I think one of the reasons you're also struggling with some of these binge eating and cravings, not just the amount of activity that you're doing, but I know for me it like, and I eat pretty clean and pretty healthy, but once or twice a week I, eat something where maybe it's unhealthy, but it keeps me sane. And so I think that's also playing a role here as well. Work in some more like fun foods, whether it's ice cream or cookies or whatever you enjoy. Work in some of that. You got the fucking calories to do it here, John. You're eating— you're gonna eat 3,400. So you got the room. So work that stuff in. And the reason this is going to work so well for John is because when you are pushing your body that hard and doing that much exercise, it's a big stress on your body. Trying to be in a calorie deficit is also a big stress on your body. So when you pile on too much stress, that's where people just aren't able to be consistent with their nutrition. And you think it's a discipline issue or a willpower issue, or I just have cravings and I can't stick with it. The reason you can't stick with it is because of your training. You're doing too much exercise. No amount of like taking your calories lower or discipline, willpower is going to fix what's going on here. He has to increase his calories, which circling back around, if he increases his calories by 200 to 300 per day, he'll actually end up eating less calories than he would if he had a day where he ate 5,000 or 6,000 calories. Because if he is struggling with binge eating and that day easily could be 5,000 or 6,000 calories, his average for the week could end up being like 4,000 or 4,500 calories Depending on how many days a week you overeat. So if you just slightly increase and you stop the binging and overeating, then you'll actually probably end up eating less calories throughout the week, which would then help his fat loss goal. So some action steps for John and you: if you're somebody who's doing a lot of physical activity, I would recommend bumping your calories up mainly via carbs to fuel the activity. And number 2, run a 2-week experiment to see how you feel. Are you more hungry, less hungry? Do you have more cravings, less cravings? Are your workouts better or worse? Do you have more energy or worse? Just run a little 2-week experiment on yourself. And, you know, number 3, it sounds like he doesn't want to do this, but another option could be to potentially scale back on the amount of activity that he's doing. Doesn't sound like he wants to do that. He sounds like he's pretty dialed in with his runs and his lifts. But if you're gonna keep this, then you have to do what we said earlier. If not, I would try to look at potentially changing this, which we might talk about a bit later in the video. So if you're like John, you're not weak, you're underfed. Fuel like an athlete, train like a beast, and let your body thank you later. Now on to the next submission. Next up, we got Catherine, and I'm not gonna lie, this one, this one hurts me a bit to go through. But Catherine, I love you, and hopefully the things I'm gonna say are gonna help you out. And I know somebody in your situation is out there as well. So Catherine's currently a 46-year-old female. She's currently weighing about 210 220 pounds, wants to get down to 175. She's 5'4, consistently hitting 8,000+ steps a day. And if I'm not mistaken, she's doing 16,000 steps a day. It's an absurdly amount of— a lot of steps. She's consistently tracking her calories, 1,200 calories, 65 grams of protein. So, and it looks like for the most part, she's also eating pretty clean and pretty healthy. And she's trying to lose fat and build muscle at the same time. She doesn't know if She's doing the right things, balancing between cardio, strength exercising, and just overall nutrition. So here's the problem. First and foremost, doing 16,000 steps a day, also doing some sort of workout every day, and only eating 1,200 calories and 65 grams of protein— all of that is a very big problem. And honestly, this is one of the most common, and I say most dangerous, problems that especially a lot of women struggle with. And Catherine said here that she's also perimenopausal, which we have worked with hundreds if not thousands of clients at this point who are going through perimenopause. And this problem is you're cutting your calories too low, you're eating too few protein, you're doing too much exercise. And what's happening is your metabolism is probably slowing down. You're probably definitely losing muscle mass. You're not gaining muscle mass. You said here you want to lose fat and build muscle same time. There is just no way way you're building muscle with this protein, this calories, and the amount of exercise that you're doing. And specific to perimenopause, I know it's harder to lose weight during perimenopause, but that doesn't mean you have to take your