#75 - How To Build Muscle AND Get Leaner

Speaker 1: 0:33

What's up and welcome back to Talking Nutrition. Christine's back for episode 75. Today I want to talk about muscle gain, fat loss, how you can achieve it at the same time, or if you can achieve it at the same time, we'll see Depends, as always. Yeah, but first, christine, do you have any updates? What's up?

Speaker 2: 0:56

Not really actually Just working away.

Speaker 1: 1:01

No real big updates. That's like the typical answer.

Speaker 2: 1:04

Yeah, what about you?

Speaker 1: 1:08

Same. To be honest with you, right now it's like it's working season again. You know, now I had a chat with a potential second coach, which I'm very much looking forward to follow up tomorrow. So a lot of good stuff, a lot of good stuff. So it's been an eventful couple of weeks.

Speaker 2: 1:27

Nice. What are you really looking for in a coach? Do you have specific things you're looking for?

Speaker 1: 1:34

I mean I got a few applications like five, but like three, pretty much I mean one person. I'm like well, no, just because I know how they act on social media and it's not helpful. You know what I mean. It's not helpful at all. It's almost like anyway, let's not get into it. Just didn't resonate at all. Other people I think I got three who just got certified, basically, or had like a year-ish experience, which is cool, but currently I'm not looking for someone who's completely new. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 2:14

I'm gonna have someone who has a little bit of experience a couple of years, good transformations, someone who is willing to also get out there and actually help people with social media.

Speaker 1: 2:24

Like I don't give a fuck about, like, how big you're following us, you know, but like I do see, and this is something, maybe it could even be like a podcast episode.

Speaker 1: 2:33

But I had to talk with one of the other candidates about this, I'm like, because he was talking about, like how certain influencers are just, you know, posting like app pictures and butt pictures, and yeah, that's true. But I told him too, like, as much as I also don't agree with that approach, kind of like of just getting likes and shit, at least they are fucking posting and they are doing the thing that requires them to get that reach. What if the people who just actually knew their shit would go out of their way and get uncomfortable on camera to help people right, like what if we step it up, I think more people would be, you know, helped. So that's kind of like what I'm looking for. It's obviously at least a couple of years experience, good transformations under the belt, you know, preferably in Norway, currently for my first coach, when I have some in Norway and other than that, just willing to grow. You know being willing to grow both as a coach right In the real fitness journey and just being a nice person too.

Speaker 2: 3:41

Yeah, yeah, I felt like so when I was looking for a coach. I actually wanted someone. Yes, they needed experience, but I also wanted to be able to bring them up in a way of how I do things and like obviously they had to align with what I was doing right from the bat, and obviously that's important. But I also like the idea of not having someone who had been in it for like 10 years and had all their own thought processes and stuff. Like I really wanted to be able to like also teach that person. So that was definitely one thing. I looked for Social media. Yeah, I agree, I did. You know, in terms of like a coach being on with me. I do have some stipulations that I have, you know, in their contract just to help out, but I'm also not like a stickler about it. But they do know they need to show up On my end. If they bring in their referral, they make more money. So that's you know something. That kind of it's like it gets them to post right.

Speaker 1: 4:54

So I will be big on that and it will be a requirement, even if it's just for clients, right? Even if it's just for our own clients.

Speaker 2: 5:05

Yeah, yeah, totally.

Speaker 1: 5:07

But also in your community space.

Speaker 1: 5:11

Yeah, online right, just how we do the podcast. Like we got new listeners a lot, and especially recently. But like, hey, even if our clients are listening, I'm learning something every week. That's what matters most. You know what I mean. And then, of course, we can help other people in the meantime too. Sorry, my voice is still a little rough from like post COVID shit. I can actually breathe again now, but like I'm still a little, like you know, coughing here and there. No, but it's exciting, I have someone, like I had someone, but they build. And then the person I'm talking to now, like tomorrow we have a follow up call like it's looking good, definitely very aligned in terms of, like our approaches just clicked. Good person willing to grow right. No, sir, shit. And yeah, couple years, couple years of coaching, and not necessarily like the 10 year, like you said. No.

