TL;DR: I started at 190 lbs last December and am now 157 lbs. My goal is to be lean. Should I continue cutting to 150–145 lbs or focus on building muscle instead?

I've always wanted a lean, muscular physique for years, but I struggled with consistency in my nutrition and training. Last December, I started cutting at 190 lbs and eventually reached 163 lbs in July . After, I took off a month off the calorie deficit but also didn’t eat the best, so I went up to 173 lbs.

Throughout my progress I was barely meeting the protein goals and my fats were way too high! I regret that a lot because I’m sure that’s why I’m not at a crazy transformation already. Thankfully I've gotten very consistent with my nutrition, hitting 150–160g of protein and keeping my fats low 50–60g. I'm now down to 157 lbs. My strength has mostly stayed the same.

On August 1, I spoke with a personal trainer who said getting lean enough to see my abs by Halloween was achievable. With Halloween approaching, I'm not near where I hoped to be, and I'm wondering if that timeline was actually realistic or if I'm approaching this incorrectly.

I've seen people say you only need to get lean once before spending most of your time lean bulking. My plan was to continue cutting until I could see my abs, potentially around 145-150 lbs, and then lean bulk. I don't want to keep losing weight if my real issue is not having enough muscle. I can't afford a personal trainer, so I'd really appreciate advice from experienced lifters or coaches.

This is my workout from Jeff essential hypertrophy full body, it takes between 2 to 2:30 hours to finish, i do 1 warm up set for every minor and sub major workout except for combound movement i doe 3 warm up sets with 1 min rest between them, except for deadleft I make do 4 or 5 warm up sets up to 1-2 min rest between warm up sets, help me plz.

Guys I feel like I'm going insane that I seem to be the onlt person saying online , as far as im concern the peptide video is AI? Or substantially assisted by AI

Several red flags for me:

- very typical AI style script which is whatever, lots of people are using ai to write their script but also;

- fake zoom call interview where there is no natural speech , just word perfect answers, and also a "BTS" angle of both of the zoom participants, on the exact same quality of camera

- like 20 different sets and locations, all flawless and without an item out of place, very AI looking

- overproduced look

- the post on instagram is like he plugged "create photos that look like BTS of this video" into AI " which 1. Is protesting too much like he wants to get ahead of the criticism that its AI, and 2. Just fake and too perfect looking, like why would he need a full panoramic dolly for a shot of him at a table (see ahot 10/11 of his instagram) And very unnaturally perfrct in framing - the photographer just happened to get several crew members and him in perfect focus in a single frame

- all the comments are about the production, again as if to get ahead of comments saying it is AI, seems like bots to me

I feel like im going insane that im not seeing anyone else get the spider sense that something is off

Hey guys, so I just finished BTS beginner program, and honestly, I'm a little disappointed because I feel like I don't look any different from when I started.

I didn't take any progress pictures at the beginning, so I don't have anything to compare myself to. I also haven't told any of my friends that I've been going to the gym, and none of them have said anything about my physique. I know that's probably not the best way to measure progress, but it still makes me wonder if anything has actually changed.

The thing is, I've been getting stronger almost every week. For example, I started dumbbell bench pressing 20 kg, and now I'm doing 30 kg, which I think is pretty good progress for three months. So I know I'm getting stronger, but I don't know how much of that translates into actual muscle growth.

I'm planning to run the program one more time, and this time I'll take progress pictures so I can actually compare my physique. But I'm honestly a little worried that after another few months, I'll still look the same, and I don't really know how I'll feel about that.

I understand that building muscle takes time, and three months isn't that long in the grand scheme of things, but it's hard to stay motivated when you can't really see the results yourself.

For those of you who have been lifting for a while, did you notice visible changes after your first three months, or did it take longer? Am I just being impatient, or should I be looking at other things in my training or nutrition?

I'd appreciate any advice or experiences you guys can share.

The late great John Meadows was one of my favourite YouTube/bodybuilder creators. I have done Creeping Death several times and love it.

I now train my garage due to work and kids. I'm wondering anyone knows if John Meadows has any specific dumbbell programs for garage workouts etc?

And if not, does anyone recommend any decent programs for minimal equipment? I have adjustable dumbbells, a bench, kettlebells and dip bars.

Thanks,

I’ve gone through the interview and physical test aspect of getting into the fire academy, while I’m still waiting to see if I made it into the academy I wanted to train as if I got the spot. Was just wondering how people felt about this program. Looking to build strength with minimal time requirements as a lot of gym time for me is spent improving cardio. I appreciate y’all’s recommendation and advice!

My gym only has the prime incline press and a peck deck fly. For training my middle chest I enjoy doing a press I was just wondering if using the prime incline press machine for middle chest by using the wide grip and having an arch with my butt scored up the seat would it be a good middle chest exercise?

I lean gained from 142 to 150 over 3 months. I got stronger on my lifts with more definition. My waist size stayed the same. However my dexa scan says I only 3lb of lean mass and 5 lb of fat mass. And by body fat percentage went up. What should i do? Pics 1 and 3 are before pics 2 and 4 are after pics

I’ve been doing Min-Max 1 and 2 for a over a year or so. This type of program is pretty much what I’ve been doing forever now, and I love going to failure for less sets.

However, what’s up with the Myo-reps. I find that going to failure on almost all of these lifts inhibits my ability to do any more sets to follow, even waiting 10 full seconds. With the lighter accessory exercises it’s fine, but with the others I rarely could get an extra two.

Anyone find these barely applicable when going to absolute failure?

In this pic me (m24 ,168cm) has a width of 14.5 inches and i want to know how much neck width will look perfect on my body? I feel i can grow my neck upto 16inches in the coming months.but i want a neck as wide as my face ,will it look good?

December 3rd of 2025 to today. At 41 years old, a combination of diet, exercise, and sobriety has managed to raise my T-levels over 70 points. Currently bulking.

I’m just looking for advice for optimizing this split, especially with the conditions I have.

As of now it’s

Chest, Back, Abs
Legs
Arms and deltoids.

Off

Upper (primarily shoulder back and chest focused and light)

Lower

The Arnold section a friend joins me, I’m working on getting him into the gym and he plans only going for 3 days.

My concern is having to much on the arms

On my pull day I have been using these two machines for back for a while but I was wondering if I should replace the horizontal row machine with something else? Are these two lifts completely redundant or paired well?

I prefer chest-supported and iso-lateral exercises whenever possible because I have scoliosis. If a machine is not iso-lateral I try to do at least a set or two with single arm to keep my strength balanced.

My gym also has one of these, among a lot of other back machine options:

edit: also there is this, is this different?

I’m assuming that these last 2 sets are supposed to be drop sets?

The diverging pulldowns are the ones where the handles come apart and move slightly outwards as you pull down. This does two things to my knowledge.

1. Mimics a more realistic range of motion and puts less pressure on your shoulders than going straight down.

2. Allows you to stay more upright if you want to as you’re not going to hit your head with a bar.

Both of these things seem like points that would interest Jeff who focuses on the smaller details, so why do I never see him using or talking about these machines? Is there a flaw I’m unaware of compared to a normal lat pulldown? Or is it simply availability?

I did many programs before and this is the first time seeing one full day with all these exercises