Well, I'm not exactly a reg, and I'm not exactly an expert, but I've certainly learned a ton from the forum. As much as I've learned about eating and strength training, one question that people here have had difficulty answering is just how good Starting Strength is for you if your main goal is to lose weight rather than to gain strength. It's certain that SS on a cut should help you gain some strength, if for neurological reasons only even if you don't end up gaining much muscle mass. It's certain that, minimally, lifting will prevent muscle loss, which would happen naturally if you were sedentary and eating on a deficit only. So it's certain that lifting would be good for anyone who wants to lose weight if for no reason other than exercise, but for dieters with only finite amounts of time, motivation, and money to spend on a gym membership, it's been hard to put forth a clear argument for lifting barbells instead of, say, running, biking, or even bodyweight exercises, none of which require going out of one's way to go to a gym and all of which can be done virtually for free using equipment most people already own.

But maybe? Turns out I've got 4 weeks free of gym usage and quite a bit more time on my hands, and I like data, and I'm curious about lifting, so let's give it a shot and see what we can measure. Maybe I'll show enough to get some dieters under the bar, or maybe we'll really just see that SS without the GOMAD isn't really worth your time. I'm just one guy, but every dataset begins with a single point.

So, about me. I'm 6'3" male, 32, weighed in at 214.2 just a bit ago. My highest weight measurement was 251.6 back in early January. I had put on quite a bit of weight in the 6 months prior because I'd stopped biking so much. I got started losing weight because I could tell I was getting fat, even to the point of needing to buy bigger clothes (some were already not fitting), and the MicroLimit forum was having a weight loss prop bet. The stars seemed aligned, so I went for it. At first I just added daily biking back and didn't lose a whole lot, so I started tracking calories in LoseIt, and then, predictably, the weight started melting off at a rate equal to or better than what their estimates said it should. I won the first round of the bet, re-upped and won a second round, which just wrapped up.

However, I've kinda stalled on my weight loss for the last couple-few weeks, for reasons I largely understand. Some of it was because I'm virtually certain I wasn't putting in the right amount of calories for some of the food I was eating. I'm not totally sure what, but both my wife and I eat the same dinners, and we both had our progress stall or reverse for a bit at the same time. We also have had a few more meals out or at friends where we knew we were over budget. And I think my body is acclimating to the biking. I haven't gotten much faster of late, and I might not be burning all the calories I used to, even though I've tried to add hills while pushing myself to get faster.

I eat a diet that's fairly high in lean protein and vegetables, although I do enjoy forbidden fruits like Coke Zero, bread, rice, pasta, noodles, and even alcohol. I do the vast majority of my own cooking, but I do occasionally get lunch out, sometimes fast food () etc., esp. where the calories are known quantities and I don't have to do much estimating.

So, this is also a bit to try and break out of my plateau, even if I don't have much with which to be disappointed. Some clothes that hadn't fit now are looking a little loose. My wedding ring doesn't stay on my ring finger too well anymore, and it even fits on my middle finger now. My face looks tons better. I'm already in better shape than I've been in 8ish years, but I could still stand to lose some fat and gain some muscle. I do still have a bit of fat around my gut, but the rest of me is much, much improved.

I've never had much muscle in my upper body, although my legs are in much better shape due to my lifting habits and sports from high school and college and activities like dancing and biking in the years since. I haven't lifted since college, and I haven't done barbell squats or bench since high school. Never done deadlifts or press, so that's new.

Anyway, the plan is to do the SS, at least as best I can, for the next 4 weeks. Lifting will always be preceded and proceeded by a 6 mile bike ride to and from the gym. I think I want to bike 10ish miles on off days so that I can keep eating at about the same level every day, although that could change if it seems to interfere with recovery. I don't think I'll keep doing the 15-25 mi rides that I had been doing to push myself harder. I'm going to try to eat at least 150 g of protein per day, which isn't hard for me based on my current habits. I seldom eat under 130 g, and virtually never under 100 g, and sometimes I'm up over 200 g, but that was usually after a really long ride. I'm going to count my bicycling calories against my food and eat to compensate, but I'm not going to count lifting calories against my totals and eat to compensate, at least not unless you guys think I need to or if I just get too ravenous. LoseIt has my maintenance level at 2911 calories/day, so my (food-biking) target will be 2411 calories/day for a 1 lb/wk weight loss goal.

