0:30
welcome back to talking nutrition
0:33
we are going to touch on smart ways to
0:36
maintain muscle mass and performance
0:38
while
0:39
cutting today and johan is going to talk
0:43
a little bit about context before we
0:45
jump into things
0:47
awesome thank you i think it's very
0:49
important right because
0:50
on this podcast to the listener like we
0:53
can't coach you
0:55
on a podcast right we don't know
0:57
anything really about your lifestyle
0:59
nutrition goals training
1:02
weight height etc all that stuff
1:05
so i want to emphasize the importance of
1:07
context and this question we got
1:10
actually in our q a box but i figured
1:12
let's do a full episode on it
1:15
just because it's something we can
1:16
really dive a little bit deeper into and
1:18
really break down
1:20
so i do want to
1:21
explain a little bit more um who's
1:23
asking this question right
1:25
so basically they asked me
1:27
hey how can i maintain as much muscle as
1:29
possible
1:30
and
1:31
keep my performance up
1:33
while cutting so to give you a little
1:35
bit of context so this person
1:37
is very much in the crossfit she's very
1:39
active
1:40
at the gym she's also a crossfit coach
1:42
she works out a lot uh but she wants to
1:44
lose a little bit of weight to help with
1:46
like the body weight movements etc
1:49
now she also wants to
1:50
keep her strength up right hold on to
1:52
muscle because then she doesn't want to
1:54
suffer in terms of weight lifting
1:57
so this is someone who's already i'd say
1:59
quite lean she wants to lose a little
2:02
bit of weight so this is going to be
2:03
much different compared to someone who
2:06
wants to lose let's say 10 kilos so just
2:08
wanted to emphasize that this person is
2:10
already very much into training and what
2:13
it's going to be for you will really
2:14
depend on your fitness level your you
2:17
know how much muscle you have a body fat
2:19
percentage etc
2:21
and to be honest too like not a lot of
2:24
people that we work with really go to
2:26
super low body fat percentages which is
2:28
when it actually gets more risky so the
2:31
lower fat percentage we get
2:33
the higher the risk of muscle loss will
2:35
be
2:36
right exactly
2:38
um
2:40
the issue
2:41
with
2:43
performance and fat loss is that they
2:46
don't go hand in hand
2:48
right like you're
2:50
focusing on
2:52
performance we shouldn't
2:54
necessarily be too worried about body
2:57
fat percentage like
2:59
i guess there's a a point there where
3:01
like
3:02
there could be
3:05
crossfit athletes that want to lose a
3:07
little bit of body fat percentage to
3:09
improve their gymnastics but then you
3:11
have to be careful because then you run
3:13
the risk of losing strength right and
3:16
this is something i'm always talking
3:18
to about
3:20
um talking with about what oh my gosh
3:22
talking to my clients about who are
3:26
more on the performance side of things
3:29
so the issue when it comes to
3:31
performance and fat loss is that they
3:34
require
3:36
the opposite so performance typically
3:39
requires you to
3:40
be eating
3:42
a lot of food at maintenance or in a
3:44
surplus and a fat loss phase is going to
3:46
require you to be in a calorie deficit
3:50
and a calorie deficit can impact
3:54
performance negatively
3:56
so
3:57
the approach becomes really important
4:00
here
4:01
and when we're talking about
4:04
an athlete going into a calorie deficit
4:08
we have to understand that we might run
4:11
into performance dips for a period of
4:14
time or we might have to
4:17
lower
4:18
training volume because of the stress
4:20
because we're trying to manage stress
4:22
right
4:22
so
4:24
let's dive a little bit deeper into what
4:27
that process might look like for
4:30
someone who's performance based but
4:33
wants to lose a little bit of body fat
4:35
so it's also really about getting into
4:37
this with the right expectations right
4:40
knowing okay cool what you just
4:41
mentioned i will lose a little bit of my
4:44
performance
4:45
i'll get it back but right now in the
4:47
short term
4:48
that's actually not going to be
4:50
the the main focus or the priority right
4:52
now in this case it's fat loss i was
4:55
going to say weight loss fat loss
4:58
so being aware of that and this also
5:00
means that you need to align this with
5:02
your season right i was just going to
