Skinny Fat to Fit: The Ultimate Guide to Transforming YourBody

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How the hell does one go from skinny fat to fit?

You’ve seen the amazing transformations and success stories.

People starting out skinny fat or overweight and manage to change their bodies in such profound ways.

Some share what they’ve learned along the way. Others only show the end product.

But deep down you know what you want to achieve: lose the damn fat and build muscle.

And do you want to know a secret? It really DOES come down to this. It’s that simple.

But where do you begin? How do you approach it? A thousand questions arise.

In reality, the whole process is pretty straight-forward and simple. What you need is to KNOW the basics andAPPLY them day in and day out.

Once you get going, the whole process can actually be enjoyable.

Table of content:

1.What exactly does skinny fat mean?2.Why are people skinny fat?3.What makes the typical weight loss approaches so bad and makes people skinny fat?4.How to approach and get rid of the skinny fat look as a gym newbie with no lifting experience5.How to approach and get rid of the skinny fat look if you ended up looking this way after a massive weight loss

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6.How to approach and get rid of the skinny fat look as an intermediate lifter with more than 6 months of liftingexperience7.What you need to know about training to failure8.How to track your progress9.Do I need any supplements?

What exactly does skinny fat mean?

Before we can diagnose whether you fall into the skinny-fat category or not, we first need to look at what it is.

A skinny fat person usually appears thin in clothes but actually has a high body fat percentage accompanied bylove handles, a pouchy gut and in some cases – man boobs.

So why are people skinny fat?

To look and be skinny-fat, you need to have a fairly low amount of muscle mass and a high body fat percentage.You may appear thin and in-shape while wearing clothes, but not so much when you’re shirtless.

The skinny-fat look should be associated with bad training and nutrition habits more than anything.

When most people decide they want to transform their body and lose the excess weight, they often jump thecardio bandwagon. They combine that with a severe slash in calories, ineffective ‘fat-burning’ supplements andtraining programs and in a few short months, they look skinny fat.

The reason for that is very simple:

Due to the caloric deficit they’ve created, they are bound to lose weight. But, because regular strength training isnot in their program and they don’t pay attention to their macronutrient intake, their body is just as likely to burnmuscle for energy as it is fat.

Now, you might be wondering: “Well, I finally look thin so what’s wrong with that?”.

The biggest mistake you could make with your weight loss is not paying attention on retaining your muscle mass.Not only does having more muscle mean your BMR(Basal Metabolic Rate) and TDEE(Total Daily EnergyExpenditure) are going to be naturally higher i.e. you can eat more calories every day, but it also makes you lookmuch better once you’ve lost some fat.

Just take a look at these 2 pictures below. On the first one, the person is your typical skinny-fat guy. He mighthave just come out from a massive weight loss journey but he still has a considerable amount of fat with verylittle muscle underneath.

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Now, take a look at the second one. He has a lower body fat percentage and he also has more muscle mass onhim. You can tell he lifts regularly and eats enough protein.

What makes the typical weight loss approaches so bad and makes people skinnyfat?

Now, you might be wondering:3/16

“Well, I’m eating healthy and exercising. Why can’t I get decent results for my work?” .

It’s frustrating, I know. But what your typical weight loss approach fails to do is be more exact.

Sure, you might be eating nothing but clean, whole foods all day, but are you eating enough food?

Are you eating enough of each macronutrient?

You could severely be under eating every day without even knowing it.

The best thing you can do is actually count your calories and macronutrients. Not only will you know how muchfood you can eat every day but if you follow flexible dieting you’ll be able to fit foods like pizza and chips into yourdiet and still lose fat over time.

The flexible diet or IIFYM has become quite popular in the last 5-10 years and it’s largely due to the fact that it’snot restrictive, it’s not hard to follow and you actually get to enjoy your nutrition while losing fat.

And, by taking the time to count your calories and know your everyday intake, you will also be able to eat morefood than you thought you should and lose fat more efficiently.

You will create just enough of a caloric deficit to serve your needs and when the time comes and your fat lossstalls, you can easily drop your calorie intake a bit more and resume.

