How To Lose Fat Once You Have Muscles
Q: I have seen in some questions here that in order to lose the last belly fat when u are already thin u should do whole progressive weight training.This will enable u to obtain muscles.After,what u should do in order to lose the fat?I mean after six or more months of weight training and when u have already some muscles.U will have muscles of course but u will still have this fat also.So,after u gain muscles what u must do to lose this fat on your belly?Starting diet this way again?
A: You're correct. You would attack that last bit of fat in two phases. Phase One: slow bulk when you'll have a more strachy carb diet and overeat to very slowly (2 pounds per month) gain weight. Most of this new weight should be muscle if you eat right and do heavy weight training. Slow weight gain is extremely important here -- fast weight gain will just lead to a lot of new fat. Phase Two: slow cut when you'll cut out most strachy foods and undereat slightly to lose about 1 pound per week. Your training does not need to change for this phase, though you can add more cardio here. By the time you get back to your original weight or so, if you did everything right you will have more muscle and less fat.
So the only difference is in the diets that you follow for the two phases. You can get examples of both bulking and cutting diets by filling out http://www.mikesfitness.com/content/fitnessguide and specifying 'Lose Fat' and then 'Build Muscle' as your goals. If you compare the two diets you'll see that the 'Lose Fat' one has fewer calories than 'Build Muscle' and also significantly fewer carbs. The amount of protein and fats does not change so much between the two diets.
For example... Suppose you're a complete novice starting out at 160 pounds at 15% body fat. That means you have 24 pounds of fat on you (15% of 160). Over 10 months you would slowly bulk up to 180 pounds. Of the new weight you might gain 15 pounds of muscle and 5 pounds of fat (some fat gain is pretty much unavoidable during bulk). That means you have 29 pounds of fat at 180 pounds or 16% body fat. Now over the next 4 months, you lose 20 pounds to get back at 160. Of those 20 pounds lost, 15 are fat and 5 are muscle (again, some muscle will often be lost during any prolonged cut). So now you have 14 pounds of fat at 160 pounds which puts you at 9% body fat and having a six-pack!
The above example is a little optimistic because few people are able to maintain such strict diets for such a long time, but it's certainly not outside the realm of possibility. Even you go from 15% body fat to 12% (instead of the 9% in this example) in one year, the difference will be very noticeable. Hope that helps explain then bulk-then-cut approach.