UKC

So as a climber i feel that i have a relatively stocky build and i would like to reduce the size of my legs/thighs in order to be lighter. I am in no way overweight. (5ft7 71kg 12% BF). However it would be nice to get below 70kg maybe 65kg and i feel like this is the main area i should aim to loose the muscle (not really the fat) from without it being detrimental to my climbing. What is the best way to specifically target this to reduce these muscles? Running? Veganism? Cycling?

Thanks

Stop exercising. 

Keep the muscle and climb more with your legs! 

Find excuses for your partner to carry the rope. 

Failing that - a hedonistic lifestyle together with aggressive upper body training seemed to do it for some of the hardcore climbers of yesteryear.  Running shorts and long socks to show off your spindly pair to best effect. 

There was an episode of The Mighty Boosh where Vince had exactly this problem. Too much football had led to legs which were too muscular to fit into skinny jeans. He attempted to address the problem by stopping using his legs altogether and by getting about using a wheelchair, hoping that the muscle would waste away unused. 

Running will give you big calves.  Cycling will give you big thighs.  The way to get rid of muscle is not to use it, but some people are just genetically predisposed to a certain body shape (in terms of muscle build) and you won't necessarily get anywhere trying to fight it, I'd more concentrate on getting your upper body stronger TBH.

You are top-end BMI in the range, but anywhere in the healthy range is healthy.  For me the middle of the range is 11 stone, which would be physically impossible without cutting more than one limb off.

FWIW, from personal perspective, I've put on a few stone of late relating to asthma (less inclination to exercise, comfort eating and steroid inhalers causing a bit more gain on top as they sometimes can), it went on quite quickly and climbing got really hard (I have now at least stabilised it by substantially cutting food) but I am getting stronger and starting to get my grade back.  It can take a while though.

Sprinting certainly does. Ultrarunners can be quite spindly though. A long slow running session might burn off enough calories to reduce all round mass without exercising the legs enough for the muscles to grow back. Or you could reduce calories in for a similar effect. I don’t think it would be easy though.

is your weight really the thing holding you back from things you want to do?

Lose. 

I seem to recall Dave Macleod saying he goes vegetarian when he wants to lose some muscle bulk.

A low-protein diet might increase wasting, but it'll waste your upper body too.

I still think I'd concentrate more on getting stronger than trying to remove bits of muscle mass around the edges.  The OP isn't *heavy* per se, maybe not ideal climber build but 70kg is near enough smack bang average and barring putting in huge effort to get properly ripped 12% body fat is pretty reasonable.  I'm *heavy* - actually twice his ideal weight he's talking of (130kg ish).  Tall, too, but extra height doesn't improve your ability to hold onto something or pull up.

So what you're saying here is that you have a slight tendency towards and Endomorphic body type and would like to loose some weight in your legs to help with climbing....  

That's good aim, but whilst diet and excercise will help you make some changes to your body and help you become the best version of you, you're not going to be able to transform your body to be a different shape and become a totally different shape.

From looking at your profile, and stats, I'd say you're doing pretty good just as you are, just keep being you!

That depends doesn't it? It might have been lower protein than his keto diet, but enough to maintain upper body muscle mass, whilst losing unused lower body muscle mass.

I'm not recommending it BTW.

Indeed.  It's a heck of a lot easier to work with your body than against it, if the OP is having trouble pulling on stuff it's going to be a lot easier to get stronger than to work against a genetic tendency to build muscle.

Exactly!

I have a slight tendency toward Ectomorph.  For a while I hit the gym pretty hard, ate a load of food and drank protein shakes in the hope that being bigger and stronger would make me better at climbing.

I put on a bit of muscle, got to maybe nearly a stone or so more than I weigh now but it was hardly a body transformation (I still got called a skinny f*cker by all my mates) and it certainly didn't make me any better at climbing.  Worse, if anything.

Now I only do exercises that are going to be of benefit to my climbing and I weigh a bit less, and am climbing harder than I ever have before.   I'm happy to be light but strong, not big and strong!

This sound borderline ill to me. Be careful. If you are stocky you are stocky, you aren't going to become a bean pole. 

Almost impossible to target specific muscle loss. (a bit like the idea of targeting specific fat loss.) But if you don't use them they will reduce. If you are really fussed try standing up as little as possible for a few months, drive everywhere, sit on the sofa, use the tv remote etc and that should do it. 

(I don't actually advise that course of action, that would fit with my comment about being borderline ill)

First rule of Gammon leg club. Embrace it.

I'll be holding a support group the first and third Monday of the month at the Imperial Rooms in Matlock. PM for info.

Big and strong is not an advantageous build for a climber.  Or a runner.  Oops.  (Maybe I should take up playing rugby...oh, I can't catch for toffee )

Or "loosening"!

I've played around with this concept being somewhat stockier myself, but the reality is that it's extremely hard to lose muscle mass. 

I'm between 76.5 and 77.5kg depending on the day. What I've been focusing on for the last year or so is to eat well from whole foods, and training power but only eating a moderate amount of protein. So far this seems to be an effective tactic as I've got a lot stronger but remained weight stable. 

How tall are you?  75kg is bang-on average, it's the person weight used for lifts as a result.

You might be stocky for a climber but that doesn't sound like *actually* stocky unless you're five foot nothing.

Don't know how old you are, but you should really consider keeping the muscle you've acquired for long-term health, or if something happens that you become immobile or a few weeks.  Your body went to great metabolic expense building what you have.

Also, unless you are operating at the absolute top end of the grades with multiple years of systematic training, you have many other options available to improve at climbing that short term (few weeks) 3-5 kg weight loss would provide.

Train with mindfulness, high-quality nutrition and sleep and your body will take care of the rest.

Certainly not the only factor but i do believe it is an importnat factor in climbing which shouldnt be ignored.

There are people who climb harder than you who are bigger than you. Rather than try losing weight you could attempt to follow a structured training plan from start to finish. Most people never manage for the tab reasons that Dave Macleod talks about in his book. The likelihood is that if you complete the plan your body fat will have dropped and your muscles and nerves will have improved in performance and even if your weight doesn't shift you'll climb harder. 

Funny you should say that but my first thought was that when I had my ankle fused I was in a cast and non weight bearing on that leg for 3 months. When they took the cast off, that leg had suffered massive atrophy, my left leg was a normal one and my right belonged to some skinny bloke. Because of the fusion it's not really possible to exercise my calf muscle so it's still really skinny - 12" circumference vs 14" for my left.

So maybe the OP should give the wheelchair a go or just pretend he's John Dunne.

If your UKC profile is up to date, climbing more would be the most important factor.

Oh aye, it's just a little 'heavier' than most people around my height who are climbing high 8's on sport. 

That being said I shouldn't give the impression that I'm interested in weight loss or whatever, I couldn't care less - I just want to climb harder so if I build power/muscle but stay weight stable this seems like a win win. 

I feel healthy and body positive and pretty much just eat what I want with a focus on whole foods. 

My message to the OP is definitely to embrace his 'natural' build but also to build a complete diet around whole foods to help make his climbing and training count as much as possible. 

Pedants corner - a vegetarian diet doesn’t necessarily mean low-protein. I’ll use my own n=1 for an example. I weight about 76kg at present, am vegetarian minus dairy, and get between 130-160 g protein in me a day (between 1.7 - 2.1 g/kg).