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View Full Version : Bulking/Cutting...when to switch gears?



bomb1977
05-06-2010, 04:04 PM
Hey I figured I would throw this one at you.

I have been working out since Feb 1st and have really changed my composition quite a bit. My lean body mass is up quite a bit and my BF% is down almost 8% in that time.

However recently I have levelled off at about 22% BF. I was planning on bulking through the end of May and then heading into a cut for June/July.

When I went from 30% to 22% I was able to gain muscle and lose fat. Now that trend seems to have levelled off.

Would it be in my best interests to cut down to about 15% BF and then bulk again? I know that running a caloric defecit will pretty much kill any muscle gains for the next 2 months, but that's life. I spent the 10 years as a salesman eating fast food and getting fat, I deserve what I got :p

I am 33 years old and weigh roughly 245 pounds with a lean body mass in the low to mid 190 range at the moment. I was thinking of trying a 2000 cal, 200 gram of protein per day cut and see where it gets me. I might have to fine tune it up or down a few hundred calories, I know...

I am dedicated, I can make it to the gym 4-5 days a week. Just maybe looking for a pat on the back or to be pointed in the right direction.

Would I be best to continue the SS workouts (I do wed,fri,sun) and then do cardio tues and sat morning. Or would I be better off just doing 4-5 cardio sessions and picking SS up when I am done cutting. (don't worry I won't tell rip :p)

My lifts are nothing impressive, I am up to 260x5 for squats, 300x5 for deadlifts, 115x5 for overheads, 150x5 for some ugly powercleans and I bench a whopping 165x5 maybe 175, I forget...I really don't focus on bench.

As you can tell, I'm a little mis-guided and a little all over the place right now.

Charles Staley
05-07-2010, 02:12 PM
I think you'd be better served to continue down to 15% first. See what bodyweight that takes you to, then back up to 20%, etc. If you start "bulking" at a lean bodyweight, more of that mass will be muscle. Work hard on lifting when you do this because it will minimize LBM loss


Hey I figured I would throw this one at you.

I have been working out since Feb 1st and have really changed my composition quite a bit. My lean body mass is up quite a bit and my BF% is down almost 8% in that time.

However recently I have levelled off at about 22% BF. I was planning on bulking through the end of May and then heading into a cut for June/July.

When I went from 30% to 22% I was able to gain muscle and lose fat. Now that trend seems to have levelled off.

Would it be in my best interests to cut down to about 15% BF and then bulk again? I know that running a caloric defecit will pretty much kill any muscle gains for the next 2 months, but that's life. I spent the 10 years as a salesman eating fast food and getting fat, I deserve what I got :p

I am 33 years old and weigh roughly 245 pounds with a lean body mass in the low to mid 190 range at the moment. I was thinking of trying a 2000 cal, 200 gram of protein per day cut and see where it gets me. I might have to fine tune it up or down a few hundred calories, I know...

I am dedicated, I can make it to the gym 4-5 days a week. Just maybe looking for a pat on the back or to be pointed in the right direction.

Would I be best to continue the SS workouts (I do wed,fri,sun) and then do cardio tues and sat morning. Or would I be better off just doing 4-5 cardio sessions and picking SS up when I am done cutting. (don't worry I won't tell rip :p)

My lifts are nothing impressive, I am up to 260x5 for squats, 300x5 for deadlifts, 115x5 for overheads, 150x5 for some ugly powercleans and I bench a whopping 165x5 maybe 175, I forget...I really don't focus on bench.

As you can tell, I'm a little mis-guided and a little all over the place right now.

bomb1977
05-07-2010, 08:50 PM
Thanks for the advice, I'm going to go down that road. Going to try and maintain SS 3 days a week and blend in some cardio on the other days. Time to start messing around with how much of a caloric defecit I need to run, without becoming too grumpy :)

Sometimes you just need some direcion from a person who's opinion you respect. Thank you for that.

Kev