This is where clean eaters usually hit a turning point. They eat healthy, exercise plenty and lose weight on aweekly basis. But, one day that weight loss stalls, and it stalls for several weeks. So, most people either panicand slash their calories into nothingness or get angry and frustrated and just call it quits.

The other aspect of the flawed weight loss approach has to do with exercise. More importantly, not due to thelack of it. See, most people combine a severe calorie restriction with a sudden increase in physical activity(oftenin the form of cardio).

I’ve stated many times that cardio is actually good for us. It provides numerous health benefits and everyoneshould include some of it in their training program.

But, because of the nature of cardio and low intensity steady state cardio in particular, it doesn’t serve you bestto rely on it for proper weight loss.

And when I say ‘weight loss’ I really mean fat loss. There is a difference and your goal should be the secondone.

As I said above, LISS cardio isn’t the best way to approach fat loss because you will lose a significant amount ofmuscle mass as well as fat in the process (which further contributes to the whole skinny-fat look).

Just take a look at these long distance runners:

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Now.. compare them to a woman who regularly lifts weights and has a relatively low body fat percentage:

As you can see, the difference is tremendous. The long distance runners are skinny but don’t have much in theway of muscle. But, the fitness model has a decent amount of muscle mass and looks great.

So combining regular strength training with an adequate protein intake will ensure you retain most of yourmuscle mass and prioritize fat loss. Not only will this help you get rid of the skinny-fat look but you will most likelygain muscle and strength in the process if you’re a gym newbie.

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How to go from skinny fat to fit

There are different stages you could be in so I decided to split them into 3 main categories. Each provides adifferent approach to attacking the skinny-fat look and you should follow the one which best describes yourcurrent situation.

This is where most guys and girls start. What is great about this stage is that you have the opportunity to buildmuscle and lose fat at the same time.

This phase is called the newbie gains and because your body isn’t used to lifting weights, you can easily buildmuscle, get stronger all while in a caloric deficit.

How to Train

Naturally, I suggest you prioritize heavy compound lifting but as a gym newbie – I advice against it. When you’rejust starting out, focus on learning the movements before adding serious weights on the bar.

Too often I see complete beginners training in a very low rep-range(1-6) with a screwed up technique. Not onlyare they NOT getting the most out of the lift but they are also setting themselves up for an injury.

Here are 8 instructional videos on how to perform the most important lifts: the flat bench press, the incline press,the deadlift, the barbell squat, the overhead barbell/dumbbell press and the pull up.

These will be the staple of your training program and for the first few months of training, your #1 goal should beto perfect the technique and slowly increase the weight on the bar.

During the initial newbie phase(which normally lasts between 3 and 6 months), you should start each workoutwith a compound lift. After properly warming up and doing 2-3 warm-up sets for the exercise, load up a weightthat allows you 8-10 reps with good form.

The only exception is the deadlift. I don’t recomment doing more than 5-7 reps per set because the lift is quitecomplex and form breaking is much easier once you get fatigued.

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For the rest of your workout, keep your reps in that range. Don’t waste time with high rep(15-20) ‘burn’ sets andpump chasing. The mechanical tension with such a low load is not nearly enough to stimulate a properhypertrophic response in your muscles(i.e. growth).

As far as training volume goes, you should aim to keep your working sets between 10 and 14 for large musclegroups(back, chest, legs) and 6 to 8 for small ones(shoulders, arms, calves).

Here is how a good and balanced chest workout would look for abeginner:

Set 1-4: Flat Barbell Bench Press 6-8 reps

Set 5-8: Incline Barbell/Dumbbell Bench Press 8-10 reps

Set 9-12: Flyes(with cables, dumbbells, kettlebells, etc.) 10-15 reps

As far as programming goes, you can follow a typical bro-split (1 to 2 muscle groups per workout), or a push-pull-legs (push: chest, triceps, shoulders) ; (pull: back, biceps).

Both options work quite well but I firmly believe a beginner should train no more than 3 to 4 days a weekmaximum.

Learn Everything You Need to Know About Nutrition

Now that we’ve gone over the training basics, it’s time to get into the nutritional side of things.

First off, keep in mind that proper training alone isn’t enough to change your body composition. Since your goalis to lose fat and get rid of the skinny-fat look, you should be in a caloric deficit.

