It's not really about calories. That whole idea is so antiquated. Two people both eat 3000 calories a day. One eats nothing but chicken and salad. The other eats nothing but donuts and cake. You tell me who looks better. It's all about the hormonal milieu. Somewhere in the Dark Ages Roger Atwater burned proteins, fats, and carbohydrates in a caloriebombmeter. To see how much energy they gave off. Guess what? You're body is not a furnace. Burn a log in a fireplace and measure the amount of energy it produces. Now, eat a log. I'm not going to go into a long discussion of biochemistry but the idea of "energy in - energy out" does not describe what takes place in your organism. The body is not a closed system.

Carbs result in insulin. Insulin is a storage hormone. Any excess carbs beyond what are necessary to maintain glycogen in liver and muscle will be converted to fat. If you ate 10,000 calories a day, all from fat, none of it could be stored as fat, as there would be no insulin. Protein can be converted to carbohydrate through gluconeogenesis however.

The presence of insulin inhibits the l-carnitine chain, which is necessary for the mobilization of free fatty acids for fuel. Your body prefers to burn carbs as they are the easiest to breakdown. So insulin tells it, "Save the fat for later, we have carbs now." This is why it is best to do cardio in a fasted state with low insulin levels, ie: before breakfast.

What I find helpful is Intermittent fasting. I mainly only eat during a 6 hour period each day. For breakfast I may have a small amount of protein and fat. Then I don't eat until post-workout, around 4 PM. So I've been burning fat all day as a result of low insulin levels. Then after I train, I'll have about 150g simple carbs with 100g whey protein. The insulin will drive the protein and carbs into muscle repair and glycogen storage. Because now I actually need glycogen after my workout. People who wake up and eat cereal for breakfast, why? They haven't done anything but sleep all night. Anyways, a couple hours later, a small meal of regular food and a couple hours or so after that, another one. Then when I go to bead, I don't lie there with my stomach growling and gnawing, and I have the material my body needs to repair and grow.

Also, I don't eat refined flour, dairy, or fruit. The only sugars are immediately after weight training. Now you'll have to figure out how many grams of carbs you need to maintain glycogen without spilling over into fat storage. Days you train legs you're going to need more than days you train arms, which will be more than days that you don't train at all, etc. But by fasting a large percentage of the time you will burn fat without suffering unduly. Because if you train yourself not to eat until late, you'll find that you do just fine burning fat for fuel. Actually probably less hunger and more energy than if you ate a reduced, "small" amount of carbs.

Anyways, my thoughts. Good luck!

Yessir its possible. If you have tie to do it run a split workout program. Morning and evening cardio. Cardio after weights....whether your main gym time is am or pm. Weights Burns carbs. Then when you hit cardio you're carb depleted and forcing fat burn. I dropped well last winter doing 2sessions at 45mins cardio plus heavy on the weights. Carb manipulating is a bonus for that as well.

15% to 12% is only about 7 pounds of fat, which sounds right for 8 weeks