Lose the fat then gain muscle? Right or wrong?

pbryd wrote: »

Personally I think people overstate muscle loss during a cut. It goes hand in hand with people underestimating how much bodyfat they need to lose to achieve a six pack.

If any real muscle is actually lost during a cut, then muscle memory will see it gained very quickly as soon as you start eating at maintenance.

Are you talking muscle loss or strength loss?

Muscle isn't quick to go on no matter what you had before. Not sure how muscle memory would help there.

Just read the blogs of many professional body-builders and power lifters that didn't play on the safe side when cutting and hated the results.

And it didn't go on quick even for them. If any should have this muscle memory you reference to allow quick comeback - they should.

Studies have generally found (Lyle McDonald had a good writeup of studies on this IIRC) if no specific resistance training is done - about 20-30% LBM is lost in average diet.
Don't recall how reasonable or extreme "average diet" means, and obviously LBM doesn't mean all muscle, as you should require less water for instance with less fat to support (blood volume).
Considering most seem to diet extreme because they start from the bottom up from some minimum - I can see it being realistic number.

But considering studies have shown a reasonable deficit, enough protein, and some simple resistance training - can keep LBM - I don't think it's overstated to say many risk it very easily with what they do.
Not much protein, heavy on the cardio, and not very reasonable deficit.

richardgavel wrote: »

pbryd wrote: »

Personally I think people overstate muscle loss during a cut. It goes hand in hand with people underestimating how much bodyfat they need to lose to achieve a six pack.

If any real muscle is actually lost during a cut, then muscle memory will see it gained very quickly as soon as you start eating at maintenance.

Then consider me an overstated. I did not lift at all during 9 months of losing 60 lbs and lost way too much LBM. I wish I had lifted and lost slower.

Muscle loss is overstated assuming you are providing sufficient stimulus to the muscles and consuming enough protein.

I wouldn't bother with cardio.

Get yourself on StrongLifts 5x5, maintain your weight and bulk on training days. I only aim to put some weight on so I'm starting at 2400 calories and work from there.

MityMax96 wrote: »

True, but in response to the OP's wording. It needed to be conveyed to him, that his plan is not the most optimal in the long run.

True, which I did in a reply earlier.

pbryd wrote: »

So start lifting while you cut down, as a beginner you should be able to build muscle and lose fat at the same time.

I think we're all on the same page then it comes to keeping muscle by lifting heavy while cutting.

There are some interesting studies that have come out recently. Even in trained individuals you can loose fat and gain muscle at the same time. Just have a pretty hefty calorie deficit but keep your protein high and resistance train.

pbryd wrote: »

MityMax96 wrote: »

So we were just confirming what you said.
All good

Cheers buttercup

You too sweet pea.

great book if you are a reader. its dated but the principles apply today just like the day it was written. Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle. imperative to do both! if you don't lift, you will lose muscle and fat at a calorie deficit. double edged sword because muscle requires more energy (calories) to maintain. if you lose muscle in your weight loss efforts, you will also be burning fewer calories at rest also. that is the last thing we want. we want our bodies burning as many calories at rest as possible...why you ask.....so we can eat more and still not gain. low calorie diets fail. unsustainable. retain your muscle by lifting on a program like StrongLifts or Rippetoes Starting Strength.

I haven't read any of the replies yet, so...

Yes, essentially.

If you're overfat you'll want to lose as much adipose tissue as possible (lowering down to less than around %15 for men and %23 for women) so that you can properly assess your physique. It's difficult to get an idea of how much muscle mass you actually have when it's covered in body fat. And purposely trying to "gain muscle" while still overfat is likely to result in poor aesthetic results later on (with a large percentage of gains being even more body fat).

It goes without saying that building muscle is a difficult, long, and arduous process especially as you get closer to your genetic muscular potential. This means there's always diminishing returns as you get larger. Therefore, you'll want to do your best to retain as much muscle as possible while losing weight as this could save you months (or even a year) of purposeful bulking.

To do this you'll want to consume adequate protein, perform consistent resistance exercise, and keep your calorie deficit low to moderate.

As stated, from there you can assess whether you'd benefit from a "bulking" cycle or if recomping would better suit your needs.

PPumpItUp wrote: »

There are some others but this is the most talked about one.

For the study, 40 young men underwent a month of hard exercise while cutting dietary energy they would normally require by 40 per cent of what they would normally require

The high protein group (2.4 g/kg) gained 2 lb of muscle and lost 10 lb of body fat.

The low protein group (1.2 g/kg) lost negligible muscle and lost ~7.7 lb of body fat.

The researchers divided their subjects into two groups. Both groups went on a low calorie diet, one with higher levels of protein than the other. The higher-protein group experienced muscle gains – about 2.5 pounds – despite consuming insufficient energy, while the lower protein group did not add muscle

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/103/3/738

My guess is they were prolly overweight to begin with, so they had some excess energy on hand
If they were lean individuals, say BF % of <15....then I doubt they would have had those results....

Did they give the stats of the men?

Yeah, they were untrained mostly. Let me look up some other studies that show even in trained individuals you can recomp with a high protein diet/calorie deficit with resistance training.