After the initial newbie phase, you won’t be able to build much muscle and get stronger while eating below yourmaintenance(deficit) but for the first few months, you can make great gains.

This is going to require you to track your calories and protein(the least).

Start off by calculating your TDEE(use the calculator here).

Next, add a moderate deficit of 300-400 calories to that number. To calculate your macronutrient needs, followthese basic rules:

1)Eat roughly 1 to 1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight.2)Eat between 0.3 and 0.6 grams of fat per pound of body weight.3)Get the rest of your calories from carbs and aim for 10 grams of fiber for every 1000 calories you eat.

Here is how this would look:

Let’s say you weigh 180 pounds and your TDEE is 3000 calories. Add the 400 calorie deficit and you’re left with2600 calories per day. Now, simply eat between 180 and 216 grams of protein, 54 to 108 grams of fat and therest should come from carbs.

As long as your protein and fats numbers are in this range, your carb are also going to be on point.

Also, keep in mind that as you get leaner over time, you will need to re-adjust your calories and macronutrientsby re-calculating your TDEE. I recommend doing so after every 10 to 12 pounds of weight you lose.

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You should follow this path for as long as you can make progress in terms of strength and muscle. This will varyfrom person to person but it usually lasts anywhere from 3 to 6 months.

Once the newbie gains are gone, your lifts will most likely stall. Being in a caloric deficit won’t cut it anymore. Atthis point, you have 2 options:

1. Continue with your caloric deficit and get leaner.

2. Slowly reverse your calories up and go into a small surplus of to start building muscle.

Side note: I wrote about reverse dieting more in the next section and you can learn theexact process and how to apply it.

What it comes down to is your personal decision and how you prefer to look. Sean Nalewanyj recently made agreat video on this exact topic/dilemma and I strongly encourage you to check it out:

This is yet another common category of skinny-fat people. If the above describes you best and you can answer“Yes” to each of the 3 statements below, then you fall into this category and should read on.

“I’ve lost quite a bit of weight recently and everyone is complimenting me on my great results but when I look atmyself in the mirror, I don’t particularly like what I see.”

“I have been in the gym during my weight loss but I didn’t do a lot of lifting. My main focus has been cardio.”

“I went about my weight loss in a typical manner: clean eating paired up with a lot of cardio work.”

Now, this current state you are in is a bit trickier than the first one for one big reason:

You’ve already spent a lot of time in a caloric deficit and your metabolism has gradually adapted to your lower

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calorie intake. Therefore, staying in a caloric deficit is not a wise decision right now.

The next best route for you is reverse dieting. Whether you want to lose more fat or start building a solid base ofmuscle, this is a mandatory step so don’t skip it.

If you haven’t been tracking your calories so far, it’s okay. Calculate your TDEE with this simple calculator andadd a deficit of about 200-300 calories on that number. Keep your calories there for 7 to 10 days and take aweight measurement every morning on empty stomach. Do a waist measurement now and after 7 days. Take aprogress pic now and in the same lighting (if possible) 7 days from now.

Your aim here is to determine whether or not you’re actually in a caloric deficit or not. If you keep losing weightand your average weight across the week is lower, bump your calories by 5% and repeat for another 7 to 10days.

Your goal here is to slowly bring back up your caloric intake and give your metabolism the time it needs to adaptwithout gaining much body fat.

This whole process of gradually increasing calories until you reach your new TDEE is going to take severalweeks(6 to 8). At that point, you’ll have two options:

1)Add a small calorie surplus of 200-250 and start building muscle over time.2)Add a moderate calorie deficit of 400-500 calories and focus on further losing fat.

At this point it all comes down to personal preference. You’re in an excellent position to start building muscle orkeep on losing fat and what you decide to do is up to you.

If you haven’t watched the video I posted above where Sean talks about cutting and bulking for skinny fatpeople, I strongly encourage you to check it out. Here is another link.

As far as training goes, because you’re a gym newbie, I encourage you to read the training basics I wrote abovein the “If you’re a newbie” section. I don’t want to repeat myself because the training approach is pretty muchgoing to be the same. I went through rep-ranges, training volume, the big compound lifts and more.

