Elite Physique The New Science of Building a Better Body

Nutrition for Muscle Growth or Fat Loss
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Put another way, eat nothing but fruits, veggies, and healthy protein sources.
That single change might give you all the results you want. And if you’d like to
progress a bit beyond those guidelines, follow the Healthy Eating Index, which
has been shown to reduce all causes of mortality, including heart disease and
cancer (Onvani et al. 2017).
Final Thoughts
All of this brings us to the final point I want to make in this chapter: Fat loss and
muscle gain are different goals requiring different strategies. Someone who’s new
to resistance training, or returning to it after a layoff, might be able to gain some
muscle while losing some fat, resulting in an improvement in body composition
even without a change in scale weight. But the longer you train, the less likely
that is to happen. That’s why you have to focus on one goal or the other:
• Eat more to gain muscle, with the understanding that you’ll probably gain
some fat in the process.
• Eat less to lose fat, knowing you’ll probably lose a little muscle.
Weight gain and weight loss are never 100 percent one thing or the other.
Throughout this chapter I discuss ways to minimize fat gain during a calorie
surplus and to minimize muscle loss during a calorie deficit. But the idea that
an experienced and fit lifter can lose fat and gain muscle simultaneously is akin
to trying to drive north and south at the same time.