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Thread: Does gaining muscle and fat go hand-in-hand?

  1. #1
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    Default Does gaining muscle and fat go hand-in-hand?

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    After watching Feigenbaum and Rip's podcast from a few years ago, I learned that generally speaking, people gain muscle and fat simultaneously or they lose it simultaneously. Feigenbaum also said unless a person is obese, they cannot build strength and muscle while losing fat at the same time.

    (As a side note, in the past when testing bodyfat with calipers, my measurements would show that this was actually happening. A person's bodyweight would stay the same, but their bodyfat reading would decline, thus indicating a gain of muscle (or fluids, I suppose).)

    What has been your experience with clients, Robert, do people gain or lose both fat and muscle together?
    And if you've found that they do grow or shrink simultaneously, what's the solution for a person wanting to gain muscle/lose fat longterm? Bodybuilding-style Bulk phases/Lean-out phases?

    Thank you, sir.

  2. #2
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    Scott, to get those basics, start by reading the articles and vid's Robert's already put out.

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    I second what Stef said. What I will say from my experience is that if you are losing fat and introduce a novel stress you may experience both. For instance, I lost fat and increased LBM when I started training the deadlift and power clean for the first time in my life.

  4. #4
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    I have experienced recomp at 20ish % bodyfat even being past starting strength. The reality is that for a non novice muscle gain is painfully slow but recomp can be accomplished provided programming is appropriate. You probably arent going to go from 20% to 8-10% but you can get to 15% by just maintaining bodyweight and training for PRs.

  5. #5
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    It really depends on how novel the stress is. This thread came at a good time because I just analyzed my anthropometric data over the last 5 years. Right now I'm sitting at 180 with a 32.25" waistline. In 2016, I had to get down to 175 lb to achieve this. To keep things consistent we'll chose the weight 180 dating back to the top of 2014.

    I'll also add that I had lifted weights including full ROM bench pressing and chin ups for 14 years, strict presses for 3 years, and deep squats for 11 years prior to running SSNLP. My first deadlift was in 2003 and I would only train it 3 months out of the year before "confusing my muscles" with some other pulling exercise lol. My baseline 1RM squat was 315 (I have video, it was deep), deadlift 320, Press was 135-145, bench press was 215 @ 3 x 5, could do full ROM 12 chin ups at 192, and Power Cleaned 135. So I was an advanced novice or undertrained intermediate at best. I added 7 lb of BODPod derived lean mass from my first LP (05/2013-11/2013). Now here is where things get interesting :-). After my first LP, I cut from 192 to 168 from 12/2013-07/2014, hence the lower body weight at the top of 2014.

    02/18/2014 - 180 lb @ 34.00" (Ran SSNLP on and off due to injuries from 05/2013-12/2014)
    02/21/2016 - 180 lb @ 33.25" (RTS style training from 2015-2016; pushed to 205 from 07/2014-07/2015 then cut to 176 from 10/2015-03/2016 followed by a cut to 162 from 04/2016-07/2016)
    03/25/2019 - 180 lb @ 32.25" (Worked with Reynolds and Alternated Reynolds Block with Reynolds DUP from 2016-Present; Slow push up to 188 from 01/2017-01/2019)

    So now let's dive deeper into the rabbit hole. Let's see what bodyweight was correlated with a waistline of 32.25" over the years:

    04/29/2014 - 174.6 lb @ 32.25"
    03/06/2016 - 177.0 lb @ 32.25"
    03/25/2019 - 180.2 lb @ 32.25"

    Present Day Lifts:

    Squat - 420 lb (33% improvement)
    Deadlift - 500 lb (56% improvement)
    Press - 210 lb (50% improvement)
    Bench Press - 291.5 lb (if we use an e1RM of 255 ~14% improvement)
    Chins - 18 reps or 90 x 3 (unknown never maxed but likely minimal change due to 20 years of experience)
    Power Clean - 225 lb (66% imrpovement)

    I want to add the caveat that most of the strength acquired took place in the first two years. 1.5 years into my LP I hit a 395 squat, 290 bench press, 210 press, and 440 deadlift. So what we see here is that my pulls had the most linear improvement over the last 6 years because they were my least trained prior to running the SSNLP. The rest of the lifts crawled after year and a half, most of which was spent recycling the SSNLP due to injuries. Now it's all slow and its pretty safe to say that my lifts are improving at single digits percentage points each year, which is on par with my body composition. I've probably gained ~5 lb of lean mass over the last 5 years, which would make sense because I am an advanced lifter who has continuously trained during this time and the return on investment is diminishing. In short, lean mass gains are painfully slow for intermediate/advanced lifters in the middle or left side of the bell curve.
    Last edited by Robert Santana; 03-29-2019 at 01:32 PM.

  6. #6
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    Thank you for all your body comp details, Robert!

