To Bulk or to Cut, That is the Question - or is it?

[Joe Black]

To Bulk or to Cut, That is the Question - or is it? by Daniel Roberts

If you spend any time on the Wannabebig Forums, you’ll run into that perennial plea for help - ‘Should I bulk or cut?’ In fact, it is probably one of the most commonly debated questions.

And, the answers you get, more than often will be contradicting. Bulk like crazy and eat anything and everything in sight... Keep a clean diet and be patient with a slower, leaner weight gain.

Perhaps there is another way to go about things? Maybe even a much simpler way?

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Be really interesting to hear peoples thoughts on this one as it's a much debated subject. Also, feel free to share with as many people as you can!

Thanks,

Daniel

[Off Road]

That was an interesting read...I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.

If a guy is 220 lbs, and starts eating as a 250 lb guy, what are the stages he'll go through?

1).I'm guessing he'll start off gaining a good ammount of fat (along with muscle)because of the increased calories.

2). At some point (in the middle let's say) he'll kind of even out the gains between fat and muscle.

3). Twards the end, he'll be maintaining his muscle and decreasing fat because he'll be using more calories to support the added muscle.

Am I anywhere near understanding this?

[Daniel Roberts]

That was an interesting read...I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.

If a guy is 220 lbs, and starts eating as a 250 lb guy, what are the stages he'll go through?

1).I'm guessing he'll start off gaining a good ammount of fat (along with muscle)because of the increased calories.

2). At some point (in the middle let's say) he'll kind of even out the gains between fat and muscle.

3). Twards the end, he'll be maintaining his muscle and decreasing fat because he'll be using more calories to support the added muscle.

Am I anywhere near understanding this?

As you said, it depends where you start from, but yup, you pretty much nailed it.

[Justin Ryan]

Great article guys!!
answers a lot of questions!

[Off Road]

Taking it a step further...

Say that I weigh 240 lbs...I continue to eat as a 240 lber...I will continue to gain muscle and loose fat on a maintenance eating schedule (provided that I continue to get stronger)?

[Daniel Roberts]

Taking it a step further...

Say that I weigh 240 lbs...I continue to eat as a 240 lber...I will continue to gain muscle and loose fat on a maintenance eating schedule (provided that I continue to get stronger)?

Once you hit the target, you're at maintenance for that target.
Given you're at maintenance there's only so much surplus (bodyfat) to fuel any increase in lean body mass.
You will simply hit homeostasis (the balance point) and you might be able to eek a pound of lbm and lose a % bf but that's where you'll stay unless you change activity levels - drop an activity and you free up a surplus, increase and you create a deficit.

But again your margins are quite small. If a change is required, set a new goal and eat/train accordingly.

[Off Road]

If a change is required, set a new goal and eat/train accordingly.

That makes sense. I forgot to factor in that there were diminishing returns the closer you are to goal.

[given'er]

Awsome article. I need to start eating a heck of a lot more lol.

[Eric Cartman]

I am currently at 165 lbs and 15% BF...about 140 lbs of Lean Muscle..

So my realistic goal in 6 months should be to gain about 15 lbs of lean muscle...

So my goal should be to eat the calories that an 180 lb person would eat?

180x14= 2520 calories

Did I do this math right?

Question: Does this mean I will be very fat for 6 months, until I reach that goal?

EC

[Virtron]

awesome article... so in the case of wanting to lose 10 lbs of fat and gaining 10lbs of muscle say at 200 lbs... you still end up at 200lbs just leaner? I mean thats pretty much perfection.

[dynamo]

yay ive totally thought this for a while. good read.

[cphafner]

Really good read. I agree most of us make this more complicated than it needs to be (myself included).

[Al19067]

Ok I'm like 210 right now, so if I wanna get to 220 I would take 220 and times it by 16? Bc I do about 7 hours worth of work

[Daniel Roberts]

I am currently at 165 lbs and 15% BF...about 140 lbs of Lean Muscle..

So my realistic goal in 6 months should be to gain about 15 lbs of lean muscle...

So my goal should be to eat the calories that an 180 lb person would eat?

180x14= 2520 calories

Did I do this math right?

Question: Does this mean I will be very fat for 6 months, until I reach that goal?

EC

You got the maths right.

Will you be fat for 6 months until you reach that goal, it depends entirely on whether all your muscle gains come at once on the final day!

Thing is your current maintenance isn't actually too far from your target, which means you're not drastically increasing your intake such that it would result in huge fat deposition, especially as you're increasing muscle mass.
Incidentally, it is highly unlikely that all your muscle gains will arrive at once - it is more likely to be small gradual increases with a few spikes of greater increases over the duration.

[Daniel Roberts]

awesome article... so in the case of wanting to lose 10 lbs of fat and gaining 10lbs of muscle say at 200 lbs... you still end up at 200lbs just leaner? I mean thats pretty much perfection.

