Working my way out of under muscled purgatory

[JakeWasHere]

Robert,

Long post but hopefully this advice will be useful to others as well. I was a weak skinny fat bordering on fat guy (5’9 and 155 with a small belly after my last diet at age 30, by 32 it had crept up to 180). Rather than diet again I found SS and took the advice that I had to build muscle since I’d never done that before. I did an LP and the some early intermediate programming with an SSC in 2018 and went from 180 to 210 while getting stronger than I ever thought possible at 34 (I’m a piss poor athlete so the absolute totals weren’t very impressive but from where I started it was incredible). Unfortunately my coach moved away and I stagnated trying to do my own programming; even worse a physical showed I was prediabetic (blood sugar 103) and I have a family history of type II diabetes so I decided to pause from training and focus on losing weight until the Starting Strength Dallas Gym opened (cheap plug).

The goal was to get down 170 by the time the gym opened in July. Apparently my body was ready to drop some weight because here we are on May 31 after 2.5 rounds of PSMF and I have already gotten back to 170 (and look leaner than I looked at 155 before I started lifting, this stuff works!). So my question to you is: now what? Programming wise I haven’t been training for 4 months so I imagine LP it is (and swallowing my pride about lost strength), but what about diet? How much should I be eating and how much weight should I be trying to regain? I only got to early intermediate so I’m sure there’s room for muscle growth but I imagine if I went back up to 210 it wouldn’t be as productive as last time. Thanks for your advice!

[Robert Santana]

Thanks for sharing and congrats on getting un-skinny fat. It took me many years to figure that out so I'm glad this material was helpful. I have to say though, stopping training over high blood sugar is about the most counterintuitive thing you could have done. Resistance training has been shown to be equal or superior to aerobic training with regards to improving insulin senstivity. This is because most of our glucose is stored in the skeletal muscle. Growing and training skeletal muscle increases glucose disposal via an increase in glycogen storage and glycogen turnover. So the antithesis of this would be to sit on your back side not training, which can lead to more insulin resistance. In short, don't ever not train again unless it is due to physical inability. This had to be said.

Now forward and onward. Brent will get you squared away in Dallas so good choice of gyms there. When you start back out on LP, which is exactly what you should do since you are coming off of a layoff, start with the standard ~200 g protein <100 g fat, and fill the rest with carbohydrates. Keep fats and carbs moderate-to-low in the beginning since the loads will be light. Then scale them up as the loads get heavier. I'm always happy to work with you on this if you find you need a more tailored approach as well. Hope this helps.

Oh and One Last Thing: Don't Not Train!