When You Cannot Track

Missing a day of tracking should not feel like the world is ending, but for a lot of us it does. When the goal is fat loss or body recomposition, calorie tracking and macro tracking can feel like the only thing keeping everything together, and the moment it disappears, structure disappears with it. We unpack how that pressure creates the exact “off plan” behavior that causes weight gain: grazing, extra snacks, second plates, and the mental loophole of “no accountability.”

We share a calmer, more sustainable way to think about it: tracking is the best tool for change, and untracked periods are best treated as maintenance. When you lower the expectation from “I must keep losing weight” to “I’m maintaining my weight,” you remove the panic choices that lead to hunger, restriction, and then a rebound. We also talk through practical workarounds for real life, like using a photo plus AI to estimate macros when you cannot weigh food, or using a repeat meal plan so you still have visibility without constant logging.

Then we lay out simple rules that keep you steady on holidays, busy workdays, and weekends: make protein the base of every meal, stick to three meals and one snack, avoid grazing, skip second plates, stop at about 80% full, and drink water before you eat. If you want to stay tight, avoid alcohol, fast food, and heavily fried food, keep sugar to one planned treat per week, and move more each day to offset the small stuff.

If this helped, subscribe so you do not miss the next one, share it with a friend who spirals when tracking breaks, and leave a quick review with the rule you are going to try first.

Transcript

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Why Tracking Feels Mandatory

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Okay, guys, won't take too much on your time, but today I wanted to talk about if you can't track. What do you do if you can't track? Well, the world might end. That's sort of mistake. Um, so one of the biggest questions I always get asked is do I have to track forever? Um, you know, I if I don't track on my off plan, like how do I maintain my weight without tracking? And it's difficult because you can not track your food. Um, you can not look at your petrol as you fill up your car. You have to be pretty rich not to look at your petrol and look at the the price going up. Um, so it's that kind of like a privilege where you can just fill your car open till it clicks to full tank, you know. That it's it's having good money. And not tracking, you want to get to a point where you you're you're very happy with your body. If you're very happy with your body, you can take the risk of not tracking. Um, because you can take some risk of being like, okay, I can kind of understand I'm getting enough protein, I'm getting enough carbs. Some days are under, some days are over, but you're maintaining the look, you're maintaining the feel. So that is like the end goal that we do want to essentially get to. I always advise, even when you are in maintenance or you are taking some time off tracking, or let's say you're on holiday, even you know, on holiday for long periods, you always track a few days just to kind of see where you're at, to make sure you are kind of hitting that, because even after 20 years, someone that's tracked, so I can go back to my thing 10 years ago, buying meals that I used to do. Um, I still get my days wrong. Um, like even today, I got two male pre male prep companies. I had my breakfast, two male prep companies today. I tried to have no yogurt, I tried to have like more meals, and I've got my meal tonight. When I put it all in my fitness part, I was like, this is gonna be easy, put all my fitness part. I was like, I'm well over today. I was like, how do I manage that? Still, I get it wrong. But there is gonna be periods of time where tracking isn't available, or tracking we we basically can't do. And in the moments, what I want to talk about today is one, how to handle them, two, how to think about them. Um and also, you know, try and give you a bit more peace with the you know, tracking isn't the be-all end all through everyday life. It is when you're trying to get results, but it's not like at some point we have to go, I can't track, and it's not the end of the world. So I'll think about this a lot, and I've got some things to talk to you about rules that you can apply when you can't track. Um, but I also want to talk to you about like just just tracking in general and and basically how to think about it. The issue

