2 Week Bulk, 1 Week Cut Repeat?

[quote]Professor X wrote:

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:

[quote]Professor X wrote:

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:

[quote]Professor X wrote:
What are your stats?

You weigh how much at what height?[/quote]

at this very moment, still building lost strength my cut these are my stats:

76 kg, 13% bodyfat, 100 kg bench press 3 reps, 105 kg squat 5 reps, 135 kg deadlift 12 reps 55 kg overhead press 8 reps, 100 kg bent over rows 5 reps with straps[/quote]

How tall are you and how old are you?

You weigh less than 170lbs. [/quote]

18 and 173 cm which is 5,8 and yes my morning weight in pounds is 167
[/quote]

Dude, you are a kid who thinks he knows all.

My advice, don’t waste time on something several people have already done and KNOW you will waste time on in the long run.

But hey…you’re a teenager…you know everything.[/quote]

Lol spot on.

Take the time now to learn how to eat and not get fat… This information will be worthwhile for you your entire life. Forget all the gimmicks that sounds like they might work. How about just eating good food in the right amounts for your weight,where you are slowly gaining but not getting fat, and doing this for months and months and months? Radical idea.

Trust me on this, you do NOT want to get stuck on an endless cycle of “bulking” and “cutting” … Always being on your way to being fat, or dieting off that fat. I did that for YYYEEEAAARRRSS and its just not the best way to go.

Instead, what you want to do is learn how to eat for gains while not getting fat. I’m at a point now where I can maintain a good amount of leanness and “cut” for 4 weeks at a time once a year or so. No more of this 9 months being fat, 3 months getting back to where I was before.

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
If you are gaining weight you aren’t cutting.

Muscle gains take much longer than 2 weeks. And fat loss takes longer than 1 week. You basically just made a recipe to spin your wheels [/quote]
Okay so what if he did 4 week bulk 2 week cut?

[quote]krummdiddy wrote:

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
If you are gaining weight you aren’t cutting.

Muscle gains take much longer than 2 weeks. And fat loss takes longer than 1 week. You basically just made a recipe to spin your wheels [/quote]
Okay so what if he did 4 week bulk 2 week cut?[/quote]

IMO the fining period is too short and depending in bf most likely the cutting will be too short.

[quote]krummdiddy wrote:

Okay so what if he did 4 week bulk 2 week cut?[/quote]

Why not do 2 days bulking, 1 day cutting? Sometimes thinking in extremes gets us to see the truth about the middle.

Gaining muscle is a long term process that body doesn’t really want to do, and if you get the wheels turning in that direction and then pull the rug out from underneath yourself by severely limiting calories you are taking that momentum away.

The other aspect to consider is that gaining mass is a recovery process taking place outside the gym and that process can take a while to happen (ever been sore for 5 days straight?). That recovery is not on a day-to-day basis, but week to week and month to month. If you take away calories for a whole week or two, you are limiting the amount of recovery that can occur from the previous weeks of training.

Call this bro science or whatever, but given the choice between adding muscle mass and getting rid of it, in the face of these wildly fluctuating calorie intakes where there isnt a significant period of surplus, I dont think the body is going to be inclined to add large amounts of mass. At the very least you arent stacking the deck in your favor.

How much mass are you going to add in 2 weeks? You can probably measure it in grams, not pounds. Now suddenly cut calories by 500-1000 a day and I dont think your body is going to be as inclined to keep that mass around, let alone add even more on top of it. However, give yourself months and months and months on constantly elevated food intake (but not to the point where you get fat) and THAT is how you pile of POUNDS of muscle over the years. The added mass also means you get to eat more food come cutting time, which is a very good thing for a variety of reasons.

Bottom line is if you have the tenacity to keep track of calories and eat them on these 2 on 1 off cycles, you have the same tenacity to simply gain slowly over a long period of time and not get fat. Just do it that way.

