Losing 10 pounds in 10 weeks is a practical, achievable goal that can reshape your body into a leaner, stronger version of yourself.
I’m living proof it can happen even faster.
Starting at a lean 166 pounds, I dropped to 156.3 pounds in 8 weeks—imagine how much easier it could be if you’re starting heavier.
In my book, Build Muscle Get Lean (grab it for every detail), I distill fat loss and muscle preservation into two simple rules:
- Put your body in a calorie deficit—and keep it there.
- Prioritize the two P’s—protein and progressive overload.
I used these 2 rules to go from 185 pounds to 160 pounds over a 6 month period during my first body transformation, and they are the same rules I used to recently lose 10 pounds.
In fact, these two rules took me from 166 pounds to 156.3 pounds in just 8 weeks.
As proof, I even documented the process.
You can watch each video that explains my process in my 8-week cut diet and analysis playlist on YouTube.
Dropping 10 pounds in 10 weeks—about 1 pound per week—is sustainable and effective.
Here’s how you can do it, backed by the exact process I used to beat that timeline.
Rule One: Establish and Sustain a Calorie Deficit
Fat loss starts with a calorie deficit—burn more than you eat.
To shed 10 pounds, you need 35,000 calories less (1 pound ≈ 3,500 calories, per Chapter 3’s Wishnofsky rule) over 10 weeks.
This equates to about 3,500 calories weekly, or 500 daily across 70 days.
My video analysis shows I averaged ~600 calories/day to hit it in 8 weeks, but 500 keeps it steady for you.
Here’s how to begin.
Calculate your Maintenance Calories
Calculate your maintenance calories or Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE).
Do this with an online TDEE calculator that uses the Mifflin-St. Jeor equation (Chapter 6).
Start with a sedentary activity factor (1.2), even if you exercise.
Chapter 3 in Build Muscle Get Lean advises to use the sedentary activity factor to start so that your calories are high enough for you to eat enough calories and still lose weight.
This also allows you to avoid metabolic slowdown.
In other words, you don’t want to cut too deeply too early.
For me, at 166 pounds (5’11”, 44 years old) this is what it calculated:
- BMR = 10 × weight (75.3 kg) + 6.25 × height (180 cm) – 5 × age (44) + 5 = 1,663 calories.
- TDEE = 1,663 × 1.2 ≈ 2,000 calories per day.
Yours might be ~2,000 calories per day, too.
But of course, you’d have to adjust the following advice for your stats.
I began at 2,000 calories/day on January 1, 2025, burning ~400 calories daily via my workouts.
This netted around 1,600 calories (400-calorie deficit).
For you, eat your sedentary TDEE and add exercise, but don’t cut calories until weight stalls.
Do the Right Exercise
If you need exercise suggestions, Chapter 12’s 7-day workout plan burns ~2,800 calories/week.
It suggests burning, 400 on active rest days (40 minutes cardio), and burning about the same number of calories on all other days (about 200 per day from six cardio sessions + resistance days).
Eating 2,000 calories with 400 burned nets 1,600 calories/day.
Because choosing the sedentary activity is almost never spot on the first time around, you may still end up staring with a 500 calorie daily deficit, just doing my suggested exercise routine alone.
So, over 70 days, this would help you be in a deficit of over 35,000 calories, which is 10 pounds.
Adjust your Calories using Data
My 8-week video analysis shows that I ate 2,000 calories for 6 weeks and lost ~1 pound/week until Week 6 stalled (no drop from Week 5).
That’s when I implemented Chapter 15’s calorie adjustment rules:
If loss stalls (<1 pound/week) for two weeks, cut 200 calories.
So, I dropped to 1,800 at 159 pounds (Week 7: 159.47, Week 8: 156.3), losing 2 more pounds in two weeks.
For you, stay with your calculated maintenance calories until you weight stalls, then consider whether you should adjust you calories by using the guidelines in my book.
It suggests checking both your body measurements and weight before making any calorie adjustments.
To track what you eat, and to make sure you are eating the calories you calculate, make sure you use a tool such as Cronometer (Chapter 7).
And of course, plan your 10 weeks of eating with high-volume, low-calorie foods (Chapter 10) like chicken, veggies, and berries.
Chapter 9’s hacks, which suggest things such as, using zero-calorie drinks, minimizing foods with added sugars, and keeping fats to a minimal, kept me on track.
