MM #1: Can You Lose Fat and Build Muscle at the Same Time?

The Hottest Question in Fitness!

February 13, 2023

Hey friend!

Happy Monday, and on that note, I’m making a change to Thrive Protocol: I’m going to publish on Mondays and Thursdays!

Mondays are going to be the Monday Mashup: more of a typical Newsletter vibe with the following format:

  • A featured Tweet

  • A quote

  • A piece of Content

  • A health and/or fitness related article

Thursdays are going to feature an article on mindset and self-development.

With that said, let’s get into it!

A Tweet

Clint always shares great wisdom. This list has a couple of suggestions you’ve probably heard before and some fresh ones. I particularly enjoyed “Exponential over linear thinking” and “Open trust over earned trust.”

A Quote

Probably my all-time fave.

The first step is always to work on yourself. It’s not selfish — you won’t be of service until you have your life in order.

Content

This is a great conversation between my friend Tom a“The Brain Battery,” and Tyler Todt.

Tom turned his life around after a terrible accident, and this conversation is a real testament to the power of your mindset in facing adversity.

With the right mindset, the worst thing that ever happened to you can turn into one of the best things.

Alright, let’s get into it and address quite possibly the hottest topic in all of health and fitness.

But first, if you want a complete guide to changing your body through food, I’m putting my Guide To Tracking Nutrition on a 50% sale for the day.

60+ pages covering everything you need to know to create a diet plan that will get you results — for just $10.

Check it out here.

Is it possible to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time?

Traditionally, the answer has been no. 

Losing fat requires you to be in a calorie deficit, a catabolic state that makes it impossible to gain muscle.

The best you can hope for in a calorie deficit is maintaining your muscle — building muscle requires a slight caloric surplus.

This is what has been said for years, and it’s what many still believe.

But there’s an alternative view rapidly increasing in popularity. 

This third option is called Body Recomposition, and it’s gaining credibility and momentum.

I have never attempted body composition.

One of my biggest mistakes in my fitness journey has been bulking and cutting: spending too much time between miserably restricting food and being a gluttonous asshole.

I’m not going to bulk or cut in 2023 — one of my big goals is to pull off a body composition.

I’ve spent the past few weeks looking over expert opinions in the field, and I’ve compiled a list of actionable strategies for anyone looking to build muscle and lose fat at the same time.

Who is this for?

Before going into the details, it’s crucial to recognize that if you have been training for less than a year and have a significant amount of excess body fat (> 25%), body recomposition will happen naturally.

You’ll be able to gain muscle and lose fat without any meticulous optimization: it’s just going to happen.

The following recomp strategy is aimed at people who have been training for a few years and are past the “newbie” gains phase.

If you’ve spent some time in the gym but have fallen off track lately, you’re carrying a bit more fat than you would like, but you ALSO want to build muscle, doing a body recomp is an option.

Here are the key points to consider:

Energy

How much are you going to eat?

There are two approaches to this: the faster recomp with a small calorie deficit or the longer recomp where you eat at maintenance calories.

Most guides to body composition suggest a small calorie deficit. 

“Small” is crucial. 

A calorie deficit that’s too large will trigger a brutal hormonal response. It’ll be tough to train hard and recover.

Jeremy Ethier from “Built with Science” suggests a calorie deficit between 5–15% of your maintenance calories.

If you maintain 3000 calories per day, you could start with a deficit as small as 150 calories, so you’d eat 2850 per day.

Other popular fitness content creators such as Ryan Humiston, Jeff Cavaliere, and Jeff Nippard suggest a moderate calorie deficit as the best way to approach a recomp.

But this isn’t the only option.

Coach Greg Doucette — a Canadian Bodybuilder and powerlifter, suggests recomping by eating at maintenance calories.

This option takes longer — you’ll want to give yourself six months to a year to expect great results with this approach, but it will be optimal for muscle development.

For the maintenance approach, the idea is to see the number on the scale stay the same but change your body composition so that you have more muscle and less fat.

Depending on your goals and patience, choose either a slight calorie deficit (not over 15%) or eat at your maintenance calories.

Protein & Meal Timing

Traditional bodybuilding culture obsessed over meal timing, leading to the common suggestion of eating anywhere from 6 - 8 meals per day for maximum muscle growth.

