How long to Newbie Gains occur?

lindsey1979

I've read a lot about Newbie gains when one starts a serious heavy lifting program (like Starting Strength). Does anyone know how long they tend to last? Is it the first 30 days, first 90, etc.? Or is it defined by so long as you're still increasing your weight on your lifts by a certain amount? Is it related to lifting a certain percentage of your bodyweight for certain lifts?

I'm particularly interested in this for those that are in a caloric deficit rather than those looking to bulk/gain muscle.

wonderbeard101

It's really a very individual thing, involving many systems of your body, as well as being affected by training and diet.

It takes time for the nervous system to pick up new skills. Think of a child learning how to throw a ball. There's a cognitive part where they learn the technique (release the ball at this point to make it go at that angle), but there's also a neuromuscular part where the body itself has to learn the control needed to release the ball at that point. You can think of that part as "muscle-memory."

In the weightlifting case, your body is adapting to moving and controlling relatively heavy loads. Your hormone levels change slightly, your body stores and processes nutrients differently, your bones and muscles become more dense, and your central nervous system (CNS) becomes much more efficient and precise at performing those movements. While all of those things come into play, newbie gains typically refer mostly to CNS development, as this is relatively quick to adapt.

Your CNS will continue to develop as you challenge it with new exercises and higher weights, but the biggest change it makes during that process is when you FIRST start challenging your body with heavy weights. So, basically, your newbie gains will last for as long as your CNS continues that first adaptation.

I know that didn't really answer your question, but hopefully it gives you a bit of insight into how incredibly cool the human body is.

lindsey1979

I totally hear ya, and I appreciate the information. I was just trying to figure out if newbie gains had something more defineable -- either a time period, a measure of weight, or something else?

I'm in a caloric deficit as well and I understand at some point, I will hit a wall and not be able to increase weight anymore. I haven't reached that point yet and was wondering if that was the demarcation point or if something else was.

Cortelli

I usually understand "newbie gains" to refer to actual additional muscle mass -- i.e., a previously untrained novice can generally add muscle mass much more easily than a regular strength trainer, and may even be able to do the otherwise unusual -- add a bit of muscle mass while in a caloric deficit. I don't think of "newbie gains" as referring to strength increases.

I was in decent shape and lifting pretty regularly about 5 years ago. I stopped lifting, and adopted a number of higher priorities than training or weight management, ignored fitness and diet (except to eat lots of really tasty, interesting food and drink!) and added a bunch of weight over the course of 3 - 4 years. I returned to lifting after a 4-year layoff around May / June last year at the same time I started trying to lose weight. Over the course of 8 months or so, while more or less continuosly in a caloric deficit, I continued to make strength gains. Only on a few accessory exercises did I seem to max out on strength -- on many others, I was still getting stronger 8 months into my new exercise regime. To be clear, I was not adding muscle mass, I was just getting stronger.

Now maybe that's a reflection about how weak I had let myself become, or maybe the fact that I wasn't doing the exact same exercises for 8 months (even if working the same muscle groups), or maybe I'm just an outlier, but I thought I'd share that to the extent you are asking about strength gains rather than muscle mass increase, you might be able to go for quite a long time making strength gains even while in a continuous deficit.

lindsey1979

Thanks for the reply, Cortelli. I wasn't sure if the term references increases in strength, muscle mass or both. I could see it going either way. I was just hoping to have a better idea of how long this goes on for until adaption sets in -- and when that is. So long as you're increasing weight, is that enough?

I'm thinking of it in a fat loss perspective in particular and if there should be some point at which I should take some time off or switch up movements to get the most bang for my buck out of my workouts. Right now I'm doing the classic 3x5 routine, but hit a mini-plateau in my actual weight loss for unforeseen reasons (i.e. deficit is still solid but the weight stopped coming off for a little more than 2 weeks). It could just be a water/whoosh thing, though previously I'd lost pretty consistently and in line with my calorie deficits. I also have some other issues (thyroid and insulin resistance) which could be contributors or not -- I don't know. Just that what I was doing before was yielding results and then just stopped for the time being without a really obvious reason why.

Cortelli

Hmm - can't help with the weight loss issue especially since I really don't know a whole lot about thyroid and IR issues, but I suspect it is not directly related to your lifting if you're doing the same routine. So long as you're increasing weight (or reps, then weight) -- i.e., progressively overloading your muscles -- you're getting stronger until you hit a ceiling.

I suppose its possible that, given your CNS adaptations (part of why you get stronger), your body is getting more efficient with energy utilization to fuel your workouts and recovery, in which case your calorie estimates for the lifting work may now be higher than they actually are or were - but it sounds like the size of your deficit should make this possibility a minor thing (if it is even real) as opposed to wiping the deficit out (also presume you are recalculating energy needs as your body weight comes down - but again, probably small in the grand scheme of things).

