Question about Recomp and Diet

5mpkfg676d

Hi everyone,

I’m onto my 4th week of body recomp and I’m honestly seeing very minimal results. Im pretty disappointed to be honest.

Anyway, my question is: every body recomp YouTube video and website talks about figuring out your daily calories then subtracting 20% to work out how many calories you need a day to stay within the recomp range. However nobody mentions what you’re supposed to do with regards to your daily calorie intake when you’re working out.

Sure if my daily calorie intake to maintain is 2400 then my body recomp range should be about 1900-2000 calories a day, but what about the calories I burn at gym?

Should I add the calories I burn at the gym (usually around 450) to my body recomp range (therefore pushing my daily calorie intake ABOVE my maintenance intake)?

It’s so confusing and MyFitnessApp doesn’t help the issue by automatically adjusting my macros as I add exercise to my dairy.

Any guidance will be so appreciated!
Thanks!

ninerbuff

Recomp is a LONG PROCCESS. You're only a month into it. It could take A YEAR just to see decent results.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

tomcustombuilder

Forget recomp for now. Either prioritize Fatloss or muscle gain. What is your height and weight?

AnnPT77

If you need to lose a significant amount of fat to be in the healthy range, recomp isn't the ideal route, IMO. If you're in a healthy weight range, recomp is one reasonable option, but results are going to be quite gradual (read: slow. Months. Years.).

I'm not sure where the advice for a 20% cut off TDEE to recomp came from. For most people, that's about the maximum deduction you'd want from maintenance calories to prioritize fat loss (unless severely obese). Prioritizing fat loss inherently de-prioritizes muscle mass gain. (It doesn't necessarily mean zero muscle gain, but it's very situational; 20% below TDEE certainly isn't most favorable for muscle mass gain.)

There's a good thread here on recomp, with advice that seems more appropriate than that:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10177803/recomposition-maintaining-weight-while-losing-fat/p1

Your lifting program and overall good nutrition also matter.

As far as exercise calories:

If you use MFP to get your calorie estimate, it intends for you to set your activity level based on your pre-exercise life, then log exercise when you do it, and eat those calories to keep the same weight-management goal. This teaches the useful lesson that when we're more active, we can (and need to) eat more; and that when we're inactive, we should eat less for the same bodyweight result. That's why MFP adds to your goal when you log exercise.

If you use an outside TDEE calculator to get your calorie estimate, you would average in your exercise by picking an activity level in that calculator that considers both daily life and exercise activity. You'd then set your calorie goal manually in MFP (not via guided set-up). This gives you a consistent calorie goal every day, which some people like. But it does mean you need to actually do the exercise you told the calculator you'd planned, or weight results will differ. In this case, either don't log your exercise, or change the calories to zero when you log it, or don't eat the calories from the logged exercise.

If you sync a fitness tracker to MFP, there can be some brand-specific wrinkles. As a generality, the fitness tracker and MFP will compare how many calories MFP thinks you'd burn, and how many calories the tracker thinks you actually did burn, and they figure out an adjustment between them. Again, generalizing, it should be OK to eat those adjustment calories, but you'd want to enable negative adjustments in MFP so it can decrease as well as increase your goal (in case you're less active per your tracker than MFP expects). Again, different trackers can differ in details, so this general explanation may break down.

These are two different methods/approaches for weight management. Know which one works for you, and use it according to its own internal logic. Either one can work.

In either case, though, recognize that MFP or any outside calculator/method are just giving you a starting estimate that's the number of calories for the average person who's similar to you with respect to those few variables you tell the calculator, even if you enter exactly correct values. You're not an average, you're an individual. Your actual needs are likely to be close to average (because statistics, basically), but can be a bit higher or lower, and in rare cases significantly higher or lower.

Follow your starting estimate for 4-6 weeks (whole menstrual cycles for adult women not in menopause), look at your average bodyweight results, and adjust your calorie goal if necessary going forward.