    (I didn't make it clear earlier, but I ask these questions for the benefit of my coaching clients as I'm content with my own body comp.)

    Over time, you built LBM/strength and dropped your BF% (primarily from an increase in LBM rather than a large decrease in BF, I'm assuming (correct me if I'm wrong).

    Here is your body comp re-organized with my conclusions. Please correct me where I am incorrect in my assumptions:

    02/18/2014 - 180 lb @ 34.00"
    04/29/2014 - 174.6 lb @ 32.25" (dropped fat/LBM)
    02/21/2016 - 180 lb @ 33.25" (gained fat/LBM)
    03/06/2016 - 177.0 lb @ 32.25" (dropped fat, but probably no loss in muscle?- I’m basing this on 3 lb BW lost/1” waistline reduction)
    03/25/2019 - 180 lb @ 32.25" (gained LBM, but possibly no gain in fat- based on a maintaining of waistline with a gain in BW)

    And again, after reading your article, "Body Composition for Barbell Training," you affirmed that muscle and fat are typically gained or lost together.

    So if you both gained LBM and dropped BFM over the years listed, it appears to me that this was done in traditional Bulk/Lean phases similar to bodybuilder style body re-composition. Yes or no?

  7. #7
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    Thank you for the kind words and re-organization there. I weight cycled similar to bodybuilders. My swings were bigger than what I recommend and that was a function of my lack of experience at the time. So here are my body weight swings:

    First weight lifted in 1999 @ age 15. Bench pressed the barbell and did “the pyramid.” Trained wide grip lat pulldowns behind the neck for 3 x 15 and recycled this routine for 3 months per year for 3 years. The other exercises aren’t worth mentioning and all single joint and machine based.

    1999-2002 - high school swimmer @ ~160 lb 17% body fat via hydrostatic weighing. Lifted 3 months out of the year from 1999-early 2002. Only barbell lift was bench press and we did heavy lat pulldowns and chin ups. The rest was machines. A brief synopsis of my lifting career to illustrate that I was not a rank novice when I came around to SS. This will help understand why my rate of mass gain is slow these days despite my size being relatively unimpressive.

    Fall 2002 - 160-165 lb @ age 18 - added squats and continued bench pressing. Bench press of 185. Baseline squat ~135?
    08/2003-01/2004 - 197 lb - added deadlifts and did my first "bulk." Experienced novice effect and lifted low reps for the first time in my life. Squatted 315 x 1 for the first time. Deadlifted that or close to it. Bench pressed 205. Could do 10 chins and weighted dips @ +45 x 5. Benched 100 lb dumbbells for 4.
    01/2004 - 07/2004 - 150 lb (moderate rep BB stuff)
    07/2004 - 2005 - 180-185 (on and off BB stuff)
    2005-2010 - 185 maintained (on and off bb stuff)
    01/2010- 06/2010 - 203 (New Rules of Lifting periodizing BB and Strength. Introduced Standing Barbell pressing and push pressing; for the first time in my life. Recorded my first training log ever)
    06/2010 - 12/2010 - 155 lb (Recycled New Rules of Lifting)
    12/2010-01/2013 - 168 lb (Recycled New Rules of Lifting until I saw my training logs not changing for 3 years lol)
    01/2013-05/2013 - 168 lb (Reg Park 5 x 5)

    In short, I consistently squatted below parallel since Fall of 2002, chinned reps since 2000 and heavy full ROM post 2002, bench pressed full ROM with no leg drive or back tightness (either barbell or dumbbell), deadlifted 3 months out of the year if that with likely zero leg drive, and started barbell pressing and "cleaning" in the beginning of 2010.

    Introduced SS

    05/2013 - 168 lb
    11/2013 - 192 lb
    07/2014 - 168 lb
    07/2015 - 205 lb
    07/2016 - 162 lb
    01/2019 - 191 lb
    04/2019 - 178 lb

    I separated the dates by peak of weight gain or peak of weight loss meaning the swing was either continuously up or down between dates. Now the numbers alone don't do much justice so let's get the dialogue in here.

    PS - you can find my training logs buried on this forum.

    05/2013: 168 lb @ 17% body fat (via BIA). SQ: 315 x 1/BP: 215 x 5/P: ~135 x 1/DL 320 x 1/PC 135 x 3/Chins: AMRAP 12 +90 x 1

    Pushed up Ran LP from 05/13-08/13 and tore right adductor ---> rehabbed ---> 11/2013 tore left adductor @ 330 x 5 x 3 (last rep, last set) Video on Youtube lol.

    11/2013: 192 lb

    From 11/2013-07/2014 I cut 24 lb of fat, pushed my bench press up to 240 x 5, Press up to 155 x 5, Deadlift up to 375-385 x 5 on SSNLP, Chins @ 15-20, and Power Cleans to 185 x 3. I had hernia repair in 02/2014 so had to reboot LP after that.

