Overall I'm skinny, but over the past few years I've developed a bit of a gut. So my goal is to add muscle overall, while at the same time lowering my body fat (mainly to get rid of the gut, but also just to have more visible muscles overall).

I know that to gain muscle you need to eat enough carbs, protein, and have X amount of calories over your BMR. However, consuming so many calories seems like the opposite of what I would want to do to lose body fat. So is it possible to work out to gain muscle while still lowering your body fat %?

Well.. what is your current body fat %, and how long have you been training? If you are a total newbie (inside your first few weeks or months) then you can build muscle and lose fat at the same time. If you have been training for a few years, it's very difficult to achieve. Depending on what your body fat % is you might want to cut down a bit first then go into a surplus, so let us know the number for your BF% and your training time frame, then we'll work out some macro and calorie numbers from there! Have you also been to the @mealplan page to calculate some starting numbers?

One of those handheld body fat test machines said around 15%, but I've heard those aren't very accurate. I'm 5'10 and weigh 150 lbs if that helps you get an idea. I started training a few months ago, currently 3 times a week.

 

I've been to the meal plan page. I entered 15% body fat, "light exercise or sports 1-3 days a week," and "lean muscle gain" options. Here's what it says:

 

BMR at rest 1718.93

BMR in motion 2320.56

 

Calorie goal 2571

Protein goal 128

Fat goal 45

Carb goal 413

 

When I choose the fat loss option instead of lean muscle gain it drops the calories goal to 2071 and carbs to 288. So this adds to my confusion about whether or not I can gain musle while also losing fat since it gives different numbers for each goal😕 

Because you are a newbie with only a few months training behind you, can can still aim to do both. Just put yourself in a slight caloric surplus (250-500 calories) and just manipulate the macros (maybe even do a bit of carb cycling) to drop a bit of fat while you're gaining muscle. The most important thing is that you need to be in a SURPLUS.

 

So the numbers you got are a good starting point, let's just edit them a bit.

 

Protein: 200g

Carbs: 250g

Fat: 90g

 

Total Calories = 2610

 

So I rounded your calories up to about 2600, lowered the carbs and made up for the lost calories by increasing protein and fat. Minimum you want for protein is 1g per lb of bodyweight, and 200g has you at about 1.3g per lb of body weight which is fine. Being at about 15% bodyfat is also a fine place to start a bulk from so that's why we can start you in a surplus right away, esepcially given you could drop a bit of fat being a newbie.

 

Also, your BMR in motion is 2300 so we're techincally only putting you in a 300 calorie surplus, but what do you think about trying this for a couple of weeks and monitoring the progress you see on the scale and in the mirror? Then we can move forward from there.. thoughts?

Thank you Scott, I'll give it a go. Currently I get about 120g protein, 120g carbs, and 50g fat, so it'll be hard to get to those numbers but I'll do my best to get close.

 

However, I'm still unclear about how I can gain muscle while still losing fat while being in a surplus of calories...is you lowering the carbs and increasing protein and fat going to help with that?