5:05
talk on that
5:08
because if you have competitions coming
5:10
up or maybe whether that's a local
5:12
competition or even like a higher level
5:14
competition
5:16
you probably don't want to be in a
5:17
deficit when you're on the floor you
5:19
know
5:19
and this also goes for the open or here
5:22
in norway we have like a functional
5:24
fitness
5:25
competition which is getting pretty big
5:27
now actually
5:28
naturally
5:30
and same thing
5:31
last year i forgot how it was this year
5:34
they had it back to back
5:36
so they had to cross it open right into
5:38
the other one or what's the other way
5:39
around anyway it doesn't matter
5:41
so it was like two back to back where
5:44
you know you can imagine if both are
5:45
like four weeks long that's pretty
5:47
taxing
5:49
that's basically
5:50
two months of going hard
5:53
that's why you want to fuel
5:55
eat a whole lot sleep a whole lot and
5:57
you want to be at your best
6:00
calorie deficit doesn't allow you to be
6:01
at your best
6:03
a lot of stress on this system
6:06
with crossfit and
6:08
less food
6:10
being in a catabolic state it's it's
6:12
risky business in my opinion yeah yeah
6:15
well you're speaking from experience
6:18
sure i am
6:20
but just make sure what i'm trying to
6:22
say is like don't diet when you're
6:24
expecting to
6:26
get a pr
6:27
or you're testing for whatever or it's
6:29
to open or any other sport really it
6:30
doesn't have to be crossfit specific
6:33
so make sure to plan your year because
6:35
that trade-off is one that you're going
6:37
to have to make
6:38
at least if you first want to
6:39
effectively lose body fat and then
6:42
switch back to the performance again
6:43
because
6:44
you will lose a little bit of
6:46
performance
6:47
but you'll get it back
6:49
yep
6:50
um
6:53
the the next thing i want to touch on is
6:57
um
6:59
so the approach essentially
7:03
with someone who's performance based we
7:06
kind of want to
7:08
get in and get it we don't want to be
7:10
hanging around in a deficit for a long
7:12
period of time
7:13
so again this is why context is so
7:15
important because this approach might be
7:18
different for someone who isn't
7:19
performance based right
7:22
so
7:23
someone who's in crossfit me and johann
7:25
both agree that we would take a more of
7:28
an aggressive approach
7:31
it's a shorter time period we're
7:34
dropping calories quicker
7:37
that way the stress
7:40
we're not stressing the system for a
7:42
long period of time
7:45
right so that might look like
7:48
15 20 25
7:50
deficit right off the top you know
7:53
staying in
7:55
that cup for like
7:57
how long six to eight weeks maybe like
8:00
around there i would say maybe eight
8:02
weeks i mean that's still a short period
8:04
of time
8:05
um but again you're managing that
8:08
overall stress that way we're not
8:10
stressing the system for too too long
8:12
i totally agree because the longer we
8:14
diet the the worse we're going to be off
8:16
in terms of
8:18
adaptations
8:19
performance or loss of performance as
8:21
you'd say
8:22
and and risking you know losing muscle
8:25
mass so all together it's kind of like
8:27
let's just get it done you know let's
8:29
get it over with let's maybe not go too
8:32
aggressive remember that the rates that
8:33
we talked about earlier
8:36
in another episode
8:37
uh where it's like maybe the one percent
8:39
okay cool let's maybe not go beyond that
8:42
and depending on the person we might
8:43
look into that rate or not but
8:45
let's go hard let's get in get out
8:48
just to make sure
8:50
that we don't give the metabolism too
8:52
much time to slow down right
8:55
now additionally
8:57
it's all time that you're not spending
9:00
building muscle
9:03
so the longer in a deficit
9:05
the less time you're spending
9:07
eating enough
9:09
actually facilitating muscle growth or
9:10
at least you know maintaining what you
9:12
have
9:13
and so also you know being able to
9:15
really chase performance again
9:17
so that's why i totally agree i think we
9:20
should get out
9:21
basically as soon as possible right
9:23
without
9:25
going too aggressive so you see there's
9:27
a fine line here i know
9:29
i'll try having a coach is so helpful
9:33
we're biased but it's true yeah
9:37
um
9:38
the next thing is to
9:40
keep protein high i mean this goes
9:44
for everyone across the board to be
