Recomp: How to avoid or fix "Skinny Fat"
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TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »If they are blaming "skinny-fat" on too much cardio, I would say that the article is questionable. The symptoms of being "skinny-fat" are some of the things that cardio has been show to help with. Weight lifting has its own benefits and it is true that the bulk created by weight lifting will give you a lower body fat percentage for the same BMI, but cardio addresses the symptoms more directly.
Thanks. I would tend to (like to) think "skinny-fat" sounds like just a person who is generally not active enough.
Nope - many cardio-only weight loss folks are skinny-fat - watch their arms as they jog, or what is pushed above their shorts jiggling around.blankiefinder wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »If they are blaming "skinny-fat" on too much cardio, I would say that the article is questionable. The symptoms of being "skinny-fat" are some of the things that cardio has been show to help with. Weight lifting has its own benefits and it is true that the bulk created by weight lifting will give you a lower body fat percentage for the same BMI, but cardio addresses the symptoms more directly.
What? Cardio doesn't prevent skinny fat. It just helps create a deficit, but your body chooses where the fat comes off of.
I did cardio, and ended up skinny fat.
You can't tell if someone is "skinny fat" by looking at them. "Skinny fat" is the non-technical name for the condition Metabolically Obese, Normal Weight (MONW). It describes the situation in which a person has high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and other symptoms of obesity, even though they have a normal BMI.
I'd suggest you can easily tell if someone is skinny-fat - with the meaning like you say - healthy BMI, but higher BF% than average.
Well - if they move - perhaps not still picture in many clothes.
Shoot, most people end up realizing it when they hit goal weight and only did cardio as exercise during the whole weight loss.
I see it in the gym all the time, cardio bunny showing midriff with shorts that look just fine standing there. Leans over to retie shoe, and the amount of fat spilling over for what appeared average is surprising sometimes. Confirmed as soon as they start jogging many times by their arms.
Yep, hate to admit it......but i was one of them.
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I'm not over weight, and no where near obese; but I'm carrying more body fat then I would like (abt 24%). My waist is 26.5 (and needs to be abt 25 (I'm 5'3). If you check out runway models, that is a pretty good description of "skinny fat," They appear great in the clothes on the runway, but don't look in a bikini (no muscle tone) and their body fat % is probably pretty high.0
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blankiefinder wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »If they are blaming "skinny-fat" on too much cardio, I would say that the article is questionable. The symptoms of being "skinny-fat" are some of the things that cardio has been show to help with. Weight lifting has its own benefits and it is true that the bulk created by weight lifting will give you a lower body fat percentage for the same BMI, but cardio addresses the symptoms more directly.
Thanks. I would tend to (like to) think "skinny-fat" sounds like just a person who is generally not active enough.
Nope - many cardio-only weight loss folks are skinny-fat - watch their arms as they jog, or what is pushed above their shorts jiggling around.blankiefinder wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »If they are blaming "skinny-fat" on too much cardio, I would say that the article is questionable. The symptoms of being "skinny-fat" are some of the things that cardio has been show to help with. Weight lifting has its own benefits and it is true that the bulk created by weight lifting will give you a lower body fat percentage for the same BMI, but cardio addresses the symptoms more directly.
What? Cardio doesn't prevent skinny fat. It just helps create a deficit, but your body chooses where the fat comes off of.
I did cardio, and ended up skinny fat.
You can't tell if someone is "skinny fat" by looking at them. "Skinny fat" is the non-technical name for the condition Metabolically Obese, Normal Weight (MONW). It describes the situation in which a person has high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and other symptoms of obesity, even though they have a normal BMI.
Dr. Hyman??
Most people on here use the common usage of the term skinny fat...
Some other definitions for skinny fat:
"When someone is thin and looks great in clothes, but is all flabby underneath"
"A person who is not overweight and have skinny look but still have a high fat percentage and low muscular mass. Usually those people have a low caloric diet, that's why they are skinny, but are not involved in any sports activities or trainings and that's why they don’t have any muscle. Since between the bone and the skin those people only have fat, the skin can be deformed easily because the skin layer is located on an unstable matter (fat). "
"A physique, while not overweight (and possibly underweight), lacks any visible lean, striated tissue."
What you are describing is just ordinary "fat", not "skinny fat." It is better to use the term as it was originally intended and the way the medical community uses it. Otherwise, it just confuses everyone.0 -
Yeah can vouch cardio caused skinny fat. Went from 185-160 by doing tons of cardio and then started to get into weight lifting. I gained about 5 lbs back when I moved states so I'm cutting now and I'm down to 161 but more emphasis on weight lifting and not so much cardio (1-2 hours a week). Good progress now and the belly fat starting to disappear.0
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Thought I'd follow up to clarify what seems to be a common misconception, maybe because some people didn't take time to read the article.
