Just looking for a few opinions from the serious lifters in here.

I've been a regular gym attendee for roughly 10-12 years. In that time i never had an injury or illness that kept me out of the gym for more than a few days. Recently i have had about 3 months out of the game due to injury and as a result i'm carrying more fat now than i ever have.

I'm naturally reasonably lean, i've always been between 8-10% BF, but as a result of the enforced layoff, and a bit of a winter coat i am now in the vicinity of 16% and have lost a bit of lean mass due to relative inactivity.

Obviously my goal now is to regain the lost mass and trim my BF% back down to what it was, but i'm getting conflicting information about the best way to go about things. There is the school that says bulk up first, regain the lost muscle mass and then cut, but others are equally adamant that the way to go is to trim your BF% down to your desired level and then slowly clean bulk until you hit your ideal size/weight.

I'm not a novice lifter, and generally my diet is good (albeit it has slipped in recent months) but this is a problem i have never had to overcome before so i'm a bit stumped. So over to you guys, which would you recommend and why?

Errr buys = guys in topic obviously!

Ive never been a fan of doing a clean bulk. I get faster results from doing a proper bulk followed by cutting down to a desired size.

Why not just watch what you eat and stay cut the whole time?

Littledragon, that was pretty much my philosophy over the past 10 years, the problem is i am at least 6% BF over what i want to be/should be plus due to inactivity i have lost some lean mass so basically i'm just weighing up the options as to the best way to get back!

I'm not wanting to add a lot of lean mass, i'm fairly comfortable with where i am now in terms of size (minus the excess BF!), probably another 3-4kg of lean mass (probably need to gain around 2kg to get back to where i was) and i'll be happy. It's not like i need to add huge amounts of size for a comp in 18 months time so the whole 5000cal diet and then 3 months of 1300cal doesn't really appeal to me!

If your just looking to lose fat and not too concerned with gaining any more weight, get strict on your diet.You will still gain muscle (you should get your 3-4 kg back pretty easy, if you want to gain more, you would have to start bulking)
Hit up the diet / food threads for all the info, save having to reiterate it all here.

Do some light cardio (walking) if your really keen, but it's not neccesary, especially if your body is naturally lean.

edit: For such a small amount of weight, you shouldn't have to bulk, your body should go back to how it was.

Generally it is easier to bulk then cut, it is hard to gain muscle on a strict diet.

walkings a waste of time, I dont classify it as exercise

But if you are going to walk then keep your arms immobilised by your side, it makes you use approximately 12% more energy when compared to walking while swinging your arms.

"walking's not exercise, it's transport"

KFC_Fiend - Sounds like you want what everyone wants...get bigger & leaner. Why not just work on sticking to a consistantly clean diet Monday through till Friday(give yourself a bit of leeway on the weekends), and regular resistance training; say 3-4 sessions a week, set yourself some strength goals so you know you're building muscle because you're getting stronger, and then re-evaluate in 16 weeks

Walking isnt excersise are you serious?

yep

Walking is Definately exercise just not the perferred choice of exercise by some people.
I Don't go to the gym and go for a walk but I do walk to the shops or whatever as much as possible, might not seem like a breathless workout but it's still exercising.

unless your so unfit that walking up a flight of stares leaves you gasping for breath then you shouldnt classify it as exercises.


if it barely raises your heart level then it's not exercise, dont walking for 30 mins and then tell me you've done 30 mins of exercise because you haven't.

i don't get why people join the gym with the sole purpose of walking on the treadmills every time....newsflash, walking is free!!!

What i tell my clients is that if you can talk and walk or keep conversation you are not trying hard enough i always use the RPE scale on my clients Rate of Perceived Exertion its a scale of 1 to 10. 1 being the easiest and 10 the hardest. And i try and keep my clients around a 7 to 8 but it all depends on the individual.

cheers

Brisk walking is a great way to lose fat while sparing muscle tissue. Hence why body builders use long sessions of walking to cut up.

KFC_Fiend, if you haven't been off gym for all that long, you will get great results purely from muscle memory. I think if you just stick to your normal weight sessions and leave cardio to your non weight training days, along with a strict diet you will be fine. Don't go too low with your carbs though, your muscle glycogen levels will be lower than normal, so they will soak up carbs once you are training again and fill out rather quickly. Cycling your carb levels is still in my opinion, the best way to diet.

I'm pretty much in the same boat you as, been nearly 2 months since I've trained due to injury, and I still have a few more weeks to go til I can.

Sorry I should be more specific.

When I say "walking" I don't mean go for a leisurely stroll. You walk as fast as you can , and that any faster movement would require you to break into a run (almost to a power-walking level)

As B unit said, Bodybuilders use this to help cut up, walking (or any activity done at around 120 bpm) uses (mostly) fat for energy. Once you start running (or going 140 bpm +), your body starts breaking down carbs and proteins.

I find it so hard to convince people of this. They still think running with a high heart rate will be more beneficial for them. It will, aerobically, and will burn more calories, but not from fat sources. This is why I did that thread about the aerobic myth. But how many people do you talk to that still are trying to lose fat, and run all the time, and are frustrated that they aren't seeing the results.

running/jogging/walking are a waste of time imo

too monotonous

there's lots of other ways to do cardio

Fix your diet. If you NEED the gym to be able to keep fat off, then you're eating wrong.

Is this right? I thought HIIT was the best way to burn more fat and less muscle. If this is correct, how often do you suggest to stay around the 120bpm for? 1/2hr, 45mins or longer?

HIIT is great for burning fat, but would more than likely still consume more muscle tissue than say brisque walking at about 130bpm. But you have to weigh up the options, as the HIIT may very well burn more fat also. If you wish to do steady cardio at the 130bpm range, do it for minimum 30mins, even an hour if you like. Personally I can get great results from this, but cardio bores me to tears.

ok fair enough, i have lost aout 16-17kgs since the start of the year doing cardio ie; runs around the neighbourhood and what not, i only started of at a walking pace and then continue up to a steady run, doing a course of app. 4.7k in around 25mins, which was my best then i got rather ill and had to stop. I havent reached this yet, but i have mainly been doing my cardio on my off days with a treadmil and the music UP! I can do 6k in 34 minutes on it so im starting to get back to my normal.

I now weigh 78kg with, and I expect a BF of im guess around 14-15%. Beofre i started my cardio, i weighed 94 odd kilos with a BF of 21% so i was a fat bastard. lol

But today i tried the walking tech, i did 20 minutes of it with a speed of 7km/h, which is what i managed with a HR of 125bpm constant. I got bored with this and turned it up to 11km/h and did another 15mins. Plus a weight session today after cardio cause i pigged out on the weekend down at byron with sweets, to much fatty meat and wa to much booze. lol i gained 2kg over 3 days hahaha


I then have my protein shake which is the BSC hydroxy burn PRO forular which i have just started(hopefully i see results this time) as i was on EVOLVE slow whey for about 2 months and all i got from this was minimum gains but found that i was putting on fat, which concerned me as this is not my goal so i have changed.