Not much progress with body recomposition?

epadmeister

Strength training lovelies, I need your help.

The good news is, I got to my GW of 55kgs almost two months ago :drinker:

The "egh" news is, I went on holiday for 2 1/2 weeks and ate at a surplus for a while! As soon as I got back I got myself back on track and back at my goal weight :bigsmile:

The bad news is, I started a strength training routine and I feel like I've not progressed in the last 4 weeks with my "maintenance" routine and I don't want to give up! I do 3 sets of 12 - 15 reps of shoulder press, seated row, squat press, reverse leg extension, leg extension, chest press, reverse back extension and double crunches, followed with 4 mins of "Tabata" training on a bicycle. I try to get this in 3 times a week, and do 2 cardio sessions and 2 rest days as well.

My body weight fluctuates up / down a couple of lbs throughout the week, I know that's normal, however my measurements haven't budged either. I keep seesawing between eating at maintenance / surplus / deficit because I'm just not sure what to do: you can't lose fat without a deficit but you can't gain muscle without a surplus! ... what kind of calories do I need to be eating?!

I know 4 weeks is not a lot of time and it'll take a hell of a lot longer, I just want to be on the right track and know I've done everything possible

Height: 161cm
Weight: 55kg
BF%: 27% (according to my crappy scales which are incredibly unreliable!)

abadvat

Got your things mixed up... 12-15 reps is not strenght conditioning - far from it!
Second - recomping is a rather complicated topic and unless you are very comfortable in what you are doing and the overall sports nutrition topic then it might be tricky to wake up one day and decide to recomp!
Last but not least - deficit you burn - surplus you build but at maintenance you are still be able to burn and build at the same time hence no need to go up one day and down the other.

MyRummyHens

Are you progressively increasing your weights/resistance for those exercises? The way you encourage your body to keep strengthening muscle mass is to increase the weight you are using progressively.

Regarding what to eat, if you are happy with your current weight then I would suggest eating at maintenance whilst you get used to your changing physique and then go from there. If you want to drop body fat faster you can aim to drop your calories slightly to help the process whilst retaining what muscle mass you have. If your priority is more muscle mass over fat loss then you can increase your calories slightly to encourage your muscle mass to increase.

Recomp is notoriously slow, I would be gob smacked if you'd seem massive improvements in 4 weeks unless you were working out 3-5 days a week with a truly exceptional trainer.

MyRummyHens

You've changed your profile photo. To my untrained eye I think you look (from that August photo at least) to be less than 27% body fat. There is a group on here called Eat, Train, Progress. The lovely people who run the group do eyeball body fat percentages from a set of photographs. Perhaps it would be worth joining and getting an idea from them where you are body fat wise.

It all really comes down to what you want first, less body fat or more muscle, if you've got a more accurate idea of where you are at with body fat then it might help you prioritize.

epadmeister

Got your things mixed up... 12-15 reps is not strenght conditioning - far from it!

Okay, what do you suggest I do? Thanks for the heads up btw

body recomp is extremely complicated

Oops, I thought it meant increase muscle while losing fat! My mistake.

Last but not least - deficit you burn - surplus you build but at maintenance you are still be able to burn and build at the same time hence no need to go up one day and down the other.

Ahh. This is a penny dropping moment for me, thanks! :bigsmile:

Are you progessively increasing your weights for those exercises?

Yep, definitely! I'm slowly moving up as the weeks go on
And totally, I'm really not expecting results in 4 weeks, I just want to make sure I'm doing the right thing. So far, I've gathered:

1) Eat at maintenance
2) Lift heavy things
3) Don't give up and have lots of patience!

MyRummyHens

With regards number of reps. There is some debate about what is best for what, but the most popular consensus is that low reps (1-6) is the optimum for increased strength and medium reps (8-12) are best for muscle hypertrophy. I personally like 3x5 for strength and 3x10 for growth and I vary it according the the specific exercise any my goal for that set of muscles.

sijomial

Disagree with the comment that recomp is complex. It can be but doesn't have to be.
Eat at maintenance including adequate protein intake, train well, get enough rest & recovery time and be patient - that's it.

But it's not quick, especially for women. In 4 weeks you should be seeing strength improvements in being able to increase your weights or improved strength endurance in being able to do more reps at the same weight but don't expect to see anything else measurable than that in such a short time. My timeframe for measuring progress is six months but I'm a dinosaur with 40 training years behind me so would expect you to do better than that.