ETA: If you're using one of those X times goal weight estimates for calories (where X is 12 or 15 or 18 or whatever), don't. They're way-stupid overgeneralized. Any decent research-based calculator is a better start. MFP is research based. For TDEE estimates, I like this one:

https://www.sailrabbit.com/bmr/

The user interface looks scary-complicated at first glance, but it has more (well-described) activity levels than most others, plus lets you compare multiple different research-based calorie estimates.

5mpkfg676d

tomcustombuilder wrote: »

Forget recomp for now. Either prioritize Fatloss or muscle gain. What is your height and weight?

176 cm
81 kg

5mpkfg676d

AnnPT77 wrote: »

If you need to lose a significant amount of fat to be in the healthy range, recomp isn't the ideal route, IMO. If you're in a healthy weight range, recomp is one reasonable option, but results are going to be quite gradual (read: slow. Months. Years.).

I'm not sure where the advice for a 20% cut off TDEE to recomp came from. For most people, that's about the maximum deduction you'd want from maintenance calories to prioritize fat loss (unless severely obese). Prioritizing fat loss inherently de-prioritizes muscle mass gain. (It doesn't necessarily mean zero muscle gain, but it's very situational; 20% below TDEE certainly isn't most favorable for muscle mass gain.)

There's a good thread here on recomp, with advice that seems more appropriate than that:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10177803/recomposition-maintaining-weight-while-losing-fat/p1

Your lifting program and overall good nutrition also matter.

As far as exercise calories:

If you use MFP to get your calorie estimate, it intends for you to set your activity level based on your pre-exercise life, then log exercise when you do it, and eat those calories to keep the same weight-management goal. This teaches the useful lesson that when we're more active, we can (and need to) eat more; and that when we're inactive, we should eat less for the same bodyweight result. That's why MFP adds to your goal when you log exercise.

If you use an outside TDEE calculator to get your calorie estimate, you would average in your exercise by picking an activity level in that calculator that considers both daily life and exercise activity. You'd then set your calorie goal manually in MFP (not via guided set-up). This gives you a consistent calorie goal every day, which some people like. But it does mean you need to actually do the exercise you told the calculator you'd planned, or weight results will differ. In this case, either don't log your exercise, or change the calories to zero when you log it, or don't eat the calories from the logged exercise.

If you sync a fitness tracker to MFP, there can be some brand-specific wrinkles. As a generality, the fitness tracker and MFP will compare how many calories MFP thinks you'd burn, and how many calories the tracker thinks you actually did burn, and they figure out an adjustment between them. Again, generalizing, it should be OK to eat those adjustment calories, but you'd want to enable negative adjustments in MFP so it can decrease as well as increase your goal (in case you're less active per your tracker than MFP expects). Again, different trackers can differ in details, so this general explanation may break down.

These are two different methods/approaches for weight management. Know which one works for you, and use it according to its own internal logic. Either one can work.

In either case, though, recognize that MFP or any outside calculator/method are just giving you a starting estimate that's the number of calories for the average person who's similar to you with respect to those few variables you tell the calculator, even if you enter exactly correct values. You're not an average, you're an individual. Your actual needs are likely to be close to average (because statistics, basically), but can be a bit higher or lower, and in rare cases significantly higher or lower.

Follow your starting estimate for 4-6 weeks (whole menstrual cycles for adult women not in menopause), look at your average bodyweight results, and adjust your calorie goal if necessary going forward.

ETA: If you're using one of those X times goal weight estimates for calories (where X is 12 or 15 or 18 or whatever), don't. They're way-stupid overgeneralized. Any decent research-based calculator is a better start. MFP is research based. For TDEE estimates, I like this one:

https://www.sailrabbit.com/bmr/

The user interface looks scary-complicated at first glance, but it has more (well-described) activity levels than most others, plus lets you compare multiple different research-based calorie estimates.

Wow that’s one hell of a reply. Thanks so much for taking the time to write all that out.

