All_Pain_No_Gainz's Journal, 08 December 2021

Wow…I ate 3200 today. Try to give myself a little breathing room from that 160lb level. More calories and carbs today than in any day since I started back in July. Let’s see what the workout looks like tomorrow. Had a personal best reps and sets in EZ bar curls this morning.  

I've planned my biggest meals around my workout. my biggest being 750cal pre workout and then the same meal post workout (minus any fats). Even being in a deficit I still have pretty productive workouts...... so far. Tuesday I hit 2 PRs in reps on shoulders.... The meal timing seems to have been a big factor in keeping me strong when I need it. I'm sure in another week this will be a different story tho. 

On a side note... You would be amazed at how much you can actually eat and not gain FAT. As long as you're giving your muscles a stimulus to grow. that's were alot of the calories will go.  

I believe it…I haven’t changed the weight in my ez bar at all since I began. Day one I was doing sets of 7, 5 and 5 😂...to failure lol. Today was 20-15-15. I could only do 7 continuous push-ups then…now 21. Quite amazing to experience.  

The bodybuilding side of FS is fascinating. I've basically been in maintenance at 138ish, want to lose maybe 5-7 more pounds. What would you recommend...go back to low cals lower workouts to lose the weight, then start the heavy lifting again? That's what I'm thinking 🤔  

To me, the whole point of lifting weights is to gain muscle, not to burn fat. You burn hardly any calories lifting weights. You spend more time in between sets resting then you do actually moving weight. So focus on CICO for now. Just drop your calories down, and increase your cardio. Lift weight at a maintenance volume to try to keep as much muscle as you can while in a deficit.  

I watched a 15 minute Greg Doucette rant on YouTube about building muscle without bulking…it is certainly possible. While he is somewhat obnoxious I agree with his assertion that bulking is not necessary to build muscle. In the time it takes to bulk, build muscle, and then cut with a painful calorie restriction you could just maintain your normal diet to achieve weight loss goals and then build muscle slowly over time with a tiny surplus, I’m talking 100-300 calories per day. If you’re lifting consistently while on a diet you will not lose muscle…my personal results back this up. I’m not lifting big numbers but my bench press increased 40 pounds over 90 days while I lost 15 pounds of body weight in a daily calorie deficit of close to 1000.  

Actually Doucette was kind of funny…he said you need a calorie surplus of 33…maybe he was being facetious, but the theory is 33 calories multiplied by 365 days is enough calories to add 4 pounds of muscle in a year. A very basic calculation would be to use a 100 calorie surplus per day…30 days in a month is 3000 calories…that should equate to 1 pound of muscle given proper lifting routines. If nothing else it’s food for thought. 

You could never track 30 calories accuratly. that's ridiculous. What he doesn't mention is the strength gains you get from a surplus. As long as you have body fat to use as fuel you could build tons of muscle in a deficit but If MainGaining worked so well then all pro bodybuilders would do it... And don't even get started on the diets of strength athletes. Those guys are eating 8-9-10k cals a day. Anyone that is science based will tell you the exact opposite of Greg doucette. But then again those guys aren't trying to push cook books filled with low calorie recipes onto you. So who knows 😎.  

That was kind of his point too…even tracking within 100-200 calories can be tough given different cuts of meat with slightly different fat patterns etc…I like to think I’m accurate within 5% but even then…that can be a deviation of 100 calories on a 2000 calorie day.  

All good points HK3 and All_Pain! I read all your comments and it totally makes sense. Thank you both for the research and ideas 💡 ❤🤘 

I second that thought.