I recently shared my amazing 2-year journey with Faster Way to Fat Loss. And I got lots of questions about macros, strength training, intermittent fasting, and more.
Whether you’re curious (or skeptical) about Faster Way or interested in fat loss and/or building muscle, this expert video interview is for you (scroll down to watch and listen)!
Today, I’m excited to share a follow-up. I’m sitting with Faster Way to Fat Loss Coach Sandi Gravatt. Sandi has been in the fitness industry for 20 years and answers all your questions about fat loss, building muscle, and the Faster Way Program in today’s interview.
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Watch My Faster Way Video Interview With Certified Coach Sandi Gravatt
Below, you’ll find both my video interview with Sandi and the transcript summary of our conversation.
- Watch the Video Interview on Youtube.
- You can also listen to this interview via podcast.
- Join Sandi & a 6-Week Faster Way Round.
How Do I sign Up?
Join a 6-week round with my incredible Faster Way Coach, Sandi.
Read The Interview Transcript
Kristin Interview Intro
Sandi, you have been my coach now for a year and a half. I started Faster Way to Fat Loss over 2 years ago and got through the first 6 months. I was doing great and experienced a ton of fat loss.
My concern within 6 months was that I was losing too much weight and I was getting too skinny. I didn’t have the toned look that I was going for because I didn’t have enough muscle. And that’s what I needed to prioritize at that point was not just losing weight, but building the muscle. And so I turned to you as my coach.
You have been through this entire process with me and it’s been fun to see not only how my body’s changed, but my mindset around building muscle and fat loss.
I think as women, this whole thing confuses us because there’s so much messaging out there. People have so many questions because I’ve been sharing my journey on social media and want to pick your brain as the expert.
LEARN MORE ABOUT FASTER WAY
Q: How did you become a coach with Faster Way?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): I started in the health and fitness industry on my own journey. I had no clue, 20 years ago, that this was going to be the trajectory of my life, my passion. But I got into the gym.
Like many other women, I had children, I had never been that person who needed to lose weight or workout prior to children. So I didn’t know what the heck to do. And I gained some weight, I felt uncomfortable. And so like I said, I turned to the gym. Little by little, the gym changed my life, the way I felt about myself, changed my confidence, changed all these things that I had never experienced in my entire life. And I fell in love with strength training. That was not something that 20 years ago, many women focused on. So it was a very new subject for women to be in the gym and lifting weights. And through that I completely transformed my body.
Most people, if you see me now, they don’t know my struggle 20 years ago, but I’m 5’2” for reference. So when I say this, it will sound differently to somebody who is 5’10”, you know, or six 6 feet tall, but I’m a petite person. And I was a size 12, which meant I probably weighing about 150 to 160 pounds on my frame. And yes, I was younger. It is a lot easier when you’re younger. If you’re younger and watching this start now, then that will make all the difference in your journey. But I lost weight, I started building muscle and I just fell in love.
And after, you know, several years, I was like, “This is what I want to do.” I wanted to help women who were like me, laying in a pile of clothes feeling miserable, nothing fits, comparing themselves to everybody that they see at that time in magazines, because there’s no such thing as Facebook, and Instagram and all of those things. But that’s literally how I fell in love with strength training and fueling your body. And so I became a personal trainer.
I’ve been doing this now for 16 years as an a expert. So within 3 years of my journey, I was like this is what I want to do. So I became a personal trainer. I’ve owned a business in home, I went to people’s houses. I did all of that for years and years and years.
Later in my journey, I started competing in fitness competitions. And that’s really when I started to learn nutrition in a whole different manner. With that comes some body image issues and the way you look at food. And as I went through that journey, I realized my mindset around how I was eating, what I was doing and that was not healthy. So I turned to macros, and that is literally what gave me freedom from food. So I’ve been training people on that now for 12 or 13 years.
So when I found faster way, we had strength training, we had a focus on nutrition, it had a focus on macros, three of the things that completely changed my body, my mind, and the way I looked at food, and I had to try it. It incorporated intermittent fasting. I had never tried that before. And I was like, I’ll give it a shot.
Within 2 weeks in the program, I was sold. And I was like this is this is the missing piece. It is a program that puts nutrition, fitness and all of it in one package so you can follow and continue to meet your goals. And so I’ve been with Faster Way for 6 years as a coach.