I’m currently 81kg / 176cm. I don’t really have a lot of fat to lose, just stubborn belly and a double chin. Problem is when I diet and lose weight I go as thin as a rake and I hate how I look. But if I go hard at the gym while bulking I can gain some good size but my belly and double chin get huge and I hate it. That’s why body recomp sounded like the ideal solution.

I do 5 days at the gym with 4 days split between full body push and pull days, with the 5th day for isolated exercises. I feel like it’s pretty much the max I can do exercise wise and I do a small amount of cardio twice a week.

Eating wise, this app MFP has helped me basically revolutionize how I eat and I’m so much more conscious of everything. That bar code scanner is a game changer! Right now I’m pretty happy with how healthily I’m eating, with the occasional cheat meal thrown in now and then for my sanity.

Thanks also for the explanation about the calorie intake. So basically I’m happy to follow MFPs adjusted numbers I just wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do. I didn’t want to accidentally start over eating but you’ve made a lot of sense here so I’m happy with that.

I’ll also check out that link you sent 👍🏼

Cheers!

tomcustombuilder

With your stats and your response to Ann’s post it sounds like you need a fairly small deficit to lose fat and maintain muscle.

Once you drop the fat you can go back to adding muscle with a very small surplus. You need very few cals over maintenance to add muscle and this is where most people get it wrong thinking they need a big surplus. Think 200 cal surplus for muscle gain as a natural lifter. Keep track of your waist measurement at your navel. If this number starts growing much you need to cut back on calories.

Recomp sounds great on paper however there are just too many ducks that need to be in a row for it to even have a chance of working so it’s always safe to pick Fatloss or muscle gain. That is something that there is no question as to if it will work plus you see changes in the body much faster which is important from a mental aspect.

Retroguy2000

I don't know where you got that 20% deficit from. That seems high for recomp. Better with 10% or less.

Recomp works best if you're a new lifter and you have a lot of body fat. I'm not sure the second applies to you here. Probably better to focus on fat loss for now, 20% deficit at most and keep lifting to retain muscle.

5mpkfg676d wrote: »

Should I add the calories I burn at the gym (usually around 450) to my body recomp range (therefore pushing my daily calorie intake ABOVE my maintenance intake)?

Think about that. You burn X per day typically. You burn Y more at the gym. Thus your TDEE today is X + Y.

You should target protein by grams. Don't worry about the macro changing based on your daily calories. I suggest at least 130g, maybe 140g.

cupcakesandproteinshakes

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

soulo_ridah

You are confusing recomp with cut. Cut is painful, quick and it sucks. Recomp takes a long long time.

soulo_ridah

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

cupcakesandproteinshakes

soulo_ridah wrote: »

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

Who knows? Maybe one day I will….

soulo_ridah

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

soulo_ridah wrote: »

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

Who knows? Maybe one day I will….

I know, you wont

AnnPT77

soulo_ridah wrote: »

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

Good grief.

99% of us don't want to look like a bodybuilder. Some of us don't even have an "ideal physique" we're shooting for . . . at least I doubt that I'm alone in that. OP doesn't mention wanting to look like a bodybuilder (and recomp, which he seems to have researched at least somewhat isn't normally a route someone would choose if they did want to look like a bodybuilder). People become bodybuilders, if that's what they want. Yes, it takes a long time, and persistent work.

OP doesn't mention that goal, doesn't mention appearance or physique at all, at least not that I can see on a quick re-read. There are lots of reasons to want to add muscle, and not all of them are "to look cute".

I get that you're joking, being puckish, or at least I think you are. The net effect, though, is possibly discouraging in context of the OP.

I don't even much lift, for sure not remotely seriously, and somehow developed more muscularity (starting after age 45 BTW) than most people in my demographic have (F, 67 now). Get progressively more active, gain more muscle. Lifting is faster, but other things can contribute, just much more slowly.

OP is lifting. He'll see progress, if he keeps it up. Not quite as fast progress as he may've been hoping for, I think, but progress nonetheless.

