Best time to stop losing and focus on muscle?

rankinsect

So I've still got quite a lot of fat to lose, as I'm 70 above my goal weight, but as I was thinking about plans for this year, I wanted to discuss pros and cons of different approaches to ultimately building more muscle.

I've been doing progressive resistance training on machines for six months, and most of my early gains have slowed by now.

Would I be better off to undershoot my goal weight (I.e. drop 80-90 rather than 70) and then focus on bulking, or hit gw and try to recomp?

Even 90 down is still in a normal BMI range for me - My gw is actually slightly overweight according to BMI but if I were decently muscular I think I'd look and feel great at that weight.

nordlead2005

My thought, is to stop losing somewhere in the 10-15% BF range. That is a pretty big range, but allows for different things depending on how you feel and your goals. 15% is the upper range of where you'll get the most out of a bulk, and 10% is in the visible abs range, but you may get tired of dieting before you hit that point. Recomp is always a valid approach anywhere in that range but if your goal is muscle mass and strength I'd avoid it, since it is slower, unless you just don't want to add weight at that point in time (i.e. for the summer).

Granted, I haven't made the transition either and have been contemplating it for the last month or so. I've lost almost 45lb, currently at 176, original GW of 175. My BF is 12.5-13.5% based on my measurements (calipers and tape). My personal goal is to get down to ~10% BF (as measured by me), and then I'm not sure if I want to bulk or not since vanity for the summer is a pretty big motivator for me. My current thinking is to do a really short bulk and then cut a tiny bit for the summer and just maintain jul-sep and then go into a proper bulk/cut cycle over the winter.

jim180155

rankinsect wrote: »

So I've still got quite a lot of fat to lose, as I'm 70 above my goal weight, but as I was thinking about plans for this year, I wanted to discuss pros and cons of different approaches to ultimately building more muscle.

I've been doing progressive resistance training on machines for six months, and most of my early gains have slowed by now.

Would I be better off to undershoot my goal weight (I.e. drop 80-90 rather than 70) and then focus on bulking, or hit gw and try to recomp?

Even 90 down is still in a normal BMI range for me - My gw is actually slightly overweight according to BMI but if I were decently muscular I think I'd look and feel great at that weight.

You make it obvious in the bolded sentence that your weight goal is nothing more than a rough estimate. What you’re really trying or hoping to do is to lose fat and add muscle. I’d suggest you start tracking your body fat percentage now, along with your weight, so you can monitor improvements in both areas. I’ve found body fat calipers to be the most accurate in-home testing method, and they’re cheap at around $6 on Amazon.

Stick with the resistance training doing compound lifts with heavy weights, make sure you’re getting enough protein (1 gram of protein per pound of lean mass), and get enough rest. That’ll help you maintain or even add muscle as you progress to a lower weight.

As you get leaner you can fine tune your goal. That may be a specific weight or a specific body fat percentage. (It’s pretty hard to set exact numbers now when you’re still 70-ish pounds away.)

As you get under 17% body fat your insulin sensitivity improves, which helps with protein synthesis, which means that your body will be more prone to adding muscle than fat, providing that you’re resistance training with progressive overload, maintaining a good diet and getting rest. The converse is true at higher body fat percentages: your body is more likely to convert extra calories to fat rather than muscle.

For that reason, most research supports cutting and bulking in the 10% to 17% range: cut until you’re down to 12% or 10% body fat, bulk until you’re up around 15% or 17%, then cut again.

AnvilHead

I think Jim hit the nail on the head ^.

No matter what you do as you're losing, some percentage of what you lose will be LBM/muscle. It's a lot more work to regain the lost muscle than it is to retain it in the first place, so I'd focus on keeping the strength training going and ensuring your protein intake is adequate to minimize LBM loss. Dropping 10-20 lbs. below your goal weight will involve losing that much more LBM, and then you have two choices - recomp (which is a very slow process) or bulk (which inevitably also involves gaining at least some fat back). Either option is more work and more time than trying to preserve it in the first place and hopefully being closer to your target (as far as body composition) when you get near your goal weight.

Yi5hedr3

When you get down to 10% Body Fat, then you scan start your bulk.