Best Bulking Strategies for Maximum Muscle Gain
Summary
TLDRDr. Mike discusses intentional weight gain for muscle building, emphasizing the benefits of a zigzag approach to cutting and bulking for a lean physique. He advises against bulking for beginners and those uncomfortable with weight gain, recommending a moderate rate of 0.5 to 1 pound per week. Dr. Mike also addresses training fatigue, the importance of macronutrients, and the role of clean versus dirty bulking, concluding with tips for overcoming a lack of appetite during bulking phases.
Takeaways
- đȘ Intentional weight gain can help achieve a lean physique faster by using nutritional tools like a hypocaloric diet for fat loss and a hypercaloric diet for muscle gain.
- đïžââïž Zigzagging between cutting and bulking phases can lead to more efficient muscle growth and a leaner physique than maintaining the same weight.
- đ« Beginners and those uncomfortable with gaining weight should avoid bulking and focus on maintenance and fat loss first.
- đ Aim for a moderate weight gain of 0.5 to 1 pound (or 0.25 to 0.5 kg) per week during the mass gaining phase to minimize fat gain.
- đ Bulking should be limited to 12 to 16 weeks to prevent training fatigue and maintain effective workouts.
- đœïž A bulking diet should primarily consist of healthy foods for optimal macronutrient balance, with occasional indulgences to maintain motivation.
- đ Clean bulking is recommended, but incorporating some 'dirty' foods in moderation can be beneficial for adherence and enjoyment.
- â° Timing is crucial for cutting fat off; wait at least 4 weeks to allow muscle gains to stabilize before starting a fat loss phase.
- đââïž After a massing phase, an active rest phase and maintenance training can help reset the body and prepare for a fat loss phase.
- đ„€ Mass gainer shakes can be useful for easily increasing calorie and protein intake, especially post-workout, but they are not essential for muscle growth.
- đ° If hunger decreases during bulking, try enhancing food flavors, increasing dietary fats, or incorporating cheat meals to maintain calorie intake.
Q & A
What is the main topic of the video script?
-The main topic of the video script is about intentional weight gain, specifically mass gaining mysteries, and how to approach it effectively for muscle growth.
What are the two powerful weapons mentioned for achieving a lean physique?
-The two powerful weapons mentioned for achieving a lean physique are a hypocaloric diet for burning fat faster and a hypercaloric diet for gaining muscle mass more quickly.
Why is it suggested to zigzag between cutting and bulking rather than just maintaining the same weight?
-Zigzagging between cutting and bulking is suggested because it allows for faster progress towards a lean physique by alternating between losing fat and gaining muscle, rather than slowly recompiling at a constant weight.
Who should consider intentional bulking according to the script?
-People who are well trained, relatively lean, and want to put on as much muscle mass as possible over the long term should consider intentional bulking.
Who should avoid bulking according to the video script?
-Those who are not comfortable with the idea of gaining weight psychologically, and beginners who are new to training and dieting should avoid bulking.
What is the recommended rate of weight gain during the mass gaining phase?
-The recommended rate of weight gain during the mass gaining phase is between half a pound to a pound per week.
Why is it not advisable to bulk for a very long time without breaks?
-Bulging for a very long time without breaks is not advisable because it can lead to training fatigue, where the body becomes desensitized to training and cannot train hard reliably, which hinders muscle growth.
What is the difference between clean and dirty bulking, and which is recommended in the script?
-Clean bulking involves eating mostly healthy foods with good macronutrient balance, while dirty bulking involves consuming more junk food. The script recommends a mostly clean bulking approach with the occasional inclusion of some 'dirty' foods.
When should one start cutting off the fat gained during the bulking phase?
-One should start cutting off the fat after at least four weeks of bulking, ideally more like eight, twelve, or sixteen weeks, when training starts to fall apart due to desensitization or being too beat up.
What is the role of Mass Gainer shakes in the context of the video script?
-Mass Gainer shakes are not necessary but can be useful for those who find it difficult to consume enough calories and nutrients through whole foods alone, especially after a hard training session.
