Is there any point to lifting?

lifting will retain more type II lean mass than not lifting while losing weight. And will experience more fat loss to compensate. What this means is you look leaner and more athletic in the end, and hopefully just avoid the skinny fat look. Take a gander at the lifting is the best thing to do thread for countless examples. Notice the common theme amongst all the women lifting while losing weight.

lifting will retain more type II lean mass than not lifting while losing weight. And will experience more fat loss to compensate. What this means is you look leaner and more athletic in the end, and hopefully just avoid the skinny fat look.

Totally agree. Lifting goes hand in hand with losing weight. Simply losing weight will put you in the skinny category but lifting and losing weight can put you into the "hot" category. As stated lifting helps encourage your body to hold on to that lean muscle tissue and sacrifice fat instead. You don't want to lose any of the hard earned muscle. Think about it, even as a woman you covet muscle even though you might not want cool looking biceps. The butt, aka glutes, is one solid muscle. If you lose it along with fat you'll just have a flat backside. Nice looking legs, muscle. An inspiring mid section and abs, all muscle. Anything you can think of that makes you look at someone and say "wow they're hot" (Aside from hair and a smile) is muscle, muscle, muscle.

Lose weight with the goal of revealing the muscle underneath because that's what separates skinny from hot. Eat a nice amount of protein (1g per pound of lean mass per day), work on those muscles 3-4 times a week, keep doing the cardio to help with fat loss, eat good and get plenty of rest. That's the K.O. combination to looking awesome and being in good health.

Final note. Strength building improves bone density and mass. That's a huge issue for many women as they get older.

For many months I did cardio only - lost a lot of weight. Eventually I noticed I wasn't as strong, I'm certain that I lost some muscle along the way. I added back in strength training and it has helped a great deal. I'm still in a calories deficit so I'm not adding any muscle mass, but I don't think losing muscle. I feel stronger now. For me a combination of both cardio and weight training works best.

I agree, you should start lifting yesterday.

I disagree with the above.
You should have started lifting the day before yesterday... leaving yesterday as a rest day.. so you can lift again today.

When I first started my weight loss journey I was told there's no point trying to lift because you CANNOT build muscle on a calorie deficit. So I never lifted.

Now I'm starting to lift and I can say that I don't care if I build muscle or not. I AM getting stronger and FEELING stronger and that's all that really matters.

Do what feels right! Do what makes you feel good! And don't worry about the experts. Sometimes they're full of hog wash.

hoooo yes - lift stuff. Lift heavy stuff. Do it now!

lifting will retain more type II lean mass than not lifting while losing weight. And will experience more fat loss to compensate. What this means is you look leaner and more athletic in the end, and hopefully just avoid the skinny fat look. Take a gander at the lifting is the best thing to do thread for countless examples. Notice the common theme amongst all the women lifting while losing weight.

This is kind of whats happening to me! ^ ..

I'm still 192lbs.. but I do lift and have done (on and off) .. for quite a while.. Only now.. the diet is becoming more 'serious' ..

I am slowwwleee losing weight.. (intentionally slowly) and thanks to lifting heavy I can see a great shape coming underneath the squishy! .. :drinker: :drinker:

The information is really overwhelming.

But yes, lift. As a beginner, you are one of the few people who can reasonably expect to gain muscle and lose fat. Regardless, you want to maintain your muscle.

I am 5'6 and started with about 20 lbs to lose. You'll see from my picture that its when I added lifting that I made breakthroughs.

The point of lifting while losing weight isn't to gain muscle, it's to avoid losing it. You may also be very pleased with the visual changes if you're a complete beginner; there's quite a difference between muscle that's loose and untrained versus someone that's been lifting for a few weeks or more.

Regardless of what's going on with your lean body mass, you can gain a certain amount of strength by lifting, even on a caloric deficit. Much of the strength gains come from training your central nervous system rather than by gaining muscle mass.

Alright, now that I have your attention from that troll-worthy title.

I've been researching and posting about lifting during the process of weight loss. I've been told various answers, and read various answers. Many seem to point to: it's very hard to lose weight and gain muscle at the same time. With that partially understood, I would think the best option (at least for me, from my research) would be to focus on losing weight (I have about 20 lbs to go), then start lifting (I'm a 5'6" female, 23, who wants to go the heavy lifting route).

I've been doing strength training using my own body weight pretty frequently--should I stop this?
Is there a point to trying to lift heavy before I've reached my initial goal weight?
Thoughts, suggestions? Nude pics?

No!!!

Lifting while losing will help ensure that the majority of your loss comes from fat instead of fat and muscle, this way at your goal weight you will have a lower BF%.

OP, It is much easier to start now and retain what you have then it is to add new muscle latter. to lose fat all you need is a modest caloric deficit (can be diet a lone, or combo of diet and cardio) adequate protein intake and strength training to retain lean muscle. Notice in this cardio is not needed to lose fat, cardio will allow you to eat more and maintain the same deficit to lose that you can get from diet alone. Too large of a deficit can also lead to the loss of muscle.

Focusing strictly on weight loss with the intention of getting to lifting once you're smaller is like deciding to become a race car driver, saving up a ton of money to buy a rally car, but waiting to learn how to drive until after you've got the car.

haha this may be true.

I lost the majority of the weight I wanted to lose before I began lifting. I was resisting for a variety of reasons (excuses). "I don't want to get all muscly/bulky. I don't want callouses on my hands. That part of the gym is for boys." etc. Well I finally cut out all that crap, and........

I like it so much, and I have already seen such positive changes in my body, that I wish I had begun earlier.

It's a common misconception that if you can't build new muscle on a deficit, then there's no point in lifting- but the truth is you won't know the difference between gaining muscle or not while lifting on a deficit- especially if you're new to it. The common goals are increased muscle tone and firmness, increased strength, increased metabolism, increased fat loss, increased bone density, feeling bada$$, and looking hot. You can achieve ALL of those goals without packing on any NEW muscle tissue. Most people (women in particular) have all the muscle you need to achieve those goals already, and by using neuromuscular adaptation (which is the primary source of gains whether you're in a deficit or not at the beginning) you train your CNS system to use the muscle that's already there. It's win-win-win-win-win. You'll feel like you're gaining muscle whether you are or not- so what does it matter, really?

edit for typos.

^^adding a few more win-win-wins in!

It's a common misconception that if you can't build new muscle on a deficit, then there's no point in lifting- but the truth is you won't know the difference between gaining muscle or not while lifting on a deficit- especially if you're new to it. The common goals are increased muscle tone and firmness, increased strength, increased metabolism, increased fat loss, increased bone density, feeling bada$$, and looking hot. You can achieve ALL of those goals without packing on any NEW muscle tissue. Most people (women in particular) have all the muscle you need to achieve those goals already, and by using neuromuscular adaptation (which is the primary source of gains whether you're in a deficit or not at the beginning) you train your CNS system to use the muscle that's already there. It's win-win-win-win-win. You'll feel like you're gaining muscle whether you are or not- so what does it matter, really?

edit for typos.

^^adding a few more win-win-wins in!

I choose to go with what they said because it made me giggle

Looks like we need a devil's advocate here. You shouldn't lift weights on a calorie deficit. You could DIE! When you lift weights, your body preserves fat, because it's precious and essential for survival. Since you're in a calorie deficit, your body will catabolize muscle. Eventually you will turn into a fat skeleton with Lou Gehrig's disease. That's what happened to me.
I'm just kidding. If you believe that then you should also try durian as a magical weight loss fruit. I've been lifting on a calorie deficit for over a year now and it hasn't hurt me any.

You are not very convincing at advocating for the devil.