Slow Results Beat Fast Rebounds

SPEAKER_00 3:00

a lot a lot of people have with fat loss, changing their bodies, everyone's in such a direct rush. Um, and they want it to happen quickly, they want it to change quickly. Some of you that have been this program for long enough now probably let go of that. And it kind of might have said, you know what, fuck it. I'm um I'm easy, um, you know, I'll come along with a ride. You know, some of you are yearly memberships, you've decided this is a long-term thing. Um, but some people want it quick, especially when people first join this program, they're like, oh my god, six, eight weeks, how can I get my body shredded as quick as possible? And when we have that kind of mentality, what happens is we have a lot of anxiety, it causes anxiety because every day off is one step away from that goal. So it's like, oh my god, I need to get this goal quick, and every day off is one step away. It's like having a project that needs to be in or homework needs to be finished quickly. It's like any time off, it's like, oh, it's gonna, you know, everything's gonna go wrong. And this needs to be way more relaxed. There's a reason why I work with people for a minimum of six months is because it gives me enough time to try and bring you down to a point where you feel a bit more relaxed around the journey. We're trying to hit certain points throughout this journey of like weight loss or body change. This slow journey, the real results, real bodies happen over time. Nothing happens fast. You can take a Zen pick, it won't happen fast. You can drop all your carbohydrates, it won't happen fast. You can drop the calories, it won't happen fast. You'll get results fast, but speak, try and ask that person have they still got the results in six months? Majority of them say no, I'm back to square one, or majority say no, I'm I'm in a worse position. Same people that pump a Zenpic and then come off it, worse position. So you might get results quick, you might get there fast initially, but you'll always come back to square one. So the only option really is to do this long term because you either go short term and you're going back and forth a thousand times over the space of five years, or you go, fuck it, I'm gonna do this for six months to a year, do it properly, and then don't have to worry about it ever again. Slow it down. Take that anxiety out, look at this more than the lifestyle. And if we can look at it more of a lifestyle, there's days when we can't track, they don't feel as heavy. They don't feel as like, oh my god, my life is over. Because what a lot of people do, because they have that mentality of like, if I can't track the world's ending, the days they can't track, they go off, off plan. And when you're off plan, you end up eating things that you wouldn't eat necessarily when you're on plan and you make stupid decisions and you go overboard and you do things that are just not needed because you're not tracking and you don't have any accountability. And you know, remember when you used to go to school and you used to have some days where it's like fucking, I don't know, no uniform days or days where you've got a little bit of freedom. Kids run wild because the only bit of freedom they got, and that's what happens with a diet is like the days we don't have accountability and days we can't track. Sometimes what happens is we're just fucking eating crisps for breakfast because there's no accountability we're tracking, or just drinking and drinking and drinking, or I'll have one more, or have this. And it doesn't need to be like that. It needs to be a case of I'm at this event, I can't track, I need to be smarter with my food, I need to just have one, eat this food, and it doesn't need to be all always tracking or nothing. It doesn't need to be always on or off. A really good mindset way

Reframe No Tracking As Maintenance

SPEAKER_00 6:35

of thinking about this, and this is what I thought about loads today, is like, think about this is this. If you're tracking your food, it's the best way to get results. Yeah, it's the best way to get change in your body because we can track the data backwards and we can basically have evidence of what's gone on. So I can say I tracked Monday to Sunday, here's everything I ate, here's the results I got. We can then look at them results and say, okay, we got this, but what why did that happen? And we've got all the evidence to kind of look, oh, that day was like this, maybe we need this, this is where we need to put more effort. So we can lower the anxiety around what's happened because we've got the data there to back it up. So it we know if we can keep that data going, the result is always going to be matched. There's a reason why professional bodybuilders always look like they do on stage is because they track everything, so they they remove all the the risk for uh you know, error or anything like that, or bikini models or anything like that. You know, the risk for error is removed by tracking everything. So the days we track are days we're gonna get great results. Now, if we've got days where we can't track, don't look at it as that day is going to be putting on weight. Yeah. Look at it as the days I can't track are the days I'm maintaining. The days that I'm trying to maintain my weight. Now, if I need to go two weeks without tracking, I need to look at this as I'm not going to realistically be able to lose weight. If we bring that expectation down that weight loss is not on the cards and maintenance is on the cards, yeah? So you're trying to maintain your weight. Because if we say I'm not going to track and we've still got that the expectation of trying to lose weight, you will do things to lose weight that will cause you to either get hungry, fuck up the diet, mess things up, because there's no way of telling where your calories are. So you're likely you're going to under eat you're going to cause too much anxiety. And while trying to get your body fat in this place without tracking, you don't have enough data to back it up. So therefore, we just need to put that expectation to a side. And we need to say, this is the time to maintain. So if I'm going on a holiday for two weeks and I can't track my food, I if I've made the decision that I don't want to come back at absolute well, I need to be looking at maintenance. Yeah. And I need to look at a smart way to keep my diet in a place where I'm maintaining. If I've got my body fat to a certain place and I feel great and I don't want to track anymore, I need to look at this as I'm not going to change my body anymore. I'm going to maintain my body and I'm not going to track. That has to be the most realistic expectation. So when people say, I don't want to track, it's like you've got to follow that and say, okay, I don't want to track, and I have to be okay with my body not changing. So then it looks at cases like, so we know tracking is for change, and without tracking, there is no change. But no change doesn't always mean a terrible, terrible, terrible thing. If you've been really good for six weeks, and then you take two weeks on holiday and you're just working on maintenance, that's not a bad eight weeks. Six weeks on, two weeks maintaining, that's not bad at all. It's way better than six weeks on, two weeks of just absolute carnage because I couldn't track and I just lost my shit. So we have to lower that anxiety around