Unless your main goal is strength endurance I would definitely drop your reps and increase the weights.

This statement isn't true at all for people who aren't already fully trained and very lean.

you can't lose fat without a deficit but you can't gain muscle without a surplus!

abadvat

Disagree with the comment that recomp is complex. It can be but doesn't have to be.
Eat at maintenance including adequate protein intake, train well, get enough rest & recovery time and be patient - that's it.

In this case OP seems to require guidance due to the deficit / loose & surplus / gain theorie.

Did probably not formulate it well - not complex however you do need to know what you are doing and need to know what your maintenance is. Whilst you might key in numbers from a website you still need to trial and error on yourself a cut, a maintenance and a bulk to understand how it works and what you can expect - you can't wake up one morning and say x website told me to maintain at xxx calories - let's recomp.

abadvat

Got your things mixed up... 12-15 reps is not strenght conditioning - far from it!

Okay, what do you suggest I do? Thanks for the heads up btw

Lower the reps range and lift weights that usually would set you to faillure at about 5-6 reps.
Progressivelly increase weights when you are able to reach 5-6 reps easily.

body recomp is extremely complicated

Oops, I thought it meant increase muscle while losing fat! My mistake.

it is indeed increasing muscle and loosing fat - notion is easy - the practicality requires however a bit of knowledge of how your body reacts to a deficit, maintenance and surplus + obviously knowing the threshold between the 3.

Last but not least - deficit you burn - surplus you build but at maintenance you are still be able to burn and build at the same time hence no need to go up one day and down the other.

Ahh. This is a penny dropping moment for me, thanks! :bigsmile:

sijomial

Disagree with the comment that recomp is complex. It can be but doesn't have to be.
Eat at maintenance including adequate protein intake, train well, get enough rest & recovery time and be patient - that's it.

In this case OP seems to require guidance due to the deficit / loose & surplus / gain theorie.

Did probably not formulate it well - not complex however you do need to know what you are doing and need to know what your maintenance is. Whilst you might key in numbers from a website you still need to trial and error on yourself a cut, a maintenance and a bulk to understand how it works and what you can expect - you can't wake up one morning and say x website told me to maintain at xxx calories - let's recomp.

Agree. My maintenance level took about 6 weeks to find by trial and error.

Also agree about potential complexity that if you want to optimise everything to make maximal gains recomping at maintenance you are going to get into a more structured training approach plus the fine detail of nutrient timing and supplements to eke out those last few hard to get percentage points. However, for someone like me where body composition goals are met as a result of training performance and progress then recomp can be ultra simple. Just part of normal life in fact.

As with all these things there isn't a one size fits all approach without the context of goals and capabilities.

acpgee

To maximize progress, do train to failure some of the time. This means picking a weight heavy enough that you can't complete the last rep of your last set (without assistance of your spotter, or muscle not being able to respond at all). To prevent injury, don't let your form deteriorate.

Liftng4Lis

You look incredible! Amazing job! This recomp, I'm told and remain hopeful, takes a very LONG time. I'm 3 months in 5 times a week, and I notice very little difference. I know that originally I was doing the 3- sets of 12-15. changed that about 1.5 mos ago to 3 sets of 8-10, heavy as possible.
Keep up the good work you're doing awesome!

Springfield1970

Holy macaroni you look great!!

First, massive congratulations for reaching this point. I'm tempted to say...just stay the same!!

I like the way you look athletic, strong, yet feminine all in one go. Do you know how rare that is?

What is it you want exactly?

Btw the bf measurements on the scale are sooooo wrong.

What's your height, weight in pounds, measurements and goals?

I'm happy to help.

epadmeister

Why thank you everybody, it feels amazing to hear that! :blushing: *curtesy*

Now then, what do I want exactly... good question. I want to lose fat and stop feeling so jiggly. I want to be lean, not "thin"! I'd love more muscle.

The reason I want to do this is because I'm trying to shake off my t2 diabetes: I want to control it with diet and exercise alone, I'm on one tablet a day - I don't want to need medication! :P

Height: 5ft 2" / 161cm
Weight: 121lbs. (SO tempted to bring this down to 117 but I won't!)
Measurements: Chest 33", Waist 25.5", Hips 33.5"

I'd like to wittle down to 32", 24" and 32" eventually.