I chewed lots of gum once I hit 1,800 calories!
Regardless, after 10 weeks of consistently eating the right number of calories and adding in the right mix of exercise so that you are in a 500 calorie deficit will help you drop 10 pounds.
Rule Two: Prioritize Protein and Progressive Overload
“Lean” means fat loss, not muscle loss—Rule Two nails this.
Chapter 8 demands 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight daily.
At 166 pounds, I ate 166 grams (664 calories) of protein, with 2,000 calories.
This left 1,336 calories for carbs and fats for 6 weeks.
So I set my carbs at 234 grams and my fats at 44 grams.
Once I hit 1,800 calories (Week 7-8), it was 159g protein, 200g carbs, 40g fat.
For you, at 170 pounds for example, this would be 170g protein (680 calories), with 2,000 calories leaving 1,320 for carbs (230g) and fats (48g).
The lean protein in the meals I suggest in my cook, (which you can get for free by signing up to my newsletter)—chicken breast, canned tuna, and Greek yogurt—ruled my cut.
Progressive overload builds muscle while cutting.
Chapter 11 suggests that you start at 60% of your one-rep max (1RM).
Since I have already went through the progressive I suggest in my book, I simply kept my lifts the same.
They were heavy enough to be challenging and I used 4 sets of 12 repetitions.
For example, my chest press stayed at 180 pounds, 4 sets of 12 reps, twice per week.
With my cardio, I still ended up losing 10 pounds with muscle intact.
Tools and Tracking
As I alluded to, tracking is critical.
Chapter 13 says body weight alone deceives.
I weighed daily, averaging weekly (video data).
Here were my average weekly weigh-ins:
- Week 1: 164 pounds
- Week 2 : 163.3 pounds
- Week 3: 162 pounds
- Week 4: 161.96 pounds
- Week 5: 159.47 pounds
- Week 6: 159.47 pounds
- Week 7: 159.47 pounds
- Week 8: 156.3 pounds
I used my Weight loss and Dieting tracking template, to record this weigh-ins.
My template allowed me to see when my average weekly weight stalled, which it did in Week 6.
After consulting my body measurements that I also recorded in the template, I may my first cut of 200 calories.
Cronometer helped me log my calories and macronutrients, a food scale helped me weigh my meals, JEFIT tracked my lifts, and My Way of Life app (Chapter 16) locked in my habits.
With these tools locked in, I hit 156.3 in 8 weeks.
If you used the same tools, there’s no reason you wouldn’t hit 10 pounds in 10.
Mindset and Adjustments
Ten weeks takes patience—Chapter 16 demands it.
My Week 7 spiked to 161 pounds post-cut (water, video), but fell to 156.3 by Week 8.
This is why it’s so important to trust your calorie deficit.
A 500-calorie deficit over 70 days is 35,000 calories to get to 10 pounds.
I averaged 600 (42,000 in 8 weeks), but 500 is good enough for 10 pounds in 10 weeks.
Again, you may not need to adjust your calories.
I only used one, but probably didn’t need it at all.
I just wanted to show how to do perform and follow an adjustment to you calories.
With a 10 week timeframe, you’ve got time to stay on your same number of original calculated calories.
Your sedentary activity factor and increased exercise will likely be just fine.
Living Lean
I talk about how you can eat out at restaurants in Chapter 9 of Build Muscle Get Lean, but this time around I completely avoided them.
If you can do this too, this would be even better for your 10 weeks. My more consistent you are with knowing what you eat, the better.
I used a lot of gum to get me through the day, but I made sure to eat high-volume meals and drank zero-calorie drinks to tame my hunger.
Also, my workouts were all less than an hour (40 minutes lifting, 20 cardio), because I had other things to do.
At the end of the day, I went from 166 pounds to 156.3 pounds, the leanest I’ve been in over 20 years.
So to lose 10 pounds, 10 weeks can definitely get you there.
And if you follow my guidance that I set forth in my book, you’ll get there even stronger and will be able to do it sustainably.
What It Takes
In brief, lose 10 pounds in 10 weeks with a 500-calorie deficit (2,000 calories + 400 burned), 1 gram of protein per pound of your bodyweight, progressive overload, meticulous tracking, and consistency.
Start you calories with a sedentary activity factor, and adjust them only if you stall, while also using your body measurements as your guide.
I did it in 8 weeks—10 weeks is your win.