calories down to 1,200. Again, we've coached thousands of ladies who have gone through this. You still need to fuel your body. The lower you cut your calories, the more stress you're placing on your body and actually the harder it becomes for you to make the progress you want to see, especially with doing this much activity. So we're going to go ahead and fix Catherine's problem right now. The first thing we're going to fix is the amount of calories that she is consuming. Um, Catherine, what I want you to do, and you watching this, I want you to click the link in the description of this video. There will be a free calorie calculator that I would love for you to use. It'll also tell you your protein goal as well. So click that link in the description below to use that. And for the sake of the video, let's just say her calories increased to 1,700 per day and 120 grams of protein per day. That would at the very least be a great start in the right direction. The second thing we're going to fix here is you do not need to walk 16,000 steps per day. It's one thing if you did that because you were like— if you did it for your job, maybe you were like a mailman or a mailwoman, or you just worked in a factory, whatever, teacher, nurse, whatever. But you're walking on the treadmill from 30 to 90 minutes. You don't have to do that. And in fact, research actually shows from a health perspective, once you get past the 10,000 to 12,000 steps per day, there's not a lot of upward benefits positively that come from that. So just back your steps down to like 10,000 per day. You're still getting all of the health benefits But you're not going to be overtraining and under-recovering, which is causing a lot of these problems to happen here. And then number 3, I would probably go ahead and switch your exercising. You mentioned you're doing cardio 4 days a week, strength 2 days a week. I would flip that. I would do strength 4 days a week, cardio 2 days a week. And I also have a free workout program in the description of this video if you want to check that out. But in terms of losing fat and building muscle, you're primarily going to lose fat through your nutrition. And we just talked about fixing that. You're going to build muscles through your strength training. So hit the strength training, make that your priority. Use the cardio as a supplemental tool to improve your heart health, improve your cardiovascular health, burn a little bit more calories, but use your cardio to supplement. Make your strength training the primary. And why this is going to work so well for Catherine is because she sounds like already very disciplined and already very dialed in, but now she's going to have a plan that's actually going to work with her versus against her. And this is a problem a lot of people have with their fitness. Like, you work so hard, but you're working so hard on the wrong things, and then you get mad because you're not seeing progress, and you feel like, I'm not disciplined, or my willpower sucks, Or my body's broken. No, you're just doing the wrong shit. Like Catherine right here, she's working very hard on the wrong plan. If you can get the right plan, you're gonna see a lot of progress. So some action steps for Catherine and you watching this. Number 1, if you're eating 1,200 calories, stop eating 1,200 calories. Number 2, bump up your protein intake. And number 3, lift weights at least 3 times per week. And Catherine, when you're watching, you're so close to a breakthrough. You're already disciplined, consistent, motivated. You don't need to push harder. You need to push smarter. Start doing the right things and your progress will skyrocket. Now on to the next submission. We have Anna for our next submission, and this one's gonna hurt me a little bit as well, but I'm doing this because I want to help you, Anna, and everybody else. So Anna's currently a 54-year-old female weighing around 151 pounds, looking to get down to 135. She consistently walks 8,000+ steps per day. Tracking her calories, 1,950 with 160 grams of protein. That is a lot of protein. I know we talked about Catherine needing to up her protein. That, that is a lot of protein there, Anna. On top of all of that, she runs 4 miles 3 days a week. She walks another 4 with a weighted vest. The days that she doesn't run, she hikes 8 miles with a weighted vest. She strength trains 4 days a week. Um, yeah, she's got a lot going on here. She's a machine, but she's struggling with something, and that is she's good on the calories for 5 or 6 days and then gets very hungry and has a binge day. Even with 160 grams of protein and 1,950 calories, she is still getting— eating relatively healthy, as we see right here. She is still getting absurdly hungry and overeating on a day. And so why this is a problem, why this is bad when you are again doing this much activity. I mean, this is just this is a lot of activity. It is a lot