OK for introduction im a 25 year old Argentinian Male. Im 6ft6inches, and im currently 260 lbs. I started IF (16/8) arround 4 months ago, my starter weight was 288 lbs and it really helped turn my life arround, not only i feel better but it helped motivate me to join the gym again after 4 years of a sedentary life, as well as counting my calories and being more consious about what i eat.
Ive been eating 2000 calories monday to friday, and on the weekends i dont count calories nad let go a little but not too much. Im doing weight lifting 3 times a week for about an hour each session and im also running arround 4 hours a week, usually divided in 5 days more or less.
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The issue is this, theres this machine in the gym which measures body weight, body fat percentage, water weight, muscle weight etc… After 4 months i measured myself again, and eventough i lost almost 30 pounds, i also had some muscle loss, even tough i was doing weight lifting.
What could be the reason for this, i need some help.
-Is 2000 calories for weight loss enough or maybe too litle? (online calculators have given me so many different amounts that i lost faith in them.)
-Am i doing too much Cardio, ive heard that can be an issue
-Am i exerting myself too litle in weight training, should i increase the weights?
-Im probably consuming arround 22% protein in avg.
Im open to all sugestions.
PD: im completely in love with this community, its by far one of the most positives communities in reddit and its awesome how uplifting everyone is. Thanks for the motivation.
A few things;
Don’t count too much on the machine at the gym, it’s probably being used several times a day by many different people so the readings can easily be off. Also, it’s probably not being calibrated as often as you think. Purchase an in home scale that will measure these things for you. It’ll be slightly more accurate.
If you’re looking to build muscle and lose weight at the same time it’s going to be difficult, try to choose 1 goal and go for that. You can certainly lose weight and tone up your musculature but losing fat and building muscle/stremgth takes a long time and it’s a process that needs to be constantly monitored. You said you take weekends off which is totally fine but you may not be hitting the macros you need to fit your goals. It’s just as easy to under eat as it is to over eat.
In order to build muscle you need to be in a not necessarily a surplus of food but your carbs, which will power your work outs need to be higher than more likely what you’re consuming as with protein. Maybe start at 1g of protein per pound of weight you are. If using metric I believe 1g of protein per kilo? So 2g of protein per kg I could be off on that though.
Cardio won’t necessarily kill gains but if you’re doing low impact/low intensity steady state or LISS (walking/jogging/biking/elliptical) for longer periods of time 30 mins or more, your body may be using your fuel (carbs) for that. Which will in turn take away fuel that your body needs for weight lifting. Try switching to high intensity interval training or HITT for cardio 2-3 per week vs lss.
Make sure you are having rest/recovery days, you absolutely cannot build muscle without recovery. Your recovery days can include higher carbs/fat/protein.
Muscle loss will happen no matter what when losing weight, especially when fasting. That said, with HITT training you can mitigate your losses because HITT workouts will cover your cardio and help with muscle building.
It sounds like you may just need to revamp your work outs. Look into doing more Olympic style weight lifting like dead lifts, bench, cleans, squats, all are great for building muscle and you can hit the entire body with 2-3 of these exercises per lift session.
Hope this helps a little!
Those machines are really inaccurate. Measure your waist, take your blood pressure, take photos monthly in the same clothes, record the heaviest weights you can press. That’s where you can check progress.
Congrats on the 30 pound weight loss. Every pound you lose takes 4 pounds of pressure off your knees. That alone is really great progress.
22 percent of 2000 is about 440 calories, or about 110G of protein. That seems very low for someone strength training, or someone of your height, without strength training.
More protein…If it were me I would try for 140g