Q: If someone wants to lose fat and get toned, where do they start?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): When you come into the Faster Way, I have a questionnaire that clients will fill out. So it’s going to ask you…
- What is your goals?
- What are you looking to do?
And based off of all that information that you put in, if it is fat loss, if it is weight loss, if it is just losing in general, you’re going to start in a calorie deficit.
Calorie deficits do not mean 1200 calories. Calorie deficits do not mean you’re not eating carbs. So it is a slight calorie deficit. So we can burn fat, but build muscle at the same time.
When you are just getting started with your journey, you can build muscle and burn fat at the same time. You can kind of change your body composition. And that’s what we focus on.
As you go, you will see how Kristin has had to change her focus where she had that initial loss for those six months. But down the road, we have to change the the focus so you can continue to make progresses.
But initially, when people come in, they want to lose weight. And so that’s where we’re going to start. We’re going to start in a slight caloric deficit, where you’re not starving, where you still feel satisfied, but you’re able to stay consistent, because you’re not eating 1200 calories. The reason people struggle most often when they tried to slash their calories and lose weight is they cut their calories too low. And they can maintain it for like two or three days. But then they get off track and they’re like, oh my gosh, that cookie looks amazing. These chips look amazing that ice cream looks amazing. And they eat it all. And then they’ve just taken themselves out of that caloric deficit, the way we’re going to do it is we’re going to focus on protein.
So we’re going to keep you satisfied, we’re going to give you the carbs, so you’re not craving them all the time. And you are going to be able to stick to it much easier. And when you can do that you can make progress a lot easier than continually starting over every two or three days. Because you have binge Do you have gone off track, you’ve had a weekend, you’ve had a birthday, whatever the case may be, we teach you how to build that into your lifestyle. So you can still live life. That’s like the biggest thing and you still want to be able to enjoy those things. So I’m gonna give you the tools and teach you how you can enjoy those things and make progress.
Q: What is the benefit of going through Faster Way and working with you as a coach?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): I have been in the fitness industry for 20 years. Whether it be paying for it or doing it on my own. I have never not paid for accountability. Do you hear me? I still I pay Faster Way. I still have a coach that I answer to that I will ask questions to. Accountability is huge.
You can go and just pull up some random calculator. But if you don’t know how to put that information into that calculator, you are not going to get the right calories, you could easily be doing way more damage. It is so much easier to have somebody to ask versus trying to figure it out on your own. People have done that for years and years and years, and they’re still spinning their wheels. If you did not join, Kristin, you probably would be in the same spot you were at two years ago. Because it’s so hard to do it on your own, you will get in your head, you will think something’s not working. The scale goes up one weekend, you panic and you lower your calories. When you have a coach that you could reach out to and be like, “Oh my God, this scale went up what does that mean?” And they can talk you off of the the ledge, you are going to save so much more time and you are going to take something off of your plate that you don’t have to worry about.
I would not go and try to fix the engine on my car, because I’m not a mechanic, I’m gonna go take my car to the mechanic so that mechanic can fix it. And that’s literally what you’re doing when you’re hiring a coach.
And nope, not all coaches are the same. They don’t all have the same knowledge. They don’t all have the same experience. They don’t all come to the Faster Way with the same expertise as others do. And so, it is important when you are picking somebody that you pick somebody who can get you past 6 weeks. You need somebody who knows what to do then because anybody can teach you how to lose weight, but it’s going to be how you keep it off and how you keep getting better and better. That’s going to make the biggest difference. But I will tell you, having somebody for accountability and just to make sure that you are on the right track is such a time saver. And it’s such peace of mind.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): 100% Yeah, I tried it all. I tried tracking macros on my own. I did YouTube workouts, I did it all. Honestly, I tried to piece it together because I did not want to pay. And now I’m like people do it.
Learn more about macros 101 and how to track macros here.
How Do I sign Up?
Join a 6-week round with my incredible Faster Way Coach, Sandi.
