Looking to maintain a lean 85kgs for U85 Rugby

[rich_U85]

Hey, I'm new to the site and I'm looking for advice about strengthening and conditioning while maintaining a constant weight.

I'm 178cm, and play a pretty competitive level of U85 rugby in Auckland and want to get the most out of my 84.9kgs!

I lost 8kg over two months to get down to the weight through dieting and heaps of cardio, but began to find that i had lost alot of strength. Ive started back at the gym and i'm now finding it hard not to put on weight.

I realise that i need to balance my muscle growth with fat loss, and am after any workout and diet tips that people could give to help me reach my goals.

Any help would be much appriciated!

[FellowshipOfTheRon]

Hey, I'm new to the site and I'm looking for advice about strengthening and conditioning while maintaining a constant weight.

I'm 178cm, and play a pretty competitive level of U85 rugby in Auckland and want to get the most out of my 84.9kgs!

I lost 8kg over two months to get down to the weight through dieting and heaps of cardio, but began to find that i had lost alot of strength. Ive started back at the gym and i'm now finding it hard not to put on weight.

I realise that i need to balance my muscle growth with fat loss, and am after any workout and diet tips that people could give to help me reach my goals.

Any help would be much appriciated!

welcome welcome

how lean are you right now (bodyfat %)? and what's the goal? is a super lean 85 really gonna be advantageous for your sport?

that loss in strength is normal if your main focus was just cardio for the past two months, you'll find the strength as well as a huge chunk of that lost weight will come right back (muscle memory) within the next month or so of jumping back to weight lifting. have you compared lean mass in the before and after? if you didn't do weights much at all in that two months i wouldn't be surprised if at least half of that loss was muscle.

the other thing to consider is that there are a bunch of different ways to train, some exercises within certain rep ranges will encourage more mass gain where as others will help you focus more on building up your strength while not necessarily as much emphasis on mass gains... i'll leave the exact details up to an experienced sports trainer to answer though.

[dogg196]

Which team bro?

[rich_U85]

welcome welcome

how lean are you right now (bodyfat %)? and what's the goal? is a super lean 85 really gonna be advantageous for your sport?

that loss in strength is normal if your main focus was just cardio for the past two months, you'll find the strength as well as a huge chunk of that lost weight will come right back (muscle memory) within the next month or so of jumping back to weight lifting. have you compared lean mass in the before and after? if you didn't do weights much at all in that two months i wouldn't be surprised if at least half of that loss was muscle.

the other thing to consider is that there are a bunch of different ways to train, some exercises within certain rep ranges will encourage more mass gain where as others will help you focus more on building up your strength while not necessarily as much emphasis on mass gains... i'll leave the exact details up to an experienced sports trainer to answer though.

I play for the Varsity Debt Collectors

They weigh us each sat, if your over you cant play. Being bang on 85kg means that ill be the biggest on the pitch and will have maximum weight advantage for the grade.

Over the summer i was lifting heavy and using mass gainers (Mutant Mass), but I was also carrying alot of excess body fat. I got down to my target weight of 84.5kg about 8 weeks ago, and have been maintaining it since then. Ive been rugby training twice a week, and gym training 3-4 times a week. My gym work outs tend to be short and sharp due to a 7am - 6pm Job, and usually consist of 10 - 20min cardio, then 3 - 4 sets of high reps, low(ish) weights on what ever area i feel like working. I take ripped freak tablets (1x pre workout), Myo protein and BCAA tablets.

Ive never measured my body fat, but i can know i have a fair bit to play with, how do i work it out?

Im running low on protein and im looking to invest, so any suppliment advise would also be great!

[Pseudonym]

Hi Rich, welcome to the forums. We're getting more and more people asking questions here about training for rugby and other sports. In fact, we're planning to create a new forum specifically for you guys soon. :nod:

[rich_U85]

Hi Rich, welcome to the forums. We're getting more and more people asking questions here about training for rugby and other sports. In fact, we're planning to create a new forum specifically for you guys soon. :nod:

Hey mate, yea sorry if my questions arnt body building spacific, but I knew that you guys would have the best advise for muscle building/fat loss.

Aswell as gaining performance for rugby, I would also like to get my body looking in tiptop shape!

[greemah]

Hey, I'm new to the site and I'm looking for advice about strengthening and conditioning while maintaining a constant weight.

I'm 178cm, and play a pretty competitive level of U85 rugby in Auckland and want to get the most out of my 84.9kgs!

I lost 8kg over two months to get down to the weight through dieting and heaps of cardio, but began to find that i had lost alot of strength. Ive started back at the gym and i'm now finding it hard not to put on weight.

I realise that i need to balance my muscle growth with fat loss, and am after any workout and diet tips that people could give to help me reach my goals.

Any help would be much appriciated!

Do you count calories? Whatever you were eating at your weight of 84kg should keep you at that weight if you continue to eat about the same amount of calories each day.

Since you say you are now back at the gym and finding it hard to not put on weight, you must be eating more. Go back to eating what you were when you weighed your target weight, and if you find your gym sessions getting to hard you may need to decrease volume slightly.

If you want to maintain that weight though, be prepared to not make too much strength/muscle gains since more muscle = more weight. If this is important to you though, you may want to cut down to more like 80kg then do a slow bulk from there to try slowly gain muscle with minimal fat, and keep a close eye on scale when you start nearing 85kg.

[tomsammce]

U85 is an awesome grade! I played a year in that when I was 19 before I finished playing rugby. Really fast and competitive, our prop wasn't much slower than our winger hahaha good times!

[Cam_NZ]

Play for an open team. If you find it easy to bulk then why not play for a bigger team?? dont know where you're from but Through my college days and even now at uni, you're called a pussy if you play for a weight restricted team and dont mingle with the big brown boys

[tomsammce]

[MOD EDIT: No offensive comments, please.]

[Cam_NZ]

[MOD EDIT: No offensive comments, please.]

lol

[rich_U85]

Play for an open team. If you find it easy to bulk then why not play for a bigger team?? dont know where you're from but Through my college days and even now at uni, you're called a pussy if you play for a weight restricted team and dont mingle with the big brown boys

The Auckland U85 grade isone of the fastest growing grades of rugby in the world, there is around 25 teams this season, and its a super fast and competitive grade. I played open for a few years and played a couple of games for an Auckland Premier team. But at 178cm and peaking at 93kg i was still getting smashed around and getting injured. I enjoy playing restricted and was just after a few dieting and workout tips.

Feel free to come along and watch us "pussys" play, its not a bad level of footy

[tomsammce]

Cam_nz probably just one of those cocos who would rather someone on his team do a "big hit" than have someone score a try and put actual points on the board. Idiot comments.

Agree u85 is hard and fast for full 80... Most open grades with big brown boys in them are slow and sloppy 20mins into the 2nd half. U85 is a much smarter game IMO

[Cam_NZ]

Play for an open team. If you find it easy to bulk then why not play for a bigger team?? dont know where you're from but Through my college days and even now at uni, you're called a pussy if you play for a weight restricted team and dont mingle with the big brown boys

The Auckland U85 grade isone of the fastest growing grades of rugby in the world, there is around 25 teams this season, and its a super fast and competitive grade. I played open for a few years and played a couple of games for an Auckland Premier team. But at 178cm and peaking at 93kg i was still getting smashed around and getting injured. I enjoy playing restricted and was just after a few dieting and workout tips.

Feel free to come along and watch us "pussys" play, its not a bad level of footy

I see what you're saying, it is a whole lot faster. I was only saying go open because you can put on weight easy. Maybe dedicate some of your gym sessions to skills,agility training etc and just eat less.

And tom can kiss my shiny white ass