Just before Christmas 2016 a Bodyscan client presented with a very dramatic change in body re-composition.

Though the actual scans were 17 months apart, the client reported that the changes recorded occurred in just five months (from August to December). In summary, the client lost 11.5kg of fat and gained 6.4kg of muscle.

The numbers are impressive enough on their own, but are even more remarkable when you learn the client:

1. claimed to use no drugs, stimulants, supplements or shakes
2. was in a calorie deficit of about 500 calories a day
3. did zero cardio
4. is female

Prepare to forget everything you thought you knew about fat loss, muscle gain and bodybuilding when you read Joanna’s story. It starts with a Bodyscan DEXA scan that was “so mortifying, so shocking that it messed with my head and took me six months to recover from”.

Then in August 2016, Joanna began a programme of Bayesian Bodybuilding.

At age 34, Joanna had spent at least nine years qualifying as a clinician and more than half her life exercising and eating well. She had spent two years competing in bodybuilding and bikini contests and is a REPS Level 4 personal trainer, as well as a two-time Ironman finisher and had competed at the Half Ironman World Championships in 2009.

“I had always weighed a lot, my BMI was always above 25 (‘overweight’) but I figured that was because I had a lot of muscle from lifting weights,” she said.

“But when I had the DEXA scan [in May 2015] I was shocked. Everything on it was bad. I had 40% body fat, high visceral fat and my muscle mass was barely average.”

Indeed, set against Bodyscan’s female client base, those three markers put her around the 80th, 85th and 50th percentiles, respectively.

“The report messed with my head. It forced me to re-evaluate and realise that everything I had ever done and read, everything I thought I knew and had been told about exercise and nutrition – often by expensive personal trainers – was just nonsense.”

After six months of doing very little, Joanna tried a ketogenic (low-carb, high-fat) diet as well as intermittent 24-hour fasting, neither of which worked for her. [Bodyscan has clients for whom keto and IF works well.]

A full year after her scan and having made no progress, Joanna was desperate to get things moving again and chanced upon online training site BayesianBodybuilding.com, authored by Menno Henselmans, a Dutch former business consultant specialised in statistical data analysis. The Bayesian tag derives from Thomas Bayes, who contributed to statistics and economics. As the website says: “Bayesian methods tell us how to form rational beliefs based on the available information. The Bayesian method is thus data driven and evidence based.”

Joanna says, “The irony is that my years of medical training and my practice as a doctor is based on hard, statistical, empirical evidence and I was not applying that approach to my training.

“Most of us accept that the world of bodybuilding and body-shaping is fuelled by so much groundless ‘bro science’ but we accept and perpetuate it because we don’t really understand what we’re reading,” she says.

The ‘bro science’ is so ingrained, so accepted that “everything Menno wanted me to do seemed to be lunacy because everything he says goes against mainstream advice. But he’s a highly educated individual and proved that everything about building muscle and losing fat I ever believed to be true was not true. ”

Joanna’s results turn mainstream advice on its head: She built muscle and lost fat simultaneously (a net change of almost 18kg in just four months); she ate just 1000 calories a day, a deficit of about 500 calories a day according to most BMR calculations; she ate moderate (130g) protein (a “protein-sparing modified fast”) and consumed no supplements or shakes; calories have been increased to further reduce fat; she does a full-body weights workout every day – no rest days, zero cardio and no cheat meals.

“He told me to never be hungry, which is hard on just 1000 calories a day, so I eat more than 3 pounds of green vegetables a day. It’s hard not to eat too much protein either,” she says.

While Henselmans rails against swathes of mainstream advice (and provides evidence to support his contrarian stance) there is little that’s generic or shared across his clients; everything is uniquely optimised. The results of Joanna’s first DEXA body scan were fed into the Bayesian programme.

And while weight-training seven days a week (and the rest of it) may seem intense, Joanna says, “It’s extreme, yes, but it also a very realistic mindset. If you want to be very good at something you have to be dedicated. There’s no room for balance!”

The results speak for themselves. As well as the remarkable change in body re-composition Joanna’s strength has increased dramatically. Her deadlift sets have increased from 55kg to 93kg.

Like an ex-smoker who has rediscovered her sense of taste, Joanna admits that her newfound physiology paradigm has made her “a bit self-righteous” (though not evangelical).

“I am a doctor in one of the most deprived parts of the UK and every day I see obesity, ill-health and chronic disease caused by poor diet and a lack of exercise. When I see people make bad choices I think to myself ‘what you’re doing today will affect you in 20-30 years from now.’”

