Bio impedance discoveries

[CFLBob]

I was thinking my sarcasm in my post probably wasn’t clear that I was making fun of myself, so I need to be clear on that. The most sarcasm is my last two paragraphs, talking about my Renpho results for the week. I’ve done fasting experiments before and while it’s a wonderful delusion, I don’t expect to lose weight every week, and stalling for a few weeks isn’t a new thing. I don’t think that listing the calories I burned is at all meaningful, but I like to throw that out.

I’ve been keto solidly since April of '15, and following some form of diet (with various degrees of success) for most of the last 40 years. I can safely say I have never achieved my goal weight, even a modest 190. A rough, calculation says that’s 16 pounds less than I weigh now, and at 2 lbs of fat to 1% BF the numbers work out as being about 18% body fat at 190. That’s not considered low body fat in anyone’s world, it’s the top of “recommended normal” range, so I should be able to get there, right? I got close last October, 192 (IIRC) and started gaining back immediately.

It’s that frustration with my own deranged metabolism that leads to the snark I left.

It seems to me that the largest muscles in the body are the thighs, so that’s where it’s easiest to add mass. If I’m not going to work those, I need to decrease my expectations for muscle mass added to my body. I don’t know how much muscle mass I’ve added to my legs since I started riding again last August, but I’m sure I have. My legs both feel and look different.

My changes for the coming week are twofold: I’m going to increase my upper body workout to 3x and I might not fast this week. I’m not sure how I’m going to work out the fasting because Thursday I have a colonoscopy and their 5 day “prep” schedule pretty much shoots everything I do. I either eat the way they want or fast the full 5 days. I intend to ride my normal three days. MWF would be the day before and the day after the procedure. (This is just a routine screening type, just because of my age; no family history, no suspicions).

[charlie3]

Neglecting lower body is a beginner mistake. A few leg sets a few times a week is enough. Quads are out front but glutes may be more important. What kids will often do is only work arms, shoulders, chest because those are visible from the front. It’s an odd obvious look.

Renpho says I’m 12.9% body fat. That sounds about right. My lowest was 11%, a big difference it turns out. I’d like to be normal at 11% but growing muscle is a higher priority right now.

[charlie3]

My goal for muscle mass has been to add 1 pound a month for 25 months, not faster. So far I’m managing that, just barely. (“Fast as possible” is a risky goal because it encourages overtraining.) Below is about 10 months of muscle mass measurements, with 10 pounds of progress, collected with the Renpho scale and added to Cronometer. The early months show no increase then there is a period of progress that ends with another flat period. The period of progress is a perfect fit for the time I was doing barbell squats instead of leg press. The squats were high rep sets, not heavy. Common knowledge in the gym is that squats are productive and necessary. My chart seems to confirm that so squats go back in the program and we’ll see what happens.

[charlie3]

Here is a chart comparing my muscle mass changes with protein intake. It tells me that the protein increase might have contributed to the muscle mass change but might be coincidental. To test that I’ll put back the squats but not increase protein.

Another thing that’s coincidental with muscle mass gain is stopping my IF stratagy. I was eating 2 meals a day six days a week and nothing on one day. I don’t believe switching to 3 squares mattered to gaining muscle but that’s something I will test.