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This category of skinny fat is different from the above 2 in a few major ways:

1. I assume you’ve been practicing the compound lifts and your technique is good. If not, check outthe 8 videos I posted above.

2. I assume you’ve gained a decent amount of muscle during your newbie phase and you aresteadily adding weight on the bar.

3. I assume you keep track of your calories, macros(protein the least) and you have a good idea ofhow much weight you’ve gained in the last few months.

This is a good place to start a fat loss or cutting cycle. You’ve got some muscle mass to justify it and you’ll besetting yourself up for a great next bulk cycle because you will be lean starting out which has quite a few greatbenefits:

1. You get to bulk longer and possibly build muscle more optimally due to better calorie partitioning and moretime spent in a caloric surplus.

2. You can see progress much better because you won’t have a layer of fat covering your muscles.

3. You get to look like you actually lift because your muscle to fat ratio is going to be much better.

Now, let’s get down and dirty into everything you need to do at this point.

Nutrition

The biggest mistake most people make when trying to lose fat is jump head first into the process.

They immediately add a ton of cardio, cut their calories low and set themselves up for failure right from the start.To avoid making this mistake, you need to pace yourself.

Start off by gradually decreasing your caloric intake over the course of a few weeks.

If you are currently eating in a surplus of 200-300 calories for a total of 3300 a day, you don’t just drop it to 2500suddenly and go from there. No, you decrease your calories more, initially, by roughly 300-400. Keep them likethat for up to a week and then decrease them by 150-200 more.

Go for another week and repeat.

By week 3 you should be eating in a caloric deficit and you should start seeing gradual loss in weight.

After week 3, drop your calories by an additional 100-150 and start tracking progress. Take progress pictures,body measurements and morning weigh-ins (to calculate your weekly average).

At this point, you will gradually lose fat over time and still have A LOT more room to reduce your caloric intakewhen your metabolism adapts and fat loss stalls.

Once your fat loss plateaus you can either start incorporating cardio and keep your calorie intake the same orgradually decrease calorie intake by 100 per day and see if that gets you going again.

The bottom line?

The process needs to be gradual.

Slowly decrease energy intake while increasing energy expenditure to ensure you’re in a big enough caloricdeficit for weeks, even months to come.

As far as macronutrients go, the same rules apply:

1.Keep your protein intake between 1 and 1.2 grams per pound of body weight.

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2.Keep your fat intake between 0.4 and 0.6 grams per pound of body weight.

3.Get the rest of your calories from carbs and focus on getting 10 grams of fiber for every 1000 calories you eat.

2 Bonus Tips:

As you diet down over time, your hunger is most likely going to kick in hard. A greatway to keep it down is by eating 1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight. I’m notsaying there is any benefit added to it in regards of muscle retention. This is more of ahunger control trick that I’ve found to work quite well.

Another great way to control your hunger is to eat mostly complex, slow digestingcarbs like potatoes and rice as opposed to ice cream and pop tarts. Sure, the ice creammight feel better coming in but due to it’s high Glycemic Index (GI), it break down fastand you are left feeling hungry.

Training

There is a big misconception that when trying to lose fat, you need to start training with low weights for high repsto ‘bring out definition’ or whatever. This is a huge mistake.

Sure, training in the higher rep ranges does have it’s benefits but basing your entire training program on thatbiomechanical capacity WILL NOT work well for you.

Not only are you not going to bring out more muscle definition but you will most likely lose much more muscleand strength compared to if you were to train as you normally do.

There are two big reasons why the high rep approach is bad:

1.Spot reduction is a myth. Just because you feel a better burn in your pectorals doing high-rep bench pressdoesn’t mean you’ll lose more chest fat.

2.Muscle retention during prolonged caloric deficits relies heavily on 2 main factors: adequate protein intake andhow much and how often you put your muscles under heavy loads.

The main point I want you to take away:

Keep your training the same, at least initially. Same rep-ranges, same amount of training volume, same workoutfrequency and even the same exercise selection.

This isn’t some ‘get in shape with Mike’ bullshit training program from the 80’s so don’t change the way you trainand think it will somehow deliver good results.