Speaker 1: 6:03

Yeah so, that being said, let's get into today's episode topic. It's basically three questions that I got to through Instagram and one in our community space where I figured let's kind of like lumping together and make an episode of it, because I still see a lot of people chase two rabbits at once right, the muscle gain, the fat loss. So let's actually start there. Do you want to explain anything like before heading into it? You just want to start with the questions.

Speaker 2: 6:34

Let's just start, yeah, cool.

Speaker 1: 6:37

We'll take the first one.

Speaker 2: 6:38

Sure. So Siv from Siv, how to balance the macros in, how to balance the macros in the meals when the goal is to build muscle and get leaner at the same time. So where do I start here? So when we're trying, it's not that you can't build muscle and lose fat at the same time. I have seen it. It's more so in people who are they've got, they don't have like a big training. A long training age is what we call it basically. So they're newbies. That's like the newbie gains where, like you, can gain muscle and lose fat fairly easy. The longer you've been in the game, it does become harder to do this at the same time. So, like Yohan and I, we periodize people's nutrition. So, for example I know I'm not talking about the meals yet, but like the main goal of building muscle and getting leaner I had a client who wanted a recop and so what we did first was like she didn't have a lot of body fat on her.

Speaker 2: 8:03

So what we did first was actually spend time in a building phase where I did have her maintenance worked on, just like routine, figuring out a good training program for her, because that's really important. Like that's a massive piece to this puzzle. When you're trying to build muscle, it's the training is majority of it, and then when you're trying to lose fat, like nutrition is really the majority of it. So we got her on like a hypertrophy program and you know she started with progressive overload and we spent a lot of time there at maintenance and then pushing up her calories a little bit above maintenance, because that's when you're going to optimize that muscle building. Once you know we were there, we saw some good progress. Then we went into a cut and this is where that muscle that you build in the surplus shows through right and this is when you get that like muscley, toned look. So we build that out in different phases in terms of how to balance macros.

Speaker 2: 9:19

So with building muscle, you want to make sure that you're getting protein in at every meal. That's really really important. Outside of that it's going to be there's many factors that can kind of play into that. You know, from a calorie standpoint everyone's going to be different. From a carbon fat standpoint, is that super important? I wouldn't say not as important as getting your protein in. But you can still like partition carbs again, like around your training and the, you know, to help with the performance, help with the recovery. Still, you still want carbs in every meal. This is a little bit of a tough question because everyone is going to be so different.

Speaker 1: 10:38

Yeah, depends. I think I mean goal wise, for sure, 100%. I still never have people do a recon phase or call it like like it's never the goal, if that makes sense right.

Speaker 2: 10:56

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:57

We're going to either build muscle, we're going to get lean. I tell people in the initial four or five weeks, whatever, when we get ready, when we build habits and we work to maintenance and you know the first onboarding, kind of like block. Basically I'm like, hey, fat loss not the goal, yet it can happen 100%, but that's not expected. People tend to lose fat once we dial in protein, once we get lifting those kind of things. And yes, they can also actually build muscle and lose fat at the same time. I just tell people like, hey, we're not going to, like that's not even the expectation here.

Speaker 1: 11:33

Muscle gain a little bit, yeah, Like I want you to be lifting weights and eating enough. That can happen, but either way, we're always going to periodize it. Like you said, we are going to build that muscle, which is a great way to start, at least for most people who don't have a whole lot to lose. And now the Scott was revealed and you're going to see so much more. Because there's a whole lot of stuff now about like gain, taining, I've heard, and, like you know, like people get fancy with like terms, yeah, exactly, that's what it's basically gaining muscle, maintenance, something like that, and going super slow.

Speaker 2: 12:08

I don't know.

Speaker 1: 12:09

Anyway, it's cool, but we need we need to understand where we're at Right and most people, whether they are experienced or not, are not going to see enough results to be excited about it and just stick to it because it takes a long fucking time For building those meals. I would say how we build meals is going to be the same for fat loss or muscle gain Protein going to be important for both. Carbs I like to keep them high. I'll go high carb every time in a muscle gaining phase and not high fat. Fats gets stored as body fat, the easiest protein. I mean I don't like speaking in absolutes when it comes to nutrition, but there's a ton of protein over feeding studies. You don't really gain like protein does get sour as body fat, Like we don't store it Right.