Lonnie123 is spot on, it’s a steady progression not a zig zag

The prof is spot on, set a coherent goal and go for it

Do so for months, a year or two even, not weeks

Btw i bulk at breakfast and the cut until lunch… Kidding of course but hope it makes sense

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:

[quote]Gambit_Lost wrote:

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:

[quote]Gambit_Lost wrote:

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:

[quote]Gambit_Lost wrote:
Truthfully, it sounds like an absolutely horrible idea to me.
My 2 cents[/quote]

Why? If this would work… [/quote]

Pretty big “if”. I don’t think it would work. I could be wrong, but for most people that would end up (as said above) in spinning your wheels. Have you found anyone, anywhere who has done this successfully? Perhaps you could google it and see if anyone agrees with you?

Why don’t you just eat clean and limit cals a little more on your bulk? If you feel you are getting “too soft” add in a HIIT session or go for some long walks?

[/quote]

sure, i googled and searched and read all i found but it was pretty limited. most people ask and experiment with exactly what you are describing, which is a very slight calorie deficit all day every day. and i think that the body needs surplus calories to create the anabolic environment needed to make the body prioritize muscle growth, the question is of course when you create that environment during your bulk how long does it take to make it change to a catabolic environment( lower testosterone for example) and i think the answer is around 5-7 days based on stuff i have read around the nett, so my logic is keep the bulking going for longer than 7 days and keep the cut for no longer than 7 days so you dont give the body time to change into a catabolic envirement[/quote]

Hmm… this was the second hit when I googled: 2 Week Bulk 1 Week Cut Cycle Thoughts | Tiger Fitness - YouTube

You’ll notice in the video, the guy is 1) not from T-Nation 2) saying EXACTLY what most people on this site are saying.

I think that you may think this is a “new” idea. It’s not. I’ve probably seen 1-2 dozen of this exact thread over the years on this and other sites.

[quote]buildsomemuscle wrote:
lol general attitude of T-Nation right there, either you agree with the norm or you fuck off [/quote]

Honest question: Why do you think you are part of the 1% and that your program will work despite not working for anyone else that you could find? Why wouldn’t you use a course that has demonstrated results?

[/quote]
well because the bulk and cut thing doesn’t work too well with me, sure i gain muscle and strength pretty fast when i am bulking, but when i cut i lose fat slow and once i have been going at it for 2 month + i stall and soon after lose strength. When i lose enough strength i quit my cut usually because i am so ashamed about being so weak after training so long.

so i look for alternatives and if this would work it would be the holy grail for me, but fuck, i guess not. goal fowards is just disegard bodyfat and get stronger to the point where i will still be strong after i lose strength during my next cut. but still, i might try it out, if i do i’ll report back but no matter what i will keep bulking trough summer and get atleast 120 kg bench press before i do anything else[/quote]

My friend, you are 18. You’ve found this site. If you choose to learn and to put the work in, you WILL get strong/big/lean/whatever-YOU-want.

My suggestion: Start another thread on the beginners forum. List your stats and goals. Listen to the advice. People are “nicer” over there and it’s a much better place for a teenager.

Please don’t “disregard bodyfat.” That’s silly and no one here has advocated that. Instead, start tracking your meals. Use a diet from this site. Learn about how your body reacts. HAVE FUN!

Honestly, probably, you will need to learn about short and long-term goals. Learn about what works and what doesn’t. Don’t try to “invent” something. 99.9% of 18 year olds don’t invent anything; they just don’t know that it’s been tried yet.

So again, I’ll suggest starting a thread in the beginners forum. Fix your hub (it says you are 23, and I was working under that assumption). Be HONEST about your stats. Read their advice and follow it. Probably people will recommend you fix up your diet (WEDYEY?!?), get on a solid program (Waterbury’s TBT comes to mind), and make sure you are properly recovering. If you actually have these things down, write them out so people know and believe you. From their more specific advice can be given.

Best of luck. I wish I had found this site when I was 18.

I like Krummdiddy’s question. Would a 4wk/2wk cycle work? If not, what is the magic number where it works? 6 and 3? 6.7 and 3.35?