As far as training volume and workout frequency go:

After dieting for a long period of time, your energy levels will drop. No matter what you do.

At this point, your 5-6 or even 4-day split that you initially followed might start to overwhelm you. You will startfeeling overtrained.

Aside from your regular de-load weeks, you can also slightly reduce your training volume across all of yourworkouts or go as far as to knock out 1 to 2 training days and combine more muscle groups.

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Example of training volume reduction:

Let’s say you normally do 16 sets for chest, 16 for back, 18 for legs (total), 12 for shoulders and 9 for biceps andtriceps each.

You can drop 2 working sets from each body part and see how you feel after a week or two. This might not seemlike a lot but you’d end up with 12 total sets less each week.

I recommend knocking off sets from your accessory exercises and maintain your volume on the compound liftslike the bench press and deadlift because these exercises burn much more calories and naturally recruit moremuscles to perform.

Example of training frequency reduction:

If you follow a typical 4-day bro-split but you are finding it hard to keep up, then knocking one day off andcombining more muscle groups will help.

For example:

Let’s say your current training split looks like this:

Monday: Chest and triceps

Tuesday: Back and biceps

Wednesday: Off

Thursday: Legs

Friday: Shoulders and traps

You can easily transition to a 3-day split for a while:

Monday: Chest, triceps, shoulders

Tuesday: Off

Wednesday: Back, biceps, traps

Thursday: Off

Friday: Legs

Notice how we added the shoulders in your chest workout and traps on back day.

If you normally follow a 5-day split, there is more flexibility to combine muscle groups and do a 4-day split for awhile, here are 3 great examples:

#1

Monday: Shoulders and traps

Tuesday: Off

Wednesday: Back and biceps

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Thursday: Off

Friday: Chest and triceps

Saturday: Off

Sunday: Legs

#2

Monday: Chest and triceps

Tuesday: Off

Wednesday: Back and biceps

Thursday: Off

Friday: Shoulders and traps

Saturday: Legs

Sunday: Off

#3

Monday: Off

Tuesday: Chest and triceps

Wednesday: Off

Thursday: Back and biceps

Friday: Off

Saturday: Shoulders and traps

Sunday: Legs

As far as training to failure goes

I’m not going to lie: training to failure can surely be fun and ego-boosting. In fact, in my first year and a half in thegym I focused exclusively on training to failure. I didn’t feel a workout was productive unless I took at least 90%of all my sets to failure. This was a big mistake on my part and here is why:

Training to failure is very taxing on your muscle and central nervous system. You are literally pushing your bodyto it’s limits, every set, workout after workout.

Now imagine you drive a car that way:

Instead of switching gears once you reach the 2000-3000 RPM range, you simply push the pedal to the metaland drive in first gear.

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What do you think happens?

The car overheats, engine and gear box wear much faster and you’re left with a steamy mess on the side of theroad. And your body reacts the same.

Rather than focusing on pushing every set to failure, doing burn sets, drop sets, giant sets, super sets and soforth, focus on small, gradual improvements over time.

As author of the bestseller book Bigger, Leaner, Stronger Mike Matthews says:

“Focus on doing just 1 more rep with the same weight. If you manage that and the rest of your workout staysexactly the same as the week before, it’s still progress.”

Focus on progressive overload, train with optimal volume and take a handful of sets to failure at the end of yourworkout. You will kick your ass LESS and get BETTER results over time.

Progress tracking

This step is of huge importance. It never ceases to amaze me how people can spend hundreds of hours at thegym per year. Yet, they can’t take 10 minutes after a workout to fill out their log or take a progress pic selfie at thelocker room mirror.

After all, how will you know how far you’ve come if you can’t really tell where you were months ago.

Progress tracking is especially important for fat loss because it gives you a much better understanding ofwhether you’re on the right path or need to re-adjust to keep making progress.

Eating just 150-200 calories more than you should every day can significantly slow down your fat loss resultsover time.

Without further rambling, let’s get down into some of the best ways to track your progress:

Progress pictures

For your fat loss phase, I recommend taking a set of 12-15 photos of yourself to have a good understanding andremember where you began. After that, you should take a progress pic every 3-4 days. The same time, in thesame mirror with the same lighting. This is the best way to keep track of how your body changes over time.