What are some strategies to deal with a lack of hunger while trying to gain weight?
-Strategies to deal with a lack of hunger include making food tastier, increasing dietary fats, having weekly cheat meals, using Mass Gainer shakes, and understanding that a fat loss phase may be necessary if hunger does not return.
Outlines
đȘ Intentional Weight Gain for Muscle Mass
Dr. Mike discusses the concept of intentional weight gain for muscle mass, explaining that while it's possible to gain muscle without it, using a zigzag approach of cutting and bulking can accelerate the process. He emphasizes the importance of nutrition, particularly the use of hypocaloric and hypercaloric diets, to achieve a lean physique. He also advises against bulking for those who are not comfortable with gaining weight or for beginners who can benefit more from consistent training and diet without the pressure of bulking.
đ Optimal Rate and Duration of Bulking
This paragraph delves into the specifics of how fast and for how long one should bulk. Dr. Mike suggests a rate of gaining half a pound to a pound per week to avoid excessive fat gain. He also touches on the importance of not bulking for too long to prevent training fatigue, which can hinder progress. The ideal duration for a bulking phase is suggested to be around 12 to 16 weeks, after which an active rest phase or maintenance phase should be considered.
đœïž Clean vs. Dirty Bulking and When to Cut
Dr. Mike addresses the myth of clean versus dirty bulking, stating that while food composition is important for health, it's less critical for body composition. He advocates for a mostly clean bulk with occasional indulgences. He also discusses the timing of cutting fat off during a bulk, recommending to wait at least four weeks to allow muscle gains to solidify, and suggests an active rest phase and maintenance training before starting a fat loss phase.
đ„€ The Role of Mass Gainer Shakes and Overcoming Lack of Appetite
In this paragraph, Dr. Mike talks about the role of mass gainer shakes in a bulking regimen, highlighting their convenience post-workout and for those who struggle with appetite. He dispels the myth that mass gainers are magical for muscle growth and emphasizes the importance of overall diet and training. He also provides tips for those who can't eat enough to continue gaining, such as enhancing food flavor, increasing dietary fats, and incorporating cheat meals.
Mindmap
Keywords
đĄIntentional Weight Gain
đĄHypercaloric Diet
đĄZigzag Method
đĄBulking
đĄTraining Fatigue
đĄClean Bulking
đĄDirty Bulking
đĄMass Gainer Shakes
đĄCheat Meals
đĄFat Loss Phase
đĄAppetite
Highlights
Intentional weight gain can help achieve a lean physique faster by using a hypocaloric diet to burn fat and a hypercaloric diet to build muscle more quickly.
People who weigh less and are fatter can benefit from intentional weight gain to become leaner by zigzagging between cutting and bulking phases.
Intentional weight gain is also useful for those who cannot reach their desired size through regular eating and training alone.
Well-trained and relatively lean individuals should consider occasional bulking to maximize muscle mass over the long term.
People uncomfortable with gaining weight or beginners in training and dieting should avoid bulking initially.
The recommended rate of weight gain during a mass gaining phase is between 0.5 to 1 pound per week.
Gaining weight too quickly can lead to excessive fat gain, which is unhealthy and requires additional dieting to remove.
Bulking duration should be capped at around 12 to 16 weeks to avoid training fatigue and maintain effective training intensity.
Food composition is less critical for body composition than macronutrient balance, suggesting a mostly clean bulk with occasional treats.
A clean bulk should be the core of any muscle gaining plan, with the bulk of calories coming from healthy foods.
Incorporating cheat meals or mass gainer shakes can help with weight gain goals without significantly impacting overall progress.
The timing for cutting off fat gain should be after at least four weeks of bulking to ensure muscle retention.
An active rest phase and maintenance training can precede a fat loss phase to refresh the body and prepare for the next bulking phase.
Mass gainer shakes are not necessary but can be useful for easily consuming high-calorie, high-protein meals post-workout.
Strategies for dealing with lack of hunger during bulking include enhancing food flavor, increasing dietary fats, and incorporating cheat meals.
