Eat More, or Less?

There’s a popular saying among fitness folks that “abs are made in the kitchen”.  If you want people to be impressed with your muscles, you do need to make them bigger.  But muscles appear more impressive--bigger, even--when they’re not covered in a thick layer of fat.  

What and how to eat are very thorny questions whose answers change depending on your goals, your daily activity level, and the fact that your body processes nutrients in its own unique way.  And I’m not a nutritionist, but I’ve read a bunch and can share what little I know. 

First, Some Basic Vocabulary.

Your diet is built from three kinds of food, called macronutrients: protein, carbohydrates (carbs), and fats.  These macronutrients (macros for short) are all important for your body to remain healthy, and for you to achieve your fitness goals.

Proteins are most abundant in meats, including fish, and eggs.  You can also find proteins in dairy products, nuts, and certain plant-based products, but the proteins in those foods are typically mixed in with more carbs and fats, unless the food has been processed to separate out the proteins.  Your body uses protein as material to build and repair muscles and other kinds of tissue, and to a lesser extent as an energy source.

Carbohydrates come from grains, fruits, vegetables, and other similar foods, and are your body’s favorite energy source.  There are complex carbohydrates--starches and fibers--and simple carbohydrates--sugars.  Complex carbs digest slowly and keep your body’s energy levels more stable; simple carbs digest quickly, which can result in wide swings in energy levels.  Although simple carbs aren’t always evil, it’s a good general rule to emphasize complex carbs in your diet.

Fats can be found in meat, eggs, nuts, seeds, oils, and other foods like avocados.  Fats have been vilified for many years as the cause of obesity, but they are needed in your body to transport fat-soluble vitamins and perform other functions; recent research is finding that sugars are at least as guilty of causing obesity, if not more so.  Your body also uses fats as an energy source.

Each gram of carbs has 4 calories.  Each gram of protein also has 4 calories.  Each gram of fat has 9 calories.  (And you might as well know that a gram of pure alcohol has 7 calories.)

Can I Gain Muscle and Lose Fat at the Same Time?

The simplest advice for how to lose fat is to eat fewer calories than you spend through exercise.  When your body needs the extra energy to fuel your exercise, it will burn the fat it has stored throughout your body.  This is called a “caloric deficit”.  

The simplest advice for how to gain muscle or get stronger is to eat more calories than you spend through exercise.  If your body is going to build muscle, it needs the extra energy.  This is called a “caloric surplus”.  

Can you do both at the same time?  Couldn’t you, like, work out a lot, eat moderately, and convince your body to burn fat and use that energy to build muscle?  Some folks call such a process “body recomposition” or just “recomp” for short.  There are plenty of people who say that recomping is absolutely, categorically impossible, period.  The world will end before such a thing would ever happen.  But I have done it, and I know others who have.  Just know that there are asterisks all over the place here.

If you are quite a bit overweight, fairly new to weight training, very serious, and willing to go slowly, your chances are better.  Eat at a slight calorie surplus, emphasize lean proteins and vegetables, and cut as much sugar out as you can.  On the other hand, if you’re fairly lean already (compared to most Americans), are pretty experienced at weight training, or want results quickly, you shouldn’t expect to be able to do both.  But there are still options for you, so don’t give up!

EDIT: I just found this article about recomping. It's probably even better advice.

Bulking and Cutting

Most experienced athletes, models, and People You Wish You Could Look Like follow a two-cycle process.  Part of the time, they focus on losing fat: they maintain a caloric deficit, lift weights, and do cardio like running or cycling.  This part of the cycle is called “cutting”.  The bad news is, if you’re too ambitious at cutting, you risk the possibility that your body will break down muscle tissue for energy instead of burning fat.  So you can’t just starve yourself if you don’t want to lose your hard-won gains.

The opposite of cutting is “bulking”, where you maintain a caloric surplus and lift weights.  Maybe cardio, but typically not.  But you can’t just go crazy and eat everything that doesn’t run away fast enough.  Too much of a caloric surplus means you gain fat.  Most folks resign themselves to gaining a little bit of fat during their bulking cycle, and consider it the cost of doing business.  Once they feel like they need to lean down again, they start another cutting cycle.  It’s all a back-and-forth game, but over the long haul, you get to where you want your body to be.

People often wonder which process they should embark on first.  Sometimes they work themselves into paralysis over this question.  My personal philosophy is, look in the mirror and decide which you’d like to see more: a leaner you, with more muscle definition, or a bigger stronger you, with more muscle tone or size (those are actually the same thing).  Whichever one is more important to you will tell you whether to cut or bulk first.  Don’t get paralyzed, just pick one.  It’s not a huge deal, as long as you plan to do both over the long term.

If you still want someone to tell you what to do, cut first.  That’s the advice I hear more often.

What if you’re already lean enough, and just want to get nice and big?  Then only bulk.  What if you just really, really want to be as lean as you possibly can?  Then only cut.

And by the way, have you seen those pictures of the pro bodybuilders with the scary-bulging muscles and veins popping out everywhere who look like you could drop a car on them and the car would get cut in half?  You should know that they don’t look like that all the time.  They are bulking through a good portion of the year (called “off-season”) and embark on an extreme cutting cycle a few months before competition.  They also have one set of steroids for bulking, and a different set for cutting.  All those photos you’ve seen were probably taken within a week or two of a bodybuilding competition.  Most of the year they just look like really, really big guys who could crush you with their pinky, but don’t have that cut-like-a-diamond look.  Just thought you should know.

In my next post, I'll talk more about details for how eating to lose fat is different from eating to gain muscle.

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