Another question: Let’s say we have two people each train for 6 months. Person A bulks for 4 months straight and then cuts for 2 months. Person B bulks for 2 weeks then cuts for 1 week and repeats. After 6 months, both Person A and Person B have spent the exact same amount of time bulking and the exact same amount of time cutting. Who has better results? The consensus seems to be Person A will. Why? And I mean that question specifically. What exactly happens in the muscles, in the brain, in the body that gives Person A more results? Or, equivalently, what happens that gives Person B poorer results?

I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:
I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.[/quote]

You mean 16/8 duh

[quote]rocket363 wrote:
I like Krummdiddy’s question. Would a 4wk/2wk cycle work? If not, what is the magic number where it works? 6 and 3? 6.7 and 3.35?

Another question: Let’s say we have two people each train for 6 months. Person A bulks for 4 months straight and then cuts for 2 months. Person B bulks for 2 weeks then cuts for 1 week and repeats. After 6 months, both Person A and Person B have spent the exact same amount of time bulking and the exact same amount of time cutting. Who has better results? The consensus seems to be Person A will. Why? And I mean that question specifically. What exactly happens in the muscles, in the brain, in the body that gives Person A more results? Or, equivalently, what happens that gives Person B poorer results? [/quote]

I already addressed your first question but I’ll state it differently this time… Gain slowly until you feel you need to cut down, and then cut down until you are as lean as you want to be. There is no magic ratio. The longer you gain (without getting over fat) and the less you HAVE TO diet the better off you will be in 10 years time.

Person A will get better results because he gave his body the appropriate amount of time to execute the goal he was after at the time. Losing fat is not a one week endeavor. Gaining muscle is not a 2 week endeavor. Every time you start to get results you switch gears and go the other direction, undoing the work you just did.

You can gain some muscle in 4 months. Provided you are smart are do not get fat, you shouldn’t have much fat to lose come diet time.

You can lose a good amount of fat in 8 weeks, I don’t know if you can do the same thing in eight 1 week cycles peppered throughout the year. Fat loss is a progressive approach very often (cut calories as the weeks go on, add cardio, etc…)

And again, the extra muscle you gain during the “bulk” will help you when you diet. These things don’t happen in a vacuum.

Knowing that, lets reexamine your above scenario. Who would you rather be:

-Person A who gets to diet on 2600 calories because he has built up his muscular base over several months thus increasing his metabolism, and allowed his body to ramp up to a higher LBM and chronically increased food intake

-Peron B who has to diet on 2400 calories because he only has 2 weeks worth of “mass gains” which did absolutely nothing to increase his metabolism and will effectively look exactly the same in 7 days time.

The numbers are ALMOST the same, but they are different enough to make a difference. Admittedly I’m painting slightly biased scenarios above… But thats because I’m biased :wink:

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:
I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.[/quote]

You mean 16/8 duh[/quote]
I like to live dangerously and give myself a little extra bulking.

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:
I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.[/quote]

You mean 16/8 duh[/quote]
I like to live dangerously and give myself a little extra bulking.[/quote]

Oh my

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:
I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.[/quote]

You mean 16/8 duh[/quote]
I like to live dangerously and give myself a little extra bulking.[/quote]

Oh my[/quote]
No one ever got big off of a measly 16 hours of bulking

bulk for 2 years cut for half of one.

Lonnie, I appreciate your reply, but your entire reply is predicated on the fact that 2wk/1wk doesn’t work, but 4months/2months does. But that’s the question, why?

If I bulk for 4 months, say I gain 4lbs of muscle. Those aren’t linear gains, but given that gains slow as one progresses, it’s actually probably an underestimate to say that I therefore gained 1lb of muscle the first month, therefore 1/2lb the first two weeks.

During those 4 months, say I also gain 4 lbs of fat. Again, that would be 1/2 lb the first two weeks.

If I cut for two months then I only need to lose 1/2 lb per week on average to lose the fat, and presumably this is a slow enough pace that I won’t be losing my muscle.

If I bulk for 2 weeks, then stop, did I not gain 1/2 lb of muscle during those two weeks? If I cut for one week and then stop did I not lose 1/2 lb of fat (that’s only about a 250cal/day deficit)? If that rate of cutting is slow enough not to cost me muscle in the previous scenario isn’t it slow enough not to cost me muscle in this scenario?

