Well my short answer is that you should definitely get lean before you start bulking. Instead, let me tell you the great benefits that comes with getting lean before bulking. And more importantly, how to stay patient once you start bulking!
The average body fat percentage of Americans are getting higher every year, even in younger population.
This chart displays the mean percentage body fat of Americans by age, group and sex:. These statistics are from , but the numbers are believed to be even higher as we speak.
The average American teenager between the age of has a body fat percentage of Also according to the American Council on Exercise , these body fat percentages is just at the brink of classifying as obese for males, and above the obese line for females. Already at years old! Get lean first — This is the foundation, which is very important. For leaning down I recommend the ShredSmart Program. Advanced trainees should just use a slight caloric surplus on training days.
There are four benefits that comes with getting lean before going on a bulk. For 6 months, you add 10 lbs 4. This is because your time in the gym will be a lot more enjoyable. As you can see, I even built some muscle during this time, which is very common in the early stages of training.
During these months of bulking, you might add lbs kg of muscle as a beginner or perhaps lbs kg as an intermediate if training is set up correctly. As a beginner I used to believe that the most effective way to build muscle was through dirty bulking.
For example, a lower body fat percentage makes you more insulin sensitive you handle nutrients, specifically carbs more effectively. The mistake of not starting out lean is one of the biggest reasons a lot of people struggle getting and keeping a lean physique in the long-term. As a beginner to early intermediate to training, you can build muscle and lose fat simultaneously , as long as the protein intake is high enough and your training is on point.
In order to lose fat you must be in a caloric deficit. As you can see, the body recomposition strategy builds less muscle, and will require more time reaching the goal of getting shredded.
While the bulking and cutting strategy, even though some muscle will be lost during cutting phases, will build muscle quicker and reach the goal sooner.
Check out this post! One very important thing to keep in mind is that, if you want the strategy of using bulking and cutting cycles to be faster than recomping then you must have a cutting to bulking transition plan set up. The trick is to keep within a healthy body-fat percentage range as you do it.
When should you bulk? When should you cut? Any time you want to prioritize fat loss, you should be cutting. If you want a customizable hypertrophy training program and full guide that builds in these principles, check out our Outlift Intermediate Bulking Program. While doing these programs, you can bulk, cut, or do body recomposition. His specialty is helping people build muscle to improve their strength and general health, with clients including college, professional, and Olympic athletes.
This is so interesting. I love your site and so glad I stumbled across it, I am a 54 year old female, weighing I am essentially bulking at moment as I would like to gain more muscle on basis that more muscles burns more calories, but see myself getting heavier without necessarily looking more muscly. I am eating around cals and some days I still feel really hungry! I feel I need to lose some bf but the thought of eating less calories is a struggle.
I lift heavy x 3 and do a couple of hiit sessions a week and try to keep my step count around 10k but am just not seeing the changes I would like. Are you able to offer any advice? Sorry if this is all a bit jumbled! Those are just a super rough starting point. Again, the trick will be to monitor how your weight changes and adjust from there. Losing weights tends to leave people feeling hungry, though.
It sounds like you want to lose some fat, though, and losing weight is indeed the best way to do it. I had hoped I would increase muscle mass and therefore lose body fat that way, rather than having to lose weight to lose body fat.
So if I understand you correctly you are suggesting if I wanted to lose that half a pound a week I could cut back from to calories then play with it from there in calorie increments? Maybe I need to sign up to your program! Thank you for replying. The main goal while bulking is to gain muscle and strength while minimizing fat gain. You may gain some fat, but the goal is for it not to be noticeable or excessive.
If you want to do this, yeah, I think starting at calories makes sense, adjusting from there in those calorie increments. And if your goal is to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, best to maintain your weight. If you want to sign up for our program, keep in mind that we have a bulking program specifically for women. Hi Shane, When cutting do you stick to that number of calories regardless of what you may burn in the day?