If hunger does not return after a fat loss phase, it may indicate the need for another cycle of bulking and cutting.
The speaker emphasizes the importance of a structured approach to bulking and cutting, comparing it to the Circle of Life.
Transcripts
hey folks Dr Mike here for Renaissance
periodization and today I have solved
every single Mass gaining mystery you
could ever wonder about just kidding but
I do have oh how many eight tips in part
one of this miniseries of mass gaining
Mysteries solved you want to put on mass
you want to get jacked you want to get
huge but you have a few questions don't
you worry I have a few answers we're
going to take the step by step first is
the question of what does intentional
weight gain actually help can't you main
gain your way or gain ttain your way to
whatever jacked physique you want kind
of but there's two things to say about
that if you weigh 150 lbs and you're a
little bit on the fatter side and you
want to be 150 lbs fucking chisel lean
that means you have to drop quite a bit
of fat but also gain quite a bit of
muscle you could do this just by staying
at 150 eating healthy and training and
slowly over time your body is be to
become more muscular and less fat but
that'll be a very long time because
you're not using the most powerful two
weapons that you have at your disposal
nutritionally a hypocaloric diet
intentionally eating less in order to
burn fat faster and a hypercaloric Diet
gaining in order to put on muscle much
faster so instead of just staying at 150
and letting recomposition take its
course which it will you can zigzag go
cut off some fat gain some muscle and
fat cut off some fat gain some muscle
and fat this zigzag will get you to that
lean physique at 150 lbs faster much
faster
than it will just to maintain the other
thing that intentional gaining helps is
it'll get you to a place where you
couldn't have gotten because you just
straight up weren't big enough and your
appetite couldn't get you there if your
appetite and you eating lots of food
whatever you want as long as it's got
protein in it training weights really
hard if your appetite gets you up to 170
pounds but won't budge you anymore how
the fuck are you supposed to weigh 180
and be 180 lbs jacked there's nobody on
this Earth that weighs 170 lb but is 180
jacked that's a contradiction in terms
and at some point being 180 just looks a
lot more impressive than being 170 and
that might be something you want how do
you get there well if you can't maintain
there you've got to intentionally bulk
to get there an intentional weight gain
gaining a little bit of weight each week
stuffing yourself a little bit with food
will get you to a place where just
eating and training won't big deal huge
deal has to be something we say now who
should not buy bulk who should bulk
people that are well trained that are
relatively lean or lean enough for them
and want to put on as much muscle mass
as possible over the long term should do
occasional periods of bulking to put on
that muscle who should not bulk I can
think of at least a few people one if
you're not comfortable with the idea of
gaining weight yet psychologically
Namaste no big deal chill out go through
periods of Maintenance and fat loss
until you're good with it and then maybe
you can bulk or you can never bulk the
other people are beginners people new to
training and new to dieting they're so
fresh they can benefit hugely from just
staying at the same body weight roughly
thereabouts not intentionally trying to
gain weight because they're so n to
training and so new to dieting they're
going to gain a ton of muscle not even
trying and then well not even trying to
bulk intentionally once they have gotten
very muscular they can take a little bit
of time to get lean and once they're
very lean and muscular training for two
or three years then they can do their
first intentional bulk you can always do
an intentional bulk sooner but you don't
have to so that intentional bulk may not
be for you give that some thought a lot
of times people start training and
dieting and a week later they're like
time to bulk and I'm like man you
started at 15% fat you could bulk to
where you're 18% fat and very muscular
in a few months what you could have just
done is just continued eating normal
high protein diet really training over a
couple months you would have come down
to 12 or 11% fat then when you bulked up
you'd just be bulked to 15 still quite
lean all of the benefits none of the
downsides of getting too fat so don't
rush into bulking if you are in that
position next how fast should you
gain it's tempting to try to gain as
fast as possible the problem is and
something most people know is that the
fraction of body fat you gain if you go
really quick is really gnarly it's
gaining fast is a good ticket to just
