Building muscle vs losing fat

[blockodile_dundee]

Please forgive me if this is total ignorance of a fundamental concept on my part. I've just started seriously researching fitness and diet and there's so much to wrap my brain around that it's kind of overwhelming.

I've been playing roller derby for the last two years, which has been comprised of about 80% cardio, 20% misinformed strength training with some bodyweight stuff thrown in. In the last two months I've started to educate myself and have started lifting heavy things and eating a lot more (I'm a 5'8" female, weighing around 155lbs. I had been sticking to around 1200 calories a day, but since I want to improve my performance and not actually lose weight, it looks like I should be eating more like 1800 a day. I eat about 80% paleo, no sugar or anything icky).

Here's my question. I have been building a ton of muscle, and I definitely feel stronger and fitter, which is my main goal. But I also don't seem to be losing fat. I keep seeing all this stuff about bulking vs cutting and how it's not possible to do both at the same time. Is that true, or just broscience? OR, more likely, is this just a premature assumption, since it's only been about 2 months? For the record, I have derby training 6-8 hours a week (mostly cardio) and I'm doing the workouts from the Rebel Fitness Guide (mostly weights) 3 times a week.

[fperez]

The bulk vs cutting you read about is a simple matter of caloric intake. To build muscles you need more calories. Eating at a deficit means you are going to lose fat, but too much deficit means you lose muscle mass as well. That's why people doing bulk training will eat 2500-3000 calories, and then when they want to cut they drop the intake by a small amount. If your focus is losing weight you should aim to lose about 1-2 pounds a week, any more than that and you will be losing muscle mass.

[Gainsdalf the Whey]

Fperez is a smart one. The only thing I've seen people reliably lose fat and gain muscle on is intermittent fasting, which basically brings bulking and cutting down to a 24 hour cycle.

[aj_rock]

Mmm because you need to consider roller derby, I'd suggest eating more for performance NOW.

When your season is over is the time to consider muscle gain/fat loss, as part of your GP phase of training. But in the middle of a season is NOT the time for trying any body recomposition.