9:46
honest with you
9:47
um
9:49
it's going to help simply maintain that
9:51
muscle it's going to give you the
9:52
materials to
9:54
do so protein literally
9:56
plays into
9:58
every cell and tissue in our body and so
10:00
we need to be getting an adequate amount
10:03
um with
10:06
athletes or performance based
10:09
individuals i typically recommend like 1
10:11
gram
10:12
or 1 to 1.2 1.4 grams per pound of body
10:16
weight
10:17
um
10:18
again
10:19
someone who is leaner is going to need a
10:22
little bit more i'd say a lot more than
10:25
someone who has
10:27
more body fat to lose so we want to keep
10:30
that protein high it's also going to
10:32
help with satiety and fullness right
10:35
managing that hunger
10:36
and keeping protein high as you said is
10:38
not even just important in a cut we
10:41
actually want to
10:42
bring it up a little but other than that
10:44
we don't necessarily want to mess with
10:46
it too much anyway compared to
10:47
maintaining or bulking right it's
10:50
it's going to always be
10:52
the priority in terms of macros and then
10:55
unfortunately
10:56
where we're going to have to make the
10:57
adjustments are going to be your carbs
10:59
and your fats
11:01
now knowing that this person once again
11:03
contacts so this person is doing a lot
11:05
of crossfit a lot of training a lot of
11:07
stress on the body
11:09
she wants to maintain performance as
11:11
much as possible as well as maintenance
11:13
carbohydrate is going to be a priority
11:15
for her why is that carbs first of all
11:18
are your preferred fuel source
11:20
especially for that high intensity
11:22
sports like crossfit
11:24
but it's also going to play a huge role
11:26
in
11:27
shutting off cortisol like after
11:29
training
11:30
because when you eat carbs we spike
11:32
insulin which then can blunt cortisol
11:34
and kind of bring you out of that stress
11:36
state
11:37
which is also very important so you can
11:39
see that okay we got protein carbs our
11:42
priority and then what's left are fats
11:46
now you don't want to completely take
11:47
out your fats but you can go pretty low
11:50
so i can't really give you an exact
11:51
prescription here when it comes to your
11:53
macros right but remember protein is
11:55
going to be priority and carbohydrate
11:58
for you know performance also recovery
12:00
nfs are a little bit less of a priority
12:03
but here also context matters uh we
12:05
don't necessarily know
12:07
how much this would be so so we can't
12:09
necessarily say like these should be
12:11
your macros but just be aware that carbs
12:13
are going to be a little bit more
12:15
important here compared to fats
12:17
exactly
12:19
um and then we have here like keep
12:22
lifting weights but we know that
12:23
crossfit people are going to keep
12:24
lifting weights they're going to keep
12:26
doing exactly what they're doing
12:28
um
12:29
talking a little bit about
12:31
potentially
12:36
lowering volume a little bit um just
12:39
based on how you feel i mean that can
12:41
help again we have to remember it's
12:43
temporary
12:44
um
12:45
and we can increase volume intensity
12:47
again once we're out of the deficit but
12:49
we're trying to manage some of that
12:51
stress so
12:53
that can be based on how you're feeling
12:56
for sure
12:57
some people respond better you know to
12:59
deficits and stress others don't so
13:01
again that's going to be
13:03
very individualized
13:05
on
13:06
the training side of things
13:09
and like for me
13:11
um i actually never dieted when i was in
13:14
crossfit never on purpose
13:17
uh i under ate
13:20
just because i didn't have the knowledge
13:22
um but once i had a nutrition coach who
13:26
was feeding me
13:27
and i had a uh my actual crossfit coach
13:32
those two were interacting so if this is
13:35
you that's really important to make sure
13:38
that like
13:39
your nutrition coach and your actual
13:42
coach
13:43
know what's happening
13:44
um
13:45
so they can adjust if needed right even
13:48
if like you potentially need a refeed
13:51
day or like something like that but it's
13:53
really important for you to
13:55
be communicating and not trying to just
13:58
be tough and push through feeling like
14:00
like it's you just you don't want
14:03
to do that so
14:05
if you're in the cut and you're feeling
14:07
like