get really really fat which sucks
because you have to diet off the fat
it's not healthy for you it makes you
look like shit etc etc etc so what do
you do
instead I think that you should gain at
somewhere between half a pound to a
pound per week in the typical Mass
gaining phase half a pound to a pound
per week half a pound if you're on the
more fat phobic side if you're on the
smaller side if you're 130 PB girl half
a pound per week is great if you're on
the larger side you are okay with
putting on a bit of extra fat if you
means a little bit more muscle gaining
up to a pound a week is totally cool for
you kilo folks out in the rest of the
world 025 to 0.5 kilos a week here's the
thing just as a thought experiment a lot
of females have trouble with gaining G
weight they say I don't want to get fat
hold on a sec let's say it's a 12we
massing phase that's 3 months of of of
intentional weight gain that's a lot
you're going to gain a lot of muscle but
you're only doing half a pound per week
that's six pounds gained six pounds you
can lose in two or three weeks of fat
loss dieting right after if you don't
want to and it's barely notable body fat
wise on your physique half a pound per
week is a Great Clip and if you want to
go a bit faster up to a pound per week
is totally cool in most
cases Point number four how long should
you bulk for bulking for a long time is
not so determined by how much fat you
gain because you can actually bulk
successfully into a relatively high body
fat and everything goes well the number
one determinant of how to cap your
bulking phase your massing phase your
muscle gain phase is how much training
fatigue you accumulate after roughly 12
to 16 weeks of multiple Messa cycles of
hard training with bulking you're going
to run into a problem
the problem is your body is so
desensitized to training and so fucking
beat up that you can't train at your
hardest anymore reliably weak on week on
week and if you can't train very hard
anymore week on week on week why are you
bulking that's like you know sending a
rocket up to space you're like yeah I
think half the fuel's in there we should
get the rocket out of orbit uh are we
sure about that so what you want to do
is make sure that you bulk for as long
as you can or as long as you have
planned if it's 16 weeks if it's 20
weeks if it's 24 wherever your training
starts to fall apart take an active rest
phase take a maintenance phase reduce
your body's desensitization to
hypertrophy potentially do a fat loss
phase we'll talk about that in just a
bit and then start bulking again but
people say like oh I'm bulking for a
year straight no you're not you're not
going to train hard for a year straight
and if you are you're not training hard
enough week on week
anyway number five clean versus dirty
bulk this is a situation that is partly
mythical and won't die and just Bros on
Reddit keep talking about
it food composition is important to
health it's not so important to your
body composition you can eat exclusively
dirty Foods potato chips Etc and you'll
still gain roughly the same amount of
muscle and fat roughly the problem is
it's really hard to hit good macros
you'll have too many fats not enough
carbs your training will be shed if you
eat mostly junk Foods so the core of
every good muscle gaining plan should be
mostly healthy foods to give you really
really good macros lots of protein tons
of carbs and enough fats to keep you
going but not so much so much fat to
overwhelm digestion and and and reduce
the number of carbs and your pumps get
worse and all that other crap so clean
bulking is the core of every plan but is
it okay a few times a week to have a few
little goodies and junk food and some
cheat meals if it's going to help you
get to your weight gain goal and it's
not making you a fat slobbery mess 100%
so what I would say is if you say clean
bulking is over here dirty bulking is
over here somewhere right in this area
between clean and dirty bulking or
actually sorry dirty bulking is over
here right in this area closer to clean
bulking but a couple dirty stuff uh
things every now and again a couple
times a week is totally cool and
probably for most people the best way to
go so I would say this is not one of
those clean versus dirty it's mostly
clean but a little bit of dirty it's
like the
bedroom H I've never been in the bedroom
before in that respect so hypothetically
that analogy holds number six when do
you cut the fat off as you bulk almost
inevitably in most cases you will gain
some measure of muscle and some measure
of fat when is it time to start cutting
the fat off I'll tell you when it's not
time when it's been like 3 weeks and you
first start to notice you're a little
bit fatter and you're like fuck it I
need to cut you need to gain for at
least four weeks for most of that muscle
