Hi everyone. I’m a beginner at strength training, currently doing the 5/3/1 program and i’m currently in cycle 7. I’ve been progressing quite good so far and i will keep doing it as long as i can…My current goal is to get as relatively strong as i can and then maybe try to focus more on my endurance and power.
I’m currently 68.5kg and i would like to drop to 66-67kg preferably in a month. I dropped my calories to 2090 (250c/160p/50f) from 2660 (350c/180p/60f) where i was maintaining my weight for months. I’m working 4 days a week, as 5/3/1 recommend and now i started doing 2-4 times cardio (on my off days or after an upper body workout), walking incline on the treadmill at a steady speed for about an hour and losing approximately 500cal each session. So far the cardio doesn’t affect my training, but instead gave me a great boost and i will keep doing it even when i return to a surplus…
Now my question is, should i eat some extra calories on the cardio days or eat the same and lose more weight? My goal is to maintain my strength and muscles. Thanks for you time and i appreciate your opinions!!
Current stats:
Age:22
Height: 174cm
Weight: 68.5kg
As far as my progress goes…on my last cycle of 5/3/1 (i was weighting 70-71kg), my max PR was:
squat 3x115
dl 1x160
bench 3x80
ohp 5x50
Don’t eat extra calories on cardio days. If anything you eat slightly more carbs/calories on workout days, but in your case it’s probably easier to just eat the same total calories every day and adjust if necessary each week based on how fat loss goes. 1 lb / week is very doable.
ok, thanks for your answer. I was thinking maybe to increase my protein intake. Right now i’m taking approximately 1 gram per pound of bodyweight. on my cardio days, isn’t it more logical to take more protein as i burn some extra calories?
[quote]Spyros wrote:
ok, thanks for your answer. I was thinking maybe to increase my protein intake. Right now i’m taking approximately 1 gram per pound of bodyweight. on my cardio days, isn’t it more logical to take more protein as i burn some extra calories?[/quote]
No. The point of cardio is to burn more calories to increase caloric deficit. If you add calories because you’re doing cardio, you’re defeating that purpose.
Choose a caloric/macro intake and stay consistent with it for at least a week, to gauge progress. This table provides a good starting point:
Goal Calories (kCal/lb) Protein (g/lb)Carbohydrates (g/lb) Fat (g/lb)
Recomposition 12.75 1.15 1.25 0.35
Fat Loss 11.43 1.25 1 0.27
Muscle Gain 16.9 1.1 2 0.5
[quote]Spyros wrote:
As far as my progress goes…on my last cycle of 5/3/1 (i was weighting 70-71kg), my max PR was:
squat 3x115
dl 1x160
bench 3x80
ohp 5x50[/quote]
Few things here:
1)Are these weights in kg’s or lbs?
2)Are these numbers from the last set of your 5/3/1 week?
Why do you think dropping 3-5 lbs is the way to go? This really wont affect your body image that much, if at all. You are not exactly a big guy as is. Are you one of those guys that is deathly afraid of gaining even a little bit of fat?
I don’t have a problem with dropping weight if thats what you want to look like but it just seems to be kinda pointless to do a cut with such little weight. You should really focus on getting stronger at this stage in the game.