Simple Workarounds When You Cannot Weigh

SPEAKER_00 10:05

not being able to put food in. Now, if we want to track, but we don't know how to weigh the food or someone's giving us a plate of food, you know, the easiest way we're in 2026 is you snapshot a photo of that and you put it in the MBM AI or any AI realistically, and you say, give me an estimate of these macros. It will give you an estimate within 80%, I reckon, these days. You then take the macros and you put them in your tracker. It's the easiest way. So if you want to track, but you you don't have the means to weigh the food, just take a photo. You'll be within 80%, and that's enough to get you get your results. So just because you can't weigh doesn't mean like I couldn't weigh it. Oh, it's just fucking shit, and I can't do it, and I'm and I'm out, you know. So no, I could just take a picture. Or, you know, even easier, take a picture and send it to me. I can work out the macros on a plate of food pretty quickly. I'll send you the macros back within an hour. So then you've got the you've got it. So then you know there is no gaps. Even if you want, if you want to track, there is still no gaps. Yeah. The other option, if you don't want to track food, is stick to a meal plan. Where you go Monday to Friday, I'm gonna eat the same thing every day. Once you've done that, you just say, Louis, I tracked Monday. This is what my week looked like, I ate the exact same thing every single day, Monday to Friday. The reason I need you to track is because so I can see what you eat. If you have a better way of showing me what you eat by writing it down on a piece of paper, which I think will be longer, because technology is easier, um, taking pictures, whatever. Like if we can see what you can eat, it's easier for us to be able to give you make changes. So that's the reason why we ask you to track. Um, it's not to make you go mad, it's more that we it's the only way that we can view what you're eating. Or because a food diary just is you know, bit old school, but that's how they're used to it. If I've got eyes on what you can you you're eating, then I can give you a much better way of coaching. If you've got gaps in your tracking, if you can write down what then meals off were as much detail as possible, again, it gives me enough data to go, I can make assumptions and I can make it, you know, get you to where you need to get to it. But if we remove tracking altogether, someone asked me recently, like they were they were they were ready to, I'm not sure she's on the call. She was ready to leave the program because tracking just got so overwhelming for her. So I said, okay, we don't need to track. I'm going to create some rules. I don't really like rules so much. Sounds a bit weight watcher-ish, slimy world, but I think we're as bad as them. Um, but these rules are pretty good at keeping you in a maintenance place. Um, even weight loss, if you're smart. And I put these in the group after, but I want to just talk you through this. So for those that have got holidays coming up, got days out, got things going on, where it's going to make things just a little bit harder to do. So if