However, more recent findings indicate that it may not be as important as once thought.

On an episode of Huberman Lab, Dr. Layne Norton discussed how Leucine (the essential amino acid for muscle protein synthesis) remained in the blood hours after a high-protein meal.

With intermittent fasting increasing in popularity, many are moving away from eating many meals daily. 

However, Jeremy Ethier and Greg Doucette recommend eating a meal with protein at least three times per day to optimize muscle during a recomp.

Greg Doucette suggests five meals per day.

You’ll find the most disagreement on the issue of meal timing, but everyone is on the same page regarding protein.

You need a lot.

It becomes even more crucial when you’re doing a recomp. If you can, you’ll want to aim to exceed the recommended 1g per pound of body weight.

Protein is highly satiating and has the highest thermic effect of all macros, meaning it costs more energy to digest.

If you’re serious about building muscle and losing fat simultaneously, you should aim to eat > 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight and spread this evenly over 3–5 meals throughout your day.

Training

Your program should be geared more towards hypertrophy (building muscle) over strength.

There is overlap with these goals, but not complete overlap. 

There are a lot of nuances between the difference between training for strength vs. training for hypertrophy, but the high-level overview of training for hypertrophy is:

  • Train each muscle group twice per week

  • Include 10–20 working sets for each muscle group(10 if you’re a beginner, 20 if more advanced)

  • Track your workouts and make sure you’re increasing the work — and for building muscle, that can mean increasing reps, sets, and load (strength only comes from increasing the load).

A fantastic split idea for a recomp is to do an Upper/Lower split.

On Monday and Wednesday, you train your Upper body (Chest, Back, Shoulders, and Arms)

On Tuesday and Friday, you train your lower body (Quads, hamstrings, calves, glutes).

This covers you for hitting each muscle group twice per week.

Easy Cardio

You don’t want to tax your body more than you have to during this process.

You’ll need as much recovery as possible if you’re attempting to build muscle in a slight deficit or at maintenance.

Therefore, too much High-intensity cardio will probably backfire. HIIT is tough to recover from. You want your cardio from easy options during a recomp.

Stick to:

  • Walking

  • Incline Treadmill

  • Elliptical

Rest and Recovery

It’s crucial to dial in your sleep while you attempt a recomp!

Muscle isn’t built in the gym. The gym provides the stimulus, but the growth happens when you rest and recover (and have plenty of protein).

Avoid stimulants and caffeine at least 6 hours before bed.

Sleep in a dark, cool room.

Create a wind-down routine.

Cut out screens 1 hour before bed if you can.

Sleeping more will also help curb your appetite, as poor sleep wreaks havoc on two hormones related to appetite: Leptin and Ghrelin.

And that’s not it… Good research supports that a few nights of inadequate sleep can lower your testosterone.

Sleep is not a minor detail here.

Aside from sleep, you’ll also want to ensure plenty of time for rest and active recovery.

I’d suggest not training more than four times per week during a recomp.

Train hard on those days (and push yourself to increase the work), but give yourself at least three days to allow your body to recover.

Go for walks. Use the sauna. Use a foam roller. Take cold showers (not immediately following a workout).

Increase your Activity

Most fat loss doesn’t happen inside the gym — it happens in life away from the gym. This is called NEAT: Non-exercise-activity-thermogenesis.

NEAT is ALL movement you do that is not intentional exercise.

  • Laundry

  • Cooking

  • Cleaning

  • Dancing

  • Sex

During your recomp, don’t just think about training and cardio, be active! Allow time for recovery, but aim to include plenty of movement in your days. Don’t just live on the couch.

Supplementation

Supplementation isn’t necessary, but it can help. In particular, I’d suggest taking 5g of Creatine per day.

Creatine is the most studied supplement in sports nutrition — it is safe and effective.

Just ensure that you’re drinking plenty of water (which you should be doing anyway) and you have nothing to worry about for taking creatine.

If you’re “skinny fat” and want to lose some fat AND build muscle, consider this third option beyond bulking and cutting.

Consider body recomposition.

When you’re ready, here’s how you can work with me.

If you want guidance and a crystal clear strategy for losing fat, building muscle, and getting into the best shape of your life while working a desk job, I’d be honored to help you.