Hey everyone, I am 19, 5’9, 141 lbs. I started training 9 months ago when I was 5,7 121lbs and I have gained a bit of muscle so far and my bench press 1RM is 175lbs, squat 225lbs for 5 reps, OHP 145lbs 1RM. I started my cut from 150lbs to 141lb as of now. My strength and fat loss have plateaued and I don’t understand what’s going on despite tracking macros and staying in a deficit. Currently running an upper/lower 4x a week split. Can the experienced folks advice me? Thank you.
As a fellow 5’9 trainee, if I woke up and was 141lbs, I would start eating and not stop until Labor Day.
What’s going on is you have nothing to cut down to. You are in a state where you need to start building some muscle. That you grew 2 inches in 9 months at age 19 speaks to me that you’re in a possible late stage of puberty: make the most of this situation and start eating and training to grow.
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Do I lean bulk from here? I don’t mind gaining fat but most fitness influencers emphasize on lean bulking as the extra kcals are useless.
Most fitness influencers are just that: influencers. They aren’t there to make you better: they’re there to make themselves money.
Why not, instead, listen to a coach? Someone with an established history in helping people achieve your goals? Consider the works of folks like Dan John, John McCallum, Randall Strossen, Stuart McRobert, K. Black, Jim Wendler, Stan Efferding, Jon Heck, Jon Andersen (whole lotta John/Jons here) etc.
A common theme you’ll see with these authors is that we must eat to support performance. Let that be your north star here. Follow a well structured approach to training and endeavor to get stronger in your training. Eat to support the training. If you are eating unprocessed foods and progressing in the weight room, you will inevitably put on muscle.
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Think about what you wrote above. You will have a difficult time gaining strength eating in a deficit. Even to lean bulk, you must not be eating in a deficit.
I approached my venture into putting on muscle when I started at 19 years old by increasing protein. Just adding more protein to what I was eating moved me into a surplus, not a deficit. I am a huge advocate for not allowing yourself to get fatter.
As @T3hPwnisher mentions your recent growth spurt, it seems odd at 19 years old. I don’t know what to make of that. I was a little bit of a late bloomer, but I had gained all my height by age 19. I have some concern about it and would like a medical answer if I were you.
My nutritional advice is to simply add more protein calories (double it) to what you were eating before you started lifting weights.
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Start walking daily, and increase your food intake substantially.
When I was your age I came to this site and was “mentored” through DM’s by a dude called Cephalic Carnage. This guy fielded hundreds of questions from me. What he taught me was a Powerbuilding split, basically a PPL working to 1-2 top sets @ 6-8 reps depending on the exercise, also utilizing some Doggcrapp methods, namely Rest-Pause and Widowmakers. I used maybe 4-5 exercises per day. This worked for me at 18/19. I was smashing PR’s almost every week in rack pulls, Kroc rows, back squats, incline pressing, etc, and it was really fun to boot.
He advised a fasted walk first thing in the morning, a habit that has continued for almost 18 years. I was in college at the time and had a buffet style cafeteria so I was able to eat like a horse, and also packed extra food into containers and smuggled them out in my backpack.
He also recommended the Push-Pull-Legs basically be repeated twice in a 7-10 day period or whatever.
I went from 180 to 240 bodyweight in about 4 years (about 2-3 of which I used CC’s powerbuilding routine)..
Some advise I might give though would be to read into Mass Made Simple and Easy Strength and alternate the two, 6 weeks MMS, 3-4 weeks Easy Strength. Use the Easy Strength to fine tune your movement patterns for MMS. At your age this would be a great way to build a fluency in the core basic lifts. That was something that I lacked early on and had to make up for later.
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Cephalic Carnage
Like so many old-hats, there was such an interesting story there, haha.
Love that idea of alternating MMS and ES.
Short answer:
Like the other guys said, eat more. At the very least Increase Calories a couple hundred at a time until your performance or progress with the weights Improves. Get back on track!
Long answer:
Tell us about your weight loss. Its pretty common for fat loss and strength progress to stall if you limit calories too much, or stay in a defecit too long.
How long have you been cutting weight?
How many calories were you eating when you started the defecit?
Have you been dropping calories lower and lower as you’ve been going?
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My current calories are 2k
150g protein
45-50g fat
250g carbs on training day
150g on rest days
10k steps per day regardless of training
Do I up my kcals?
I can’t seem to shed that last layer of fat (stuck in the 2 solid abs and faint 4 abs loop).
been cutting for 4+ weeks as of now.
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At your age and height along with weight. AS already pointed out. A cut should not be in your vocabulary.
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I was pretty skinny when I started weight lifting. I was the skinniest kid in my high school. I got my bloodwork done and everything in within range. I figure it must be the increased caloric consumption tied to my muscle building needs which may have increased my natural growth hormone release.
You have got to get being “cut” out of your mind. You need more muscle. Muscle burns fat better than anything else.
Start getting strong as your priority.
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I can’t seem to shed that last layer of fat (stuck in the 2 solid abs and faint 4 abs loop).
This is because you don’t have enough muscle to cut down to. Leanness is a product of bodyfat percentage. At this point, as you keep trying to cut fat, you’re losing lean tissue at a comparable rate, so you’re ending up the same: just smaller.
Build some muscle.
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You’re right, I’ve been spinning my wheels for a while. With the endless stream of conflicting training and nutrition advice floating around these days, it’s been difficult to determine whether I should cut or bulk or gain while maintaining (some influencers call it main gaining). It’s clear now that what I need is more solid muscle and strength.
Also, thank you everybody for the straight shooting advices.
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Absolutely dude! In the whole line of “Never ask your barber if you need a haircut”, don’t go to influencers seeking fitness advice. They’re going to tell you whatever gets clicks. And what gets clicks is constant shirtless photos with razor abs.
Know what gets results?
An off season: where the abs go soft for a little so we can grow
But people stop clicking when that happens.
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Another thing you’ll find is these influencers after awhile will do 180 degree turn on their advice. IF what they are preaching isnt getting them clicks. At least thats what ive noticed over the years.
It’s kinda like the muscle mag periodization @TrainForPain and I have discussed.
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You’ve almost got abs after 4 weeks of cutting and 10 pounds lost. You must have been pretty lean to start the cut.
And before that you gained 30 pounds in 8 months. Without getting fat.
You’re doing a pretty solid job of training and eating so far! You should have no problem eating to gain without getting sloppy fat if you just do what you did before!
Just for reference, Were you tracking calories during the 8 months you bulked up? How much were you eating then?
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