Speaker 2: 13:06

Very hard, very hard to store protein as body fat.

Speaker 1: 13:10

Then carbs same type of deal. Most of our body fat comes from dietary fats. Only a tiny bit, a couple percent, is from carbohydrate and fats. Because it's already fat, it gets most easily stored as body fat. So I'll always try to keep fats at the minimum, even in a gaining phase, unless it's personal preference and we like having a little bit more fat in your food, and it's still not that much.

Speaker 2: 13:37

Yeah, it's a lot easier to overeat fat and end under reported. You know what I mean. I feel like people wildly under report the fat that they're eating, like the oil that they're adding to their food and things like that. So it's another way for us to control that.

Speaker 1: 13:57

Yeah, which, which is kind of like a good way to go into the second question, I feel like from Tonya. So she says how much protein should I eat to one lose weight but also to build muscle? That's why I put these you know questions together, she says. I've read so many different answers to this and I genuinely wonder what I should keep up with. Generally speaking, for the most part, like I know, like one gram per pound of body weight. It's always been that golden standard.

Speaker 1: 14:30

A lot of people are pushing for a little bit lower these days. I've kind of dropped it to like 0.8 for most people, at least if we're not in a fat loss phase, because when we're at maintenance, when we're bulking, we don't have to worry about the body breaking down muscle for energy as much. So that's one. I'll still push for higher proteins. Just from experience I can see that we're best. I mean, I know the same goes for you and if this is what I've seen and heard, you know, also from fellow coaches and there's a lot of stuff these days, I feel like, especially among Some of the bigger names in the space who are now mentioning studies, right, you know, you don't need that much protein, blah, blah, blah, which is fair and it's true. And Again, I think there was a study I Think Mano Hanselman's post about it posted about this when it turned out to be a way less, but that was for strength and muscle gain. So we need to like look at the why. You know what I mean, what the goal is. Could we be Fine with low protein than the? Like one gram per pound of body weight or point eight, yeah, sure, am I still gonna push for the one gram? Like, yeah, if we can, if we can, hundred percent, every single time, every fucking time.

Speaker 1: 15:51

Why is that? A lot of people come to me for fat loss. It's gonna keep you full. That's the number one thing. We've also seen the biggest Recomp, like what we just talked about. Right, when people go on higher protein diets, um, does it really change from fat loss to muscle gain? Not necessarily, like I'll still, I'll put extra emphasis on it during a fat loss phase and we could easily go to 1.2, like. If someone's good, like fine with it, let's. Let's go because it's gonna help. Is it necessary? Yeah, technically no, but it's gonna help, it's gonna keep you full, so why not?

Speaker 2: 16:32

Um yeah, yeah, I agree with that. So, like definitely a bigger emphasis. I mean, obviously it's important, it's giving us the materials to build the muscle in a building phase, in a dieting phase. It's helping us maintain that muscle because we're in a catabolic state and we don't want to be losing them, losing muscle verse fat Also, like Johann said, very satiating. But there's a, there's a situations where, like I'll have a client at like point eight to one gram. I don't necessarily push higher because then you have to think about it's taking away from like carbohydrates, and so I will have it all kind of base it off, like how they're feeling and where they're at like if they can be at point eight and they want a little bit more Carbohydrates and they're, they're satiated, like it's keeping them satiated. We're not seeing like any of that muscle loss or anything like that, which is, I Barely see. That just based on how we do things. But yeah, I'll keep it around that point eight if they Want more carbohydrates to be able to enjoy things more, you know.

Speaker 1: 17:49

During a dining phase, that is yeah and to your point, I like that as well, because then we can get better workouts in, or at least we can get away with as many carbs as possible, right?

Speaker 2: 18:05

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 18:06

A lot within your budget, basically.

Speaker 2: 18:08

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 18:09

But it's going to depend on the person and you even see here like there's different and to Tony's question like there's different approaches for different people with different goals, those kind of things you know. Also there we need to personalize that. Let's call it like around one gram per pound of body weight. Let's call it around sorry, 0.8 instead.

Speaker 2: 18:31

Yes.

Speaker 1: 18:31

One gram if we can 0.8. That's a good kind of like ballpark. And then right, look at the rest of the stuff the protein sorry the carbs and fats as well.