Say you do your weights workout and walk 5k some days and others just do the weights. So on the 5k days you burn more. Can you eat more? She asks hopefully! Ahaha yeah! Cutting is all about burning more calories than you eat. But yes, if you burn calories from walking, you can eat extra calories that day or at some other point that week. And if your weight loss stalls, instead of reducing your calorie intake, you can increase your activity levels.
I noticed that you mentioned that all three of your programs could be used to bulk, cut or reformat. I am female so I checked out the bony to bombshell program, but noticed most of the comments were about gaining weight. All of our programs are made to help people get bigger and stronger. Thanks so much, was very informative indeed, i think im at the point where im unsire whether to shred or bulk, at one point i was trying to bulk while trying to lose the excess fat. Should i lose this fat first?
The article pretty much explains the answer to your question. To make that happen the fastest or best way what should be my course of action? I should watch my diet, do cardio and what sort of weight training? Create a moderate caloric deficit, get a sufficient amount of protein and weight train properly to maintain muscle and strength. Hey great site, thank you for the effort involved.
In line with your article I want to lose fat, so am cutting, but my question is where to stop? When it reaches that point, cut. I have been weight training with a PT for the past 4 months. I started at lb. I am following a high protein lower carb diet, and it seemed like maybe I was not eating enough with the extra cardio and weight training I was doing. As you mentioned to lose the fat…which is my main goal—I need to reduce the calories and increase the calories burn and the results should be fat loss.
Its now 4 months later and I weight lbs. I lost some inches but not a noticeable amount…clothes fit about the same… some areas clothes are tighter legs and arms and when I did the body fat test… it is exactly the same. I did the HCG diet at one point during the 4 months and dropped some lb.
Cardio wise I was doing an hour after PT session and cardio on days in between but switched to doing a min interval cardio session recently. I have never pushed my self this hard and feel disappointed in the results. I do have under active thyroid disease but am on medication and its stabilized with the medicine.
Should I eat more? First of all, thank you and congratulations for the amount and quality of info. Love your work Sex: Male Age: 21 Height: I realise now that I need to lose weight first vitals above.
And crucially, what would this minimal amount look like; i. So, rather than focusing on muscle maintenance during fat loss, you should be focusing on muscle growth during fat loss. Read this one. Thanks for your speedy reply. So just one full body workout per week? Also, if I do manage to crack in say 2 days a week, are you saying that that will go some way to going beyond maintenance and building me muscle?
Thanks a lot, man! What I am saying though is that twice per week would perfectly sufficient for this purpose. After some months and lots of reading I found someone with a similar view like yours but with a much restricted diet which I hated but help me with the decision to stop paying the gym and instead got my own barbell and pull up rack.
Would that be a problem?? Plus, cycling calories is the main reason your calories need to get that low, so your average calorie intake for the week still works out to be something higher. My aim is to be around kgs. Read this one , this one and this one.
When I look in the mirror, I feel fat! I want to cut, but many tell me to take advantage of my youth and start with a bulk. What is your take on this? I just want an impressive physique but I just need to lose this damn fat! What should I do first? What do I do? Do I cut with minor bulking, I want bigger legs and arms, but lose the fat. You need to lose that fat while maintaining the muscle you currently have.
As someone who is just starting to seriously work out at age 26, this is probably one of, if not THE, most helpful articles I have read in regards to working out for beginners. Thanks for the info!
The only crappy part is, idk if that weight is good or not. But the strength is definitely awesome. The month before that I was doing high volume training. So in 2 months you should have ideally gained lbs.
You gained 20lbs. I am 5 foot tall 20yr old female and I have just lost weight by eating kcals a day while doing weight training and cardio. I went from lb to lb which is my current weight it has taken a year an a half. Basically I want to get away from eating this little a day as I know my weight training will not progress with this little food. I know there is no magic formula but can you give a starting point as I keep doubting my decisions? The only way I know how to lose weight is by a kcal deficit but if i seem to be maintaining at something is surely wrong.
