Should You Build Muscle or Lose Fat?

So you're just starting out in the gym, or getting back into it after a period of time where life got in the way, and you're looking to get into some serious shape. You're 100% ready to commit, you want to get strong, fill our your frame and get ride of the muffin tops to become the complete package. You want to unleash your inner athlete and become the everyday athlete if you will... But should you start by building muscle first, or losing fat first? It's a great question, and one I get asked by pretty much everyone in the same position as you. Now I don't want to sound like a cliché strength and conditioning coach and immediately defer to "it depends"... but it kinda does. Depending on your training age and current body composition, you may not have to chose. Building Muscle AND Losing Fat At The Same Time

If you bodyfat percentage is higher, and your training age is lower, it is more likely that you will be able to build muscle and lose fat at the same time. That's because to lose body fat, you MUST be in a calorie deficit, but to build muscle your DON'T need to be in a calorie surplus (and you can't do both at the same time). The key part at play is the lower training age (i.e. you've never been to the gym before, or you've only just started training properly). In this scenario, the stimulus from training is so new, so novel, and so potent (you're body is literally like "wtf are you doing? I need to adapt NOW"), that it alone can cause a significant increase in muscle mass, even when in a calorie deficit. You'll sometimes hear this referred to as the "newbie gains" period, where everything progresses quickly and with seemingly less effort, and it is because this is a whole new thing for you and your body to adapt to. As your bodyfat percentage decreases and your training age increases (i.e. you drop under 15/20% bodyfat for guys/girls and you've been lifting for 2 years +, things need more targeted work. And this is the period of time where you need to really ask yourself the question "should I build muscle or lose fat"? Should You Build Muscle Or Lose Fat? Pure bodybuilding advice will follow the tried and tested "bulking then cutting" approach to building muscle and losing fat once the newbie gains have dried up. Where you'll go through a "bulk" meaning a significant calorie surplus to force the issue, fuel training, get stronger, increase training volume, build muscle and gain a bit of body fat in the process (sometimes a lot). You'll follow that with a "cut" where you switch to a calorie deficit, and aim to strip the bodyfat you've gained off (and possibly more), while trying to maintain as much of your new muscle mass as possible. But which do you do first? Personally, for the everyday person looking to unleash their inner athlete, if in doubt, lose fat first. Why You Should Lose Fat First Unless you are already very lean I would aim to lose some body fat first for a couple of reasons. The first being, that when you lose some extra body fat and get down to sub 15% for guys and sub 20% for girls, even if you weigh less you'll likely look bigger/more muscular/more defined. You'll show more of everything you've got, and get a clearer picture of where you're currently at compared to where you want to be, identify any areas that you particularly want to work on, and have a great starting point comparison for the future. Plus, when you're in-shape, strong, leaner and healthy, your body will be operating in a pretty solid way. Putting you in a really good position to gain weight predominantly in the form of muscle, with minimal fat gain. One of the main reasons is improved insulin sensitivity, with insulin being an extremely anabolic hormone. It gets such bad press these days with the nonsense information spouted by people like the Glucose Goddess, Tim Spector and the whole Zoë crew. But increased insulin sensitivity and spikes in insulin around training will be very productive when it comes to building muscle. For those of you who don't know, insulin is a storage hormone, it can shuttle blood glucose (blood sugar) and proteins to where they are needed, i.e. the muscle cells. This is PERFECT for people looking to build muscle. So an effective training programme and nutrition plan starting from a lean position can maximise this process, and help you build more muscle while gaining less fat. If you try and start this process when at a higher bodyfat percentage, your insulin sensitivity will likely be less, and where insulin is a storage hormone, it also signals to store fat as well and storing muscle. So while in that scenario you will still store more muscle, you will likely store more bodyfat at the same time, leading to a longer/more severe cut later down the line. How To Optimally Lose Fat Then Build Muscle Now here's what I would specifically do to make the best use of your training time and effort to lose body fat and gain the most muscle as an everyday athlete. Step One: Calorie Deficit - Heavy Training - High Protein - Carb Cycle - Reduced Cardio

Following this process of a 10-20% calorie deficit to lose body fat until you are at a very lean point (<10/15% body fat for guys/girls). Prioritise heavy resistance training and a higher protein diet (~2g protein per kg bodyweight per day) to help maintain your lean muscle mass. Eat higher carb around your training sessions to help fuel performance and recovery. Reduce your cardio workouts, especially high intensity interval (HIIT) training to help maintain your recovery capacity even when in your calorie deficit. Step Two: Maintain For Half Your Fat Loss Time If you spent 12 weeks losing body fat, spend 6 weeks maintaining your new lean physique. If you spent 16 weeks, maintain for 8. This allows your body to be in homeostasis (balance) for a period of time, and identify this leaner physique as your new normal/starting point. Step Three: Calorie Surplus - Volume Training - Higher Protein - Higher Carb Move into a calorie surplus of around 10-15%. We want to gain weight, but not too rapidly. Muscle gain is a slow process, and if we try to rush it too much, we will gain more weight, but predominantly in the form of body fat. If you don't gain as much of it, you don't have to spend as much time losing it later. Protein is still important, but not as important as when cutting. 1.5g protein per kg bodyweight per day will be plenty and leave more room for carbs. Higher carbs will allow you to train harder, with more training volume, recover better, and have left over quick access energy to build the muscle you want. 3-4g carbs per kg bodyweight per day would not be uncommon in this scenario as your improved insulin sensitivity will be able to shuttle it to where it's most needed. Training volume and muscle hypertrophy generally have a dose/response relationship, as in the more training volume you do, the more muscle you will grow. It's not an exact rule, but aiming to lift a greater training volume that in your fat-loss phase will be beneficial to your muscle gain goal. Step Four: Know When To Stop Finally, you need to know when to end you muscle gain phase to minimise your fat gain on top. For guys this would be around 15-18% body fat, for girls around 22-25%. You will have gained significant muscle, you could gain more, but the further you go the more likely you'll be gaining a higher and higher ratio of bodyfat alongside the muscle you're gaining. And you'll subsequently have to spend more time stripping the bodyfat back off. You can then repeat this cycle as many times as you need to reach your body composition goals. And in the meantime, you'll always look strong, fit and athletic year round because you never gain too much additional body fat. Sure you may spend some of the year looking strong and full in t-shirts but a little soft when shirtless, and other times looked jacked and lean when shirtless and a little slimmer when fully clothed, but you'll always look in-shape, confident, and like an everyday athlete. Ian.