Am I looking for a unicorn?

dblanke01

I have two questions. I want to gain muscle while decreasing body fat. Is it possible to do this simultaneously? Right now I’m eating at a caloric deficit. I’m female, 5’5, 135 lbs. I weight train or do HIIT or body weight workouts. Which brings me to my second question: can I build muscle doing body weight workouts? I don’t have weights at home and can only get to the gym 2x/wk.

MikePTY

It's possible to do, especially if you eat close to maintainence and do a body recomposition, but sometimes even at higher deficits. But you are likely going to need to do more weight lifting (it was unclear exactly how much you do). Body weight exercises are good and build strength, but if you are trying to gain muscle in a deficit nothing beats plain old lifting heavy.

erickirb

Most likely you will not build muscle on a routine like that in a deficit. You can gain small amounts of muscle in a deficit, but would probably require more than 2x/week and should be on a structure tried tested and true program.

Typically, lifting while in a deficit is to maintain the muscle you already have as it is easier to retain then to build it after the fact (even when in a surplus, building muscle is slow)

mom23mangos

Body weight is fine for upper body, especially as a female. I almost solely train my upper body with bodyweight. So save your 2x/week of gym for lower body. And use a reliable program for your upper body workouts. You Are Your Own Gym. Convict Conditioning, Gymnastic Bodies, GMB Fitness, Calisthenics Academy....

xineasaurus

You can lose weight while building muscle, but you have to be careful about hitting the right macros. So, a lot of protein. The recommendation for women trying to gain muscle is .6 - .9 grams of protein per pound of body weight, so you're looking at 80+ grams per day. I'm also a woman trying to recomp at a deficit, and for me this is a tremendous hassle because I don't eat a lot of meat (ugh, so much greek yogurt!).

Also, want to agree with moms23mangos that body weight exercises are fine for building upper body strength for most women and 2x a week going heavy lower body in the gym (squats and deadlifts! with auxiliary movements!) will get you there just fine.

rosiorama

You’re going to get a deluge of opinions, so pick what best works for you.

If you can only get to the gym twoce a week, I’d say start a full body program because contrary to other posters, I find that just doing body weight exercises only gets me so far and is not enough for me. And I’d devote that gym time to lifting, because you can get your cardio in outside the gym (not including your warmup).

Two times a week at the gym can be supplemented by what you do at home. Make sure you get that protein in - my food choices revolve around getting protein in at every meal and snack, whether it’s in the form of cottage cheese, animal protein, protein powder or bars... higher protein in my diet also helps me keep my calories in track.

Good luck!

mom23mangos

rosiorama wrote: »

You’re going to get a deluge of opinions, so pick what best works for you.

If you can only get to the gym twoce a week, I’d say start a full body program because contrary to other posters, I find that just doing body weight exercises only gets me so far and is not enough for me. And I’d devote that gym time to lifting, because you can get your cardio in outside the gym (not including your warmup).

Two times a week at the gym can be supplemented by what you do at home. Make sure you get that protein in - my food choices revolve around getting protein in at every meal and snack, whether it’s in the form of cottage cheese, animal protein, protein powder or bars... higher protein in my diet also helps me keep my calories in track.

Good luck!

Have you ever followed an established program? I find it very hard to believe that as a female you ran out of progressions as far as strength goes. Heck, even as a man, unless you are this guy maybe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vH4MH6Bb8Pw

Or are you not able to put on as much mass as you like?

JBanx256

You CAN build muscle while in a deficit but it's slow (and building muscle for females is slow to begin with, soooo....yeah - I'm pretty freakin' proud of what I managed to do in these comparison photos. Approx 5 lbs lost and size off my waist, but added size to my quads). Bodyweight...ehhhh...if you're looking to pack on some mass, bodyweight isn't going to be the most effective route.

Tic78

JBanx256 wrote: »

You CAN build muscle while in a deficit but it's slow (and building muscle for females is slow to begin with, soooo....yeah - I'm pretty freakin' proud of what I managed to do in these comparison photos. Approx 5 lbs lost and size off my waist, but added size to my quads). Bodyweight...ehhhh...if you're looking to pack on some mass, bodyweight isn't going to be the most effective route.

I’d be damn proud of they results too. Great work 💪

JBanx256

Tic78 wrote: »

I’d be damn proud of they results too. Great work 💪

Thanks! That's 2 pretty rough months LOL. Not where I wanna be yet, but getting closer...

dblanke01

JBanx256 wrote: »

You CAN build muscle while in a deficit but it's slow (and building muscle for females is slow to begin with, soooo....yeah - I'm pretty freakin' proud of what I managed to do in these comparison photos. Approx 5 lbs lost and size off my waist, but added size to my quads). Bodyweight...ehhhh...if you're looking to pack on some mass, bodyweight isn't going to be the most effective route.

DAAAANG it’s not even WCW and I’m 😻😻😻. Teach me your ways!!!!

mom23mangos

You look freaking amazing @JBanx256!

JBanx256

mom23mangos wrote: »

You look freaking amazing @JBanx256!

thank ya ma'am!