Ok. Clichés are numerous in fitness and weight lifting. Yeah we have all heard the one that nutrition is 70% of success in fitness. Not really, but it is used to show how important nutrition is. Nutrition is important but like all things it can be overrated at times. For instance, let’s say you eat perfectly but never train. You will lose weight but then it is really possible to be skinny but out of shape. There is also the issue that no diet or training plan fits all people.
I say this because there is some concern by a few commenters about my plan and right now nutrition is not a focus. The clichés comes: ‘You will never out train a bad diet.’ Really? Hmm. I think my own experience proves this false. When I first started training I was in my late twenties. All I did was lift weights. No diet, no cardio, just iron. I lost weight (300lbs. to 225lbs.) leaned out and felt great. No diet. How is this possible? Well it illustrates why clichés do not always work.
I am 6’5″ and I have never been under 200lbs since I was a Sophomore in college. Marriage does that to you. Even in these later years of training since I was 39, I have had several plateaus in dropping weight. 262 and 283 respectfully and that was with training and a nutrition and this is why I have stopped stepping on a scale. Weight loss don’t mean nothing. I will never be small again.
I want you nutritional geniuses to figure out a muscle-building diet for a guy who is 6’5″ and who can’t get his weight below 285lbs anymore. I want you to imagine the amount of carbs, protein and fats that will take. I have created diets in the past that were well above 6000 calories a day and that is with a lifestyle that is fairly sedentary. When I was working in retail stocking shelves at might I had to add 2000 more calories a day to get any muscle gain at all. Now I want you to think about a diet where I am trying to shred fat. Still high. The lowest calorie take in I could get in was 2400 and that was to maintain my 275 grams of protein a day plus keep my energy level high enough to train at all. Still a ton of food and sometimes my stomach was not large enough for it. For me, I have out trained diet.
Now I am not saying everyone can do this. I simply know for the past two months I have seen results with no concern for diet. I lift weights and my shorts and pants fit better and are looser. Explain that. My point is that training has an effect, diet or no diet. There will come a time where nutrition will matter more. That time will be soon. But for now I don’t need it to get results. Now I will need nutrition to get result when I really want to get super lean. I simply am saying the ‘never’ is not true. The cliché should read ‘most of the time you can’t out train a bad diet.’ Mutants like me do walk the earth.
The Body Rundown:
Nutrition: Yeah, still getting result without it so come March it will be cut time.
Flexibility: Working on it.
Cardio: Walking a lot and my rep range is still above five. 😉
Strength: Switched from 3×8-10 to 4×8-10. It made the last sets a real struggle. I think though this is going to get good.
Blessings and Cheers!!!
Yes, you will still get some results whether you did only nutrition or only exercise, but you will never achieve maximum results unless you do both. Also, by “diet”, I do NOT mean “calorie restriction”. I’m talking nutrition, as in you need proper nutrients. Maybe you are getting some, maybe not. If your diet was only soda pop and potato chips, then no amount of exercise in the world could make up for that poor of a diet. If your regular diet already contains vegetables, meat, natural fats (ie not from cooking oil), etc. then likely you are already getting a decent level of nutrition.
Bart,
I should have responded to this earlier, sorry about that, but I think you make my point for me in this comment. You are clearly distinguishing ‘maximum results’ from just ‘results’ and you are right but the cliché is that you can never out train a bad diet. Never is a universal word and the moment one person proves it false, then it becomes a lie. It takes the whole package to get the maximum results but you can get results without the whole package and that is my only point.
My nutrition has always been difficult because I am a big man. When your taller than average and have large body parts without fat on them you still burn a ton of food. Even eating right I can still come up short in what I need to grow muscle. On the flip side, I can just not care and still get results. To be fair though, I eat a lot of meat and veggies naturally but I don’t shy away from chips when their offered at a social gathering or even sweets. I have a soda pop maybe once or twice a month. mostly its water. So in a sense I eat partially OK.
My problem with clichés is that some of them can be discouraging. Someone might look at this one and then go ‘to hell with it, I will never get my diet perfect so no matter how much training I do it won’t matter.” That simply is not true. I would rather have them training and then gradually talk to them about diet. Doing something is better than doing nothing so I would rather find a different way to talk about nutrition with someone than ‘never’ and ‘all’.
Blessings and Cheers!!!