Starting a lean build phase at new lighter BW — novice or intermediate?

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Jordan, Austin, and team, thanks for all the great content. Been a fan and customer for years.

I have a quick question that relates to both program selection and nutrition plan if you can spare a moment.

Background:

33 y/o dude. Trained regularly from 2013–17, only intermittently in chunks 2018–23, and now I’m back at it with discipline and regularity since January.

I’m 5’9". I began January at 163 lbs, 34-35" waist, estimated 18-19% BF.

I was fed up and wanted to lean out before slow-bulking, so I cut as fast as I could stand for 12 weeks while keeping every ounce on the bar that I could. By April 1, I was 145 lbs, 30-31" waist, with measuring tape and DEXA both estimating ~11% BF. By the end I was on ~ 1500 kcal daily and felt like shit!

I ended this cut with these estimated 1RMs:

  1. Squat 220 lbs.
  2. DL 250 lbs.
  3. Bench 175 lbs.
  4. OHP 120 lbs. Current plan + concern:

I had planned on upping calories to maintenance (~1900k), sitting there for 3-6 weeks, adding creatine, and then embarking on a slow bulk where I’ll try to add about 0.3% BW per week = about 2 lbs. per 5 weeks.

On April 1, I went to maintenance calories and started re-running BBM Beginner Block I, a program I’ve loved in the past and which previously took me well beyond novice into intermediate territory.

Since I’m still coming out of a semi-detrained state and well below my career maxes, I’d expected I would be able to consistently adapt and add strength workout-to-workout while eating at maintenance for a while.

For the first couple weeks, that worked great, but for the last 7-10 days I’ve been surprised to be missing lifts and seemingly plateauing. Current approx. 1RMs:

  1. Squat 235 lbs.
  2. DL 270 lbs.
  3. Bench 190 lbs.
  4. OHP 125 lbs. I’m also realizing that my new lower bodyweight means that I’m “intermediate” rather than “novice” on several of these lifts, according to the broscience bodyweight ratio ballparks that one sees online.

Here is my question: Is my problem programming, nutrition, or both?

Do you think I should be able to easily keep adding back strength every workout, even on maintenance calories, and the problem is that I am “too trained” (relative to bodyweight) to get maximal benefit from BBM Beginner Block I?

Or is the programming probably fine, and I just need to go ahead and start the slow weight gain phase now, to get my numbers moving again?

Given my past experience, I feel way too weak and small in absolute terms to “graduate” into an intermediate program. But on the other hand, I don’t want to pack bodyweight back on faster than will be helpful.

Thanks.

2

Hey Drew,

Thanks for the post and congrats on your success so far.

To the question regarding what should you do, I would keep running the program and aim to add weight to the bar every 2 weeks on the main lifts. If that’s not working, it’s reasonable to suggest programming needs to be adjusted for you. Moving onto the next phase or a different template would be reasonable. You should not be missing or close to missing any weights in training. Rather, adding weight should be a reward for improved fitness, not the cause of the improved fitness. In other words, you get stronger and add weight, not the reverse. This practice is far more likely to compromise your results than a diet or programming. We discuss this in detail here: Progressive Loading | Barbell Medicine

As far as whether this is programming, nutrition, or both…that’s a more complex question.

To start, you may have noticed that we don’t use the terms novice, intermediate, or advanced very often when referring to an individual’s level of training. We avoid use of these terms because they don’t mean anything specific, which means they have little effect on program management. We would disagree with proposed definitions suggesting novice individuals can make progress day to day, intermediates week to week, and advanced lifters greater than a week. This does not match experience or existing evidence on adaptation rate.

Adaptation rate’s vary depending on what you’re looking at and how it’s being tested. For example, trained individuals maxing out every day on both multi- and single-joint movements have shown improvements in 1RM performance daily. Does this mean they’re novices even though some of them squat over 500lbs? Additionally,. the average time to 1RM improvement in untrained lifters is ~ 4 weeks when tested, with significant variance between individuals. On top of all this, performance varies day to day, making small changes in weight on the bar pretty noisy. I just don’t think using the terms novice, intermediate, or advanced lifter means much, nor does it help tailor the programming to the individual. I don’t know what program you were running during your cut and sporadically before that, but the beginner program is likely fine.

Next, the role of nutrition in strength performance is likely overstated in my opinion. Barring malnutrition causing rapid weight loss, dehydration, and/or symptomatic mineral deficiencies, I do not suspect your dietary pattern is negatively affecting your trajectory here. Some would argue that you have to eat more in order to support training, recovery, and muscle mass, though this ignores the relatively low energy use during training, widely available resources during recovery periods, the length of time it takes to gain muscle (months), and the role of increased muscle mass on strength performance (not tightly correlated). 0/10, would not recommend rapid weight gain for strength improvement. I do think you’re likely lighter than you need to be for maximum strength potential, but moving that direction should be undertaken over time.

3

Thanks very much Dr. Jordan.

I have never thought about progression in this way — i.e., increased training load as a symptom / reflection / “lagging indicator” of progress, rather than the proximate stimulus needed to create that progress. This paradigm switch is super interesting.

I suppose I’ve probably let this old linear progression mindset cause me to mentally underrate some RPEs on the margin (that wasn’t so bad, call it RPE 6.5, I gotta keep climbing!), and maybe this is why I’ve missed a couple RPE 8.0 sets recently.

I am glad to hear you think I’ve got more runway left with your Beginner program. I like that thing.

On nutrition, I hear you. Definitely not aiming for rapid regain. But I do have hypertrophy as a major goal in its own right, either ranked alongside strength or just below it.

So, one last question for now: In light of my goals, do you think that targeting approx. +1% BW per month is about right, too quick, or too conservative? That would be ~1.5 lbs of monthly weight gain and a daily surplus of about 150-175 kcal.

Feels very conservative given what I’m used to from before my cut, but it looks like there’s an increasingly clear emerging consensus that pushing things much beyond that would probably just add more bodyfat.

Thanks again for your thoughts.

4

Yea, I’d be more inclined to aim for ~ 1 to 3 pounds a months, with the understanding that weight gain is not linear and you’re really comparing rolling averages from weeks of data vs week to week progress, which is not likely to last.