help with supplements

[Ibizahoo2]

Helpful people of PH

Ive been going to the Gym for around 8 months and Ive gone from 11 stone 6 to 13 stone 7, mostly muscle but some fat aswell. I have begun cycling to work, around 20 miles a day to attempt to burn the fat off and cut up a bit.

my question is, how can I ensure that I dont lose the mass and the size I have got to, but still burn the fat off. I dont want the cycling to burn the fat but also seriously decrease muscle size?

so what should I take in to stop this. I already have 1 Protein Shake a day.

Thanks
AMP

[anonymous-user]

There is no magic supplement that will achieve the results you want. There are several other threads on here about supplements and has been said on most of them what works for one may not work for someone else.

To maintain the size and muscle mass you have achieved you will need to continue to do weight training. Cycling won't neccessarily decrease this as long as you vary your weights routine and change it regularly. You need to keep your body guessing or you will hit a plateau and not make any more gains. I would recommend taking more protein either as a supplement or in your normal diet.

Doing CV exercise in conjuntion with a good weights programme should encourage muscle growth.

[balders118]

I agree with most of the above - up the cardio (short intense bursts will reduce the risk of losing muscle, interval training for example) and make sure you keep at the weights. However you probably already consume enough protein if you have made gains, and increasing this will probably give no benefit and will make fatt loss harder as you will have upped you calorific uptake.

Caffeine might be useful, if you don't already use it (tea, coffee, regular red bulls count as using it). It increases metabolism of fats by increasing the release of free fatty acids into the blood streem, therefore using fat as an energy to store to a greater degree. This could also reduce the risk of protein (muscle) being used as energy.

[Calculator]

Kre Alklyn and BCAA to minimise muscle wasting when you cut calories (or in your case burn more).

[Ordinary_Chap]

I'm going to go against this and suggest it is highly unlikely you've gained a stone in 8 months never-mind more.

I think you're probably over eating which is why you've gained so much weight.

Supplements can't help you with this.

If I were you I'd work out your BMR and required calorie intake and then see how many you are consuming today.

[balders118]

Ordinary_Chap said:

I'm going to go against this and suggest it is highly unlikely you've gained a stone in 8 months never-mind more.

I think you're probably over eating which is why you've gained so much weight.

Supplements can't help you with this.

If I were you I'd work out your BMR and required calorie intake and then see how many you are consuming today.

Good point, I didn't really pay attention to the OP but a stone of lean muscle in 8 months is very unlikely indeed!

[anonymous-user]

balders118 said:

Good point, I didn't really pay attention to the OP but a stone of lean muscle in 8 months is very unlikely indeed!

You should have paid attention then - he didn't say it was lean muscle. He said some of it was fat too, which is why he is trying to cut it by doing some cycling.......

[balders118]

bmw535i said:

balders118 said:

Good point, I didn't really pay attention to the OP but a stone of lean muscle in 8 months is very unlikely indeed!

You should have paid attention then - he didn't say it was lean muscle. He said some of it was fat too, which is why he is trying to cut it by doing some cycling.......

"mostly muscle, some fat" is what he said. I would say its more likely to be a 50/50 ratio.

[anonymous-user]

balders118 said:

"mostly muscle, some fat" is what he said. I would say its more likely to be a 50/50 ratio.

Ok, would you have any suggestions for the OP other than to say he's getting fat?

[balders118]

bmw535i said:

balders118 said:

"mostly muscle, some fat" is what he said. I would say its more likely to be a 50/50 ratio.

Ok, would you have any suggestions for the OP other than to say he's getting fat?

Ummm, yes... refer to my first post! My second post was to agree with OC that the OP may be taking in to many calories, so if he wants to lose some fat an easy option would be to cut some of these out.

[anonymous-user]

balders118 said:

Ummm, yes... refer to my first post! My second post was to agree with OC that the OP may be taking in to many calories, so if he wants to lose some fat an easy option would be to cut some of these out.

Ok, no worries. I tend to take a pre-workout N.O drink. while this does contain high levels of caffeine it can cause gatro-intestinal problems for some people.

