A bit of a question about losing fat versus building muscle.
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candacefausset wrote: »arditarose wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »tigersword wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »So can the muscle you currently have become stronger even if it doesn't get bigger? I don't fully understand the growth of muscle. I lost a lot of strength during a bad stint of depression where I was almost totally inactive for nearly a year. I want to lose fat now because I eventually want to get to a state of bulking and cutting. But I don't want to bulk now and then cut and lose a lot more muscle mass that I spent a hard time working to build. But at the same time, I feel like I can't get any stronger. I haven't started lifting yet because I don't have access to any equipment but I did order a book on body weight workouts. So hopefully that will be here soon and I can keep up with that.
Strength and muscle growth are two different things. Most strength gains come from training your nervous system to properly use the muscle you have (it's called "neuromuscular adaptation.") I like to describe it like lifting a box with ropes. You have a crane with 4 ropes. To lift a light box, you might only need a single rope, and the others just hang free. Now, for a heavier box, you go ahead and attach the other 3 ropes to the box, because you need the extra rope to support and lift. You didn't add more rope to the crane, you just used more of the ones that were there.
Muscles work the same way. Untrained means muscle tissue is there, buy maybe your brain is only telling half of that muscle to fire, because it uses less energy and you never need more than that anyway. Then you lift something heavy, and suddenly your brain realizes that it needs to start using more muscle. So it starts telling your body to prep more muscle, waking up nerves, shuttling some glycogen from your liver to the muscle, so next time you lift, it's easier. You didn't add any muscle, you're just making better use of what's there. That's what most strength gains are in the beginning, the first few months to a year. After that, strength gains drop to a crawl, that's when you're waiting for actual muscle tissue growth to happen.
So would you suggest, if my fat loss takes longer than a year (I don't think it will but I also don't want to have to rush everything) to go ahead and do a bulking phase in order to gain more muscle and strength after the strength gains have slowed or stopped? I know I am thinking long term and maybe I should just focus on the here and now but I enjoy having a game plan. Plus the knowledge is helpful and hopefully something I can one day impart on others.
A few of these guys might have better suggestions, but my opinion would be to just jump in and start losing the fat. Do the body weight routines and start lifting asap to save the muscle. You can reassess as you lose. I think you'll want to drop a decent amount of body fat before you bulk.
That was my idea. Because I know that cutting will involve muscle loss again and the further I have to go to get to my ideal, the more muscle I will have lost along the way as well. But I definitely am going to listen to all the advice from the experienced people (including you lol).
Your goal should be to lose the fat while retaining as much muscle as possible. You can aid that with adequate protein consumption and progressive overload lifting. You do not want to bulk at a high body fat percentage. Nutrient partitioning is less effective at a high body fat.
Is that the main reason why you should not bulk with a high BF%?0 -
arditarose wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »arditarose wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »tigersword wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »So can the muscle you currently have become stronger even if it doesn't get bigger? I don't fully understand the growth of muscle. I lost a lot of strength during a bad stint of depression where I was almost totally inactive for nearly a year. I want to lose fat now because I eventually want to get to a state of bulking and cutting. But I don't want to bulk now and then cut and lose a lot more muscle mass that I spent a hard time working to build. But at the same time, I feel like I can't get any stronger. I haven't started lifting yet because I don't have access to any equipment but I did order a book on body weight workouts. So hopefully that will be here soon and I can keep up with that.
Strength and muscle growth are two different things. Most strength gains come from training your nervous system to properly use the muscle you have (it's called "neuromuscular adaptation.") I like to describe it like lifting a box with ropes. You have a crane with 4 ropes. To lift a light box, you might only need a single rope, and the others just hang free. Now, for a heavier box, you go ahead and attach the other 3 ropes to the box, because you need the extra rope to support and lift. You didn't add more rope to the crane, you just used more of the ones that were there.
Muscles work the same way. Untrained means muscle tissue is there, buy maybe your brain is only telling half of that muscle to fire, because it uses less energy and you never need more than that anyway. Then you lift something heavy, and suddenly your brain realizes that it needs to start using more muscle. So it starts telling your body to prep more muscle, waking up nerves, shuttling some glycogen from your liver to the muscle, so next time you lift, it's easier. You didn't add any muscle, you're just making better use of what's there. That's what most strength gains are in the beginning, the first few months to a year. After that, strength gains drop to a crawl, that's when you're waiting for actual muscle tissue growth to happen.
So would you suggest, if my fat loss takes longer than a year (I don't think it will but I also don't want to have to rush everything) to go ahead and do a bulking phase in order to gain more muscle and strength after the strength gains have slowed or stopped? I know I am thinking long term and maybe I should just focus on the here and now but I enjoy having a game plan. Plus the knowledge is helpful and hopefully something I can one day impart on others.