FWIW, I lost pretty consistently, but did have a few weird "WTF?" periods of no loss or weirdly rapid loss, but generally no more than 10 days or maybe a little more. I wasn't on one of the standard and popular 3 x 5 or similar programs (I would have been if I could do it over again even though I am pretty happy with my ultimate results) and I did switch up some exercises, but that was mostly for variety and I was still hitting the same muscle groups, just in slightly different ways. I don't think it really impacted the energy burns or fat loss directly, though. Wish I had better insighty to share!

lindsey1979

Yeah, well I'm learning about all the thyroid and IR issues right now As for calorie burn estimations, I'm using one of the bodymedia armbands and they appear rather accurate from what I can tell -- and take into account my new weight as I go.

I am consistently increasing weight -- they're much smaller amounts, sometimes only a lb or two each session -- but it is going up and over a month, it adds up. I have felt recently sort of run down -- like I wasn't recovering fully. Why? I can't say. Work is stressful, but not more so than it was 2 months ago. My guess is that I just needed a little extra recovery time for whatever reason or I may be having a thyroid flare up (my thyroid issue is of the auto-immune variety so it makes me swing hypo and hyper) as I have noticed some small hypo symptoms more recently in addition to the weight stall.

So I opted to skip a lifting and sprint session mid-week and just walk a lot as a semi-rest week. And I do feel more recovered, so I take that as a good sign. I plan to re-engage both lifting and sprinting this weekend per the usual. I just hope that the weight issues start to resolve and this plateau breaks cause it is confusing as all get-out.

Cortelli

Be careful with faith in the armbands -- they are apparently great at tracking steps and heartbeats, but translating into calories is a bit tricky. I don't have one, but from the research I had done and the general feedback I've seen on these forums, it certainly sounds like they do a great job of very general tracking of daily activity but they don't translate very well to calorie estimates for non-step based activity (i.e., lifting), and probably don't do a great job, calorie-wise, on sprints as opposed to walking or a more leisurely jog.

Just adding a pound or two or a rep or two is plenty of progress -- as you've discovered it adds up really quickly! The run-down feeling could be a bit of CNS overload or over-training -- and of course it could be any of dozens of other things. There are so many variables in all this that without a ton of experience with your own body and reactions in similar circumstances it is very, very hard to figure out.

I think you are right to ease back and skip a few workouts when feeling run-down or just not up to it -- there are other alternatives, but one all-too-frequent unwelcome alternative is trying to push through and then really suffering a setback by injuring yourself in some way. I've done that and luckily got away with just minor setbacks as opposed to something that could sideline me for weeks. I like to think I'll make better choices going forward but we all tend to be a bit over-optimistic and over-confident from time to time so it's something to keep your eye on.

lindsey1979

I agree with you on the armbands. There are some things it's not good for at all -- like when I'm in traffic or mowing the lawn on our riding law mower. It apparently thinks I'm jogging or something, so I don't wear it for those activities at all and the activity tracked is just like I'm sleeping. I see some indication of activity during lifting and sprinting, big spikes in the METS for short periods of time, but overall it's less than the prolonged activity of walking, which is where I burn most of my calories. I think I walked 32 miles last week in my neighborhood and there are some good hills there too 400-500 feet or so every 3 miles. So, if anything, I figure the armband is underestimating my calorie burn as the activities where there may be more, I'm either not wearing it or it's not showing much. Either way, the vast majority of my calorie burn is coming from daily activity (which during the week isn't much as I have a desk job) or my walks after work or on the weekend. I feel it's highly unlikely that it's overestimating the walking calorie burn as when I've compared the walking numbers, they're very close or slightly lower than what I find with online calculators or my running app. And, more than anything, up until 18 days ago or so, I was totally losing right in line with the calculated deficits from my calories and burn as calculated by the armband.

I did cut back on the lifting for a semi-rest week so we'll see if things turn around in the next 7-10 days.

wonderbeard101

Out of curiosity, how long have you been eating at a deficit, and have you been doing low carb?

lindsey1979

I believe I was eating at a deficit for most of last year, though I didn't get into strict measurements until the latter half of the year. I did lose some weight, but it was very, very slow -- like 2.2 lbs over 3 months when the calculated deficit should have yielded 15-18 lbs in that time period. That was consistent with what I was losing before hand, but with a lot more exercise and similar food intake (I was training for a half marathon) -- so I figure I was likely in a similar deficit earlier.

After showing my strict calorie counting numbers to my doc, he was finally convinced that something was up (I was eating at 700+ daily caloric deficit). Eventually I was diagnosed with a thyroid issue and a glucose metabolism issue (insulin resistance). The weight only started to come off like a "normal" person when I started on medication for those two issues -- about mid-February of this year. I wasn't up to my full clinical doses yet, but I was close -- probably 75% or so. I had been lifting for a few months last year but then stopped and hadn't been lifting for a good six months when I began again in earnest late January of this year.

As for how long I've been going low carb, hard to say. I went Paleo and then later Primal last year around February and so a lot of my carbs had been cut down due to that since I wasn't eating any grains, pasta, rice, etc. It was the first thing I'd found to help out with the fatigue in particular (which now I know was caused by my hypothyroid and possibly insulin resistance). But I didn't start to consciously keep the carbs lower until the insulin resistance diagnosis -- which I now generally keep them at total carbs of 60-80 g per day. Looking back at my diaries, I think I averaged 130-150 or so, but some days were 60 and some days were over 200 -- the big difference tended to be if I ate more fruit or sweet potatoes on those days.