14:08
super fatigued you know you're really
14:10
seeing performance hit make sure that
14:13
you're communicating that with your
14:14
nutrition coach also your regular coach
14:18
and potentially they'll add something in
14:19
like a refeed which can help for the
14:22
time being you know um this is kind of
14:25
going off of what we had planned but i'm
14:28
thinking back to my own experience
14:30
um it's just really important to
14:34
be
14:34
open
14:35
and be transparent about how you're
14:38
feeling and communicate
14:40
because it's only going to benefit you
14:42
right a lot of the time
14:45
crossfitters try to be tough
14:48
right they're they're they are tough
14:49
they are tough i should say they're not
14:51
they're not trying to be tough but
14:53
they'll push through things
14:55
right injuries feeling like crap
14:58
right so
15:00
yeah i i just want to emphasize
15:02
communication you know with your coach
15:04
if you do have one
15:06
right if you don't i mean
15:08
you can't really communicate yes
15:12
cause like this person she's a coach too
15:13
by the way and uh
15:16
so mostly on the training side of things
15:18
hey coaches need coaches too oh oh yeah
15:20
for sure that's why you have coaches why
15:22
i have a coach but we both have mentors
15:24
in
15:25
spend a lot of money
15:27
on that stuff you know yeah because
15:30
even if it's just for the accountability
15:32
and once again
15:34
like
15:35
we're super biased because we are
15:36
coaches
15:37
but we also believe in this yeah
15:39
because we know it works
15:41
we're all emotional beings and we often
15:43
make those decisions based on like
15:45
feelings and you know i'm not
15:47
always on logic
15:49
so i think there's something to be said
15:50
about just the accountability side of
15:52
things and right having someone to keep
15:54
you in check
15:56
so i'm not going to lie like i'm in week
15:58
17 of my car it's getting hard now you
16:00
know
16:01
i don't really want to go to the gym
16:03
yeah
16:04
but you have that accountability
16:06
yeah you know and
16:08
macros are pretty low and i'm definitely
16:11
feeling it
16:13
so the accountability
16:14
definitely helps a whole lot
16:16
right
16:17
i also feel like a lot of people are
16:20
expecting the risk of muscle loss to be
16:22
super high right it's like as low as
16:25
soon as we go beyond that one percent
16:26
we're like
16:28
it's probably not going to be too bad
16:30
you know you really have to push it and
16:32
you already have to be very lean
16:34
to really risk quite a bit you know or i
16:37
should say and or so either be super
16:40
lean and or
16:41
really push it in terms of being in a
16:43
deep deficit for too long yeah for too
16:45
long that's the problem deep and too
16:47
long
16:48
yeah so if you don't push it too far you
16:51
should probably be fine and then if you
16:53
keep training as well because i mean i
16:55
know she's going to keep training
16:56
because she loves it
16:58
but
16:59
the amount of training that you need to
17:00
do to hold on to the muscle that you
17:02
have
17:03
is much less
17:05
than what it takes to build it initially
17:08
and i believe it's even you know down to
17:11
a third or less
17:12
right in terms of volume
17:14
so
17:15
in this case
17:17
i wouldn't necessarily worry too much
17:19
about the muscle loss
17:22
you know assuming that sleep is taken
17:23
care of but we'll get into that in a sec
17:26
and then when it comes to training you
17:28
know performance
17:30
yeah you'll see a bit of a drop but
17:31
you'll get that back
17:33
um
17:34
i think the last point here is
17:36
prioritizing sleep
17:39
this is like the foundation to our
17:41
health in general for all things
17:44
so that is
17:48
i would say the most important of them
17:50
all to be honest with you if it's if
17:52
you're asking my opinion
17:54
um that's where all of our repairing is
17:56
happening right that's where we're
17:57
recovering for not getting enough if
17:59
we're not recovering we're going to
18:03
increase the risk of that muscle loss
18:05
plus we're just simply increasing more
18:07
stress on the body
18:09
and again we're trying to
18:11
try to manage that as much as possible
18:13
so sleep is definitely at the top of the
18:16
priority list
18:17
and not just in this case in in every
18:20
case
18:20