Q: Does Faster Way address hormone health and unbalanced hormones?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): Nutrition, exercise, and how you’re fueling your body – it’s not always your hormones that are the problem. It is what you’re trying to do to lose weight or to lose fat that is causing the problems. I am postmenopausal myself, yes, at 44 years old. There are things that I’ve had to adjust and tweak for myself to feel good. For instance, because I’m sure people have asked this about fasting, I adjusted how long I fast, because I found that I was not having as much energy. I was not feeling as good. So I did a little tweak to my intermittent fasting. And I feel perfectly fine. So it’s all about what you’re doing that is going to help you balance your hormones. Whole Foods is a huge one. It literally will come down to exercise, how you’re fueling your body, when you’re not stressed out so much, and you’re sleeping a little bit better, because you have more energy throughout the day – all of those things make a huge difference in your hormones, all of them. There’s not this like magic pill that you’re going to take that’s going to fix your hormones, but it’s all the little stepping stones and blocks that you’re building in Faster Way that will help your hormones.
Q: Can you talk about the scale and why the Faster Way does not recommend stepping on the scale?
I think people need to have a healthy relationship with the scale. So in the beginning of it because people are so focused on losing weight, if they don’t see the scale move (just dropping, dropping, dropping, dropping, dropping) they feel like they are not making progress when really, weight fluctuation is very normal.
If you can learn to go along and let it just fluctuate and not panic over stepping on the scale scale, because guess what? When we introduce you to eating more carbs, carbs are carbohydrates – water.
So we are really focused on that first six weeks of just getting used to the plan, getting used to the Faster Way and getting used to listening to how your body is feeling. And not just using this scale as the one and only sole way that you’re tracking your progress.
I believe people need to have a healthy relationship with the scale because as you’re moving along, the scale is data. And that’s what I want to teach people: how to use the scale as data, not the end all be all.
But weight loss does not mean fat loss. Fat Loss does not mean weight loss, so you can lose fat without losing a single pound of weight. And so that’s why we focus more on non-scale victories and just letting go of the scale. Even if it’s only for a little while to you have a better relationship with the scale.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): The crazy thing is I weigh more today than I weighed at my leanest time, back when I first came to you as my coach. Yet my body looks 100% better and different today than it did back then and I’m heavier on the scale.
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): I’m 12 pounds heavier. Actually, I’m probably 15 pounds heavier now than when I began my Faster Way journey in 2018. So 12 to 15 pounds heavier, but if you look at me, I look totally different and way better.
Q: Is it possible to do the Faster Way if you’re busy (work, kids, etc.)?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): You want to make the time like, you have to start prioritizing yourself. Because it’s going to make the biggest difference in your future down the road.
Is it a time commitment in the beginning? Yes. Is it worth it? Yes.
But you can do our workouts at a hotel, you can do them with bands, you can be more mindful of your nutrition, you can learn how to cook meals that your entire family will eat.
I’m going to tell you, you have to find the time. If you don’t make the time, you’re never going to do it. But you don’t need to spend two hours in the gym. You don’t need to spend an hour on the treadmill, you don’t have to spend 7 days a week going to classes. You learn how to just focus on your nutrition, making progress and getting better as you continue.
And that’s where I will say that the time commitment starts to decrease when you start on understanding the principles a little bit easier, where it just comes to you more naturally, like, you know, yes, is tracking macros in the beginning going to be a time commitment? Yes! but the long run, the benefits are totally worth it and will pay off.
You can take those workouts with you, you can take the macro tracker with you – you have all of these things at your fingertips. And we’re not saying that you have to be perfect 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, there’s going to be some leeway. But that’s where you build a lifestyle is learning how to fit the program into your life, not you trying to take away things from your life to fit into the program.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): I tell everybody that it’s gonna take you time to learn how to track macros, but anything worthwhile takes time. And honestly, if you’re desperate enough, you’re going to want to.
I reached the point of desperation, I tried it all. And I was like, this is like the final thing. I’m just gonna give it a shot, I’m gonna go full on, I’m going to learn it. And I’m so glad that I did take the time to learn it. Because last year, as you know, it was the craziest year for us: we moved, I was single parenting most of the time, working, driving back and forth to Miami trying to house hunt, living with my parents while converting our home into a rental. And yet, because I had established the habits early on, taking a little bit of time to learn, I was able to, even within the craziness and not having a home to workout and cook my own meals, I was still able to keep up with it. But it took a little bit of upfront learning to be able to create a lifestyle that it like you said, it got easier over time and I had to build the habits.
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): People always talk about, “I’m just not motivated. I don’t have motivation.” Well, motivation, I will tell you, at some point in your life, you’re not going to be motivated. There’s days I’m like, “I’m not motivated to take my sweatpants off and go to the gym.” But it’s those habits that kick in that you’re like, “Okay, I’m going to just go for it. This is what I do.”