P.S. @cupcakesandproteinshakes tends to be modest, I'd say, based on photos of her I've seen here. I think she's pretty inspiring, TBH. She's been at this recomping thing quite persistently, with good results. She has experiential insight into the process, certainly - very relevant to the OP.

Jthanmyfitnesspal

5mpkfg676d wrote: »

I’m currently 81kg / 176cm. I don’t really have a lot of fat to lose, just stubborn belly and a double chin. Problem is when I diet and lose weight I go as thin as a rake and I hate how I look. But if I go hard at the gym while bulking I can gain some good size but my belly and double chin get huge and I hate it. That’s why body recomp sounded like the ideal solution.

I hear you! As one dude to another: if you do just weights don't control your eating, you'll get heavy and strong. It's not all bad, people will give you more space.

If you eat a good diet at about maintenance, do weights, and some cardio. Bam! Good things start to happen. You may not see it in the mirror (at first), but if you watch your progress, you'll see it there.

Now, what's meant by "maintenance." It means eating what you burn, including workouts. Workouts with weights don't burn that many calories, so be careful with that. But, if you do significant cardo, you should definitely eat something to counterbalance it (or you'll lose some weight, not horrible).

5mpkfg676d

Jthanmyfitnesspal wrote: »

5mpkfg676d wrote: »

I’m currently 81kg / 176cm. I don’t really have a lot of fat to lose, just stubborn belly and a double chin. Problem is when I diet and lose weight I go as thin as a rake and I hate how I look. But if I go hard at the gym while bulking I can gain some good size but my belly and double chin get huge and I hate it. That’s why body recomp sounded like the ideal solution.

I hear you! As one dude to another: if you do just weights don't control your eating, you'll get heavy and strong. It's not all bad, people will give you more space.

If you eat a good diet at about maintenance, do weights, and some cardio. Bam! Good things start to happen. You may not see it in the mirror (at first), but if you watch your progress, you'll see it there.

Now, what's meant by "maintenance." It means eating what you burn, including workouts. Workouts with weights don't burn that many calories, so be careful with that. But, if you do significant cardo, you should definitely eat something to counterbalance it (or you'll lose some weight, not horrible).

Thanks man, that’s what I’m aiming for now. I guess i just need to be patient. Which is not a bad thing to learn 😂

5mpkfg676d

AnnPT77 wrote: »

soulo_ridah wrote: »

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

Good grief.

99% of us don't want to look like a bodybuilder. Some of us don't even have an "ideal physique" we're shooting for . . . at least I doubt that I'm alone in that. OP doesn't mention wanting to look like a bodybuilder (and recomp, which he seems to have researched at least somewhat isn't normally a route someone would choose if they did want to look like a bodybuilder). People become bodybuilders, if that's what they want. Yes, it takes a long time, and persistent work.

OP doesn't mention that goal, doesn't mention appearance or physique at all, at least not that I can see on a quick re-read. There are lots of reasons to want to add muscle, and not all of them are "to look cute".

I get that you're joking, being puckish, or at least I think you are. The net effect, though, is possibly discouraging in context of the OP.

I don't even much lift, for sure not remotely seriously, and somehow developed more muscularity (starting after age 45 BTW) than most people in my demographic have (F, 67 now). Get progressively more active, gain more muscle. Lifting is faster, but other things can contribute, just much more slowly.

OP is lifting. He'll see progress, if he keeps it up. Not quite as fast progress as he may've been hoping for, I think, but progress nonetheless.

P.S. @cupcakesandproteinshakes tends to be modest, I'd say, based on photos of her I've seen here. I think she's pretty inspiring, TBH. She's been at this recomping thing quite persistently, with good results. She has experiential insight into the process, certainly - very relevant to the OP.

This is very true. I’m not after a body builder physique. I just want to get rid of my belly fat and gain some muscle definition. Not sure why this other guy is being such a negative Nancy about my post but I’m thankful that everyone else is seemingly nice and helpful in this community.