Speaker 2: 18:42

Yeah, like we mentioned with the previous question, you want to be having it at every meal for muscle protein synthesis. I can never say that, right, we did it, we did it. You know, just stay on top of that muscle building. Like you want to be having it every meal, right, and then also from a satiety standpoint, like if you're looking at she said weight loss again, like that's going to keep you full, right, it's going to help, you know, not drive that overeating, and then that's going to help in maintaining your muscle.

Speaker 1: 19:20

All right. Next question.

Speaker 2: 19:24

Do you recommend more weight and less reps or less weight and more reps for weight loss? And what if you want to build muscle? So, again, like when we're, so from a weight loss standpoint, it's not really going to be about either training and the rep ranges and whatnot. It's going to be more so the nutrition side of things when it comes to muscle building, like hypertrophy again, like people would always say, it's between like the eight and 10 rep, but it can be like six to 15. Like there's like a wide range and we, more so we wanting to focus on, like you know, rpe, like your RPE or your RIR, so reps and reserve and training, like at that RIR to or RPE, eight, right, just kind of shy of failure, like really pushing yourself there. Like that's where you're going to find muscle building.

Speaker 2: 20:28

There it's, it's there's no, just like, oh, it's eight to 10 reps and it's three sets, right, it's, it could be anywhere in this range, but your effort really matters, like that's what's what really matters most. And then the weight loss again could still be hypertrophy, rep ranges, but you're going to see the weight loss from the nutrition side, because this is where you see people that that are constantly training, training, training. And their body doesn't change. It's because they don't have the nutrition side of things dialed in right. So it's not necessarily like more weight, less reps or less weight and more reps Like that. That doesn't mean anything in weight loss.

Speaker 1: 21:16

No, it's, that's, that's my whole. Anytime I see like fat burning workouts, you know I'm like a cringe.

Speaker 2: 21:23

You know there's no yeah, there's like there's no such thing as like fat burning exercises or you know things like that.

Speaker 1: 21:32

So I mean fat burning, technically, yes, but not fat loss, and that's the thing.

Speaker 2: 21:41

Yeah, that's what you're. They're confusing it.

Speaker 1: 21:44

Yes, yeah, but that's purposely done to get you to get the fat burning workouts right. Uh huh, um, it just, it just doesn't work that way. You know what I mean? It's like what zone should I be in to be burning body fat? It's like this is why, right, we need to just get very clear when we put out content and not mislead people, right, right, yeah, I will say to. So to the question in terms of muscle gain, it does matter. Um, first, at least if you look at strength versus muscle gain. So that's maybe not completely related to this question, but I did want to bring it up. Um, if we're to get a little bit more on the training side of things with this question, with, like, muscle and strength, typically, if you want to really get stronger, you would be lifting slightly lower reps, uh, have your weight and then for hypertrophy, like you know, higher reps, lower weights. But, like you said, it's yes, you always see like a 10, 12 or 15 range, but it's such a big range, you know it is a big range.

Speaker 2: 22:55

Yeah, it's not just like we typically hear. It's like eight to 10, but it could be 15. Yeah, you know it. So it's. Yeah, it's bigger than we think.

Speaker 1: 23:06

I think this is another thing with content on social media. There's more and more people now who really know their shit with training and all that, which is great. Um, there's more people who do it as a hobby, who actually really know their shit compared to right Most people, compared to before also. But what we also need to understand is the difference between someone who is maybe right single digits body fat, who has trained for a long time close to failure, knows their shit right. There's a difference between that person and someone who's just getting into training you know what I mean who maybe doesn't have to worry about specific rep ranges or whatever it may be, or specific periodization blocks or mesocycles, whatever it is. You know they just need to get into the gym. You know what I mean?

Speaker 2: 24:00

Yeah do a lot of confusion there. And those are the newbie gains. They can really do Anything and they'll start gaining muscle like they don't have to worry so much.

Speaker 1: 24:11

Yeah, then it slows down with the years, you know, it becomes more difficult to build that muscle.

Speaker 2: 24:19

More difficult and harder to maintain, and that's why, when you, as you age, protein becomes more and more important for you. It increases as you age and we see people decreasing it, right, and so we're backwards with that.