The article is not saying that cardio makes you skinny. It doesn't. You can live on the treadmill and gain weight if you eat too much.
The article is not saying that cardio makes you fat. It doesn't. Cardio burns calories and will help you lose weight, provided that you eat fewer calories than you burn.
And the article is not saying that cardio makes you skinny fat. It doesn't. Skinny fat is a combination of low muscle mass and high body fat percentage. If you fit those criteria and your overall weight is low, you are skinny fat. You can get there with cardio or without cardio.
The article is saying that too much cardio interferes with strength and muscle growth and that the longer your individual cardio sessions are, the greater these effects are. The article also links to the research to support that statement.
If your goal is to get stronger and add muscle mass, you should lift heavy and focus on compound lifts. Too much cardio can impede your progress, so you should limit cardio. And HIIT is preferable to steady state cardio.0 -
I am just starting recomp; I have the combination of low muscle mass and a somewhat high body fat % (24 - 25%). I have increased my muscle mass and decreased my body fat considerably; I'm older so it is a slower process than would be on someone much younger--but I'll get there (Rome wasn't built in a day). The thing of it is, is to keep progressing. Like Paul the Apostole says: "I keep reaching for the goal;" this applies not only to our fitness but to our walk w/the Lord and other areas of our life. I have started to lift heavy--I was already keeping my cardio to 15 - 20 min a day (I have now changed it to HIIT).0
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I lasted...2.5 months in a recomp. Go me.0
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This is the best (or at least the most welcome) advice I've heard in a long time:
https://legionathletics.com/skinny-fat/
I've lost 42 pounds over the last year or two, hit the healthy BMI range about 22 pounds ago, and am currently about 14% body fat. I was trying to get down to 12% or 10% before changing directions and starting a bulk, but have been having trouble making progress from this point. And to make matters worse, I gained about one percent body fat over the last month, gaining fat and losing lean mass. And worse yet, I seem to have lost some strength over the last couple weeks.
The photo below looks about like I do, except younger:
Here's the part of the article that really caught my attention:
Now that you know the shortcut to skinny fat–large calorie deficit, way too much cardio, and way too little resistance training–let’s talk about how to prevent and, if necessary, undo the damage.
“Should I try to lose fat or build muscle?”
There’s the million-dollar question that plagues skinny fat people everywhere. They know the type of physique they want but how do they actually get there?
Guys tend to think they should just focus on building muscle and girls are inclined to want to lose more fat. And they’re both going to get nowhere…because they need to do both.
That is, they want to set up their diet and training so they can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time.
This is commonly referred to as “body recomposition” and it’s the only way out of the skinny fat predicament. Too much fat and too little muscle is what got you into this mess and you have to flip that around to escape it.
Now, you’ve probably heard that it’s impossible to gain muscle and lose fat simultaneously. That’s untrue.
If you’re new to weightlifting (and heavy weightlifting in particular), and you probably are if you’re skinny fat, you absolutely can build muscle and lose fat at the same time.
More specifically, if you don’t have at least 1+ years of proper weightlifting under your belt and haven’t already gained your first 15 to 20 pounds of muscle (men, about half that for women), then you can effectively “recomp” and should make it your first priority.
You just have to know what you’re doing. And this article breaks it all down.
It convinced me. I'm switching to maintenance/recomp mode, although I'll ease into it over the next three weeks with a 300, 200, then 100 calorie deficit and then settle on my TDEE with possible further adjustments if I'm gaining or losing weight after that.
I'm happy. I think.
Seems like a lot of work. I started lifting, NRulesFW, and it all happened quite naturally.
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I hope this isn't derailing. But can I get away from skinny-fat by using dumbbells and resistance bands? The lift heavy talk and dead lifting = Greek to me (and, truth be told, frightening to me.) I do not belong to a gym and don't foresee belonging to one, ever.
I like the idea of reducing length of cardio workouts and now I am adding push ups, dumbbell reps, etc. and starting to see some minor results...
Can it be done without the oft-mentioned dead-lifting and heavy lifting???
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vivmom2014 wrote: »I hope this isn't derailing. But can I get away from skinny-fat by using dumbbells and resistance bands? The lift heavy talk and dead lifting = Greek to me (and, truth be told, frightening to me.) I do not belong to a gym and don't foresee belonging to one, ever.
I like the idea of reducing length of cardio workouts and now I am adding push ups, dumbbell reps, etc. and starting to see some minor results...
Can it be done without the oft-mentioned dead-lifting and heavy lifting???
