I have been off cycle for a few months now and am sitting pretty comfy at ~275. Now I will preface this by saying I still think I have room to improve naturally, but at my weight I’m a little worried about pushing the envelope (bulking) without AAS.
So, basically, at this size is it worth it for me to still really pound the calories without assistance or is that just asking for adding a lot of bodyfat? I’m curious what approach those of you who are already really heavy and may be close to your genetic limit, take when off cycle.
What route do you take for continued progression? Do you just work on maintaining what you have, keeping the BF in check, and focus on strength?
I hope this makes sense, hah, kind of having trouble explaining this.
Cliff notes: Bulking to 300 (w/o AAS) and ending up as a fat fuck is not something I want to happen.
At your level of development I don’t recommend you attempt anything “drastic” without AAS.
Bulking or cutting.
I say cut with AAS before shooting higher natural or otherwise, figure out EXACTLY what your working with, before you make new goals.
If you cut down to 9-10% your going to look fantastic, and you might find that your carrying less lean mass than you think.
Until your next cycle I say just focus on getting some of your lifts up and maintaining.
Or try running more cals but lower carb.
Off cycle I generally try to replace 300-400 cals of carbs with 600-800 cals of fats, you lean up just a little if your workouts are on track, but dont lose muscle due to the surplus.
[quote]Westclock wrote:
At your level of development I don’t recommend you attempt anything “drastic” without AAS.
Bulking or cutting.
I say cut with AAS before shooting higher natural or otherwise, figure out EXACTLY what your working with, before you make new goals.
If you cut down to 9-10% your going to look fantastic, and you might find that your carrying less lean mass than you think.
Until your next cycle I say just focus on getting some of your lifts up and maintaining.
Or try running more cals but lower carb.
Off cycle I generally try to replace 300-400 cals of carbs with 600-800 cals of fats, you lean up just a little if your workouts are on track, but dont lose muscle due to the surplus.
[/quote]
Sounds good man, thanks for the post. I think I’m gonna hold off on a legit cut until I’m over 300 though. I get paranoid when I do it on my own, so I’d like to hire shelby or someone to walk me through it. Also, if I’m going to pay someone to do it I want to make sure I have a shit ton of LBM so it’s worth it.
Way, dI agree with Westclock. At this stage in your development, I think it would greatly benefit you to cut down to single digit bodyfat. I started my precontest cut at 245 lbs, and came in at 214 lbs before water depletion, and 207 lbs at 3.5% on stage. I did well, but the greatest benefit was the ability to truly see my flaws and my strengths. I always thought my quads and hams were great, but after I cut, I noticed my hams were lacking. I now realize I hold alot of excess weight in my hams and backside.
It’s really hard to really know your weak points when you are over 15%. Also there is a great super anabolic rebound window when you start bulking again after being super lean. In a year after I did my contest, I was up to 265 lbs, with lots of improvements to the weak areas…still a long way to go I might add…lol.
IMO you have plenty of LBM to be proud and happy about when you see yourself at 8%. Goodluck.