6 Weeks of Burning the Fat, Feeding the Muscle
 

I'm a swimmer and a very new body builder. I'm in the off season so I spent a month bulking (which I think I gained a pound, but I didn't have calipers so I couldn't keep precise track at the time except through weight) and then six weeks of cutting.

Here's the result of my cut:

Start: 140.0 lbs., 12.3% body fat
End: 135.6 lbs. 9.8% body fat

change in fat mass: 3.93 lbs.
change is lean body mass: .47 lbs.

http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/731...rmation.th.jpg


I know the poses are completely different, but what do you guys think? The next area for improvement is DEFINITELY my scrawny little chest.

How tall are you?

Are you doing shows already? If not, then why not do an extended lean bulk? Bulking, then cutting is going to make for slow progress.

I read several books for beginners, one of them being Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle by Tom Venuto, and he recommended getting off all of my excess fat before I start bulking.

Right now my goal is to get to 130.0 lbs. so I'll be around 6% before I start bulking, because losing fat really stinks!

Also, I'm not sure if you know about somatotypes, but I'm pretty sure I'm an ecto-mesomorph, aka a "hardgainer", so it's pretty hard for me anyways to eat over my maintenance calories, making good choices (we all know it's easy to get to 5,000 with In-n-Out) without getting sick (like 4,500).

Any tips? I just joined today, but I'm definitely reading the stickies. I'm already having 6-7 meals a day, tapering my calories from breakfast to dinner. I try to keep my macro nutrient ratio at 50:30:20.

Absolutely no need to get to 6% before bulking. If you get that low, then you're losing precious muscle & wasting time. 40/40/20 might be a better ratio for you if you're a hard gainer...or even 40/30/30.

f yeah. thanks man.