A few of these guys might have better suggestions, but my opinion would be to just jump in and start losing the fat. Do the body weight routines and start lifting asap to save the muscle. You can reassess as you lose. I think you'll want to drop a decent amount of body fat before you bulk.
That was my idea. Because I know that cutting will involve muscle loss again and the further I have to go to get to my ideal, the more muscle I will have lost along the way as well. But I definitely am going to listen to all the advice from the experienced people (including you lol).
Your goal should be to lose the fat while retaining as much muscle as possible. You can aid that with adequate protein consumption and progressive overload lifting. You do not want to bulk at a high body fat percentage. Nutrient partitioning is less effective at a high body fat.
Is that the main reason why you should not bulk with a high BF%?
That and it can get discouraging to see that you are at a high bf, you're bulking and gaining weight and probably muscle but along with that comes unwanted fat. Then you look in the mirror and you aren't going to see those muscle gains you suspect because of some added fat. It won't be as visible as you suspect. Then you're looking at an even longer cut which can be extremely discouraging.
Yeah, I get that part. But I didn't realize the nutrient partitioning thing.0 -
candacefausset wrote: »arditarose wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »tigersword wrote: »candacefausset wrote: »So can the muscle you currently have become stronger even if it doesn't get bigger? I don't fully understand the growth of muscle. I lost a lot of strength during a bad stint of depression where I was almost totally inactive for nearly a year. I want to lose fat now because I eventually want to get to a state of bulking and cutting. But I don't want to bulk now and then cut and lose a lot more muscle mass that I spent a hard time working to build. But at the same time, I feel like I can't get any stronger. I haven't started lifting yet because I don't have access to any equipment but I did order a book on body weight workouts. So hopefully that will be here soon and I can keep up with that.
Strength and muscle growth are two different things. Most strength gains come from training your nervous system to properly use the muscle you have (it's called "neuromuscular adaptation.") I like to describe it like lifting a box with ropes. You have a crane with 4 ropes. To lift a light box, you might only need a single rope, and the others just hang free. Now, for a heavier box, you go ahead and attach the other 3 ropes to the box, because you need the extra rope to support and lift. You didn't add more rope to the crane, you just used more of the ones that were there.
Muscles work the same way. Untrained means muscle tissue is there, buy maybe your brain is only telling half of that muscle to fire, because it uses less energy and you never need more than that anyway. Then you lift something heavy, and suddenly your brain realizes that it needs to start using more muscle. So it starts telling your body to prep more muscle, waking up nerves, shuttling some glycogen from your liver to the muscle, so next time you lift, it's easier. You didn't add any muscle, you're just making better use of what's there. That's what most strength gains are in the beginning, the first few months to a year. After that, strength gains drop to a crawl, that's when you're waiting for actual muscle tissue growth to happen.
So would you suggest, if my fat loss takes longer than a year (I don't think it will but I also don't want to have to rush everything) to go ahead and do a bulking phase in order to gain more muscle and strength after the strength gains have slowed or stopped? I know I am thinking long term and maybe I should just focus on the here and now but I enjoy having a game plan. Plus the knowledge is helpful and hopefully something I can one day impart on others.
A few of these guys might have better suggestions, but my opinion would be to just jump in and start losing the fat. Do the body weight routines and start lifting asap to save the muscle. You can reassess as you lose. I think you'll want to drop a decent amount of body fat before you bulk.
That was my idea. Because I know that cutting will involve muscle loss again and the further I have to go to get to my ideal, the more muscle I will have lost along the way as well. But I definitely am going to listen to all the advice from the experienced people (including you lol).
Your goal should be to lose the fat while retaining as much muscle as possible. You can aid that with adequate protein consumption and progressive overload lifting. You do not want to bulk at a high body fat percentage. Nutrient partitioning is less effective at a high body fat.
That's definitely what I am trying to do at this point. I have been eating a good chunk of protein. Most days I go well over MFP suggestions (fell short today but I have been battling the respiratory virus my little ones passed onto me). We will be moving to a place in the next 2-3 months where I can join a gym and start lifting.
All of this is really good information and I am so thankful for it!0 -
candacefausset wrote: »So can the muscle you currently have become stronger even if it doesn't get bigger? I don't fully understand the growth of muscle. I lost a lot of strength during a bad stint of depression where I was almost totally inactive for nearly a year. I want to lose fat now because I eventually want to get to a state of bulking and cutting. But I don't want to bulk now and then cut and lose a lot more muscle mass that I spent a hard time working to build. But at the same time, I feel like I can't get any stronger. I haven't started lifting yet because I don't have access to any equipment but I did order a book on body weight workouts. So hopefully that will be here soon and I can keep up with that.
