Gaining Lean vs Bulking: How to Prove It

Training Bodybuilding
21

[quote]B rocK wrote:
i’m really getting sick of the term ‘lean bulk’

i actually USED that term last week; yuck.

the difference between bulking and lean bulking (IMO) = eating like shti and getting fat, having a well tabulated diet with calories in excess.

if two people go on these diets, in 2yrs you’ll have a fat dude and a strong dude.

[/quote]

Actually I’d say that you’d have two strong dudes. Take a look at heavyweight powerlifters, or olympic lifters, those guys are extremely strong, and most carry a fair amount of bf.

And that’s sort of the point. In order to get to the point where you are moving huge weights, you need to maximize your leverages. How do you do that? By getting as big as possible (obviously lots of it has to be muscle, but the fat will actually help as well).

Once you do that, then go ahead and cut down and you’ll likely (if you do it right) have put on a huge amount of muscle mass. The examples are numerous of individuals who have had success with this method. You could probably count on one hand the number of individuals who have reached mind numbing levels of muscularity by staying lean the whole time.

So, unless you fall into the genetic freak category, you’d probably be better off sticking to the former method.

Here’s something else to consider. According to a study that was done some years ago, Sumo wrestlers actually carry more lean mass than powerlifters or bodybuilders. Yet, sumo wrestlers don’t even perform resistance training.

Berardi noted in one of his articles (I believe it was one of the “Massive Eating” articles, but not completely sure), that even completely sedentary people will gain muscle mass from a caloric surplus. Though, admittedly it won’t be a high percentage of the weight they gain, it still suggests that people are foolish to fear fat gain if they are looking to build maximal muscle.

Think about it this way,

Let’s say that you go on a “lean bulk” where you just barely eat over maintenance and stay at a low bf%. You gain slowly, but the majority of the weight that you gain (say 90%) is muscle. The only thing is, that you only gain about 5 lbs over the course of a year. Which means that you only gained 4 1/2 lbs of muscle.

Now let’s say you go on a “traditional bulk” where you just focus on gaining weight and getting as strong as possible (and basically don’t worry about fat gain). You put on some fat (let’s say that 70% of what you gain is muscle). At the end of the year you gain 52 lbs (say 1 lb per week). At this point you have put on a decent amount of fat. But, you have also put on a little over 36 lbs of muscle.

Now tell me, who made better progress, and who is going to reach their goal weight faster?

22

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
Actually I’d say that you’d have two strong dudes. Take a look at heavyweight powerlifters, or olympic lifters, those guys are extremely strong, and most carry a fair amount of bf.

And that’s sort of the point. In order to get to the point where you are moving huge weights, you need to maximize your leverages. How do you do that? By getting as big as possible (obviously lots of it has to be muscle, but the fat will actually help as well).

Once you do that, then go ahead and cut down and you’ll likely (if you do it right) have put on a huge amount of muscle mass. The examples are numerous of individuals who have had success with this method. You could probably count on one hand the number of individuals who have reached mind numbing levels of muscularity by staying lean the whole time.

So, unless you fall into the genetic freak category, you’d probably be better off sticking to the former method.

Here’s something else to consider. According to a study that was done some years ago, Sumo wrestlers actually carry more lean mass than powerlifters or bodybuilders. Yet, sumo wrestlers don’t even perform resistance training.

Berardi noted in one of his articles (I believe it was one of the “Massive Eating” articles, but not completely sure), that even completely sedentary people will gain muscle mass from a caloric surplus. Though, admittedly it won’t be a high percentage of the weight they gain, it still suggests that people are foolish to fear fat gain if they are looking to build maximal muscle.

Think about it this way,

Let’s say that you go on a “lean bulk” where you just barely eat over maintenance and stay at a low bf%. You gain slowly, but the majority of the weight that you gain (say 90%) is muscle. The only thing is, that you only gain about 5 lbs over the course of a year. Which means that you only gained 4 1/2 lbs of muscle.

Now let’s say you go on a “traditional bulk” where you just focus on gaining weight and getting as strong as possible (and basically don’t worry about fat gain). You put on some fat (let’s say that 70% of what you gain is muscle). At the end of the year you gain 52 lbs (say 1 lb per week). At this point you have put on a decent amount of fat. But, you have also put on a little over 36 lbs of muscle.

