building muscle or losing fat...

[jay4812]

So I've been doing a combination of Cardio/Dieting/Weight Lifting. I guess you can say I plateaued. Someone at the gym said "your body can't build muscle and lose fat at the same time." Is this true?

[JayyC]

yes true. one small exception is when someone new is working out they may be able to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time the first 3-6 months. also goes for people that have been out of the gym for 5-10 years just starting back.

[jay4812]

Well damn. I really enjoy lifting weights. It's why I go to the gym. I think that if I have to stop weight lifting and just switch to cardio, I may lose my drive. Like people always find a way to do what they want and always find an excuse to not do the things they aren't so interested in.

Like, if I know I'm going to the gym, I don't mind waking up and doing cardio, and when I do cardio, I tend to watch what I eat more... sorta like a domino effect in a negative way. Cause half the battle is mental.

[JayyC]

no reason to stop lifting though.. plenty of people lift hard and get huge without worrying about a low bodyfat %. find a new workout or modify your diet to push through and keep working out man, later on if you want to cut then cross that bridge when you get there.

[dkemano42]

Well damn. I really enjoy lifting weights. It's why I go to the gym. I think that if I have to stop weight lifting and just switch to cardio, I may lose my drive. Like people always find a way to do what they want and always find an excuse to not do the things they aren't so interested in.

Like, if I know I'm going to the gym, I don't mind waking up and doing cardio, and when I do cardio, I tend to watch what I eat more... sorta like a domino effect in a negative way. Cause half the battle is mental.

Hey man,

Dont stop lifting to lose weight/fat. The reason you wanna keep lifting weights is because any muscle gained will help burn more calories. You will gain a little muscle if you just started not too long ago...but the other reason is because you don't wanna LOSE any muscle you have. If you switch to just doing cardio, the hard gained muscle you do have will go away. Its a "if you dont use it you'll lose it" deal. If you keep lifting it gives the muscle a reason to stay right where it is.

DK

[Meathead.]

So I've been doing a combination of Cardio/Dieting/Weight Lifting. I guess you can say I plateaued. Someone at the gym said "your body can't build muscle and lose fat at the same time." Is this true?

It can be done slightly

Think of it this way...a lot of ppl tend to have excessive calories thru their diet at the end of each day or week, they choose to add cardio to become deficient to lose weight...or u can not do any cardio and just eat less to lose weight. u have those 2 options.
if u do it right - there can be gains during the process of dieting. Instead of those calories being expended through cardio, they can be used for recovery and building muscle and getting stronger, that whole process...which in return will cause you to become deficient overall so if the calories are just slightly increase, maybe 250 calories, add some very light cardio in to a heavy training program, balanced diet, genetics...etc
good bro science for you. i believe it.

[Alexanabolic]

So I've been doing a combination of Cardio/Dieting/Weight Lifting. I guess you can say I plateaued. Someone at the gym said "your body can't build muscle and lose fat at the same time." Is this true?

I would say it's all depend. Nobody react the same and I have see many people loosing weight and building muscle at the same time even past the beginner stage, but everyone will agree by saying this is not optimal.

The fastest way to gain muscle is not by dieting, and the fastest way of loosing weight is not by trying to gain muscle.

But I would say by personal experience that short interval of bulking and cutting is something to avoid. You will end up still fat and not muscular. But again, there is no absolute, it may work for some people...

What for sure, do not stop lifting weight and from your avatar, you do not look fat at all. Why not give a chance to your body to put some muscle even if you gain some fat?

[jay4812]

Agreed. I guess everyone is different. I've just heard that you can't do both. I realy am trying to confirm. I don't believe in that extremes (bulking up and then cutting). I just was wondering if what I was doing is going to yield what I want. From my avatar, i'm bulking. And I do have some fat in areas. I want to be "big" as well as "cut". We all know cuts come from having the muscle to show, and losing body fat. Or can I keep my activities and do something like a low carb diet or atkin's?

[Alexanabolic]

Agreed. I guess everyone is different. I've just heard that you can't do both. I realy am trying to confirm. I don't believe in that extremes (bulking up and then cutting). I just was wondering if what I was doing is going to yield what I want. From my avatar, i'm bulking. And I do have some fat in areas. I want to be "big" as well as "cut". We all know cuts come from having the muscle to show, and losing body fat. Or can I keep my activities and do something like a low carb diet or atkin's?