That's pretty much it.

[Daniel Roberts]

Ok I'm like 210 right now, so if I wanna get to 220 I would take 220 and times it by 16? Bc I do about 7 hours worth of work

That's correct, and if you find you're not gaining weight do as suggested in the article and add 250kcal and monitor.

[DMedley]

Daniel, thanks for the article.

I think the results of following this have been pretty well covered.

The timing could not have been better for me. A few weeks ago while out camping for 3 weeks, I was thinking about this very topic. I decided to come home and try it ... no better way to know if something works or not.

Since getting your article yesterday, I am more convinced than ever that this is the way to go.

[Al19067]

That's correct, and if you find you're not gaining weight do as suggested in the article and add 250kcal and monitor.

Thank you, great article

[Painzer]

Great article Daniel. Thank you.

[Irish Pilot]

Great article and interesting read. The one thing that has to be re-inforced is that to be what you want to be at your goal weight, you also have to TRAIN like that guy, not just eat like that guy.

[Yamar]

This method will work for the heavier guy looking to lose but I'm not sure the other way. In the example of the 250 lb guy targeting 235 makes sense.

I'll use myself as an example. 130 lbs @ 10% BF. Goal is 150 lbs 8% BF. I could simple eat the maintenance calories of a 150 lb man and will gain weight till I hit 150 lbs, only thing is I highly doubt I will be at 8% body fat when I get there. At that point I will be at 150 lbs, lets say 15 %BF. See I'm still short of my goal. My only option would be to do a traditional cut, which would put me under 150 lbs in the end, than I would need to bulk, so it's right back to the traditional approach.

[Off Road]

At that point I will be at 150 lbs, lets say 15 %BF. See I'm still short of my goal.

But at that time, you'll be eating for a 150 lb guy (maintenance), but you will continue to exercise. So, you will loose some fat. Then you'll be over maintenance, so you'll put on muscle (provided you continue to work out to get stronger). See how that can work?

[Daniel Roberts]

Great article and interesting read. The one thing that has to be re-inforced is that to be what you want to be at your goal weight, you also have to TRAIN like that guy, not just eat like that guy.

Absolutely right - it's a point I perhaps should have stressed more in the article, although at the time of writing I was wary that I needed to keep focus on the nutrition and not dilute/confuse the message. Good point though.

[Daniel Roberts]

This method will work for the heavier guy looking to lose but I'm not sure the other way. In the example of the 250 lb guy targeting 235 makes sense.

I'll use myself as an example. 130 lbs @ 10% BF. Goal is 150 lbs 8% BF. I could simple eat the maintenance calories of a 150 lb man and will gain weight till I hit 150 lbs, only thing is I highly doubt I will be at 8% body fat when I get there. At that point I will be at 150 lbs, lets say 15 %BF. See I'm still short of my goal. My only option would be to do a traditional cut, which would put me under 150 lbs in the end, than I would need to bulk, so it's right back to the traditional approach.

See post number 2 and 22 by Off Road.

Food for thought though - if you're goal is 150lbs @ 8% bf and you've worked out the maintenance for a man @ 150lbs @ 8%bf and you're eating that every day and training appropriately, why when you hit 150 @ 15% bf (almost double the target figure - your example) do you think you'd stay that way if you're eating for a man at 8%?

[always_losing]

Ummm, being doing some maths concerning this.

I don't think this works. You need to seriously doctor numbers to get anything like the appropriate results.

I'll give an example:

I weigh 200lbs at about 10% bodyfat. Lets set my 1 year goal at 210lbs with 8% bodyfat. This seems very reasonable to me.

So my maintenance is 3200 calories and my 'as if' consumption is 3360 calories.
This gives me an initial surplus of 160 calories which my body will use to build muscle and gain fat. I need to gain 1.1lbs of muscle per month to reach my goal, this translates to 0.03666 lbs per day.

So now I can work out my new bodyweight, and hence maintenance and surplus calories for each day. It will take 187 days before this will become a caloric deficit (equivalently I reach 210lbs, 186.78 lean 23.22 fat). Now we need to make an assumption about the continued rate of lbm increase. Even if we assume it remains constant, which is very unlikely, I don't reach the goal set initially. By the end of the year, 168 days later, I am still only at a caloric deficit of 75 calories, definitely not enough to incite the weight loss I need to reach 8% bodyfat.

Eventually I reach the expected lbm, since we gained this at a fixed rate, but I still have 10% bodyfat. If we relax the 'lbm gain' especially after we reach maintenance I get ever further away from my goal. Halving lbm gain after maintenance is reached changes the final picture to my weighing 212lbs at 11% BF.

Personally, I think bulk cut is more efficient.