Now tell me, who made better progress, and who is going to reach their goal weight faster?[/quote]

This should be a stickie at the top of the forum.

23

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
Now let’s say you go on a “traditional bulk” where you just focus on gaining weight and getting as strong as possible (and basically don’t worry about fat gain). You put on some fat (let’s say that 70% of what you gain is muscle). At the end of the year you gain 52 lbs (say 1 lb per week). At this point you have put on a decent amount of fat. But, you have also put on a little over 36 lbs of muscle.

Now tell me, who made better progress, and who is going to reach their goal weight faster?[/quote]

Even if you gained 50% muscle, you’d still be doing a lot better than keeping yourself on a “restricted bulk”.

Anyone out there carrying some serious size that hasn’t added it by following the above method? Speak up now.

24

[quote]Petrichor wrote:
Some time ago, somewhere someone started to associate the concept of “bulking” with an increase in bodyfat%.

I don’t know why this happened, but it got way out of hand.
[/quote]
Because it’s almost impossible to gain a significant amount of muscle mass without a concomitant increase in bodyfat percentage, unless you are A) an adolescent or a new trainee, B) on AAS, or C) pretty fat to begin with.

The math is actually pretty simple. Let’s say you start with 10 percent bodyfat, and you eat enough excess calories to gain muscle mass. If you do everything correctly - diet, training, recovery, etc. - you should be able to achieve somewhere between 60 and 80 percent nutrient partitioning. That means that for every five pounds of scale weight you gain, at least one pound will be fat, probably a bit more. In order for you to maintain 10% bodyfat, you would need to achieve 90% nutrient partitioning (i.e. only one pound of fat gained for every ten pounds of scale weight). No natural trainee is that efficient at gaining lean mass.

Moral: while you are gaining lean mass, your bodyfat percentage will almost certainly increase.

You can try to mitigate this either by gaining very slowly, or by dieting frequently to remove excess fat before resuming a building phase. Either of those techniques will work fine if you want to gain twenty or thirty pounds over the course of two or three years. What is in dispute is whether anyone has ever used these techniques to gain fifty-plus pounds of lean mass between the ages of 22 and 32. Adolescent gains don’t count.

25

[quote]milod wrote:
Either of those techniques will work fine if you want to gain twenty or thirty pounds over the course of two or three years.
[/quote]

Two of three years? Try five, six, or even more.

26

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
milod wrote:
Either of those techniques will work fine if you want to gain twenty or thirty pounds over the course of two or three years.

Two of three years? Try five, six, or even more.[/quote]

Shit, try EVER. There are few guys who are going to stick with this seriously for ten years if their gains are that minimal. It takes a shit load of drive to push your body to gain in excess of 50lbs of lean body mass. The average person couldn’t do it.

That is why there are so few people who have achieved it this way that none of us even know such a person.

To gain 30lbs of pure lean body mass takes full dedication and a shit load of food. The “slow gainer” who takes 5+ years just to come close to that is going to be rare indeed.

27

[quote]dyskee wrote:
ok get this iam supposed to be dieting for a competition ok last week i was down to 125.4 lbs today iam 136 thats 11lbs and i got much more cut i run everyday on an empty stomach and train 7 days a week frombodybuilding to rowing .

also i think it comes down to how well u know ur body i know how my body responds to certain foods , and last year trying to bulk up with a godd bf i went from 140 lbs with 13% bf to 166 lbs with 11% bf . i just made some rules and stuck by them , no carbs after 6 pm , if iam going to cheat its going to be the post workout meal no sodas or sweets , and it worked . i don’t have super genetics i was a fatboy thats why i did this and it worked.[/quote]

Delete T-Nation account.

Train for 10 years.

Create New account.

Hope nobody realizes your old screen name.

28

[quote]gswork wrote:
There are lots of arguments about gaining muscle while staying lean (i.e. around 10% bf) as opposed to gaining while letting bf% go up to around 15-20% or more.

Most of the proponents of the former method point out that fat isnt helping muscle growth and that the optimal nutrients, if so timed, would serve to give optimal muscle growth.

In the other camp are those pointing out that most real life examples of people growing large amounts of muscle involved a bulking phase that included some fat.

The only way to ‘prove’ one or the other in this debate is to run a twin study, i.e. get a few sets of two genetically equal people on two equal exercise programs with the two different diet approaches and then study the total growth in muscular lbm at the end of a period.

