Recomposition: Maintaining weight while losing fat

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  • chrissi_k
    chrissi_k Posts: 175 Member
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    Tagging along for all the great information
  • thop83
    thop83 Posts: 47 Member
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    Sorry about all of my dumb questions but I had a question regarding macros when recomping.

    Do macro nutrients matter once the daily goal has been met? For example I eat all of my macros to their goal number and then workout and eat back my excess calories. Do I still need to strive for them to be equal to the goal percentage or is that relatively useless to try and achieve?
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    limetree683 wrote: »
    This is a great thread! One question - do I have to be at my ideal body weight before starting to recomp? I am 5'7'', 74.1kg but would like to be about 62kg (middle of my ideal weight according to the BMI chart). I've started stronglifts and am making some progress, but I think my calorie settings of 1500 a day is too much of a deficit for alternating days of stronglifts and c25k with sundays as a rest day. I do want to build some muscle and not stall on my lifts too early so another member suggested I eat just a little less than my TDEE on lift days (2121 cals according to scooby) and at my usual 1500 deficit on run days. Does anyone have any experience with doing this? Would be good to get your insight and advice! Thank you :)

    Only during initial start to lifting, with some fat to spare - do you have the unique ability to gain some muscle (once existing is tapped out) while still losing fat.
    Also at the start - you'll be making progress no matter what.
    You won't be able to do either later after being a tad more experienced.

    You will not get that later.

    Keep at the deficit - just make it more reasonable - you are one in control of your profile option of how fast you want to lose.
    1 lb weekly is still reasonable for you, or 1/2 kg.

    Oh - you are misunderstanding the TDEE chart you are attempting to use on Scooby- that is average weekly activity - averaged back out to daily.
    Do what you are attempting - you are still getting a bigger deficit than you think on lifting days.

    If willing to have different eating levels - why not just use MFP as designed.
    Change weight loss to 1/2 kg weekly. Pick honest activity level outside exercise so no extra deficit there.
    Log your lifting as Strength Training under cardio. (may seem low but that's true)
    Log your running at honest pace and time done. (most accurate in the database)
    Meet your daily eating goal. Attempt to get more of the day's calories in after the workouts, when body can use them most.
  • TigerNY128
    TigerNY128 Posts: 763 Member
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    Hi, everyone! I've been researching recomping and hope it's ok if I join this thread. I recently lost over 40 pounds. I am 5'7" and 134 pounds. I was going to lose 10 more and then start lifting, but my boyfriend, who is into bodybuilding, has encouraged me to start now. He is training me and I am hoping to gain muscle/lose fat. I am used to eating around 1,400 calories but my boyfriend has told me I need to increase the calories to make any muscles gains. I've never been at maintenance, so I don't know what my calories would be, but most calculators seem to put me around 1,950. Any thoughts on this?
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,401 MFP Moderator
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    hoppertaylor wrote: »
    Sorry about all of my dumb questions but I had a question regarding macros when recomping.

    Do macro nutrients matter once the daily goal has been met? For example I eat all of my macros to their goal number and then workout and eat back my excess calories. Do I still need to strive for them to be equal to the goal percentage or is that relatively useless to try and achieve?

    That depends on the rest of thr day. If you already hit your protein goal for thr day then you can go a bit heavier on carbs. Personally, i would follow the tdee method over the mfp method. The tdee estimates average daily burn, so you base macros and calories off of that. For example, i maintain around 3000 calories so for a recomp i would aim around the number or slightly below to account for some error. And since i am 170 at 15% bf, i aim for about 150g of protein.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    TigerNY128 wrote: »
    Hi, everyone! I've been researching recomping and hope it's ok if I join this thread. I recently lost over 40 pounds. I am 5'7" and 134 pounds. I was going to lose 10 more and then start lifting, but my boyfriend, who is into bodybuilding, has encouraged me to start now. He is training me and I am hoping to gain muscle/lose fat. I am used to eating around 1,400 calories but my boyfriend has told me I need to increase the calories to make any muscles gains. I've never been at maintenance, so I don't know what my calories would be, but most calculators seem to put me around 1,950. Any thoughts on this?

    The principle is sound - but no one can comment on numbers when you give no means to confirm them.

    For instance - the normal TDEE charts are ONLY about exercise, days or hours per week - they assume life otherwise is very sedentary (based on 1919 study).

    So if you were accurate in estimating hrs of week of high-end cardio (not walking which counts half-time) and weight lifting, and picked the correct section, and have no kids or pets or not active outside desk job and gym - then that level is probably correct.
    If active job, or active after work - bump up a notch.

    And yes to starting now.
    You may want to do a very minor 10% deficit, and keep loosing while getting stronger, and may decide at some point you have reached goal weight, even if not 10 lbs.
    Then you eat even more and workout even harder and progress even faster.
  • TigerNY128
    TigerNY128 Posts: 763 Member
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    @heybales

    Thanks for the reply and advice!
  • ythannah
    ythannah Posts: 4,368 Member
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    husseycd wrote: »

    And May 2015. Probably closer to 130 lbs.
    [img][/img][IMG]http://i532.photobucket.com/albums/ee322/jivete/Lifting progress/IMG_20150516_150836.jpg[/IMG]


    Oh, well done!! I'm in total quad envy right now.
  • griffinca2
    griffinca2 Posts: 672 Member
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    Nice!! Something to aspire to. B)
  • CrystalFlury
    CrystalFlury Posts: 400 Member
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    Well this will be fun. I believe after reading through some of these posts and figuring out my TDEE I will be eating a heck of a lot more calories. I upped it recently to 1500 and feel great with 3 out of 6 days lifting(doing it every other day and then off days I do moderate intensity aerobic workouts). Now I think I will increase a little more (1795)

    I have been on MFP since Aug 2011 and for a lonnnggg time have been on a deficit after noticing just how easily I lost weight with that and aerobic activity. Long story short--I only realized in the last month that the only way I will effectively change my physique is through weight training--something I have never done. I've been reading up on it and learning some things that finally made my light bulb click and go WOW wish I'd paid more attention to people when they said I should REALLY strength train. Before now, my only "strength" training activity was following Jillian Michaels with 5 to 6 lb weights. Makes perfect sense now as to why I wasn't getting ANYWHERE. I think it was a mixture of being too comfortable in my old ways (crazy amounts of aerobic exercise) and stubborn thinking I didn't need to lift to make changes.