From my experience, building muscle while on Keto is near impossible or very hard. I would instead look for carb cycling and put emphasys on peri workout nutrition to get the most of the workout and loosing fat at the same time

[everblue]

I believe you can.

Reasoning:

Lifting weights causes your muscles to contract. This contraction requires the molecule ATP. I believe the more strain you put on a muscle cell the more ATP it requires to contract the sarcomere (functional unit of the muscle cell). Weight lifting requires a bit of calories. The ATP can be derived from fat (triacylglycerols inside adipose) via beta oxidation ---->TCA cycle (a.k.a. krebs cycle) -----> Electron Transport Chain. I believe the key is being able to catabolize the triacylglycerols and be able to time carbing up with consuming protein. Carbohydrates cause muscle cells to be more permeable to amino acids, as we all know amino acids aid in the repair and such of the muscle cell. I'm going to be experimenting with this for the next 2 weeks and will post my results on my fat loss log. Will be interesting to see.

[jay4812]

From my experience, building muscle while on Keto is near impossible or very hard. I would instead look for carb cycling and put emphasys on peri workout nutrition to get the most of the workout and loosing fat at the same time

peri nutrition?

[jay4812]

Yes, Please let me know your results. Can you give a quick description on how you are going to approach this?

I believe you can.

Reasoning:

Lifting weights causes your muscles to contract. This contraction requires the molecule ATP. I believe the more strain you put on a muscle cell the more ATP it requires to contract the sarcomere (functional unit of the muscle cell). Weight lifting requires a bit of calories. The ATP can be derived from fat (triacylglycerols inside adipose) via beta oxidation ---->TCA cycle (a.k.a. krebs cycle) -----> Electron Transport Chain. I believe the key is being able to catabolize the triacylglycerols and be able to time carbing up with consuming protein. Carbohydrates cause muscle cells to be more permeable to amino acids, as we all know amino acids aid in the repair and such of the muscle cell. I'm going to be experimenting with this for the next 2 weeks and will post my results on my fat loss log. Will be interesting to see.

[mike_in_TX]

Well damn. I really enjoy lifting weights. It's why I go to the gym. I think that if I have to stop weight lifting and just switch to cardio, I may lose my drive. Like people always find a way to do what they want and always find an excuse to not do the things they aren't so interested in.

Like, if I know I'm going to the gym, I don't mind waking up and doing cardio, and when I do cardio, I tend to watch what I eat more... sorta like a domino effect in a negative way. Cause half the battle is mental.

Dave - You have to decided what your goal is. Do you like your size and want to just be more bulk?

I think @ my point, I want to aim more for the beach body style. Since I been actively into mountain biking is pretty hard keeping up w/ the 160lbs riders. I don't do bad, but when it comes to hills I extremely exhausted. I really do-not consider myself fat, but I think the bulk I gained really impact my cardio

Trust me, I enjoy lifting and lifting heavy weights, but when it comes to cardio I am weak at it.

But now...
(Yes it is boring) I been running every morning, doing core body workouts and my body is getting much lean, fit and I feel I am a more active person and not the same guy in the gym leg pressing over 1100lbs anymore.

My goal is to hit 160, my hardest part is eating less and more healthy. I am sure this is hard for a lot of us anyways. But I am adapting to it easily this time around.


This being said, (mountain biking) I gained calfs w/ bricks bigger then my neck now. I drink less water and don't stop. I can easily do a the same bike trial in less then 1.25 hrs vs. 2.5 hrs then.
**Oh, I also learned how important electrolytes are now**

Good luck!

[Alexanabolic]

peri nutrition?

What you eat in the 2 hours span surrounding your workout, pre and post

[jay4812]

Well, I don't really have a pre eat per se. I do have a protein shake right afterwards. It's basically cause I graze through out the day. So I usually have a snack around 3PM, usually something dairy like yougurt and a a handful of nuts. Then right after work I head to the gym and then do my workout. Right when I get home I immediately fix my Optimum gold standard 100% whey protein shake.

I'm pretty sure I made my goal pretty clear. I don't want to be thin/cut. I want to have mass with pretty good definition.

What you eat in the 2 hours span surrounding your workout, pre and post

[MCrow]

Building muscle and losing weight can happen at the same time. However, like others have pointed out it may not be possible for more lean people. I'm fairly overweight (though I'm losing it) and I'm pretty sure I'm building a good amount of muscle but I'm also losing about 3lbs per week. My arm measurements have gone up almost an inch in the first month while my weight dropped 12lbs.

