New Member

[CatFitness07]

New to body building. My short story. I am 51 and have always been fit and had decent muscle tone and 97lbs. I had gained about 4 lbs in November of 2016. My son was bugging me to join his dad's gym, I am divorced. I kept saying no thanks. January 2017 my son talked to me to look at the gym, I said fine but I am not joining. Looked around and was very impressed. Joined that day and hired a trainer. Went the next week for my BMI it was 24.1 and I weighed 101. I could not believe it. I ate like a bird. They told me I need to eat clean and how much I should. For those few weeks I had to force myself to all the food. I felt great and lost 2% Bf in 2 weeks. Trainer 3 days a week and eating clean.

May comes and I am 16.8 body fat. Oh how I was proud of myself. End of May my trainer gets a new job. I was sad but she still trained me a few times per week. Started traveling thru out the summer and boom. Lost my focus. Still working out a little and eating clean only 50%. Trained with my trainer and went up 18.1 last week. Not very happy. That is why I joined here to reach my goal to get to 13-15%. Hitting the gym tomorrow like crazy and have been eating clean and not cheating.

[oregonchick76]

How tall are you?
How did you measure your body fat? Unless a DEXA, most likely not accurate.
13-15% is not a realistic number unless you are a competitive fitness model. Those numbers are exceptionally lean/ripped. Even folks who compete do not stay at that low of a body fat percentage during off-season.

Eating clean is a bunch of baloney. You need to eat to meet your macros - protein/calories, etc. Obviously folks should aim to eat mostly healthy, but whether you eat clean or not, it doesn't change your body fat composition. To lose fat, you eat in a deficit, to gain muscle, you eat in a surplus and lift.

What lifting program are you following? What does your lifting routine look like?

[anandagirl]

How tall are you?
How did you measure your body fat? Unless a DEXA, most likely not accurate.
13-15% is not a realistic number unless you are a competitive fitness model. Those numbers are exceptionally lean/ripped. Even folks who compete do not stay at that low of a body fat percentage during off-season.

Eating clean is a bunch of baloney. You need to eat to meet your macros - protein/calories, etc. Obviously folks should aim to eat mostly healthy, but whether you eat clean or not, it doesn't change your body fat composition. To lose fat, you eat in a deficit, to gain muscle, you eat in a surplus and lift.

What lifting program are you following? What does your lifting routine look like?

All of this.

Being 13-15% year round is not a realistic or healthy goal. If you want to hit that number to do a photo shoot, fine, but I wouldn't recommend that year round.

As far as losing fat goes, eating clean isn't the end all, be all. You need to track calories/macros. Read the stickies, look into IIFYM, and go from there.

Also, you're an adult woman and having a goal is awesome, but for long term success, sometimes the goal shouldn't be all about a number on the scale.