    I'll be making some much needed changes now.
  • griffinca2
    griffinca2 Posts: 672 Member
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    Try doing 4 sets of 4 reps--requires you to lift heavy (with good form). You're more than welcome to check mine out. Good luck, you will get there. Good form is more important than the weight.
  • heytherejune
    heytherejune Posts: 7 Member
    edited July 2015
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    LolBroScience wrote: »
    IronBatMaiden wrote: »
    Got any tips for a person who works a desk job and comes home really late from work? Do you recommend bringing some weights to work or doing them on your break?

    Go when you have time, make time.

    One quote I heard that always helped me:
    "Did you know that Vladmir Putin works out every day? Are you busier than the president of Russia?"

    During lunch, or early in the morning, you will be able to fit in some time for a workout.
  • icemaiden37
    icemaiden37 Posts: 238 Member
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    heytherejune wrote: »
    LolBroScience wrote: »
    IronBatMaiden wrote: »
    Got any tips for a person who works a desk job and comes home really late from work? Do you recommend bringing some weights to work or doing them on your break?

    Go when you have time, make time.

    One quote I heard that always helped me:
    "Did you know that Vladmir Putin works out every day? Are you busier than the president of Russia?"

    During lunch, or early in the morning, you will be able to fit in some time for a workout.

    Awesome! Is that true? I know he's pretty serious into martial arts when he's having a little break from running the country.
  • arabianhorselover
    arabianhorselover Posts: 1,488 Member
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    Is there anything in the world I can do to make my thighs look better after losing weight? I have been working on building muscle in them, but not sure what else I can do, since I'm 54, and I've got flab where the fat used to be.
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,401 MFP Moderator
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    arabianhorselover wrote: »
    Is there anything in the world I can do to make my thighs look better after losing weight? I have been working on building muscle in them, but not sure what else I can do, since I'm 54, and I've got flab where the fat used to be.

    Is it loose skin or is there more body fat on them?

    And do you lift?
  • arabianhorselover
    arabianhorselover Posts: 1,488 Member
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    Well, I'm sure there's some fat, but if I lost all of that there would be lose skin. It's like the areas that were filled with fat don't have the fat to hold them up anymore, so when I stand up they fall down. Hard to explain, but I'm sure there are a lot of women who know what I'm talking about.
  • senecarr
    senecarr Posts: 5,377 Member
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    arabianhorselover wrote: »
    Well, I'm sure there's some fat, but if I lost all of that there would be lose skin. It's like the areas that were filled with fat don't have the fat to hold them up anymore, so when I stand up they fall down. Hard to explain, but I'm sure there are a lot of women who know what I'm talking about.
    That sounds like loose skin. It can take up to two years after weight loss for loose skin to get about as good as it will get - some people will have it snap back sooner or better depending on age and possibly genetics (hate to use that word that way).
  • Samm471
    Samm471 Posts: 432 Member
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    I am nearly at the stage to lose bf but maintain weight however I wondered if I don't see progress after a couple of weeks do I need to tweak my calories? Will I need to eat more? How will I know for sure if it's muscle I'm gaining and not fat? Also how can you find out exactly what your calories for maintenance is?
  • griffinca2
    griffinca2 Posts: 672 Member
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    1) It may take you more than a couple of weeks to know if it is working; as long as you're not gaining you're probably pretty close. 2) You will have to experiment; I started recomp a couple of weeks ago and am still playing with calories/macros--you'll need to figure out what works for you. 3) Simple, 1 lb of muscle takes up less space than 1 lb of fat; if your weight is staying pretty much the same (possibly fluctuating a pound or two) and you seem to be getting smaller, you're putting on muscle. You can purchase one of those scales that measure your weight, body fat, etc.; they aren't very accurate (+/1 3%) but you can tell which way you're headed. 4) If you click on Home in MFP, click on goals there is a tool that will guide you thru it. Also, you can go on line and find many sites that will help you figure out your maintenance calories. B)
  • mattyc772014
    mattyc772014 Posts: 3,543 Member
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    @samm471 try this online calc to figure out your maintenance.

    http://www.sailrabbit.com/bmr/

    I think I got the calc from the OP on another thread. It is a great tool. Try it and adjust your calories as you go along. I too am in a recomp for about 1 month now. Took me a few weeks to get calories on track. You need more than a couple of weeks on recomp. At least 3 months doing a recomp. Maybe more. Recomps are slow. Stick to a plan (both calorie and weight training). Find your go to foods that you like and can use almost every day to hit your macros. Ideally you want to not lose or gain weight. So far I lost 2lbs. No big deal.

    Take measurements. Either a tape measure or body fat calipers. They are not very accurate but will give you an idea how you are progressing. So far I lost about 3-5% BF from using calipers. I know my numbers are not very accurate but no matter how many times I take them they are always down from a month ago. So I am happy with that.

    Read through the thread more, you may find more help. I always come back here to read. Click the star on the top right of thread just above the search symbol to make it a favorite. Whenever someone posts you will then get notified. Lots of luck! :)

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