[jay4812]

Okay, how about if I word it like this. Can you lose fat when you lift weights? I mean, I'm not sitting on a couch. When I lift I break a sweat. What exactly happens if all you do is lift weights. It burns calories does it not?

[MCrow]

Okay, how about if I word it like this. Can you lose fat when you lift weights? I mean, I'm not sitting on a couch. When I lift I break a sweat. What exactly happens if all you do is lift weights. It burns calories does it not?

Yes, you can burn fat by lifting weights but you still have to have a caloric deficit.

[AtleastItried]

Okay, how about if I word it like this. Can you lose fat when you lift weights? I mean, I'm not sitting on a couch. When I lift I break a sweat. What exactly happens if all you do is lift weights. It burns calories does it not?

I went from 266 down to 226 without ever doing more than a 5 minute warm up jog.

I actually recommend to a lot of my friends that they stop trying to kill themselves with the cardio and lift instead. It's gotten a lot of them back in the gym...

[jay4812]

What is a good deficiet without letting your body think it's starving?

Yes, you can burn fat by lifting weights but you still have to have a caloric deficit.

[jay4812]

Did you do anything like a certain diet? Did you just continue to eat as usual and lifted?

I went from 266 down to 226 without ever doing more than a 5 minute warm up jog.

I actually recommend to a lot of my friends that they stop trying to kill themselves with the cardio and lift instead. It's gotten a lot of them back in the gym...

[MCrow]

What is a good deficiet without letting your body think it's starving?

It can vary from person to person but about 400-500 calories is a good rule of thumb.

[Drekkor]

You can build muscle & lose fat 'at the same time'. Totally seperate biological functions, protein synthesis is just more likely to occur in a calorie surplus. Timing your diet/lifts correctly will vastly increase the likelyhood of it occuring when on a restricted diet aimed at reducing fat reserves.

[deadpool9]

http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

Try going by that calculator, and start at the Fat loss amount, or that +100 cal.

[jay4812]

Well, I cardio first thing in the morning. Usually about 30 mins. I do this because they say that it's when your blood sugar is the lowest. I have breakfast after that. Usually 3 eggs, a small ammount of breakfast meat, and a glass of OJ. At work, I'll have like a snack in the morning, lunch, and afternoon snack. Right after work I go to they gym and lift. Right after that I go home and make a shake... Does this sound about right? Or am I missing something here?

You can build muscle & lose fat 'at the same time'. Totally seperate biological functions, protein synthesis is just more likely to occur in a calorie surplus. Timing your diet/lifts correctly will vastly increase the likelyhood of it occuring when on a restricted diet aimed at reducing fat reserves.

[rakmm1]

Well, I cardio first thing in the morning. Usually about 30 mins. I do this because they say that it's when your blood sugar is the lowest. I have breakfast after that. Usually 3 eggs, a small ammount of breakfast meat, and a glass of OJ. At work, I'll have like a snack in the morning, lunch, and afternoon snack. Right after work I go to they gym and lift. Right after that I go home and make a shake... Does this sound about right? Or am I missing something here?

Sounds ok. Keep in mind that doing cardio on an empty stomach can cause you to burn muscle as you're catabolic first thing in the morning.

I'd also watch the "breakfast meat" (if you're meaning sausage or bacon with high fat) as the glass of OJ you're having will spike your insulin levels and cause you to store that fat.

[deadpool9]

Sounds ok. Keep in mind that doing cardio on an empty stomach can cause you to burn muscle as you're catabolic first thing in the morning.

I'd also watch the "breakfast meat" (if you're meaning sausage or bacon with high fat) as the glass of OJ you're having will spike your insulin levels and cause you to store that fat.

Turkey bacon is good for B'fast. Not much fat, but the same crunch as pork bacon.

[rakmm1]

Turkey bacon is good for B'fast. Not much fat, but the same crunch as pork bacon.

Exactly. I eat one piece of turkey sausage. Only 3 g of fat. Not going to affect you adversely, but sure helps you choke down a bunch of egg whites!

[jay4812]

good idea. i'll switch to turkey bacon. So just water for breakfast? Is there something else I can have? I'm trying to get vitamins and nutrients from more whole sources.
Regarding the catabolism... I heard that the result out weighs the risk (at least in the morning)? Anyone wanna chime in on that?

[Drekkor]

Regarding the catabolism... I heard that the result out weighs the risk (at least in the morning)? Anyone wanna chime in on that?

Fasted cardio is overrated imo. You're better off having a little to eat before you do cardio.