Q: A lot of people love their cardio, and they don’t want to give up their cardio. Can they squeeze in some strength and see results?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): That’s where I will come in as your nutrition coach and I’m like, “Okay, if you’re going to run if you liked, you know, it can be somebody who’s running, you know, three miles a week or somebody who’s like, I’m an ultra marathon runner and I won like 35 If miles or whatever it is that they’re running, your nutrition needs to match your goals. If you are running and you are doing all those things, but you’re not fueling your body, you’re not going to be at your best runner. Like, I will have runners who tell me like, since I’ve started faster way, and I’ve started fueling my body, I am running things faster. I am finishing faster. I’m setting prs. I don’t feel as winded. I am not as sore like. So like, yes, you can fit running into the faster way. It’s the nutrition that we need to work on to make sure we are fueling your body appropriately for that. So did I answer that question?
Q: I don’t feel like the Faster Way workouts are hard enough – I’m not sore and not sweating. Do I need to add more?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): The amount of calories you burn has zero to do with the progress you are making. The fact that you are sweating and you have mascara running down your face does not mean anything. You can wear a full face of makeup and do strength training, and get better benefits out of it than if you were sopping wet hair and zapped energy from Orange Theory fitness. So the calories you burn does not matter.
I will tell people you’re working out to build muscle to build strength not to burn calories, not to burn off what you ate. That’s not what your workouts are for. You do not have to feel sore. If you’ve never worked out before you might feel sore.
I don’t get sore. I am never saw. I mean, there’s hardly anything. Anything that I do that makes me sore doesn’t mean that I’m not getting a good workout. So people have to look at that – it’s not a measure of a good workout.
The other thing that I will say is if you don’t find the faster weight workouts challenging enough, then you need to add probably more weight. Maybe you’re that person who is shoulder pressing 15 pounds and you’re like I can do 25 of these. Well, what if you put down those 15lbs and grabbed a set of 20 and now you are like “Okay, I’m like struggling now.” So is it that you’re not lifting heavy enough? Or is it be you still have in your mind that you didn’t burn enough calories? You’re not sweating? You’re not dying? Those things do not measure a good workout.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): And that muscle is going to do more for you in the long run burning calories than a little cardio session? Cardio is great. I’ll do hit because I want like the endurance, I feel good.
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): You do cardio for your endurance and for your heart strength training; not to build muscle and your metabolism. If you want to be a better fat burner, sitting on your butt watching Netflix, eating ice cream, you better have muscle on your body because that is what’s going to make that feasible- having that muscle. Cardio is not it that is just not the end all be all and those things that focus on high intensity all the time. That’s not going to build muscle.
Q: One of the things that people who follow your Instagram notice is that you do different workouts than Faster Way. Why?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): So that’s funny. I’m in the gym. So I do look at our gym workouts and do our gym workouts. But I will even tell my clients, I have six or seven exercises. I call them like my Golden Grail of things. So it’s like squats, it’s hip thrusters, it’s pull ups, its chest presses, its military presses. And I can’t think of the other two. But there are six things, or six exercises that I will incorporate throughout my workout. Because I have different goals, when you have been doing something for 1819 years, what works for somebody who is just starting out in their fitness journey, and somebody who has been doing it for 19 years is not going to be the same thing. So there are things that I incorporate in.
If you follow me, you know that I like working glutes because those suckers head south after a certain age if you are not building them. So that is truly a focus of mine.
And this is also something people don’t know, 10 years ago, I had a very severe back injury, where it took me out from working out for months, I mean, so severe that I didn’t even get out of bed for two weeks. And that right there changed my mind about how I can continue to strengthen my back. Glutes will strengthen your core and your back. And if you have back problems, you want a strong booty. So that is something I have really focused on probably in the last like 4 years to make sure that I never end up in that spot again, where my back was so injured that it just it was crippling.
So a, I follow the gym workouts. But there are 6 things that I add in several times a week. I probably work out 45 minutes to 55 minutes. So my workouts are not 2 hours long. But just incorporating those few extra things will add a little bit more to my workout.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): And what people don’t realize is the same basic moves you’re doing, if you follow a faster way workouts, it’s literally the same basic moves. There’s not like a special sauce that you’re adding in or whatever.
