Burn fat?

xstarz 2kaii9x

Do you have to burn off excess fat before doing weights and stuff to define your body more?

TimeToShine

Absolutely not, lift weights and eat at 500 calories below maintenance to maintain the muscle mass you have and perhaps build some as well if you're new to lifting. That way, when you've lost the fat you'll look a lot better than someone with the same bodyfat % and no muscle.

Sephiroth_dude

TimeToShine wrote: »

Absolutely not, lift weights and eat at 500 calories below maintenance to maintain the muscle mass you have and perhaps build some as well if you're new to lifting.

How do you work that out?

Ray Mond

TimeToShine wrote: »

Absolutely not, lift weights and eat at 500 calories below maintenance to maintain the muscle mass you have and perhaps build some as well if you're new to lifting. That way, when you've lost the fat you'll look a lot better than someone with the same bodyfat % and no muscle.

afew months back i reduced my cals by 500 in the hope of losing body fat, i kept lifting heavy not as heavy as before and doing lots of circuits . my body fat went down from 20 to 16 but i looked very skinny especially around my neck area, went from 81 kg to 71
so the last couple of months i went back to eating loads 4000+ cals a day and lifing heavy , i have got back up to 77 kgs but have gained some fat around the mid section so wanna cut down no again...
any advice on anything i could have done wrong the 1st time...
sorry for hijacking the post op

TimeToShine

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

How do you work that out?

People who are new to weightlifting will put on muscle mass regardless of their caloric intake. OP wants to know if he/she has to get down to a low bodyfat before starting to lift weights to look good. This is not the case. If he/she were to start lifting now and cut he/she would then build a decent amount of muscle and lose fat at the same time. Obviously, the more efficient method would be for him/her to bulk now eating 3-4k calories a day while lifting to maximise muscle-building and then cut down to the desired bf% but I doubt that's a route OP would want to take.

Ray Mond wrote: »

afew months back i reduced my cals by 500 in the hope of losing body fat, i kept lifting heavy not as heavy as before and doing lots of circuits . my body fat went down from 20 to 16 but i looked very skinny especially around my neck area, went from 81 kg to 71
so the last couple of months i went back to eating loads 4000+ cals a day and lifing heavy , i have got back up to 77 kgs but have gained some fat around the mid section so wanna cut down no again...
any advice on anything i could have done wrong the 1st time...
sorry for hijacking the post op

What do you mean by "circuits"? You may have been doing an imbalanced routine which didn't work your traps enough. If you've gained 6kg through bulking and lifting then you've put on a good amount of muscle, you may start to cut down again but make sure you get enough protein and continue to lift around 3-4 times a week. Try doing an established routine rather than knobbing around on machines, something like WS4SB, and also bear in mind no matter how well you train you're bound to lose some muscle mass when you cut, the trick is to lose as little as possible by getting sufficient protein and lifting regularly.

Edit: Also, forgot to ask. Over what timeframe did you put on the 6kg? You don't want to exceed an 800kcal surplus, or you will become fairly fat.

Ray Mond

[QUOTE=


What do you mean by "circuits"? You may have been doing an imbalanced routine which didn't work your traps enough. If you've gained 6kg through bulking and lifting then you've put on a good amount of muscle, you may start to cut down again but make sure you get enough protein and continue to lift around 3-4 times a week. Try doing an established routine rather than knobbing around on machines, something like WS4SB, and also bear in mind no matter how well you train you're bound to lose some muscle mass when you cut, the trick is to lose as little as possible by getting sufficient protein and lifting regularly.[/QUOTE]

conditioning circuits did them twice a week.
and i dont use machines either have a routine which worked very well when i was looking to gain strenght and put on size but am gonna start a new one as im looking to cut down now...
thanks for the reply

marathonic

Ray Mond wrote: »

afew months back i reduced my cals by 500 in the hope of losing body fat, i kept lifting heavy not as heavy as before and doing lots of circuits . my body fat went down from 20 to 16 but i looked very skinny especially around my neck area, went from 81 kg to 71
so the last couple of months i went back to eating loads 4000+ cals a day and lifing heavy , i have got back up to 77 kgs but have gained some fat around the mid section so wanna cut down no again...
any advice on anything i could have done wrong the 1st time...
sorry for hijacking the post op

I think you're trying to achieve your goals too fast. From another thread, you went through 2 bags of ON Mass in 5 weeks, ate like a horse and put on 7kg in that time.

I'm on a bulk now but am weighing myself weekly. If I put on more than an average of 1lb - 1.5lb per week, I'll know that I'm going too fast and need to reduce my calories slightly.

Mellor

TimeToShine wrote: »

That way, when you've lost the fat you'll look a lot better than someone with the same bodyfat % and no muscle.

That makes no sense, if two guys the same size are the same same body fat percent, then they've the same muscle mass.

If you are comparing two guys of different size, well that just silly.