You can use some dumbbells...eventually you will need weight that is heavy/hard for you to use though. Resistance bands are fine. But really if those are your only resources, why not a body weight program?
ETA: Better yet...why not to some research on heavy lifting? We all started somewhere!0 -
vivmom2014 wrote: »I hope this isn't derailing. But can I get away from skinny-fat by using dumbbells and resistance bands? The lift heavy talk and dead lifting = Greek to me (and, truth be told, frightening to me.) I do not belong to a gym and don't foresee belonging to one, ever.
I like the idea of reducing length of cardio workouts and now I am adding push ups, dumbbell reps, etc. and starting to see some minor results...
Can it be done without the oft-mentioned dead-lifting and heavy lifting???
You could add in weighted squats (using hand weights, a bag of potatoes or whatever), weighted step-ups, etc.0 -
@arditarose Research = good idea. I shy away from the lift heavy talk because of several past back injuries (not from weight lifting, from running.)
@blankiefinder I do squats, will add hand weights. Thanks.0 -
vivmom2014 wrote: »@arditarose Research = good idea. I shy away from the lift heavy talk because of several past back injuries (not from weight lifting, from running.)
@blankiefinder I do squats, will add hand weights. Thanks.
Ah, okay. Always good to be cautious when it comes to injuries.0 -
Thought I'd follow up to clarify what seems to be a common misconception, maybe because some people didn't take time to read the article.
The article is not saying that cardio makes you skinny. It doesn't. You can live on the treadmill and gain weight if you eat too much.
The article is not saying that cardio makes you fat. It doesn't. Cardio burns calories and will help you lose weight, provided that you eat fewer calories than you burn.
And the article is not saying that cardio makes you skinny fat. It doesn't. Skinny fat is a combination of low muscle mass and high body fat percentage. If you fit those criteria and your overall weight is low, you are skinny fat. You can get there with cardio or without cardio.
The article is saying that too much cardio interferes with strength and muscle growth and that the longer your individual cardio sessions are, the greater these effects are. The article also links to the research to support that statement.
If your goal is to get stronger and add muscle mass, you should lift heavy and focus on compound lifts. Too much cardio can impede your progress, so you should limit cardio. And HIIT is preferable to steady state cardio.
Yes, this does make sense.
It''ll be hard for me (as i love Cardio), but i know i'm going to have to cut down on it (and continue to lift) if i want to get stronger and build more muscle.0 -
That was a good article. I'm glad to hear that I'm doing just about the right amount of cardio, and just this weekend started a heavy weight lifting program to start to get rid of this skinny fatness.
Thank you for posting this! 0 -
I find the whole "skinny fat" phenomenon a bit meh really. It has become a marketing term used to drive looking a certain way rather than a health based perspective or performance based perspective. NWO is of concern but it seems that skinny fat is only loosely used in that sense.
It needs to be confined to Grazie magazine or something...0 -
So I read the article and more importantly the link the author provides for HIIT article where he discloses he went from 11% BF to 9% BF(body fat) over 11 weeks eating a deficit, doing HIIT, lifting, and some cardio. I think the lifting was 3.5 to 5 hours and cardio 1.5 to 2 hours. The kick in the proverbial dangly bits is the deficit he was using. 25% deficit over the course of the 11 weeks. You need to ask yourself just how healthy do you want to appear and what makes sense. Personally, a 25% deficit and working out 7 hours a week seems excessive. Then again I'm not blogging for people to 'use my services'. As for skinny fat, the author defined it as too little muscle mass and too much body fat. Makes sense.0
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I find the whole "skinny fat" phenomenon a bit meh really. It has become a marketing term used to drive looking a certain way rather than a health based perspective or performance based perspective. NWO is of concern but it seems that skinny fat is only loosely used in that sense.
It needs to be confined to Grazie magazine or something...
Yes, I see this view. It's like ANOTHER way of saying: Nope, you still don't look right.
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vivmom2014 wrote: »I find the whole "skinny fat" phenomenon a bit meh really. It has become a marketing term used to drive looking a certain way rather than a health based perspective or performance based perspective. NWO is of concern but it seems that skinny fat is only loosely used in that sense.
It needs to be confined to Grazie magazine or something...
Yes, I see this view. It's like ANOTHER way of saying: Nope, you still don't look right.
Yes there's that, but there ARE also health risks associated with a high body fat %, no matter what your weight is.0 -
Yes there's that, but there ARE also health risks associated with a high body fat %, no matter what your weight is.
I agree. Especially the old belly fat - it's bad all around (pardon the pun). So it's a split of knowing that it's unhealthy and knowing there's always, always, always more work to do.
Hey - that's life, right?
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