AnnPT77

5mpkfg676d wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

soulo_ridah wrote: »

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I’ve basically been recomping for 3 years because bulking ain’t my jam and I hate dieting. It’s a longgggggg proceess. You won’t see much in a month.

Your training programme is key. You must set up a programme with progressive overload.

You won’t look like a pro body builder recomping. I think most of them do bulk/cut cycles and some have chemical assistance.

I look like a lift, I’m just not ripped.

99% of us will not look like a body builder lol
Close your eyes and imagine your ideal physique, now open your eyes, you are NOT getting it - G.D.

Good grief.

99% of us don't want to look like a bodybuilder. Some of us don't even have an "ideal physique" we're shooting for . . . at least I doubt that I'm alone in that. OP doesn't mention wanting to look like a bodybuilder (and recomp, which he seems to have researched at least somewhat isn't normally a route someone would choose if they did want to look like a bodybuilder). People become bodybuilders, if that's what they want. Yes, it takes a long time, and persistent work.

OP doesn't mention that goal, doesn't mention appearance or physique at all, at least not that I can see on a quick re-read. There are lots of reasons to want to add muscle, and not all of them are "to look cute".

I get that you're joking, being puckish, or at least I think you are. The net effect, though, is possibly discouraging in context of the OP.

I don't even much lift, for sure not remotely seriously, and somehow developed more muscularity (starting after age 45 BTW) than most people in my demographic have (F, 67 now). Get progressively more active, gain more muscle. Lifting is faster, but other things can contribute, just much more slowly.

OP is lifting. He'll see progress, if he keeps it up. Not quite as fast progress as he may've been hoping for, I think, but progress nonetheless.

P.S. @cupcakesandproteinshakes tends to be modest, I'd say, based on photos of her I've seen here. I think she's pretty inspiring, TBH. She's been at this recomping thing quite persistently, with good results. She has experiential insight into the process, certainly - very relevant to the OP.

This is very true. I’m not after a body builder physique. I just want to get rid of my belly fat and gain some muscle definition. Not sure why this other guy is being such a negative Nancy about my post but I’m thankful that everyone else is seemingly nice and helpful in this community.

Ehh, don't let it get to you. Sometimes people (including me) are just being chatty or even joke-y/provocative on a public thread, don't think how the comment may land in context of the OP. It helps to cultivate a bit of a thick skin, let any perceived negativity roll off.

I agree that most people here sincerely do want to help, but there'll be a diversity of opinions, and communication styles ranging from touchy-feely to extreme tough love and beyond. With a bit of time, you'll figure out which posters are more knowledgeable, but I'd observe that we're still all random idiots on the internet (me for sure included). Keep seeking out solid sources on all sides of a question - on MFP and elsewhere; watch out for the scammy marketers and those who've bought into popular diet or fitness mythologies; follow up any info in ways that include critiques of that info; and you'll do fine.

Advice here, mine and others', is pretty much guaranteed to be worth the price you paid us for it. Caveat emptor!

tomcustombuilder

some people are afraid of looking like a bodybuilder. They don’t have to worry. Looking like a bodybuilder takes a huge amount of dedication and desire and a causal lifter has zero chance of looking like that, man or woman.

I remember someone telling Arnold Schwarzenegger that they don’t want to look like him and he said “don’t worry, you never will”.

Don’t be afraid of weights or some sort of resistance training, it can be your fountain of youth and it doesn’t have to be that heavy.

Cheers!
Happy Training….

nossmf

I do 5 days at the gym with 4 days split between full body push and pull days, with the 5th day for isolated exercises.

I'm a little confused about what you mean here. Are you doing 4 full-body days? Two push and two pull days, with no leg day? Whatever regimen you select, do not ignore leg day! Aesthetically it's great to have strong legs to go with a strong upper body, plus the leg muscles (being bigger) burn more calories than arm muscles, plus my bench press actually improved when I really started to hammer my legs.