And about the DEXA scan that – eventually – motivated Joanna to start the journey? She says emphatically: “There’s no point having a scan unless you’re going to act on it.”

A DEXA Scan at Bodyscan

It’s clear that Joanna’s Bodyscan DEXA scan was the catalyst for her body recomposition journey. Her scan results helped to lay the foundation for an informed recomposition plan — and it worked. Armed with knowledge of her body fat percentage and composition (plus newfound motivation), with Henselmans’s help, Joanna could tailor her diet and exercise to reach her goals.

To kickstart your own body recomposition journey, book an appointment for a DEXA scan with Bodyscan today. For your first appointment, you should book our 60-minute Baseline Scan with post-scan Consultation. This package includes a scan, printed and PDF report, explanatory notes and a detailed, personalised interpretation of your results. We’ll input your DEXA scan data into our body composition calculator to give you calorie guidance and targets for muscle gain and fat loss.

If you’re serious about getting yourself in better shape then you’ll want to track your progress and keep yourself accountable – and save money at the same time! In which case, you can purchase pre-paid packages of scans that will measure your fat loss and muscle gain over the course of a year. Each package starts with the one-hour Baseline and is followed up with one, two or three Progress scans.

If you have questions about DEXA scans in the UK, please write to us here.

Mainstream advice	Joanna’s Bayesian programme
Do cardio or HIIT	Zero cardio
Workout 3-4 times a week, allow muscles to recover	Workout 7 days a week, high frequency training
Do a split programme, targeting different body parts each workout	Every day is a full-body workout. Three workouts, A, B and C, rotated through the week
You need high protein, 2.2g per kg (1g per lb) of body weight	No benefit from consuming more than 1.82g/kg
Change the workout programme or your muscles will get used to the exercises and not grow	Muscular adaptation is the goal; the program is updated only in response to lack of progression
Consume carbs after workout	No benefit
Vary what you eat so you don’t get bored	Eating the same thing daily is fine. Harness the power of habit and routine.
Treat yourself or break things up with a cheat meal or cheat day	Any cheat meals are at your own discretion; not planned
There is a short ‘anabolic window’ after working out during which you should increase protein or carb consumption	The anabolic window is much longer than broscience proposes, not a mere 1-2 hour ‘anabolic peephole’.Joanna doesn’t drink any protein shakes or supplements
You can’t lose fat and gain muscle at the same time	Not true, Joanna did both significantly. Body recomposition should be expected for most serious trainees
You can’t build muscle in a calorie deficit	You can. Joanna built more than 6kg of muscle on just 1000 calories a day, a deficit of at least 500 calories a day according to the Katch-McArdle and Mifflin-St Jeor equations
BCAAs are good for you	A sufficient dietary protein intake means you already consume enough BCAAs in your foods and you don’t need to supplement them
You should phase your muscle-building and fat-loss: a bulk phase followed by a cutting phase	There were no ‘phases’; Joanna was always ‘recomping’: losing fat while simultaneously gaining muscle
Keep carbs low and fat high to keep you satiated	Joanna paid close attention to her food quality without worrying about the carb:fat ratio
If you train on low calories you will get metabolic damage	Metabolic damage is a myth
Not everyone can lose fat, especially if you have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) or are hypothyroid	Everyone can achieve a very low body fat percentage (Joanna has PCOS and is hypothyroid), but genetics do have a bigger influence on your capacity to build muscle.

Notes:
Joanna’s (not her real name) two scan reports are 17 months apart (May 2015 and December 2016), so unfortunately we do not have unchallengeable proof that the changes recorded occurred in five months.

However, Menno Henselmans has confirmed that Joanna became a client on August 9th 2016 and the programme he devised was based on the results of the May 2015 body scan. He also said, “She told me ‘If anything, I looked a bit worse.’”

The purpose of the case study is simply to provide an article of interest and ‘food for thought’ to Bodyscan subscribers. It is not intended as an advertisement or an endorsement of Menno Henselmans’s  Bayesian Bodybuilding. Menno was sent the case study only after it was written to correct any technical or factual errors in relation to Joanna’s programme and general methodology.

It should be emphasised that Joanna’s programme was uniquely constructed for her and her alone. It is not a generic programme and the individual elements within it (eg, weight training on a calorie deficit) should not be taken as general advice for you to follow.