On a larger scale you’d need more test subjects to average out genetic differences. Either way the outcomes would be true as a snapshot of this day, knowlegde of diet etc may increase in the future.

My guess is that if you really could pre-empt exactly the nutrient requirements and the timing thereof you wouldnt need to ‘bulk’ as such, but that in practice this isnt sufficiently well understood and also so easy to get wrong in practice that you won’t see many examples of success.

Most people attempting to grow while staying very lean will fail, especially if doing so on their own without day to day coaching, because they simply won’t be able to get the balance right.[/quote]

Look for the pictures of Dave Gulledge(sp?). This will end the debate once and for all.

29

That was a good thread:
http://www.T-Nation.com/tmagnum/readTopic.do?id=699538

30

[quote]rsg wrote:
That was a good thread:
http://www.T-Nation.com/tmagnum/readTopic.do?id=699538

[/quote]

It needs to be bumped, but it’s in the physique photo sections. Should be in the Bodybuilding one too.

31

I try to lean bulk, but I end up carrying some fat. If you can gain lean mass while still able to see abs, you’re a rare bird. You don’t have to become a fat boy, but best case scenario would be to say your smooth, with a little definition. Otherwise your chasin your tail.

32

First, lets look at the reasons for each reasoning.

  1. HEAVY BULK MASS GAIN: The best way to gain the maximum amount of muscle in the minimum amount of time (which still requires lots of effort).

  2. SLOWER LEAN GAINS: Lets you maintain lower body fat, which perhaps you will feel better about – especially as a FFB.

Personally, I like to compromise with a little of both styles.

During fall through spring, eat 4,000+ calories per day. Did I mention how much I love beef, cheese, and potatoes?

Then as summer comes along, clean up the diet and maybe do some carb cycling along the way in order to be leaner for my trip to Cabo San Lucas. So that I could make a film about it… Happens in Cabo: Stays in Cabo! Except the video evidence... - YouTube

But overall, if you’re trying to gain quality muscle mass…the most logical route is to EAT BIG and TRAIN HARD.

Keep eating small and you will see people achieving your same results, but in half the time.

My first year of training, I ate big and went from 150 lbs to 200 lbs. Then as summer neared, I cleaned it up a bit and dropped to 190 lbs…which feels much more comfortable taking my shirt off. In another month or so, I’ll go back to the big eating for more unstoppable strength gains.

33

[quote]Professor X wrote:

The day someone not a midget who weighs 136lbs begins GIVING their personal experience with all of that muscle gain on a bodybuilding forum…and no one laughs and flames the hell out of them, is the day this site dies.

I really want to see what happens here.[/quote]

imagine…a 135lb midget…buffness

34

[quote]dyskee wrote:ok last week i was down to 125.4 lbs today iam 136 thats

and last year trying to bulk up with a godd bf i went from 140 lbs with 13% bf to 166 lbs with 11% bf . .[/quote]

I’m really confused here. If you were 166 lbs with 11% bodyfat you had 147.75 lbs of lean body mass… where did it go?

I also have to kind of laugh at the thought of people conducting a very expensive study to figure out how to make people bigger faster. Who’s going to pay for that? Move over obesity and cancer studies, guys want to know how to eat to gain the optimal amount of muscle mass lol

35

[quote]Scott M wrote:
dyskee wrote:ok last week i was down to 125.4 lbs today iam 136 thats

and last year trying to bulk up with a godd bf i went from 140 lbs with 13% bf to 166 lbs with 11% bf . .

I’m really confused here. If you were 166 lbs with 11% bodyfat you had 147.75 lbs of lean body mass… where did it go?

I also have to kind of laugh at the thought of people conducting a very expensive study to figure out how to make people bigger faster. Who’s going to pay for that? Move over obesity and cancer studies, guys want to know how to eat to gain the optimal amount of muscle mass lol
[/quote]

Especially since satisfactory or better answers have been around since before anybody on this site except Ellington Darden began lifting.

36

I will now contribute to the beating of this dead horse with this useless post.

