Bigger Guy Trying to Follow SS Nutrition

[grant.meeker]

Jordan,

I've been on SS for a little over a month now and am seeing tremendous gains and an incredible reduction in back pain related to both muscle spasms and sciatica from herniated discs. The nutrition has been going good, I feel - I'm averaging about 225 g protein/day, about 2000-2500 calories, 150g carbs, less than 80g fat, but I'm wondering if this is the best way to build muscle.

In trying to take full advantage of the novice effect that I'm working under now, would it be better for me to shun any plans to drop the excess body fat I have (I'm 6'2, 225, about a 40 in waist, am trying to get down to 200 or so) and just focus on strength building, (i.e. following Rip's 6000 cal and 1 g whole milk/day diet) or is my current trajectory going to allow me to achieve maximal strength gains while also dropping a few pounds of fat I simply don't need to be carrying around with back problems?

[Jordan Feigenbaum]

You might "leave" a little strength on the table by not GOMAD'ing (or similar) your way up to 250-60, but you'll go plenty far on SS and then the advanced novice program by eating ~3000 calories that's based around single ingredient foods, lots of protein, starches pre and post workout only, copious amounts of vegetables, and titrating milk (or similar) to effect. What I mean by that is, if your waist isn't going down as it should, back off the milk a touch. If you're staying about the same weight and your waist is decreasing add some cals, say be adding units of milk.

If you wanted some macros, it's probably look like 275, 150, 150 (pro/carb/fat), but that number isn't something you can just "eyeball", that's a weighed and measured thing, as 275g of protein is considerably more than most people could eyeball.