The OP is phrased badly, but it sounds like he is asking do you have to cut body fat to improve definition, and the answers is yes, lower bf% = more definition.
There are lots of ways to achieve this, but that wasn't his question

PatrickMac

TimeToShine is definately right about a 500cal defecit, anything more and you'll struggle to put on any muscle if you're new (you're likely to lose if you've been doing it a while). Keep the weight as heavy as possible while trying to simultaneously build/maintain muscle mass while dieting. Its about keeping the muscle in heavy stimulation to reduce catabolism (muscle breakdown). You should also pay more attention to the timing of your nutrients, aswell as the quantity. take a large quantity of protein and High GI Carbs (like the sugars in the weight gain), directly after training to promote muscle recovery (and size). A diet with well timed but reduced carbs can build muscle while the total calorie defecit and increased metabolism eats the bodyfat. My 2 cents anyway, hope it helps

PatrickMac

Just to try answer your question a bit more directly xstarz, It is more effective to either reduce bodyfat before bulking, or vice versa, as each goal is easier to achieve if a single goal. ie just size/cutting down. Saying that the previous posts give good advise on doing both simultaneously. Unless you want to be small and lean, or big and carrying some additional weight, I think building muscle while reducing calories is the best option. But keep the defecit to 500cals (1lb a week bodyfat), any more and your body may stop you building muscle, and halt fat burning. its the bodys defence mechanism to what it thinks is "starvation". So you cant be too eager with this method.

gymsoldier

Ray Mond wrote: »

my body fat went down from 20 to 16 but i looked very skinny especially around my neck area, went from 81 kg to 71

81kg @ 20% BF = 64.80kg Lean Mass
71kg @ 16% BF = 59.64kg Lean Mass

You lost 5.16kg of lean mass, of course you were looking "skinny" after what you were use too.

You diet and training did not suit at all as you lost over 11lbs of lean mass.

gymsoldier

PatrickMac wrote: »

But keep the defecit to 500cals (1lb a week bodyfat)

500cals x 7 = 3500cals
1lb = 454grmas
454grams x 9cals (fat) = 4086cals

And anyway, besides this simple maths mistake. Has no body ever heard of the theory of "Beans Law"? Not to reduce daily calories (BMR + Exercise) by no more then 15%.

darrenw5094

gymsoldier wrote: »

Has no body ever heard of the theory of "Beans Law"? Not to reduce daily calories (BMR + Exercise) by no more then 15%.

Nope. Never heard of that one. Reducing calories by 500 a day seems to work though. I have lost a fair percentage of BF with this while getting back the muscle gains from years ago. Probably easier to get those gains back the second time around, but a deficit of 500 calories a day seems to be a winner. Of course everyone is different, but you could tweek it to your own needs.

Check out this website, everything is covered here in great detail.
http://www.bodybuilding.com/guides/

TimeToShine

Mellor wrote: »

That makes no sense, if two guys the same size are the same same body fat percent, then they've the same muscle mass.

What? I was referring to the fact that is the OP were to lift weights while cutting he would look better than if he just cut. And as for my comparison, well depending on which route the OP takes he will end up a different size. I think his question was do I have to be skinny before I start lifting to have some definition, the answer to which is no.

Mellor

gymsoldier wrote: »

500cals x 7 = 3500cals
1lb = 454grmas
454grams x 9cals (fat) = 4086cals

And anyway, besides this simple maths mistake. Has no body ever heard of the theory of "Beans Law"? Not to reduce daily calories (BMR + Exercise) by no more then 15%.

The bolded part is your mistake. A 1lb of body fat isn't equal to 454g of fat
A portion of BF is made up of water, its about 85% fat afaik so 3500 is pretty close

gymsoldier

Mellor wrote: »

The bolded part is your mistake. A 1lb of body fat isn't equal to 454g of fat
A portion of BF is made up of water, its about 85% fat afaik so 3500 is pretty close

"Under normal conditions, fat cells contain ~90% triglycerides and ~10% other stuff where other stuff includes some water, the cellular machinery that makes all the stuff that fat cells make and a couple of other things that I'm forgetting right now. Basically, fat cells do not normally contain much water."

Lyle McDonald
02-09-2008

Mellor

I'm not sure what your saying there, that quote backs up my point. Its that 10 percent that doesn't contain 9 cals per gram.

gymsoldier

Mellor wrote: »

I'm not sure what your saying there, that quote backs up my point. Its that 10 percent that doesn't contain 9 cals per gram.

Just the points in bold, it isn't just 10% water, its other things aswell.

"Under normal conditions, fat cells contain ~90% triglycerides and ~10% other stuff where other stuff includes some water, the cellular machinery that makes all the stuff that fat cells make and a couple of other things that I'm forgetting right now. Basically, fat cells do not normally contain much water."

Lyle McDonald
02-09-2008

So we could be talking only about 2-3% water.

Mellor

gymsoldier wrote: »

Just the points in bold, it isn't just 10% water, its other things aswell.

...

So we could be talking only about 2-3% water.

I get that, but its still irrelevant to my point. You're not making any sense at all. Lyle quote agrees completely with me, he was actually the person i got thins information from. So it's funny that you are using him to counter my posts.

I said "a portion" of fat was water. I never said how big this portion was, and it doesn't matter. The non-fat portion of body fat can be water or cellular machinery, either way it doesn't add to calorific value. It doesn't matter what the 10-15% is made up of, as long as its not lipids.

I said body fat is bout 85% fat (lipids/triglycerides), which your quote from Lyle roughly agrees with, in actual fact the fat content of WAT varies anywhere from 80-95% according to Lyle, see Chapter 2 Stubborn Fat solution.

I was trying to explain why its not as high as 4086 calories like you suggested.

500cals x 7 = 3500cals
1lb = 454grmas
454grams x 9cals (fat) = 4086cals

1lb of fat is 454g and let’s assume 85-90% lipid on average. So about 400g is stored triglycerides. 1g gram of fat is 9 calories which is totals 3600 cals.
As I menitoned the lipid content of WAT varys from 80-95%, so the calories required to burn of 1lb of fat vary from lb to lb. 3500 is a convient average, and prob pretty accurate.

gymsoldier

I hate being wrong, but Ill stand corrected this time