Fat Loss/Strength Loss???

Bigger Stronger Leaner Competitive Bodybuilding
1

With summer coming I would like to get a bit leaner for appearance sake. But, and this is the big but, I am a competitive Olympic style weightlifter.

Right now I am 5’9", 232-233 lbs, 17-18% bodyfat and I am pretty strong. I compete at 105kg, which is about 231.5 lbs, so I am fine for lifting right now.

Now, I know I would look way better at 10-12%bf. But, I cannot afford to lose any strength. I also cannot take a lot of drugs (as I am subject to testing). I could take about 200mg of test prop/wk.

When I tried to eat really “clean” recently I noticed a definite strength loss, and my workouts were terrible. I cannot afford to lose a lot of strength. In fact, I cannot afford to lose any. I really need to continue to get stronger.

I workout 5 times/wk. Bulgarian style (snatch, clean and jerk, squats, occasional romanian deadlift) four times per week and upperbody (bench, rows) once. Obviously, clean and jerk and snatch strength are my priority.

So, is there anyway to lose fat without losing strength and without feeling really lethargic in the gym?

2

[quote]j_mo wrote:
So, is there anyway to lose fat without losing strength and without feeling really lethargic in the gym?[/quote]

Yes.

You reduce calories and reduce the total volume of your workouts but still lift heavy.

3

I suspect that you eat too much carbs. I’m sure I have read somewhere that the Bulgarian OL team had a diet with 60% of calories from fat. This is similar to the Anabolic Diet. The advantage of such a high proportion of calories from fat is that your body gets better at producing fat burning enzymes. If you go the Anabolic Diet route, it is supposed to be protein-sparing as well.

An alternative would be the T-Dawg Diet, but it will take longer for you to adapt to fat-burning on that because the carbs are a bit higher.