to stick around ideally more like eight
or 12 or 16 weeks
as soon as you hit that point where your
training isn't good anymore and you
can't push your massing phase any harder
because your body is desensitized of
training or you're too beat up in all of
your joints to keep going then you take
an active rest phase which is two weeks
of really easy training or no no
training at all you might take another
two to four weeks of Maintenance which
is training in sets of 5 to 10 very low
maintenance volume is about a third of
the volume third of the number of sets
you typically do maybe you typically
train six days a week you train Four
really cool the body off let it really
really settle really get sensitive
training again then what you can do
after is a fat loss phase to get rid of
pretty much all of the fat you gain
during the last massing phase and that
should take somewhere between four and
eight weeks in most cases like if you
did a 16we bulk an 8we fat loss diet
should absolutely take all the fat off
that you put on once you're finished
with that diet take a week of active
rest or something like that and get
right back into bulking no problem it'll
be really awesome if you take fat loss
phases more sparingly that's okay you'll
get great results but you'll get fatter
and fatter and fatter over time it just
means you'll have to do a really gnarly
series of fat loss phases one really
long one later and that's no fun so I
would recommend yeah every 12 to 16
weeks after massing phase is over if
you're interested in it another after
active rest and a little bit of
Maintenance training four to eight week
fat loss phase can really get you going
typically we call that a mini cut
especially if it's 3 to six weeks long
that's totally cool as well but some fat
loss face to get the fat off to get you
going again is a really good idea you
don't just want to become the Michelin
mat
eventually Point number seven do you
need Mass Gainer shakes no but you could
be in a position where a mass gainer
Shake is an easy way for you to get a
high carb high protein amount of
calories it's an excellent thing to take
after a really hard training session you
finish your training shake or you don't
have a training shake you get a mass
gain a shake going you take a shower you
relax you do whatever you work a little
bit then you get hungry you have your
first Whole Food meal a mask SK Shake is
also great because it's easy on the
stomach a lot of times after really hard
training you're not so hungry and if you
eat a ton of food you start wanting to
throw it up Mas Shake can be great if
that describes you absolutely consider a
masc or Shake but the idea that Maser
Shake is Magic and that it somehow if
you add it into your plan you're going
to just explode with new muscle that's
not the case it's not made of steroids
or some shit it's just food Blended and
refined down to be really easy to eat
that's the only magic it has for you
lastly what happens when you're just not
hungry enough to continue to gain you
can't eat the food I have a couple
suggestions one is to try to make your
food tastier flavor it better there's
tons of flavorings at the store tons of
recipes online you can do a good job if
your food is tastier you can generally
eat more of it another thing is to raise
your dietary fats a little bit if you're
trying to eat super clean you have 30
grams of fat per day and you're bulking
that's tough go up to 60 70 80 90 100
grams of fat per day and all of a sudden
your calories are way higher you're
gaining a ton that extra fat is get your
sex drive up and your training
motivation through the roof and all of a
sudden it's really great and it boosts
your calories a ton another thing is to
have a couple of weekly fun cheat meals
to help you get going mask Gainer shakes
are another option and at the end of the
day if all those things run their course
and eventually they will you won't be
hungry enough to hit your Surplus then
it's time for fat loss phase generally
speaking if you plan things out right if
you start nice and lean the beginning of
a muscle gain phase that phase takes 12
to 16 weeks and no more you'll get nice
and full at the end you do your recovery
period your active rest in your
maintenance and then when you drop down
and do your fat loss phase at the end of
that fat loss phase at the beginning
you're not hungry at all it's the
easiest fat loss phase ever at the end
of that fat loss phase seven or eight
weeks later you're going to be pretty
fucking lean and pretty fucking hungry
which potentiates you for another 12 to
16 weeks of massing Circle of Life Simba
rasa scar them hyenas all the
motherfuckers are there and speaking of
there I'll see you guys in a little bit
with part two of this series thank you
so much for tuning in see you
then
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