Rules That Keep You On Track

SPEAKER_00 13:10

you can't track, what I would do is follow these rules as much as possible. Number one, protein has to be the base of every meal. Why does it have to be the base of every meal? It's not because protein is doing any magic within the meal and it's like healing your muscles or keeping your muscles because if you were off for two weeks and you didn't have zero protein, it wouldn't really make too much of a difference with like muscle gain or muscle degeneration. No muscle wastage, whatever the word is can't think about it now. Um, but protein with every meal, if it's the base of the meal, it's gonna it means 30 to 40 percent of the plate or bowl, whatever it is, will be taken up of a macrobe that cannot be digested and stored as fat. Now you could fact check that and you you find that protein can be digested as fat, but it can only be digested and stored as fat when the carbohydrates and fats aren't present. So it's not really it can't be. So it means only 70% of the plate is left from fats and carbohydrates, the sources that can be digested and stored as fat, energy sources. Because if we don't burn the energy, we store the energy. So it means a good 30% of our diet is going to be covered with with a with a macronutrient that's only doing good for our body. So, rule number one, protein should be the base of every meal. Chicken, green yogurt, fish. Um eggs are necessary protein in my eyes, they're more fat. If you look at your track uh tracking, you'll see it's got more calories from fat. But if you put egg whites, more egg whites, then it can be the base. Um pulses and beans aren't really protein that much, they're more like carbohydrates. So just quality of protein. Um, three meals a day and one snack or one small meal. So no grazing in between, no eating crisps, no eating popcorn, no eating, I got myself an apple or I got myself a little, I took two pieces of fruit or nicked a bit of toast off my child's plate. Three meals and one snack. Why is this a good rule? Because with if you just do one plate of food within that meal, within that sit setting, there's not as much damage that you can do. When you look at all the other rules that we've got to put into place here. Um it's only them in-between parts. If I'm on holiday, like I might have like eggs, um, yogurt, and toast for breakfast, yeah. Lunchtime, I might have a sandwich. Now, to be honest, that's not too bad. What what's what where the damage is happening is when I'm sitting by the sunlight just smacking the crisps, ice creams, um, just going in the kitchen and picking bits up because I fancy it. That's where the majority of the calories are happening. So three meals, one stack. Protein with every meal, three meals, one stack. No seconds, no second plates, no second service. No, I'm still still hungry after my meal. You've had your meal, you're done. Move on. Stop at 80% full. Now, this is a good rule. Someone said it's a rule made up in Asia, but I'm not sure how true that is. Maybe I should have clap checked that above. Not sure how true that is. Um if you treat your food so well and stop at 80%, you realize you're fuller a little bit later on. It normally takes a bit longer for the signal to hit the body. That's why we can normally consume quite a lot of food, and then afterwards we go, I'm so full. I've done it, overdone it. It's because it takes time for the food to digest and send the signals to the body. So if you stop at 80%, you normally know that okay, I've probably had enough here. You know, it's that time when you're out with friends and you're eating, and then like you kind of had your food, and then this someone's left a little bit of that on the plate, someone's left a little bit of sushi in the middle, and someone's left some edam over there, and you think, or some chips in the middle. You've had your food and you're looking at it like, don't eat it, don't eat it, don't eat it, fuck it, I'm gonna eat it. And then you eat it, and then once you've picked a bit of it, you're picking, and you're like, I've already had my food. Why am I still picking at the bits? Because at that point you're pretty bored. Conversations are drying up, and I was like, the fruit feeling a bit sleepy, and you're just picking up food to entertain yourself. So stopping at 80% and be like, right, I'm done. And you know, sometimes you have to say it out loud in your head, I'm done. Boom. That will trigger the habit of being finished. Drink 250 mils to 500 mils of water before your meal. Majority of the time we're not starving, we're dehydrated. Um, and that will just help you feel a little bit fuller before going into a meal and smashing loads and loads and loads of food. So that's the first set of rules. Eat this way: protein with every meal, three meals, one stack, no second plates, 80% full, drink 250 to 500 meals per meal. Now, these second lot of rules are the rules that you want to avoid if you're really, really trying to stay tight, you know. Avoid all alcohol. If you add alcohol to a day where you can't track, it's most likely you're gonna be putting on a little bit of weight or a bit of water, even if you go for slim lines. Yeah. Avoid fast food. If the food comes in a paper bag, it ain't it ain't doing you no good. It just ain't. Don't matter if the calories are low, the salt is the salt alone is gonna make you feel shit. Like realistically, you guys that want to like lose a bit of fat, get yourself in shape, get yourself feeling great, like, especially if you're in a place where you're like, I'm not feeling confident in my body, I don't feel good in my good in my skin. This is something that's been bothering me for a while. Like, your mindset should not be, I'm going to eat fast food. Um, it shouldn't be I'm going to drink alcohol, but obviously sometimes we want to have a bit of alcohol, but it shouldn't be. Like the anxiety of how we feel should overcome these things. And then lastly, no heavily fried food. Realistically, I'd say no, no fried food whatsoever, but obviously sometimes we can fry salmon or fried chicken, whatever, but like you know what I mean. No, no fried food, chips, nuggets, fried battered fish. So if we can stay into no alcohol, no fast food, no fried food, we're gonna be in a really, really good place. I mean, if we add on um, you know, donuts and stuff like sugary fried things in there, you're gonna be pretty covered. And then the last thing is enjoy one treat per week, sugar-wise. You know, you won't, if you're away and you want to have dessert, but you want to stay on chat, you have one dessert, you can it's not gonna touch your sides. If you're away and you don't want to stay on chat, have as much dessert as you want, but just don't moan about your body when you get back. But if you want to have one dessert in the week, because you contract, you it will not touch the sides. And that's your little treat. Not a treat a day, not a little bit something every day, because that again can just sort of top things up, but it will a treat a week is gonna be really good. And then move your body as much as possible. Move, move, move, and move more. More movement, but overdo any bad diet because you burn the calories off. It is calories in, calories out to start with. It is then quality of food second, of quality of macros, for example. So just move, move, move, move. The more you can move, the more stretching, even if you went over on a bit, you know, a few bits and bobs on a day-to-day basis. If you move your ass as much as possible, it will outdo that. When I was working at Barry's boot camp, like I couldn't put weight on to save my life. I thought I had such a fast metabolism. Fast forward now, nearly 40. I'm like, my metabolism is not fast anymore. So no, I used to do 30,000 steps at Barry's. I was walking all day long. So I could eat anything and it wouldn't touch the sides. I didn't have a fast metabolism. I was moving my ass. I currently, I mean, today, I've done 3,000 steps. I am going to go walk later on before you start shouting. Um, I've only done 3,000 steps. At this moment, the days I used to work at Barries, at this precise moment, I'd probably be on 25,000 steps. That's not an age problem, that's not a metabolism problem, that's not a hormone problem, that's a lifestyle change. So the more movement you can do, it will overcome any little bits and bubbles when you can't track, you might have gone over on some days. It will overcome that. So again, really short version: protein every meal, three meals one stack, water before meals, eight said four, walk every day, one treat per week. Avoid alcohol, fast food, fried food, seconds, and grazing. These are good rules to try and stick to when not able to track. If you want to maintain your weight off, remember, very unlikely you're going to get good results without tracking. It can happen, but it's very unlikely. We want to be able to track, to be able to prove that we've eaten enough or we've done the hit the right threshold to get the results we want. It's the best way of changing your body to the best, best of your ability. Um, so yeah, that's my little speech on when you can't track. I will put these these rules in the group, um, so you've all got them to kind of like look over and keep in your notes, put in back pocket for the days that you can't. But if you stick to them rules, I'd be very, very, very, very, very, very, very surprised if you had a bit of time off tracking and you came back and you put a lot of weight on. Very, very, very surprised. Them rules pretty much take care of uh take care of everything. And then

