Recomp advice needed.

sinead29
sinead29 Posts: 69 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Looking for a bit of advice. Im female 36, 5'4 and 127 lb bf is 23% i think..over the last year ive lost 35 lbs but carry most of my fat in my middle and have started lifting to get the body i want.i was lifting my own program for about a month but now Ive started stronglifts( on week 2). I also do a circuit class once a week. Over the last month i havnt really seen any changes to my middle, What im not sure of though is whether to cut or eat at maintenance. At the moment im eating 1760 cals per day. Any advice on how to go forward?

Replies

  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,809 Member
    Cut if you want to lose weight, eat at maintenance if you don't.

    A month is not enough time to see any progress. Take measurements and photos and be patient.
  • Rusty740
    Rusty740 Posts: 749 Member
    Yeah, a month isn't long enough, Revisit in 8-12 weeks when your 1RMs are way up. I'd consider dropping calories by 100 if you can keep up with Stronglifts' increases while doing so.
  • VeggieBarbells
    VeggieBarbells Posts: 175 Member
    sijomial wrote: »
    Cut if you want to lose weight, eat at maintenance if you don't.

    A month is not enough time to see any progress. Take measurements and photos and be patient.
    ^^^ This is on point and measurements / photos is exactly what I do.
    Any advice on how to go forward?
    I'd say think 12 months to see real noticeable differences. Of course everyone is different but 1 month is a drop in the ocean. Also dead lifting really helps or anything that works your core will make an impact. Cross fit exercises aren't for everyone but boy do they work your core muscle groups. To be fair, expect this to be a long haul. Unless you've got good genetics, that's realistic. Good luck.
  • bethany_rose8
    bethany_rose8 Posts: 102 Member
    Keep eating at maintenance, training, drinking water and take advantage of products with digestive enzymes like yogurt, kombucha etc
  • sinead29
    sinead29 Posts: 69 Member
    Thanks everyone. Im going to follow everyones advice and just stick at it and check progress in about 12 weeks. I will eat at a small deficit though i think, until my lifts stall.
  • Spliner1969
    Spliner1969 Posts: 3,233 Member
    sinead29 wrote: »
    Looking for a bit of advice. Im female 36, 5'4 and 127 lb bf is 23% i think..over the last year ive lost 35 lbs but carry most of my fat in my middle and have started lifting to get the body i want.i was lifting my own program for about a month but now Ive started stronglifts( on week 2). I also do a circuit class once a week. Over the last month i havnt really seen any changes to my middle, What im not sure of though is whether to cut or eat at maintenance. At the moment im eating 1760 cals per day. Any advice on how to go forward?

    Best advice for recomp.. patience. It's gonna take time. Imagine how long you think it'll take then double it, and you might be there. I've been at it for about 1.5 years now and still going at it. Occasionally I'll add calories to gain a little, then cut a little (very small amounts, and usually no more than 60 days for a slight bulk and 60 days of a slight cut) but honestly in all that time the extra fat I carry in my midsection has maybe been cut in half. It's still there. The only way to see it completely gone is to go back to a cut, drop my calories 500ish a day and stay there until its gone. I just don't want to lose that much weight at the moment. I'm at the high end of the BMI for normal for my height, but with the muscle mass I've managed to put on in recomp all this time, I'm happy where I am. The midsection is probably not where I want it, but it may never be without me dropping another 20 lbs.

    I decided it was better to build more muscle for a while before attempting another serious deficit. So I set out about a year ago to gain 15 lbs of muscle then do a cut if there was any fat left (Jury is out on how much i've gained but my original goal was probably too high). My personal upper limit for weight is the limit of the normal BMI scale (for me it's 194lbs). Once I hit that, or get really close to it, I'll start that cut and try to drop 10lbs to see where I am (10lbs may not be necessary). I'm at around 187-189 right now, and when I started recomp I was at 178. I honestly can't really see that I've added any fat (this is a good thing) during the recomp phase, but I know I have because caliper tests show me at around 13-14% body fat now vs about 11% when I started recomp. Regardless recomp has allowed me to eat at a happy range of calories for quite some time, and I'm not going in any particular wrong direction. So back to my original statement, have patience. The only way to lose the last bit of belly/midsection fat is to cut/eat at a deficit. If you aren't willing to drop another 10lbs or so to see if it goes away, then I suggest recomp and add some muscle over the period of 6 months or more before considering it. But before you switch to maintenance/recomp make sure you have at least 10lbs of wiggle room for your weight (I dropped 10lbs below my original goal before starting recomp). The goal is to gain muscle and lose fat, but it's not always that simple. In order to gain muscle you're always going to gain a little fat. Both of those mean added weight. Just my .02 based on what's worked for me.. and I'm not even finished after 18 months.
  • RedSquadronLeader
    RedSquadronLeader Posts: 84 Member
    sijomial wrote: »
    bethany_rose8 wrote: »
    Keep eating at maintenance, training, drinking water and take advantage of products with digestive enzymes like yogurt, kombucha etc

    FIFY

    Yeah water's not useful for anything.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,809 Member
    edited June 2017
    RedSquadronLeader wrote: »
    sijomial wrote: »
    bethany_rose8 wrote: »
    Keep eating at maintenance, training, drinking water and take advantage of products with digestive enzymes like yogurt, kombucha etc

    FIFY

    Yeah water's not useful for anything.

    Do you really think specifically drinking water is a prerequisite for recomping? Or going to magically make it more effective or faster?

    The more water I drink the faster my arms grow and my stomach fat goes - said no-one ever.....


  • tcunbeliever
    tcunbeliever Posts: 8,219 Member
    I'm 10 weeks into Leangains (calorie and carb cycling) - this is the first time I have seen significant low belly measurement reductions, that's always my problem area too. I can't even begin to claim to understand how or why it works, but it's working for me. I used this site do calculate my macros:
    https://rippedbody.com/how-to-calculate-leangains-macros/
  • Spliner1969
    Spliner1969 Posts: 3,233 Member
    tcunbeliever wrote: »
    I'm 10 weeks into Leangains (calorie and carb cycling) - this is the first time I have seen significant low belly measurement reductions, that's always my problem area too. I can't even begin to claim to understand how or why it works, but it's working for me. I used this site do calculate my macros:
    https://rippedbody.com/how-to-calculate-leangains-macros/

    That's an interesting calculator. I'll have to play around with it. Although it puts me back at the 'eat less on rest days' routine which I hate. I spread my weekly calories out over seven days so I can eat the same each day whether or not I'm working out or not.

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