whether you have fat loss goals
18:22
performance health
18:25
muscle gain you name it
18:27
yeah it's the cornerstone corner stone
18:30
to our health
18:31
yeah it really is
18:34
because if you sleep like a lot of
18:36
other stuff is always going to suffer
18:38
if you sleep great
18:40
pretty much everything is going to be
18:41
much easier
18:43
decision making you know motivation
18:46
uh actually wanting to train workouts
18:48
make healthy food choices
18:50
sleep is going to affect
18:52
hunger hormones tighter hormones your
18:54
hormones in general like not just those
18:56
you know
18:57
right and then
18:59
and that sleep is even going to affect
19:01
how much muscle you lose compared to how
19:03
much fat you lose so remember we talked
19:06
about fat loss versus weight loss in the
19:08
second episode
19:09
now
19:10
this is exactly what i mean so there's a
19:12
really cool study that compared two
19:14
groups where one group
19:17
was only allowed to spend five and a
19:18
half hours in bed
19:20
the other group
19:21
eight hours
19:24
they compared the data
19:26
and a group who was in bed for five and
19:27
a half hours
19:29
lost way more muscle mass the funny
19:31
thing is that they lost the exact same
19:33
amount of weight
19:35
in terms of kilos
19:37
not in terms of fat loss and muscle
19:39
so even there
19:41
you could have everything dialed in but
19:43
sleep like
19:45
and still risk losing muscle
19:47
so out of all of these and i totally
19:49
agree with you
19:50
out of all of these sleep is probably
19:52
going to be the number one priority
19:55
which should really be the case anyway
19:57
right
19:58
typically athletes are pretty good about
20:00
that though
20:02
i think so because
20:04
and especially in crossfit too because
20:06
we're getting into
20:07
you know apps like romwa to do a little
20:09
bit more of the the stretching and the
20:11
recovery side of things right and we
20:14
tend to be or you know crossfit in
20:16
general tend to be more
20:18
kind of like into it like in into the
20:19
whole thing right not just the
20:21
performance side of things but also
20:22
recovery and just diving a little deeper
20:25
in terms of sleep
20:27
you know nutrition etc
20:29
yeah
20:30
okay let's summarize this and go through
20:33
each point that we touched on
20:35
so the first one was
20:37
not dieting for too long
20:40
and not going
20:42
too aggressive so
20:44
dieting too long and going too
20:45
aggressive we want to
20:47
diet for a shorter amount of time you
20:50
can still go a little bit more
20:52
aggressive here right we just don't want
20:54
that prolonged
20:56
stress on the system
20:59
second thing was to keep protein high so
21:02
we recommend body weight or 1.2 to 1.4
21:06
grams per pound of body weight
21:08
keeping carbohydrates high as well
21:12
and then lastly keep training which i
21:14
know in this case is not going to be an
21:15
issue so you want to keep lifting
21:17
weights you basically want to send a
21:18
signal to your body of hey we still need
21:20
to hold on to these muscles right
21:22
there's still a use for them that's all
21:24
we got to do
21:25
we're not trying to say hey we need to
21:27
build new muscle because it's just not
21:29
the ideal environment for it even though
21:32
sometimes we can still build muscle even
21:34
in the deficit it's just not very likely
21:37
but keep training to send that signal
21:40
and once again it's much easier for your
21:42
body to hold on to the muscle that you
21:44
do have already than to build it
21:47
last point very important for any kind
21:49
of goal any health and fitness goal
21:52
and that is sleeping enough
21:54
ideally when you train a lot i would say
21:56
let's try the aim for
21:59
you know seven eight hours like eight
22:00
would be great but hey let's be
22:02
realistic like that's not always the
22:04
case these days
22:05
um i wouldn't really go lower than seven
22:08
right like
22:10
six
22:11
uh once a week you know
22:14
preferably not at all
22:16
but you know try to emphasize recovery
22:18
because the recovering that you do is
22:20
when you're asleep it's not at the gym
22:23
it's when you're asleep
22:25
you try to aim for 7 to 8 and you should
22:27
be pretty good i'd say
22:30
boom
22:31
those are our tips hope you enjoyed the
22:33
episode and we'll talk to you soon