It can be hard to maintain a balance between striving for mass building and keeping the fat levels down. If you want to build muscle mass you have to consume lots of food which is why I would recommend a high protein diet. I don't really think one shake a day is enough. Perhaps cutting out some other foods from his diet and upping the protein would work - as well as eating little and often rather than 3-4 big meals......

[Ibizahoo2]

bmw535i said:

balders118 said:

"mostly muscle, some fat" is what he said. I would say its more likely to be a 50/50 ratio.

Ok, would you have any suggestions for the OP other than to say he's getting fat?

i was thinking this. i have gained just over 2 stone. my bdy fat% is currently about 18%, i want to get to 10% which is where i was before i started the gym and consuming more calories/protein

[Ibizahoo2]

and i worked it out and im consuming about 3200 calories per day

[Ordinary_Chap]

How did you work that out your calorie consumption?

Also how did you measure bodyfat?

[Reardy Mister]

Ordinary_Chap said:

How did you work that out your calorie consumption?

Also how did you measure bodyfat?

Get hooked up to a BMR meter. Once you know your BMR, you can adjust your fat % at will and adjust your food intake to suit your goals, be it for cutting or building mass.


This will also tell your body fat %

[Ordinary_Chap]

Reardy Mister said:

Ordinary_Chap said:

How did you work that out your calorie consumption?

Also how did you measure bodyfat?

Get hooked up to a BMR meter. Once you know your BMR, you can adjust your fat % at will and adjust your food intake to suit your goals, be it for cutting or building mass.


This will also tell your body fat %

Seem you've answered a question I didn't ask

Also your BMR doesn't tell you your body fat %

[Reardy Mister]

Ordinary_Chap said:

Reardy Mister said:

Ordinary_Chap said:

How did you work that out your calorie consumption?

Also how did you measure bodyfat?

Get hooked up to a BMR meter. Once you know your BMR, you can adjust your fat % at will and adjust your food intake to suit your goals, be it for cutting or building mass.


This will also tell your body fat %

Seem you've answered a question I didn't ask

Also your BMR doesn't tell you your body fat %

I answered your very question. The machine runs a small current through your body. The strength of the returning current tells it what type of tissue it had to pass through and therefore what percentage of your body is fat vs muscle (by you telling it your weight). Once you know what percentage of your body is muscle for your weight, you know your bmr because x amount of muscle requires a specific amount of calories for it to be maintained.

[Ordinary_Chap]

Reardy Mister said:

Ordinary_Chap said:

Reardy Mister said:

Ordinary_Chap said:

How did you work that out your calorie consumption?

Also how did you measure bodyfat?

Get hooked up to a BMR meter. Once you know your BMR, you can adjust your fat % at will and adjust your food intake to suit your goals, be it for cutting or building mass.


This will also tell your body fat %

Seem you've answered a question I didn't ask

Also your BMR doesn't tell you your body fat %

I answered your very question. The machine runs a small current through your body. The strength of the returning current tells it what type of tissue it had to pass through and therefore what percentage of your body is fat vs muscle (by you telling it your weight). Once you know what percentage of your body is muscle for your weight, you know your bmr because x amount of muscle requires a specific amount of calories for it to be maintained.

I was asking the OP how he figured out those figures!

Also do you mean BMI and not BMR?

[balders118]

Ordinary_Chap said:

I was asking the OP how he figured out those figures!

Also do you mean BMI and not BMR?

I assume by BMR he means Body Mass Ratio, i.e. fat:muscle/everything else but I got confused at first because I've not heard it called this before as I've always refered to it as fat%.

[Ordinary_Chap]

balders118 said:

Ordinary_Chap said:

I was asking the OP how he figured out those figures!

Also do you mean BMI and not BMR?

I assume by BMR he means Body Mass Ratio, i.e. fat:muscle/everything else but I got confused at first because I've not heard it called this before as I've always refered to it as fat%.

He quoted me who was talking about BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) which made me wonder what he was referring too.

Maybe he did mean BMR? I'm not sure.