Speaker 1: 24:35

So you really, you know, as you age, your protein needs increase because your ability to maintain muscle Is harder, becomes harder percent, yeah, which I think, at least for me, like that's that's even one of the reasons why we should be pushing for at least slightly higher protein. Kind of depends on the person and the age and stuff, but I do bring this up a lot recently at least. It's like we initially start this fitness journey For our own good right. Like we want to do this, like I want to build the muscle, I want to look lean or whatever is. I want to get healthier, yes, true, but we're also, first of all, setting the example for our family members, maybe kids, friends, maybe and we're laying that foundation right for when we are I don't know, 60, 70, 80, you don't want to be like that old, like fragile lady, right? Like you want to like still be able to run around and Get up, right when you fall down or whatever it is.

Speaker 1: 25:35

You know, pick up the you know grandkids, or Jump around, like do fun shit, go hunting you know what I mean like still be able to do shit and Not be that person who needs to be in a wheelchair. All of that and let's be honest, of course anything can happen, but like it can happen. But we're also laying that foundation for them. So let's maybe already Create that habit of hey, we're gonna eat that higher protein A diet, we're gonna be lifting weights? Hey, maybe, even if we don't really love lifting weights, let's just do it for that reason right.

Speaker 2: 26:07

Yep.

Speaker 1: 26:08

I think that is also worth doing.

Speaker 2: 26:11

I so, just from, like a relatability standpoint, so I spent over a decade of my life lifting and building muscle right and competing and and all of that, and I'm in this season of my life right now where I don't feel like lifting.

Speaker 2: 26:31

It's a really weird time and so Like I'm leaning into that, in the sense of like I am doing other things to keep me moving, um, on a daily basis. But I'm also lifting because I know how how important it is For me now but for the future and what I just said, like it's only going to get harder for me to maintain the muscle and if I'm starting to lose it now, like that's a problem, right. So I'm doing what I don't want to do for my future self and that's something that is so important, I mean, in so many different aspects of our lives, um. But speaking on, you know, lifting and what you just said, that made me think about that. Like right now I'm just not into this lifting thing, but I'm doing it because it's so beneficial for my health, presently and in the future.

Speaker 1: 27:28

That's even the the main reason people have a slower metabolism when they age. It's not the actual age, it's. That is, you're not eating enough protein, you're not building muscle, you're not maintaining muscle, you're not lifting weights. Plus, you're sitting down all a fucking day.

Speaker 2: 27:44

What is it like it? It the research shows it start.

Speaker 1: 27:49

It potentially starts to slow down after 60 60, 65, yeah, but between 20 and 60 when compensated for lean mass etc. Uh, it says the same.

Speaker 2: 28:02

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 28:04

Or compensate, like adjusted, whatever the term is. You know what I mean. Corrected, I don't know. I'm still european, I can get away with bad english sometimes, but between 20 and 60, like we really have no excuses to to put it on our age. You know what I mean Like it's not a thing right right.

Speaker 2: 28:24

Yeah we're in control of it essentially, unless there's I I would say, unless there's some like Like compromise stuff, like hypothyroid or something like that. Yeah, but again, you can still improve it with that too.

Speaker 1: 28:41

So yeah, yeah, the habits and you know the things that you should be doing anyway. Like that doesn't change, you know. So we can still do something at least.

Speaker 2: 28:54

That's like an off, like very often you hear about, like women with PCOS and they they blame like Um slow metabolism, but it's like Minuscule, like how much their metabolism metabolism is actually being affected. It's really not a lot at all. And again, it's like these what we're talking about. Right, building muscle, things like that are what are going to help aid in that process 100%. So, that being said, eat your protein.

Speaker 1: 29:24

Get to the gym. Eat your protein. Get to the gym with some weights right, even if you don't feel like it.

Speaker 2: 29:31

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 29:32

Any updates coming up or anything that you want to share.

Speaker 2: 29:38

I don't think so, think all good.

Speaker 1: 29:42

All good, all good same here same here just working doing double episodes and uh yeah, September challenge is going well, so we're. We're now Over halfway into week two. It's been really cool so nice sharing another Q&A Replay on Thursday. So if you enjoyed this episode, make sure to share it on your instagram stories. Drop the quick rating and review and now we will talk to you very soon.