Recomp

[JlHorsley]

Utter myth or real possibility? If anyone has successfully done it, what are your favorite strategies?

Just looking in the mirror, I seem to have pulled it off a bit by eating at a small surplus (.5 pounds per week according to MyFitnessPal). That lasted a few weeks, but the waist size is starting to creep to 35", and I'd like to stay around 34" for the time being.

There's conflicting info on the ol' web. Should one maintain a slight surplus? Deficit? Maintenance? I'd imagine there's some individual variance there. So if you folks have successfully recomped, what did your nutrition look like?

[quikky]

In my opinion, recomp only works for one or both of the following populations:

- Obese
- Very new

If you are neither, recomp = spin your wheels.

- Not a nutrition expert
- Not an SSC

[5hout]

Utter myth or real possibility? If anyone has successfully done it, what are your favorite strategies?

Just looking in the mirror, I seem to have pulled it off a bit by eating at a small surplus (.5 pounds per week according to MyFitnessPal). That lasted a few weeks, but the waist size is starting to creep to 35", and I'd like to stay around 34" for the time being.

There's conflicting info on the ol' web. Should one maintain a slight surplus? Deficit? Maintenance? I'd imagine there's some individual variance there. So if you folks have successfully recomped, what did your nutrition look like?

Not really addressing your question, but I think useful information: There was an article linked in MASS (iirc) recently that I saw an abstract of (i.e. a chain of summary that might mean this is useless info) that talked about how much of a surplus is required and mention gains at 350 cal surplus per day, with speculation that they might be possible at lower surpluses.

I would also note that, depending on your lifting history, you might have a pretty good amount of gains available without necessarily adding muscle. This means a 'recomp' could still be pretty effective.

Take all of this with a grain of salt, b/c my background on this stuff is basically "lul I dun looked at reddit and utube vids a lot".

[lheugh]

It's been my understanding that it's a transient effect in certain circumstances.
1. Newbie gains (most potent period of adaptive training responses leading to repartitioning of calories consumed and released from stored adipose tissue)
2. Obesity (less potent signalling of a deficit due to high stores of energy so muscle protein synthesis rates aren't attenuated as much)
3. Enhanced individuals (super potent anabolic signalling overriding the balance quo)
As an aside, bodyweight fluctuations of +/- 2% occur for no pertinent reason at all so it's tough to say outside of these circumstances.

[plaguewielder]

Related question:
Say a person wants to get from state A (80kg, 12% bf) to state B (85kg, 10% bf) over the course of a year. They can bulk (caloric surplus) for 8 months and cut (deficit) for 4 months. All good.
Then they can bulk for 4 months and cut for 2, repeated twice.
Or bulk for 2 months and cut for a month, repeted four times.
Etc. (Essentially a continuous transition from classic bulk/cut to recomp).
At what iteration of the process do we go from ''ok, that's possible'' to ''no way''? It's probably a function of training history, current body comp, age (proxy for hormonal state?), food timing (?) etc.

[FredM]

Recomp isn't a myth but also isn't worth your time (most likely). It's an inferior strategy to cut/bulk cycling in probably 99.9% of cases.

@plaguewielder BBM and Stronger by Science have discussed this. While you can probably get results bulking for 2 months and cutting for 1, it's getting to the point where you're missing the data necessary to make proper adjustments. On the bulk you're missing the data to determine what works for you strength wise, and on both you're missing some data to determine whether you're making the right calorie/macro adjustments.

"Too short" is probably 4 week bulk/2 week cut. Because of water weight, your body's own metabolic adjustments, and other variables, you're most likely not going to get reliable data to succeed.

Personally I've moved to a 12 week bulk/4 week cut cycle where the goal is to end the cut 1/2" or more on my waist smaller than my last cut (and same on the bulk).

[plaguewielder]

Recomp isn't a myth but also isn't worth your time (most likely). It's an inferior strategy to cut/bulk cycling in probably 99.9% of cases.

@plaguewielder BBM and Stronger by Science have discussed this. While you can probably get results bulking for 2 months and cutting for 1, it's getting to the point where you're missing the data necessary to make proper adjustments. On the bulk you're missing the data to determine what works for you strength wise, and on both you're missing some data to determine whether you're making the right calorie/macro adjustments.

"Too short" is probably 4 week bulk/2 week cut. Because of water weight, your body's own metabolic adjustments, and other variables, you're most likely not going to get reliable data to succeed.

Personally I've moved to a 12 week bulk/4 week cut cycle where the goal is to end the cut 1/2" or more on my waist smaller than my last cut (and same on the bulk).

Actually, didn't Austin (or was it Jordan?) mentioned he didn't ever bulked but just slowly moved to the desired weight? And that is exactly the ♾ iteration of above mentioned process of gaining, so instead of bulking 8kg and losing 3 in eg. 12 months, you just gain 5kg in that time

[JohnHelton]

Actually, didn't Austin (or was it Jordan?) mentioned he didn't ever bulked but just slowly moved to the desired weight? And that is exactly the ♾ iteration of above mentioned process of gaining, so instead of bulking 8kg and losing 3 in eg. 12 months, you just gain 5kg in that time

I think this approach has real validity. Most people, including me, tend to bulk too quickly and get fat. That then requires more time in a caloric deficit where you aren't building mass. Ideally, one would be in just enough of a caloric surplus to build muscle without adding the fat. However, that is just hard to do. Once you let the monster out of its cage, it is hard to control him.

