Goal: Gaining muscle while losing fat

kdiamond

I think if you clean up your diet (and by clean up I really just mean watching calories), eat at maintenance and lift heavy, you'll achieve your goals. Recomp is slow but it can be done if you're disciplined. It really doesn't matter how you split up your weight training but 3-4x a week is good. Do less cardio, or do HIIT a couple of times a week instead.

Cortelli

I would note that no study I've seen has shown any benefits (unless taking lots steroids, anyway) from over 1g/lb of body weight, or more accurately, .8g/lb of lean bodyweight. And these tend to be upper bounds which have had an extra 10% or whatever already added 'just in case' your body happens to need a bit more.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1158604-eric-helms-protein-research

The study that Sarauk2sf describes in detail above (link in the thread) suggests that - while cutting - resistance trained athletes appear to optimize lean body mass retention with between 1.1g and 1.4g of protein per lb of LBM, scaling to the higher end with leanness and/or greater caloric deficit. I like this study because it reviews existing, available studies for characteristics that are important to *me* in determining where my protein intake should fall: the review parameters include results that come from adult (≥ 18 yrs), energy-restricted, resistance-trained (> 6 months) humans of lower body fat (males ≤ 23% and females ≤ 35%) performing resistance training. Protein intake, fat free mass (FFM) and body fat had to be reported in these studies (so not just nitrogen balance, etc.). I'd be curious to see a study like this covering bulking as the conventional wisdom has it that less protein is fine when bulking.

geebusuk

bmele0:
'Tone is merely the state of having some but not big muscle (it's very hard for women to get big muscles without having lots of testosterone) and low fat to be able to see it.
The good news is (if it can be thought like that), is that having a good bit of extra weight you probably have above average muscle from that - making sure you use it and eat adequate protein will help ensure you lose as low a proportion of it as possible.
The best time, as it goes, to start weight training is always 'now' ...
Then, when you get to a lower fat level, if you want to gain more muscle to show some 'tone', you're in a better position.

Does anyone think you need to gain fat to heal a burn or a cut?

Does anyone think that evolution would have createdf a system where healing an injury requires the same features that adding calorie-burning mass does?
As it goes, a friend is currently eating at a decent deficit and hurt his leg - not from doing anything specific. He's been limiting the use of it, but it's not been healing - getting worse if anything. I don't know the details, but I do suspect that in this case the body doesn't have the resources available to a decent job on the injury.

Prostaglandins are made from essential fatty acids, and why they are often marketed as an anabolic bodybuilding supplement in a variety of products (such as cla). So at least now you know why that stuff is sitting on the shelf of your local gnc but it is easy enough to get them in your diet by eating fats, especially fish, flax seed and nuts.
[/quote]

Lil_Northern_Light

i really like the top portion of your last reply @gee.

I'm actually really enjoying this workout, and yes trying hard to kept protein levels higher than I used to have - tough, and slow going . getting the toning done, still lots more work, but will continue with weights! :happy: