How To Properly Bulk. An Evidence Based Approach

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IN TODAY’S ISSUE
How To Properly Bulk. An Evidence Based Approach.

What’s your go to when you bulk? Dirty bro bulk? MADCOW? Copy what Sam Sulek eats? Or perhaps you eat “clean” and your soul borderline die inside with kilos of broccoli, rice and chicken.

Perhaps you have been yoyo dieting between bulking and cutting as you gain much more fat than you’re comfortable with and never really bulk long enough to add some real quality muscle mass?

At the end of the day, it comes down to calories in vs calories out, but what about where your calories come from and how quickly you gain weight? Can we limit the amount of fat gain during a bulk?

What You'll Find Out

• 🤓 Body Recomposition & Optimising For Muscle Growth

• 👉 The Most Important Macronutrient

• ✅ How Big A Calorie Surplus & How Fast Should You Bulk?

• ✍️ TL:DR - Key Takeaways & Practical Applications

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WHAT’S UP
Body Recomposition & Optimizing For Muscle Growth

Firstly, it is possible to grow muscle (perhaps not increase overall body weight) in a slight calorie deficit or at maintenance calories, referred to as Body Recomposition. This is where you gain muscle and lose fat at the same time.

Certain parameters need to be met in order to achieve this, and although this typically works best for beginners or detrained experienced lifters, it is possible to achieve in trained individuals (Barakat et al., 2020) - Strength and Conditioning Journal.

Although body recomposition may sound appealing and might just be what you're looking for, you will never build as much muscle during body recomposition as you would taking the time to do a proper bulk.

Optimizing Muscle Growth

Food is fuel for our bodies at the end of the day, so the more food the better right? The main problem with the classic bro “dirty bulk” - while they may help add slabs of muscle with the huge amount excess calories, this route will also add quite a lot of fat onto your frame in the process. This results in most people yoyo dieting between bulking and cutting too frequently and never really getting anywhere.

Now, some fat gain will happen, but the more fat gain we can limit while optimizing muscle growth the better.

The quicker you gain weight, through an overconsumption of calories higher than what is required to begin to increase weight, the higher the percentage of that weight will come from an increase in fat as opposed to muscle (Garthe et al., 2013).

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SCIENCE BRO
The Most Important Macronutrient.

If your here and reading this article, you should already be aware of the importance of Protein consumption on muscle growth and recovery.

Having a high protein diet has been shown to preserve muscle in a cutting phase, and this randomised controlled trial by (Campbell et al., 2018) found a positive response to having a high protein diet when in a calorie surplus on body composition. The 8 week trial involved 17 aspiring female physique athletes, who were split into a higher protein (2.5g per kg of bodyweight per day) or lower protein group (0.9g per kg of bodyweight per day).

The high protein group were in a ~400 kcal daily surplus, created wholly through increased protein intake. After the 8 week resistance training and dietary intervention, the authors of the study found FFM (Fat free mass) to have increased significantly more in the high protein group (+~2.1kg) vs the lower protein group (+~0.6kg). They also found FM (Fat mass) decreased over time in the higher protein group (-1.1kg) but no significant change was observed in the lower protein group.

SCIENCE BRO #2
How Big A Calorie Surplus & How Fast Should You Bulk?

A pilot study by (Ribeiro et al., 2019b) which included 11 amature male bodybuilders, who trained 6 times per week for 4 weeks were split into two groups, one group (G1) consumed a higher energy intake while the other group (G2) consumed a moderate energy intake.

The results? G1 (the higher intake group) was the only group to find a significant body fat increase from the intervention (G1 - +7.4% vs G2 - 0.8%). For muscle mass, G1 seen more muscle growth than G2 (2.7% vs 1.1%).

So although you would gain 1.1% more muscle, it’s personal preference if that’s worth the extra 6.4% increase in body fat.

You can see the results in the chart in figure A, from the study below:

A study by (Smith et al., 2021), had 21 resistance trained males take part in a 6 week intervention, taking a daily high calorie protein and carbohydrate supplement with the goal of gaining roughly 0.45kg per week.

The studies authors found that on average a total body weight gain of ~0.55% per week resulting in almost all gains being in FFM (Fat Free Mass).

TL:DR
Key Takeaways & Practical Applications

The body of evidence shows that a slower rate of bulking to be beneficial at increasing lean muscle mass while limiting fat gain. Looking at the study results on trained competitive bodybuilders by (Ribeiro et al., 2019b). I wouldn’t consider the extra 1.6% increase in muscle mass to be worth the 7.4% increase in fat mass as opposed to just 0.8% increase.

• Body Recomposition is possible, and you can build muscle this way, however it is not optimal for muscle growth.

• Ensuring you consume a high protein diet can aid in the desired effect of increased muscle mass (FFM) and limit fat mass increase.

• Although the study used protein intakes as high as 2.5g per kg of bodyweight, the current body of literature has found 1.6g-2g per kg of bodyweight to be sufficient.

• A slower rate of body mass increase is optimal for increasing muscle mass without needlessly increasing fat mass (however may not eliminate fat mass increase)

• Aim for a smaller calorie surplus over your maintenance calories, the study above found 0.55% per week to result in almost all FFM gain. The general stance in the evidence based fitness community is 1-2% per month.

Building muscle takes time, you can’t feed your muscles to grow, trying to do this will just result in excess fat gain.

Figure out how much your maintenance calories are, and go slightly over them. A simple way to get this started is to add a surplus of 250 kcals or 10% of your maintenance calories per day. Begin to track your bodyweight and aim for 1-2% increase per month.

That’s it for today ✌️

If you have any questions you’d like answered, topics you would like discussed, or perhaps some feedback, email them over to me at: [email protected]

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