Jumping back to an earlier post . . . I'm glad you ordered a book (did anything, really) to get involved in resistance training -- pushing your muscles through hard work. It's often considered easiest / more convenient or efficient to do resistance training with weights, but body weight exercises are a good substitute, and for some may be a much better alternative just out of preference / enjoyment. I lift weights, but found this thread a great source of inspiration, and a great resource for friends who just really don't care for weights: community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1428309/what-can-calisthenics-do-for-you-let-me-show-you/p1
So with that said -- one of the very best things that you can do for yourself, that I think many new to MFP totally miss or ignore, is to be sure to take action to try and preserve muscle while losing weight. The goal, in my view, should be to lose fat, not just weight, and they way to do that is to convince your body that it needs to retain the muscle mass it already has. Resistance training, together with adequate protein intake, offers a proven method to limit losses of muscle while losing weight.
All a long-winded way of saying "way to go!" with your interest in doing some resistance training while losing. If you can stick with it, I think you'll be much better off in the long run than most folks who come to MFP looking for tips on losing weight. Good for you!
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candacefausset wrote: »So can the muscle you currently have become stronger even if it doesn't get bigger? I don't fully understand the growth of muscle. I lost a lot of strength during a bad stint of depression where I was almost totally inactive for nearly a year. I want to lose fat now because I eventually want to get to a state of bulking and cutting. But I don't want to bulk now and then cut and lose a lot more muscle mass that I spent a hard time working to build. But at the same time, I feel like I can't get any stronger. I haven't started lifting yet because I don't have access to any equipment but I did order a book on body weight workouts. So hopefully that will be here soon and I can keep up with that.
Jumping back to an earlier post . . . I'm glad you ordered a book (did anything, really) to get involved in resistance training -- pushing your muscles through hard work. It's often considered easiest / more convenient or efficient to do resistance training with weights, but body weight exercises are a good substitute, and for some may be a much better alternative just out of preference / enjoyment. I lift weights, but found this thread a great source of inspiration, and a great resource for friends who just really don't care for weights: community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1428309/what-can-calisthenics-do-for-you-let-me-show-you/p1
So with that said -- one of the very best things that you can do for yourself, that I think many new to MFP totally miss or ignore, is to be sure to take action to try and preserve muscle while losing weight. The goal, in my view, should be to lose fat, not just weight, and they way to do that is to convince your body that it needs to retain the muscle mass it already has. Resistance training, together with adequate protein intake, offers a proven method to limit losses of muscle while losing weight.
All a long-winded way of saying "way to go!" with your interest in doing some resistance training while losing. If you can stick with it, I think you'll be much better off in the long run than most folks who come to MFP looking for tips on losing weight. Good for you!
I've actually been around for quite a long while absorbing information as I can. I lost 43 pounds before my bad depression. Gained 20 back so I sort of feel like I am starting over but I remember some of what I learned before. Just trying to learn more. My end goal is to be strong. Yes I want the excess weight off of me but I want to lift heavy ultimately. I want to lift weights. I'm just not at a place where I can yet due to the fact that we live in the country and only have one car with two young children and the husband works over nights and a whole bunch of other factors lol. But I want to do something. I do have a couple Jillian Michaels dvds so I have been alternating those with my cardio days so that even while waiting on my book, I am getting some strength related work in. I just hate that I feel so weak right now! But if time and dedication is what it takes to get strong, I will do it.
ETA- And thank you. It took me entirely too long to get to this point but at least I am here now lol0 -
Yup - not trying to say you're oblivious or otherwise not thinking seriously about this. Just trying to emphasize a point that I think the hundreds and hundreds (thousands?) of lurkers who will read this thread but will never comment on the forums would benefit from! People see shorthand, generalized truths like "can't build muscle on a deficit" and sometimes take that as a pass to focus only on scale weight loss, to their long-term detriment.
Also to encourage you with your efforts, since they are, without doubt in my mind, worthwhile!
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Yup - not trying to say you're oblivious or otherwise not thinking seriously about this. Just trying to emphasize a point that I think the hundreds and hundreds (thousands?) of lurkers who will read this thread but will never comment on the forums would benefit from! People see shorthand, generalized truths like "can't build muscle on a deficit" and sometimes take that as a pass to focus only on scale weight loss, to their long-term detriment.
Also to encourage you with your efforts, since they are, without doubt in my mind, worthwhile!
Makes sense! Thanks again!0 -
Excellent beginner's bodyweight exercise you can start now nerdfitness.com/blog/2009/12/09/beginner-body-weight-workout-burn-fat-build-muscle/0
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