Will I Lose Muscle Doing Low Carb Plus Intermittent Fasting?

[CROM]

Hey guys. I’ve been weightlifting for 26 years religiously. Currently I am 215 lbs and trying to get to 195 lbs. I’ve already lost 15lbs. My problem is I am trying to maintain my muscle while just losing fat. I am always obsessed with making sure I get enough protein that I think it prevents me from losing more weight.

Was thinking about trying low carb with intermittent fasting. Has anyone tried this and didn’t lose muscle? Or if I cut my protein to 100gm per day do you think I would lose muscle? I usually take 190gm protein per day. I am on TRT.

 

[Guided_by_Voices]

I have gained muscle (and more importantly health) since doing IF and LC. Listen to the recent podcast from Ben Greenfield with Thomas DeLauer on this topic. It covers this in great detail. Check out leangains as well.

 

[Nashtide]

I’m nowhere near as big as you and I not trying to drop as much weight as you, but so far, I’ve managed to drop body fat without losing lbm on a plan similar to yours. I simply reduced overall caloric intake. I’ve done this mostly by reducing carbs. I also follow a modified IF. I don’t eat after 6:30pm and have breakfast around 7:30am. So certainly not strict. I think the key to maintaining lbm while losing bf is to do it slowly and keep protein intake high.

 

[junglejim2612]

I went from 279 to 178 between May 15 and Thanksgiving of last year using fasting.
Then I signed on with Defy and hit the gym and the results have been amazing.
People that know me and haven't seen me in a while don't recognize me.

 

[JohnTaylorHK]

At 145lbs, I started with a ketogenic diet and IF with amazing weight losses in a few short weeks (down to 118lbs). I am a lot lighter than you, but consciously kept my protein at around 80g/day. Building the weight back without gaining too much fat was achieved by adding lots of vegetables (esp raw cabbage and carrots), which only took a week or so to kick in. I'm now back to around 135lbs, abs still visible. Its worth noting I also almost stopped using weights in favour of intense isometric stretching and isotension exercises, with similarly amazing results. I'm convinced the isometric/tension gains are due to the increase in intensity without the worry of increasing weight load. I use HIIT warmups for 10 minutes (rope jumping). My skin cancer disappeared whilst on the zero-carb KD, returned after adding the veggies, so lots of room for experimentation with carb levels going forwards. I'm also starting to do single day fasting (post-dinner to pre-dinner) to get rid of those nasty senescent fat cells. Namaste.

 

[DragonBits]

I think if you keep your weightlifting routine and protein, you shouldn't lose any muscle mass.

I have lost about 30 lbs, my lbm has stayed the same, but my arm strength has declined. (based on dumb bell weights).

But I have been focusing on running the last 6 weeks, and not doing a lot of weightlifting. My ab crunches have increased, incline press declined a little from my peak weight 6 months ago.

I was 168 lbs and 5.4 and now 138, so 30 lbs is a bigger percentage of total body weight.

 

[BayArea]

It really depends on how high your caloric deficit is. I would still shoot for 1g protein per pound of lean body mass to minimize muscle loss. This has been my protocol while doing IF + low carb and it has worked well.

 

[JohnTaylorHK]

It really depends on how high your caloric deficit is. I would still shoot for 1g protein per pound of lean body mass to minimize muscle loss. This has been my protocol while doing IF + low carb and it has worked well.

I also found that concentrating on quality food helps. Anything with a label is OUT. Ensure you get enough vegetables (I eat 8oz of chopped cabbage, carrots, raw each day with a very small quantity of balsamic vinaigrette). Put your foods into the calculator HERE to see if you are missing anything obvious. I am attaching a printout of my last calculation. The only thing missing is my iso-flexion workout, but I don't think that burns significant calories, and it's not intended to. Hope it helps. Namaste.

 

[Mr S]

I went from 279 to 178 between May 15 and Thanksgiving of last year using fasting.
Then I signed on with Defy and hit the gym and the results have been amazing.
People that know me and haven't seen me in a while don't recognize me.

What did Defy put you on? The HCG diet? Just curious

 

[madman]

What did Defy put you on? The HCG diet? Just curious

The HCG Diet: Does It Work?



Stephen Butler is Chief Scientific Officer at MAP Diagnostics and has been working on the structure and function of hCG and hCG subunits for over 20 years. Laurence Cole is the Director of the USA hCG Reference Service and has been working on the structure and function of hCG, its variants and subunits for almost 40 years.

 

[Mr S]

The HCG Diet: Does It Work?



Stephen Butler is Chief Scientific Officer at MAP Diagnostics and has been working on the structure and function of hCG and hCG subunits for over 20 years. Laurence Cole is the Director of the USA hCG Reference Service and has been working on the structure and function of hCG, its variants and subunits for almost 40 years.

It’s quite interesting because I do see a correlation between losing body fat and HCG. I understand the HCG diet restricts caloric intake to 500 calories a day. That’s what I find tricky... the plans that have popped up when I’m searching for HCG (no diet related) have two plans usually: 26 or 46 days which consists of injecting 200iu of HCG daily for either 26 or 46 days. This diet claims that muscle is preserved during the weight loss and only fat is lost. I do have some but not serious belly fat. I don’t see myself “losing” up to 15 lb of belly fat in 26 days. On the other hand, if a body tends to convert testosterone to estrogen via aromatization resulting in high estradiol levels, the fat will just get worse. I guess. However, perhaps it helps with body composition. The dosage is small and it’s assumed to be taken alone not as part of a TRT protocol. So I guess it’s unlikely to cause a spike on T if I stop to think well.