Hey Jordan,
I understand you have said on several occasions that people can still gain strength despite whatever their weight goal is (Loss/maintainence/gain) and that you increasingly think that muscle size isn’t as well correlated to strength as we once thought.
That said, in your coaching experience, have you found any significant difference in strength gains intra-individual (esp for non-novices) when doing weight loss vs maintainence/gain?
My thinking is that weight loss typically represents 1) added stress on the body compared to weight maintainence/gain and 2)may cause some loss of lean muscle mass, hence it seems likely that although one could definitely still gain strength on a cut, one would probably still be missing out on some hypertrophy-related increases in strength, small as they may be.
Hence, if I gained X strength while doing a cut, is it fair to say I could have gained slightly more than X if not on a cut? Or it really doesn’t work that way in your experience.
The other question is regarding the cut itself - as you guys have put out, there are many ways to go about it in the context of a health-promoting diet. That said, have you seen any difference in terms of performance between those who go lower carb versus mod-carb and lower fat, in terms of 1) initial performance change and 2) long term change?
I would imagine if someone is used to fairly high volumes per workout, a drop in carbs may initially cause some dropoff in performance, which would then adapt gradually… but then again, resistance training isn’t typically very energy-consumptive (versus say endurance sport) so it might just be a psychological thing?
Just curious to hear your perspective on these things.
Thanks! Can’t wait for your book.