Anything else I can give?

SezxyStef

Recomp can be complex as mentioned but it most definately takes a while...

I've seen women here do one and it take a year to get to the point where they were happy with the results.

Recomp means eating at maitenance and if you are set to eat 1450 a day that doesn't appear to be maitenance.
Recomp means doing a progressive heavy load lifting program 1-6 reps as heavy as you can go and then the next time adding weight. If you get to failure you don't add weight the next time. You do this 3x a week. (esp as if you are new to compound lifts)

I hit my goal in may and was still reverse dieting and will be tweaking my maitenance as well (it's been about 6 weeks) but I have continued to lift over that time as well. I see some difference in the 8 weeks since hitting goal and 6 weeks into maitenance but I have been lifting for a year but nothing spectacular in recomp area...

Be patient, make sure you are getting in protien and enough calories and start a compound progressive load lifting program.

Starting strength, Strong lifts or NROLFW (hear that is complicated)

Schtroumpfkin

Am having a serious case of body envy right now....
Well done on your achievements to date.

abadvat

Why thank you everybody, it feels amazing to hear that! :blushing: *curtesy*

Now then, what do I want exactly... good question. I want to lose fat and stop feeling so jiggly. I want to be lean, not "thin"! I'd love more muscle.

The reason I want to do this is because I'm trying to shake off my t2 diabetes: I want to control it with diet and exercise alone, I'm on one tablet a day - I don't want to need medication! :P

Height: 5ft 2" / 161cm
Weight: 121lbs. (SO tempted to bring this down to 117 but I won't!)
Measurements: Chest 33", Waist 25.5", Hips 33.5"

I'd like to wittle down to 32", 24" and 32" eventually.

Anything else I can give?

I know your diary is open but don't understand the eat back calories mfp works on.
What is your calories target(s) daily?

epadmeister

Okay, scoobys workshop have me on roughly 1900 calories a day to maintain weight. MFP have me as 1850 to maintain weight. I feel that this is too much so I've been recently trying to net 1600 calories for the week - I only stupidly set my goal to 1450 yesterday!

I'm aiming for between 1500 - 1600 net calories a day.

abadvat

Okay, scoobys workshop have me on roughly 1900 calories a day to maintain weight. MFP have me as 1850 to maintain weight. I feel that this is too much so I've been recently trying to net 1600 calories for the week - I only stupidly set my goal to 1450 yesterday!

I'm aiming for between 1500 - 1600 net calories a day.

1900 seems a bit much with your stats.
Before starting fix your workout / training patern and routine as a first and eventually fix your calories + macros... Start at let's say 1500 to start with - take measurements + pictures (weight, BF and tape measurer) and go on for at least 2 weeks of solid and CONSTANT tracking / working out.
2 weeks later re-measure yourself (same timings, conditions, water levels etc....) and assess I would say.
At that point it will be a matter of seeing how your body moved, the new stats and see if you are oncourse or need to re-evaluate.

adawson55510

For body recomp i suggest consuming most of your carbs around you weight session also carb cycling works very well with recomp.

protein 1gram for a woman per lbs of bodyweight

Eg.
Meal 1 protein.. 20% carb intake..
Meal 2 protein.. fats.. greens
Meal 4 pre workout protein..40%carb intake.. greens
meal 5 post workout protien.. 40% carb.. intake.. greens
meal 5 protein.. fats.. greens

Non training day i would decrease you over all carb intake by 30% and add the calories in good fats nuts oils fish etc

Insulin is the only hormone in the body that stores fat and insulin can only be spiked by carbs so imo all carbs should be used around training so they get used for energy and aid repair. Fats and protein are essential where carbs are not.

Carb cycling is simple and great for losing weight and gaining muscle its also speeds up metabolism

For eg
Mon low day 100g
tues medium day 150g
wednesday high 200g
thursday low 100g
friday med 150g
saturday high 200g
Sunday extra high 300g

I usually find when i do the extra high day and weigh myself the next day i usually lose weight on scale.

W31RD0

I personally like 3x5 for strength and 3x10 for growth and I vary it according the the specific exercise any my goal for that set of muscles.

Whoa 10 sets? That's a lot of volume.

What is the consequence of low sets 1-3 vs high sets 5-10? I understand Strength, Hypertrophy, and Endurance training as it relates to reps, but what effect do the number of sets have?