37

[quote]Zund wrote:
dyskee wrote:
ok get this iam supposed to be dieting for a competition ok last week i was down to 125.4 lbs today iam 136 thats 11lbs and i got much more cut i run everyday on an empty stomach and train 7 days a week frombodybuilding to rowing .

also i think it comes down to how well u know ur body i know how my body responds to certain foods , and last year trying to bulk up with a godd bf i went from 140 lbs with 13% bf to 166 lbs with 11% bf . i just made some rules and stuck by them , no carbs after 6 pm , if iam going to cheat its going to be the post workout meal no sodas or sweets , and it worked . i don’t have super genetics i was a fatboy thats why i did this and it worked.

Get out.

Learn how to write coherent English.

Edit: Gain 50lbs.

Consider coming back.[/quote]

I 2nd this motion.

38

[quote]ab_power wrote:
gswork wrote:
There are lots of arguments about gaining muscle while staying lean (i.e. around 10% bf) as opposed to gaining while letting bf% go up to around 15-20% or more.

Most of the proponents of the former method point out that fat isnt helping muscle growth and that the optimal nutrients, if so timed, would serve to give optimal muscle growth.

In the other camp are those pointing out that most real life examples of people growing large amounts of muscle involved a bulking phase that included some fat.

The only way to ‘prove’ one or the other in this debate is to run a twin study, i.e. get a few sets of two genetically equal people on two equal exercise programs with the two different diet approaches and then study the total growth in muscular lbm at the end of a period.

On a larger scale you’d need more test subjects to average out genetic differences. Either way the outcomes would be true as a snapshot of this day, knowlegde of diet etc may increase in the future.

My guess is that if you really could pre-empt exactly the nutrient requirements and the timing thereof you wouldnt need to ‘bulk’ as such, but that in practice this isnt sufficiently well understood and also so easy to get wrong in practice that you won’t see many examples of success.

Most people attempting to grow while staying very lean will fail, especially if doing so on their own without day to day coaching, because they simply won’t be able to get the balance right.

Look for the pictures of Dave Gulledge(sp?). This will end the debate once and for all. [/quote]

Those pics are some of the most inspiring ones i’ve ever seen. I wanna look like that!

39

Em i dont know if im allowed post here so sorry if i cant.
I write my 1st thread yesterday when i found this site this is the 1st i see where bulking means getting fat.

I started lifting when i was 10 when my mother allowed me and my brother just gave me stuff to eat and when i stopped moving up on weighing scales he added more… and i lifted lots of weight.

Now 2 years later im 102kgs or 225lbs to people not from europe. But im 6ft 5" so it looks like nothing on me. if i did what some looney tunes are doing where they are barely eating and stay the same all the time i would still be tiny.

I have been lifting for 2 years now and i hope when im 18 ill be HHUUGGGEEEE bigger than my big brother !!! But if i do what some people say here id be the same!

I know you have been training longer and know more than me i have long way to go but why cant people just eat good food… if your not going up eat more… if you see fat on you eat less (like my brother HAHA) and just lift heavy weights.

I think my brother saved me from all this stuff this debate is really weird. i dont see the point of it… i mean if you want to get bigger you need to eat more … i dont see the problem if you put on some fat start running or eat less !

and to the 1st guy how to prove it maybe for 6 months do 1 approach for the 2nd 6 months do the other approach see which one gets you more muscle instead of waiting for some big huge study from some big huge company to tell you THIS is the way to train.

40

[quote]Scott M wrote:
I also have to kind of laugh at the thought of people conducting a very expensive study to figure out how to make people bigger faster.

Who’s going to pay for that? Move over obesity and cancer studies, guys want to know how to eat to gain the optimal amount of muscle mass lol
[/quote]

Some people like to talk lean gain but cant point at well thought out comparative studies showing that it works as well as ‘normal’ gaining. The latter has many examples of people who did let bf rise while gaining considerable musclemass, and we’re talking moderate bf here.

I’d agree that such a study is unlikely to get funding. It’s also a challenge, I dont think enough is really understood about precise dietary and hormonal requirements for proponents of lean gaining to put forward a ‘take home’ plan that will likely work* for an average person.

There are too many variables and even if it was understand entirely i can’t see a lot of people getting it right, especially those without day to day guidance.

Getting big faster is a consideration in wasting diseases (including cancer), but of course the short term answer is already understood - testosterone helps, and medically there is no perceived need to grow lots of lbm, just to get back to average.

*work as well as standard practice for gaining as much lbm as possible in the least time.