Here was my first workout:

Squats:
45x5x1
65x5x1
95x5x2
135x5x3

I stopped at 135 less because I couldn't push more weight up but more because the ancillary support muscles didn't seem up to the task.

Bench:
45x5x1
65x5x1
95x5x1
105x5x2
105x4x1 <-- failed last rep

Deadlift:
45x5x1 off a rack, as I'd never done anything like this before and just wanted to see what it was like.
95x5x1 off a rack again. It was actually pretty easy.
135x5x2 off the floor. This also wasn't too hard, but Rippetoe cautioned against overtraining the deadlift, esp. at first, so I stopped at 115 and did just 2 sets.

On the whole, it felt good. The one thing in my form that I got consistently wrong that I knew about compared to Rippetoe's guide was that I don't breathe like he says yet. Breathing out on extension is going to be a habit I'll have to shake. You guys might get some videos for form check, but I don't have any now. In the mean time, I'm just going to do my best.

As for calories and brotein on the day, I haven't weighed tonight's steak just yet, but the total calories should come in around 3275 less 875 from the biking, so about 2400 even. 190ish g protein, depending a lot on just how big my steak is.

I'm going to post later with a bunch of body measurements (circumferences, etc.). In addition to those and tracking the increases in weights lifted and any decreases in body weight, are there any other things you guys think we can quantify to try and measure progress? I'm open to ideas.

first

and gogogo

Great OP Wookie.

Thanks!

And if anyone has suggestions for improvement, I'm open to ideas. The biking to and from the gym is mandatory (I have to get there, the only way I reasonably have to get there is my bike, and I'm not moving the gym or my residence), but I'd consider biking less on off days, certainly if I'm miserable after a week and a half. Is 150 g a reasonable protein target? Think I should eat an extra 300 calories on lifting days to make up for the energy expended there?

WOOKIE! Log often plz. Looking forward to seeing your progress.

When someone tells me they want to lose weight, I refer them to that moment in American Beauty when Kevin Spacy's character sums up the reason he wants to lose weight: "I want to look good naked."

I have a pic somewhere that shows what I looked like when I lost a bunch of weight and what I looked like a while later at the same weight but after strength training. Hyooge difference.

It's easy to lose weight, but to avoid ending up as the dreaded skinnyfat, put on some muscle. A little will make a big difference.

Perfection. Maintain.

Well, of course. This is all certain, too. But do you shed all the fat you want to, and then add muscle weight, or can you do both at the same time? That's the purpose of this log.

Anyway, here are some garphs for you guys

Deadlifts are programmed for one set of five in by the book SS, but i definitely don't see an issue with getting a bit more volume in while you are learning technique.

Wookie,

Yes. I am an advocate of recomp4lyfe.

But what I did was lose weight until I was somewhere around the weight I wanted to maintain, then put on muscle.

Yeah. This is kinda what I was thinking, esp. since I wasn't maxing out the weight I could do in 5 reps.

Great job so far, wookie. I think the fakeb method is probably the best one if you're mostly concerned with aesthetics; as you're still new to lifting, you should still be able to get stronger on a deficit anyway.

If you're not losing weight riding 50 miles a week or whatever it is, I'd suggest that your diet is not as tight as it needs to be. Do you weigh/measure your food? With that kind of cardio, 2500-2700 calories/day should still end up being a pretty decent deficit at your size, so there are definitely some leaks somewhere. What's your BMR/TDEE?

I weigh and measure everything. That weight graph isn't an accident. That's why I'm pretty sure I had some wrong numbers for something we ate a couple weeks ago. We have leftovers of just about everything, so the mistake would be magnified over multiple meals.

No idea what your last two acronyms are.

Basal metabolic rate and total daily energy expenditure. Essentially I'm asking if you know around how many calories a day you need to maintain weight, and if so, have you recalibrated since you lost the first bunch of weight.

you still drink a ton of beer?