of stress on your body. You guys, we have to remember our bodies; they can only take but so much stress. You just keep piling on more, piling on more, piling on more, doing more. Because that's what you've thought and maybe been told. That's what gets you progress— more workouts, more cardio, more calorie restriction. At some point, your body is going to backfire. And so for a lot of people watching this, it's not about you working harder. You have to take a smarter approach. You have to prioritize recovery. You have to prioritize making sure that your plan is working with you. And right now, Anna's This plan is not working with her. This is a biological and physiological response from overtraining and under-recovering. There's not going to be any amount of discipline or willpower that's going to fix this. She is going to keep getting stuck in this same cycle unless she changes these couple of things. So number one, I would look at your exercise. We're running 4 miles 3 days a week, and then you're walking another 4 miles with the weighted vest. Why are you walking another 4 miles with a weighted vest? Just stop doing that. You don't have to do that. You can maybe walk at a slow pace, but you don't have to throw on the weighted vest. Also, the days I don't run, I hike 8 miles with the weighted vest. Take off the weighted vest. You don't have to do that. And if you want to hike on the days that you don't run, that's fine, but you should probably do what we call calorie cycling. So on those days where you're hiking 8 miles, Increase your calories. Like we talked about in the beginning with John, I told him to increase his calories by about 300. I would do the same, if not more, for you. So just make it a round number. If you're currently at 2,000 calories on those days, if you want to do those hikes, you got to eat at least 2,300 to 2,500 calories. That's a, that's a non-negotiable. And then on top of that, if you're doing all of this cardio, you don't need to also strength train 4 days Drop your workout down to 3 days per week. Your body will recover much better. There will be less stress on your body. And now you're not running your body into the ground, stressing it out to God knows how much, and it's going to recover better. You're not going to be as hungry. And I also think the last— probably one of the last things— 160 grams of protein. Girlfriend, you only weigh 150 pounds. Why are you eating 160 grams of protein? If I were you, I would drop this protein. I know it sounds crazy, but I would drop this protein down to like 120, maybe 130 grams per day. Use the extra calories to go towards those carbohydrates like we talked about earlier, because with this much activity that you're doing, you need more carbohydrates. You're good on protein. Going from 120 grams to 160 grams of protein is not going to do anything for you. But going from, let's just say, 120 to 160 grams of carbs, that will do a lot for you. And why this is gonna work so well for Anna here is she's gonna bring down her stress levels, she's gonna bring down her hunger hormone levels. It's gonna be less cravings, less overeating, better recovery, more recovery, and you will not feel this need, this urge to have to overeat. And this— I hope you guys have been enjoying this video. If you are, you know, drop a comment below. And if you want me to do a free review of your plan, click the link in the description below. But I hope you're seeing more isn't better. Better is better. Better quality is better. I want you guys to start thinking about quality over quantity. And some action steps for you guys out there. If you are somebody who's trying to, you know, just pile on a ton of exercise. Either cut back the exercise or increase the calories. Number 2, if you are eating a very high amount of protein, you could probably bring that protein down a bit to then up the carbs and the fats. And number 3, stop thinking that— Anna here said she was doing this for 5 or 6 days and then had a binge day. If that's happening week over week over week, that is a sign your body is trying to tell you something, and it's not trying to tell you you have no willpower. It's trying to tell you the plan that you are trying to do is not working and you need to change it. And for those of you who got this far in the video, thank you. And if you want to change your plan and have an expert coach on my team build you a plan and work with you one-on-one, click the link in the description of this video to apply for our one-on-one online coaching. I can only pick 3 people per video for these reviews, so I can try to get to yours and you might get lucky, but if you wanna assure and guarantee you can fix this, click the link to apply for our one-on-one coaching. And in the meantime, you can watch this video here to break down a little bit more about what proper workouts should look like when you're on a fat loss journey.