Photo Shoot Invite And Details

SPEAKER_00 23:20

lastly, while I've got you here, um the photo shoot is gonna be, I'm gonna open the photo shoot tomorrow. So sign up for the photo shoot. Date-wise, I'm looking at the last week of August or the first week of September. It's probably where I'm looking at. Um once I've got everyone signed up, or the people that are interested, I'll then run a like a date data analysis of like what dates are good, and we'll lock in a date which works for the majority of people. Questions for photo shoot. You see the photo shoots behind me there, of these six lovely ladies. There's been many, many more than that. Um, we've done five photo shoots, averaging about 10 women per shoot. So we've shot about 50 women. It doesn't matter where you're at in your journey, it doesn't matter what shape, size you are. All that matters is there's been a change in you and your confidence and how you feel. Um, so we can just tell, tell that story. I mean, obviously, from now until the end of September, end of August, there is what six weeks for you to dig in and get a little bit more kind of change within the body. Obviously, is it is it is a motivator to get you feeling even better. Um, and it is a scary day because you're gonna step in front of a do a photo shoot to me for the first time. But it is one of the most rewarding days, as most of these women will tell you that some of them are probably on the call. Um, they feel, you know, everyone feels great after. And they and the photos we do, like they're just unbelievable. Um so the option is for anyone that wants to sign up, literally anyone can sign up. Um it's it's it's great. It it's it's honestly, it's it's really like you know, it's really, really good. Who's on the call right now? Elizabeth, she done one, Whitney's done one, uh, Stacy's done one, so Turner's done one. Yeah, honestly. Um I I would advise if you're feeling like you want to put yourself out of your comfort zone, you feel like you need a confidence builder, you feel like you just want to see yourself in that light, go get it, girl. Go get it. All right, I'm gonna stop the recording now and ask answer some questions.