    07/2014: 168 lb @ 14% body fat via DXA

    From 07/2014-12/2014 - ran TM split for bench press and press and progressed to weekly pulling on deadlifts and started pushing squat again. Competed in the SS Classic in Oakland and hit a conservative 365 Squat, 185 press, and 405 deadlift (overshot my 3rd attempt and missed 440 at mid shin). Rebooted SSNLP and hit 405 x 5 in November of 2014 ending my last attempt at SSNLP. Went to the SS Seminar in Wichita Falls where I passed the platform, rebooted squat LP and ended at 335 x 5 x 3 with no advanced novice programming (always did a straight 3 days). I weighed somewehre around ~180-185 lb at this time, still gaining.

    Now here is where things got interesting.

    01/2015 - 190 lb - Switched to RTS style training (RPE/Fatigue sets etc). Did this for an entire year.

    From 07/2014 -> 07/2015 - I pushed up from 168 lb to 205 lb and stayed at 205 lb until 10/2015. My best lifts were Squat: 395, Bench Press: 290 (clean)/295 (with a butt rise), Press: 210, Power Clean 210, Chins: still 15 reps @ 205, Deadlift 455 lb.

    10/2015 - Decided to cut because as you can see the loads lifted did not justify the weight. I got a DXA scan done and was 26% body fat and the trends showed no change in lean mass, which told me that any change in lean mass was within the margin of error of the device and I had also switched devices because the DXA I had previously used was no longer available. So even with those changes in variables, I was hard pressed to believe that anything more than 5 lb was plausible and the most likely I had gained 35-37 lb of fat mass and 3-5 lb of lean mass. Makes sense given that my lifts didn't change all that much and I had been bench pressing, squatting, and chinning consistently for 13 years at that point in time, pressing for 5 years, and deadlifting consistently for 3 years. A trained drug-free lifter in this demographic shouldn't gain much muscle + the programming was not the most effective. Anyhow, let's move on.

    10/2015-01/2016 - Cut from 205 to 184 -> Squat went up to 400, deadlift went up to 470 (end of October @ 198), then 475 at the January LA seminar @ 184. Press dropped to 205 (end of October @ 198), and to an unknown amount by January, and bench press dropped to 265.

    01/2016 - 04/2016 - Trained using a high set weekly LP. I had an awful meet the week after pulling 475 and everything crashed. Fired my coach hired a local guy who wasn't very logical in his programming. He programmed my deadlift artificially low because he used percentages of my best completed attempt in my January meet (425) despite having pulled 475 a week before. Bad move and led to an avoidable loss in deadlift strength in the months to come. Cut from 184 to 175, competed at a USAPL meet where I squatted 380, bench pressed 255, and deadlifted 440.

    05/2016 - 07/2016 - Cut from 175 lb to 162 lb @ 11.8% body fat. Best squat was 365, deadlift 440, press 185, bench press, 270, clean 220, and chins @ 20 for amrap

    07/2016-10/2016 - continued attempting to train high set weekly LP with more food and nothing happened strengthwise. Maintained.

    11/2016- Hired Reynolds and alternated between DUP and block ever since. Baselne numbers with him were Squat: 370, Deadlift 440, Bench Press, 270, Press 185 @ 165 lb

    11/2016 - 03/2018 - Scaled my body weight up too 175 lb and: Squatted 420, Deadlifted 500, Pressed 210, Bench Pressed 291.5, and Power Cleaned and Jerked 225 lb. Still chinning 15 reps in a row

    03/2018- Present - Tough year and I involuntarily gained weight up to 188 lb by January 2019 at Nationals. I weighed out at 191 lb and stayed at that weight for the following two mornings so we'll count that as my baseline weight ;-). Set meet PRs but no all time PRs yet. Looking at a new deadlift PR soon. Weight is currently down to 178.2 and I've been cutting for 7 weeks and closing in on the 8th. Max attempts next week.

    Hope this helps you and everyone else on here learn something. I've never taken a drug in my life and this is what my progression has looked like. About as painfully mediocre as they come!
    Last edited by Robert Santana; 04-04-2019 at 12:57 PM.

  8. #8
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    THANKS Robert!

  9. #9
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    Wow! Well that was quite the lifting biography. You've been up and down bodyweight-wise quite a bit! You've learned a lot and been on a bigtime journey.

    By the way, I've been enjoying your old client, Ness, as my Coaching Academy coach. She's full of laughs and energy

  10. #10
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    starting strength coach development program
    Yep pretty much man. Taught me a lot and I hope that others can learn from it. Ness is a fine lifter and coach. She has actually reinstated herself as a nutrition client recently. Always a fun time. You are in good hands with her.

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