Changing Conditioning programming while dieting

Howdy,

I’m currently running Hypertrophy I while dieting to lose some fat (~10 lbs). I would like to preserve as much muscle as possible, so I was wondering if changing up the conditioning would be appropriate. I have heard Mike Israetel and Eric Helms say that high impact conditioning modalities with a significant eccentric component are not great for preserving muscle mass while dieting (compared to lower impact forms such as walking on a treadmill or using an elliptical), so I was planning on replacing all programmed HIIT cardio with LISS cardio just for this template. Does this seem like a good idea? Is there merit to this school of thought?

Also, I have heard that it can be a good idea to separate conditioning from lifting weights as much as possible. In light of that, I was going to move my cardio & trunk work to Sundays and Tuesdays while lifting weights on the other five days of the week. This doesn’t give me a complete “off day” during the week, but I was thinking that probably doesn’t matter much. Pretty much the same question here: Does this seem like a good idea? Is there merit to this belief?

I think that in this context, which is not prepping for a bodybuilding show at a very low body fat, this information is not relevant. I also think that HIIT can be done with low impact, low eccentric component, e.g. rowing, cycling, etc.

I don’t think it matters if you separate your lifting and conditioning at all in this context. For competitive athletes with very high training volumes however, this may be useful.

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