In this article, you’re going to learn if you should cut or bulk if you’re skinny fat.

I know the skinny fat look well because I used to be this all growing up. I hated the look of my belly poking through my shirts and I never felt confident taking my shirt off. I’d wear baggier clothes to hide my body’s shape. And for years trying to change my body I never got a clear answer whether I should cut or bulk first.

This is probably the biggest question that’s asked when I’m working with guys. It’s whether they should cut or bulk first. It’s an important question because it’ll determine your strategy. However, there’s a third option I’ll introduce to you that you can do as well.

 

You can either watch the video, read the blog or both. The video here:

 

 Cut or Bulk If You’re Skinny Fat

Let’s first look at what these mean.

To cut means you will be in a calorie deficit and losing weight over time.

To bulk means you’ll be in a calorie surplus and putting on weight over time.

In both scenarios, you could be either losing fat or muscle or gaining fat or muscle. It’s going to a mixture of both but you want it to be a beneficial ratio of muscle to fat in either scenario.

Cutting or bulking as a skinny fat guy is a problem that comes up so often because these guys don’t have a lot of muscle. If they had a lot of muscle they then the belly and love handle wouldn’t look as bad. But because their arms are skinny AND they have a belly/love handles it looks bad.

For example, if there are two guys who both have a waist of 36 inches but one of those guys has 25 pounds more muscle he’s going to just look better.

 

Cut

You should cut when you have a bigger belly in comparison to your chest.

If your belly is really big and poking through your shirt then maybe you cut first.

 

Bulk

This would be good if the guy is mainly skinny with little love handles.

Then he could bulk where he’d put on muscle and probably some fat.

 

Option 3: The Recomp

This is potentially the best option, and what I recommend, for skinny fat guys because it’ll help them build muscle and burn fat at the same time.

The fitness industry has made it sound impossible but it’s not. I’ve done it and so have many others.

The recomp is a little more advanced but basically, you’ll be getting in your resistance training, eating more on certain days, less on others, and getting in your low intensity cardio.

Once you make those adjustments you basically just keep that up for several months. You’ll start to see more muscle being put on and your waist may shrink a little or stay the same but as long as you’re not putting on more fat then it’s okay because you’ll be adding muscle.

 

The next step for you is to get a good structure around this recomp. If you’d like help finding out how that would work for you then send me a note on my contact page here and we can set up a quick call to discuss it.

 

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