[FredM]

Recomp isn't a myth but also isn't worth your time (most likely). It's an inferior strategy to cut/bulk cycling in probably 99.9% of cases.

@plaguewielder BBM and Stronger by Science have discussed this. While you can probably get results bulking for 2 months and cutting for 1, it's getting to the point where you're missing the data necessary to make proper adjustments. On the bulk you're missing the data to determine what works for you strength wise, and on both you're missing some data to determine whether you're making the right calorie/macro adjustments.

"Too short" is probably 4 week bulk/2 week cut. Because of water weight, your body's own metabolic adjustments, and other variables, you're most likely not going to get reliable data to succeed.

Personally I've moved to a 12 week bulk/4 week cut cycle where the goal is to end the cut 1/2" or more on my waist smaller than my last cut (and same on the bulk).

Actually, didn't Austin (or was it Jordan?) mentioned he didn't ever bulked but just slowly moved to the desired weight? And that is exactly the ♾ iteration of above mentioned process of gaining, so instead of bulking 8kg and losing 3 in eg. 12 months, you just gain 5kg in that time

Yes they both have recommended recomp in the past but neither of them actually did it.

Austin went from 160 to 180 on his SSNLP. That coupled with obviously above average genetics put him at a relatively lean 180 even though he had gained 20 lbs. So getting to 200 and 15% bf wasn't the same exercise for him as it is for most of us.

Jordan got as big as 220 I believe.

Slow bulks are smart. I didn't advocate for a dreamer/fast bulk. If you want ot call gaining 1/2 lb /week a "recomp" then sure, recomps are awesome. But typically people mean staying at the same weight while losing fat and gaining muscle. That is an epic waste of time in almost all cases.

[plaguewielder]

Yes they both have recommended recomp in the past but neither of them actually did it.

Austin went from 160 to 180 on his SSNLP. That coupled with obviously above average genetics put him at a relatively lean 180 even though he had gained 20 lbs. So getting to 200 and 15% bf wasn't the same exercise for him as it is for most of us.

Jordan got as big as 220 I believe.

Slow bulks are smart. I didn't advocate for a dreamer/fast bulk. If you want ot call gaining 1/2 lb /week a "recomp" then sure, recomps are awesome. But typically people mean staying at the same weight while losing fat and gaining muscle. That is an epic waste of time in almost all cases.

I know you didn't mean super fast bulk or anything. I am not trying to argue either way.
What I am trying to say is, if you gain 1/2lb /week (or even month) and not gain BF percentage, you basically are recomping (not sure how it's defined but I'd say weight increase with decreased BF would qualify?). So how is that possible but staying at the same weight and NOT losing fat while gaining muscle isn't?

[FredM]

Yes they both have recommended recomp in the past but neither of them actually did it.

Austin went from 160 to 180 on his SSNLP. That coupled with obviously above average genetics put him at a relatively lean 180 even though he had gained 20 lbs. So getting to 200 and 15% bf wasn't the same exercise for him as it is for most of us.

Jordan got as big as 220 I believe.

Slow bulks are smart. I didn't advocate for a dreamer/fast bulk. If you want ot call gaining 1/2 lb /week a "recomp" then sure, recomps are awesome. But typically people mean staying at the same weight while losing fat and gaining muscle. That is an epic waste of time in almost all cases.

I know you didn't mean super fast bulk or anything. I am not trying to argue either way.
What I am trying to say is, if you gain 1/2lb /week (or even month) and not gain BF percentage, you basically are recomping (not sure how it's defined but I'd say weight increase with decreased BF would qualify?). So how is that possible but staying at the same weight and NOT losing fat while gaining muscle isn't?

Like I said, recomp isn't impossible, just a waste of time. I don't think most non novices can gain 1/2 lb a week and have it be close to 100% muscle and/or also lose fat. What rate is required for that? No idea. Probably varies a lot by individual. Probably is impossible for many people. Which is why it's a waste of time. Even if you are one of the lucky few where this would work, let's do some quick math:

You're 200 lbs and 20% bf. You want to be 210 lbs and 15% bf. In your example you can gain 1/2 lb a month for 20 months to accomplish your goal. Realistically, this is going to take a lot longer than 20 months because you're not going to reliably gain 1/2 lb a month for that long without some misses/setbacks. But let's even assume you do it absolutely perfectly. That's 20 months.

Alternatively you can gain 1 lb/wk and gain 50/50 muscle and fat. When you cut you can probably lose 10/90 losing 2 lbs/wk. In 6 months you're 250 lbs and 25% bf. You can lose 40 lbs in 4 months and be 210 and <15% bf.

The numbers aren't that realistic (you probably need to be leaner to bulk like that, you're probably not going to actually lose 40 lbs in 3 months) but they're illustrative and easy to calculate in my head. It's half the amount of time to do it the traditional way and it's more or less guaranteed to work if you do it right.

Or you can spin your wheels for 2 years on a recomp strategy that half of "experts" don't even think will work. I choose cut/bulk cycling. It's also way more fun. Every time I gain 10+ lbs I add 50-100 lbs to my squat. In just 12 weeks.

[michael]

https://sci-fit.net/bulking-deficit-gaining/