Much less beer (maybe a beer per week), but I do usually have wine with dinner, sometimes whiskey or gin in the evening.

LoseIt reduces my caloric target automatically with every pound I lose, so my 2411 is recalibrated since I started, although my weight loss goal through March was 3 lbs/wk. I think 2911 isn't a bad estimate of my maintenance level.

Anyway, I already have a shocking development for this thread:

SS + deficit proves nothing. There is zero doubt you will get stronger, you have schoolgirl lifts my friend. Your bodyfat must be in the skinnyfatfat range of 25-30% range and everybody agrees with that high bodyfat you can make strength and muscle gains.

The reason it proves nothing is that with all weightloss comes LBM loss. Muscle is but a fraction of LBM. So I have no doubt your are going to gain some muscle here, but if you lose over 10pounds it's not going to be large enough to offset water/feces/fatbloodsupply losses. So even if you were to get professionally bodyfat tested we wouldn't know much, the bodyfat test is going to show loss of LBM. Well unless you get roided up and then the muscle gain might be significant.

A better option would be the fakebusto way. Drop down to 200 with diet and then meticulously measure all bodyparts and stay at maintenance. You will get stronger and recomp which would give us another datapoint to the Fakebusto Method, which is Candito approved. And now LyleMcDonald approved for skinnyfats in the 20-30% range.

So anyway, the steak wound up being 18 oz, so my final numbers are 3336 calories, 875 biking, 193.6 g protein.

Initial measurements:

Neck (in) 16.25
Shoulders (in) 44.5
Upper arm (in) 13.75
Chest (in) 43.25
Waist (in) 39
Gut (in) 41.5
Butt (in) 45.75
Thigh (in) 25
Calf (in) 15.75

Surely you can't be measuring that all the time.

As for MrsWookie, she's a 33yo female, 5'10", 224.6 as of tonight. Her main goal is getting smaller, not necessarily lighter, and as I was talking with her about my plans for lifting, she was enthusiastic about doing it herself. The prospect of swapping fat for muscle, even if she doesn't lose as much weight, is very enticing for her. She also likes science (she's a PhD also), so, while you won't get nudes, you will get her data. She's going to start lifting with me on Friday, so she'll be a day behind, but after that we'll sync up. LoseIt currently has her maintenance level at 2634 cal/day, and she's been resolved to lose 1.5 lbs/week, putting her budget at 1884 cal/day. We're not sure if we want to keep her on that target or bump it up by 250 cal/day with the prospect of as many or more inches coming off for the same number of pounds, but for now, we're going to keep the -1.5 lbs/wk target. We're also not really sure of a protein target for her. 120 g? 130? Her LBM isn't what mine is.

Her calories today were 1453 with 113 g protein, but she's contemplating having some more.

She's done some weight lifting on machines, but she's just about a rank novice at using any kind of free weight. It's been a long time since any lifting regardless, and she's not very strong. She's interested in doing SS like me as much as she can, but obviously we might have to make some adjustments, as I suspect some if not all of the exercises will be challenging even with just a naked bar. Thus, some input on proper form for goblet squats and deadlift variants (I know Rippetoe recommended big disks that weren't 35 lb, but that's not an option at our gym) would be appreciated. I think there are lighter bars to be found at our gym for presses and bench presses, so that will probably work OK, but I wasn't paying too much attention to that today.

She's interested in tracking slightly different measurements from me, but here are hers:

Neck (in) 14.25
Shoulders (in) 43
Upper arm (in) 12.5
Chest (in) 45.25
Bust (in) 38
Waist (in) 39.25
Hips (in) 46
Thigh (in) 27.25
Calf (in) 18.25

I'm thinking once a week, but we need to get a baseline. I do want to measure as much as is reasonable, though.

You disappoint me.

And again, I am not claiming I'm doing things the best way. It's entirely possible that the best practice for a fatty to arrive at the ideal body type is indeed to focus entirely on losing weight down to a certain point and then to work on gaining some back entirely as muscle. That might be right, but we don't have (or at least I've never been shown) conclusive data showing as much. Here I'm going to offer data from two people on an alternative hypothesis. If we're wrong, everyone still benefits.