Q: Why does Faster Way practice intermittent fasting? Will things like half and half break a fast?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): I call it digestive rest, and it is truly beneficial. There are so many different like fasting protocols. I will tell you, if you’re my client, the first thing that you’re going to hear out of my mouth is fuel is more important than fasting.
So if you are somebody who has severely been under eating, we might have to adjust that fasting window, I would rather you learn how to fuel your body before you start trying to not eat enough. So again, we’re going to tweak things as needed.
But digestive rest is important. It is that time where your body is doing nothing, like it’s not working at digesting food. It can then work on other things. And it’s just a way to let food get out of your system and burn fat a little bit. And it doesn’t have to be extreme.
I will look at all of my clients, for example pregnant people are not going to fast the same. Can you still fast? Yes, but it’s probably going to be a lot lower than somebody else. Women who are in the brunt of menopause, that is going to have to change your fasting window. Somebody who runs, you’re gonna have to adjust your fasting window.
So in the Faster Way, the general fast is 16 hours of giving your body digestive rest, and then eating for eight hours. But there are so many middle grounds in between there, that is also beneficial. So it’s just looking at your lifestyle and health. Do you have Hashimotos? Do you have an autoimmune disease? All of those things come into play when we are talking about fasting.
For half and half, just in general, you want to keep things under 50 calories, have no fiber and no sugar. If whatever you’re putting in your coffee meets those 3 criteria, it should be okay. If you are that person who has creamer or coffee, you’re gonna have to tweak that a little bit, where you’re gonna have to back off some of the creamer.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): Yeah, it scares people so much. But I point out to people that everybody fasts. When you go to sleep at night, you are fasting, probably for a good 6-9 hours. I don’t know, whatever you’re sleeping at night, you’re naturally fasting. It’s just that people get so scared because I think there’s so many like hormone specialists out there talking about it and all sorts of things. And I’m like, listen, I intermittent fast, usually for about 12 hours and I dinner and breakfast. I love breakfast. Nobody is gonna take breakfast away from me.
Q: How can people work with you? What’s a 6-week Faster Way Round like?
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): For the first 6 weeks, that’s where you’re gonna lay the foundation and the fundamentals where we’re going to work out the kinks where you are going to start understanding protein intake and start understanding macros. It’s like kindergarten, where we’re learning and we’re just doing all of the things and trying to figure out how it all works. That is where you’re going to ask any and all of your questions, you’re going to have your stumbling blocks, you’re going to have really good days, you’re going to have really bad days. But along the way, you’re learning that foundation to keep going and build your fitness and health lifestyle.
But where you’re really going to continue to make the progress is in VIP, moving forward.
I am not that person who is going to be like, yes, you’re going to reach your goals in 6 weeks. Because I’m going to tell you right now, that’s probably not going to happen, there’s probably half a percentage of people who met their goals in six weeks. I mean, it’s that’s just an unfeasible thing. But in that initial 6 weeks, that is the foundation, that is where you learn about intermittent fasting, carb cycling, dairy and gluten, just every and all the pieces that you need to make it a lifestyle.
Final Thoughts
One of the last thing that I want to end with is I, I don’t want people to look at this as like a weight loss plan. I want to transform people’s minds and thinking, “I want to get stronger, I want to feel better. There’s so much more out there when you start focusing on not just losing weight. It’s the journey throughout the process that is going to transform your mind. And it’s just you have to give it time. I have so many people like Kristin, who was like, I’m not doing this past 6 weeks. And those are the people who are the ones that are skeptical. The ones who didn’t think it would work. Well. We I don’t want it to work in 6 weeks, because if it works in six weeks, you’re not going to sustain that at all. You want to be able to build on to that lifestyle so it will sustain.
Kristin (Live Simply, Host, Faster Way Client): I’m not a coach but the people that see the most success are the people who have that consistency and just love the process of the day in and day out. They’re not just looking for some quick results.
Sandi (Faster Way Coach): I will share people’s things at the 6 week mark, you know, they send me pictures. But when you look at my account, you’re going to see people who have been doing it for 8 months. You are going to see people like Kristin who have been doing it for 2 years because I like to highlight what you can do down the road. Kristin had good results in 6 weeks. But she had amazing results at 2 years. So those are the people that I tend to highlight and share. Because that’s literally what is transforming somebody’s life, not just quick, easy, “Here’s what I did in six weeks, and then I left.” It is literally just transformed somebody’s life.