Weight scale

Yet another great progress tracker. Every morning, on an empty stomach, go to the bathroom, do your thing andthen jump on the scale. Write down your daily weigh-in and take the average for the week.

Over time, your weight will fluctuate and you might be 2 pounds heavier one day then suddenly lose 4 pounds.This is why a weekly average is much more accurate. As long as your weight goes down on a week-by-weekbasis, you’re on the right track.

Body measurements

For your fat loss, it’s important to take body measurements in the start and see how they change over time.

Again, I recommend doing it in the morning on an empty stomach. This way you can avoid any potential bloatingthat occurs later in the day.

Here is a comprehensive video by Scott Herman on how to take proper and accurate measurements:

As far as frequency goes I recommend taking measurements every 2 week.

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Tracking your workouts is very important.

Knowing how well (or bad) you did the week prior gives you an immediate goal:

Beat your last week’s workout or if you’re in a caloric deficit – match it.

You can buy the pre-designed workout log or you can just go ahead and get a regular A4 format notebook tosave yourself some money. Write down your numbers on the compound lifts and write down your training volumedone.

You can also use a great app for that but a fair warning: It’s not out yet for us Android users.

The app is called Rep Count and from what I’ve seen, it’s easy to use, has a great interface and.. well.. you canwrite down your numbers in there.

How long is this going to take?

Changing your body composition is going to be a challenge. You WILL need to put in the work. You WILL have tospend quite a few days eating less than you desire. And you most certainly WILL feel like you’re not making anyprogress, at times. This is why I emphasize progress tracking so much – because you have hard evidence ofactual progress and how far you’ve come over time.

As far as the actual time it’s going to take – it’s different for everyone. It could be 12 weeks and it could be 30.Depending on your current body fat percentage, you might have to stick with it longer. The best answer I cangive you is this:

It’s going to take as long as it has to until you reach your desired look.

Should you take any supplements?

I personally don’t like to rely on supplements too much. I like to consider myself what fitness youtuber and coachOmar Isuf likes to call a ‘supplement minimalist’. I take the proven and researched supplements that support mywell-being and performance over the long run.

I don’t chase the latest “fast-absorbing” protein or “new and improved pre-workout formula” and neither shouldyou. So without further rambling, let’s get into my (short) list of recommended supplements which I take on adaily basis.

Creatine monohydrate. I won’t get much into this one. If you’d like to know more about it, I welcome you tocheck out the article I wrote on it a while back: Everything You Need to Know About Creatine

Take your standard 5 grams every day. It doesn’t matter what time you choose to do so. Here is a shortersummary of this supplement in a video:

Standard Whey Protein powder. Now, protein powder comes in many, many forms. I’m going to go on a limbhere when I say this:

A standard whey protein is going to work just as great as the 3 times more expensive “fast digesting super 3000formula” one. You should do yourself a favor and don’t fall for the marketing scams.

If you’d like to read more about protein powder, check out this very in-depth article on the matter.

The reason I like taking protein powder is because it’s convenient. Do you need it to build muscle over time?Heck no. But you can easily whip up an overnight oatmeal or a protein shake ready to go in 5 minutes.

You can also check out this list of amazing recipes to try using protein powder .

Omega 3 Fish oils. This is yet another great supplement that not only support your well-being but it has been15/16

proven to have positive muscle-building effects over time. You can read more about it and it’s positive healthbenefits in this article.

Conclusion

Changing your body composition doesn’t happen easy. It requires dedication and discipline to form the body andlife-transforming habits associated with it.

There will be times when sticking to your diet plan will feel very difficult. Sometimes you might not feel like goingto the gym and working out.

But do you know what makes it all worth it? The fact that you will prove yourself that you can achieve somethinggreat when you put your mind to it.

That will not only translate to you having a great-looking body and better health but also a better approach toeverything.

Your life, your finances, relationships and everything in-between.

Also, I would love to see the results you get so feel free to send me updates, questions and concerns over atthinkinglifter@gmail.com

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