I understand that lots of experienced people don’t believe in the 2wk/1wk method. I’m not saying it’s equal. I’m trying to understand why it isn’t equal. I can also readily understand why people might want to focus on one goal for a few months at a time rather than switching gears so quickly. What I don’t understand is why some people laugh at the idea but don’t (can’t?) really support it with anything other than “people just don’t do it that way.”

I have explained why I think it wont work multiple times and in different ways in each post I have in this thread, at this point I think my avatar is about to go blue in the face.

Again, why not do 2 days bulking, 1 day cutting? Did you not gain 5 grams of muscle and then lose 12 grams of fat?

[quote]rocket363 wrote:
Lonnie, I appreciate your reply, but your entire reply is predicated on the fact that 2wk/1wk doesn’t work, but 4months/2months does. But that’s the question, why?

If I bulk for 4 months, say I gain 4lbs of muscle. Those aren’t linear gains, but given that gains slow as one progresses, it’s actually probably an underestimate to say that I therefore gained 1lb of muscle the first month, therefore 1/2lb the first two weeks.

During those 4 months, say I also gain 4 lbs of fat. Again, that would be 1/2 lb the first two weeks.

If I cut for two months then I only need to lose 1/2 lb per week on average to lose the fat, and presumably this is a slow enough pace that I won’t be losing my muscle.

If I bulk for 2 weeks, then stop, did I not gain 1/2 lb of muscle during those two weeks? If I cut for one week and then stop did I not lose 1/2 lb of fat (that’s only about a 250cal/day deficit)? If that rate of cutting is slow enough not to cost me muscle in the previous scenario isn’t it slow enough not to cost me muscle in this scenario?

I understand that lots of experienced people don’t believe in the 2wk/1wk method. I’m not saying it’s equal. I’m trying to understand why it isn’t equal. I can also readily understand why people might want to focus on one goal for a few months at a time rather than switching gears so quickly. What I don’t understand is why some people laugh at the idea but don’t (can’t?) really support it with anything other than “people just don’t do it that way.” [/quote]

I am not Lonnie, but here is my take:

I tried it (ABCDE) and it didn’t work for me. I don’t care why. I don’t have time to worry about why, because I only have so much time on this planet to make gains so I can be jacked and tan and awesome. I don’t want to waste it trying to do science when I should be lifting and eating in a manner that I KNOW will produce results.

This is the problem with bodybuilding (and life in general). Your time is limited, and if you’re young enough, you have a lot of it. So much so, that it seems infinite. So you think, sure, I’ll try this or that harebrained BS idea of mine. You follow through with this a few dozen times, and all of a sudden it’s 5-10 years later and you’re still back at square fucking one. Minimal progress, after all that time.

To some extent, I think just about everyone does this when they first start. I know I did, hence my ABCDE experiment, and countless other bullshit ideas I followed through on that didn’t do jack shit. Hell, lots of people do this (program and diet hopping) their entire training lives.

But, some people do eventually get wise, and then start doing the things that they KNEW would work from the start, because EVERYONE THAT EVER GOT BIG AND STRONG DID IT THAT WAY. The sooner you figure this out, the better off you will be.

This is true in bodybuilding AND in life. The answers are out there. Find out what the people who have accomplished what you want to accomplish did to get where they are, and do THAT EXACT THING.

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:

[quote]Smashingweights wrote:
I prefer an 18 hour bulk to 6 hour cut schedule.[/quote]

You mean 16/8 duh[/quote]
I do a 8 hour fast everyday… its very good… I do it while I sleep!!

[quote]rocket363 wrote:
If I bulk for 4 months, say I gain 4lbs of muscle. Those aren’t linear gains, but given that gains slow as one progresses, it’s actually probably an underestimate to say that I therefore gained 1lb of muscle the first month, therefore 1/2lb the first two weeks.
[/quote]

Here’s a question. You assume that because gains slow as they progress then they must be fastest at the beginning. Have you considered that perhaps gains start off slowly and take time to increase? Or if you’re a more visual person, a graph of gains vs time will look like a sigmoid curve.