I have been looking at weight lifting women and they eat ALOT a day. I want to be them. My overall aim is to be ripped and improve my strength and to generally be lean and drop this body fat percentage down as much as possible. Have you read the diet guide yet? I weigh and have a BMI of I want to build muscle and gain strength on my whole lower body,arms and waist.
But the only problem I have is my stomach sticks out a little but when I measure my waist it comes out 26 inches. But looking at my stomach in the mirror I can see slight definition. Is that fat or my abs starting to develop? You can try. Use the contact form. Hi thank you for this wonderful site.
I used to only do cardio for the longest time and hence while i did lose both fat and muscle and drop dress sizes, I easily gained the fat back.
As per the diagnostic sheet, I need to gain about 12 pounds of muscle and lose about 15 pounds of fat. I did try only a calorie deficient diet but to my horror, I only lost muscle mass! Should I focus on first gaining the muscle since I am deficient and not even at normal levels of muscle mass or go into a calorie deficient diet with weight training? And since you sound like you are probably a beginner to weight training, that deficit should be combined with a sufficient protein intake and an intelligent beginner program focused on progression.
Again, awesome site! Is this healthy? The article above recommends to start bulking rather. Yes my end goal is to build more muscle eventually but I really want those abs as well. Measuring my back near the shoulder and the side of my stomach, near my right hip. I bought one of these , but I just cant get the hang of it. Thanks for the advice, what Ill do is go to another Biokineticist and just have it double checked they could have been wrong , and like you say, I might not be lean enough, ill continue with my cutting phase until I see something developing.
I started using a workout tracker before I found your site and I put some images up on their a month ago. I am guy. I used to weigh a little over kgs last year during the same month. Now my upper abs do show but I still have love handles. What should I do? My primary goal with my body is to be fit and athletic, beach body kind of. Great article! Still confused. I want to get bigger as in muscle mass but i want to barely have a thin layer of fat over that muscle.
I do not know my BFI. Is there any tips? Read this one and this one. Thanks for the great article! I am basically a newbie to weight lifting, and just started 14 weeks ago with one week of rest. I want to get big and muscular, but knew I had to cut fat first. I am making progress almost every week I go to the gym on my lifts, so I know I am getting stronger.
Visibly, I am less fat than when I started, and a little more shapely muscular. Fourteen weeks is about three months, and though I have been cutting this entire time, my weight is exactly the same as when I started. Granted, the whole reason I am cutting while lifting is because I have read that newbies can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, which you mention in another article. This is clearly happening with me; however, I am a bit confused as to why my weight is the exact same as three months ago.
For example, maybe my TDEE estimate is off, and I should be eating less calories and losing fat faster. Any opinions? I would consider myself somewhat lean at this point, and while I am more lean than I have ever been in my life, and definitely improved over three months ago, I am not as lean as I want to be.
I have no clue what my real body fat percentage is, but I definitely want to have less belly fat than I do now, so I have decided to continue cutting until all abs are visible before I bulk. Like you mentioned, fat loss can happen waaaaay faster than muscle growth can. So if they are in fact happening at an equal rate, it would mean fat loss is happening quite slow not extra fast growth.
That makes a ton of sense. I also have pictures from Day 1, and there is at least a small difference compared to now. If I want to lose fat faster, I should just lower calories further, right? I can barely see my top 4 abs. Can I do those simultaneously, or does it have to happen separately? Thanks for your help. Hey great article man it really cleared things up!
Like should I continue to lift heavy weights 4 times a week and just incorporate more cardio and a better diet? And if I go into a caloric deficit will I lose strength and be unable to maintain my current muscle mass?
This one would be a good place to start. This one. Love the Article. I was told different paths i should take and not sure which one should i go first. Should I work on Leaning out first? Then bulk up after I see enough muscle and possible visible abs showing? I am completely new at this and also do you have anytips on workout routines I should follow for a guy who has little muscle? Details here.
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