Transitioning from Cutting to Bulking

Bigger Stronger Leaner
21

[quote]audiogarden1 wrote:

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
I’m not sure what you’re looking for here. Everyone has unanimously given you the opinion to slowly add cals back.

ex:

next week: +100 cals

week after: +100 cals

Each week look at bodyweight. If you’re losing, keep adding. If you’re stalling keep adding. If you’re gaining at a steady pace…stay. If you’re gaining too much, scale back.

Week by week. No one knows where you’ll be in 6-8 weeks.

You are way overthinking this at this point. [/quote]

Yeah, ive acknowledged this approach several times now…

At this point i was interested to see if anybody had any criticisms for the tentative template i provided for macros and calories. Yes everybody’s different and will respond differently but i was interested to see if anyone who has taken a similar carb cycling approach for bulking would have any criticism or tips regarding the numbers provided.

And i know that adding calories back in slowly will require a good deal of instinctive training here to evaluate how things are going, but i’d like to have some sort of template for reference as an overall “end result” diet to help guide the manner in which i add back macros and foods.

If you feel i’ve received the best feedback im gonna get, so be it. I welcome any other opinions though. I dont think its “over-thinking” to want to explore every piece of advice or criticism i can get. Much of this is for the sake of discussion and to generate new ideas. If bodybuilding was so cut-and-dry it would take all the fun out of it. I appreciate the feedback provided so far though. [/quote]

Thanks for clarifying. There is no “end result” diet. And trying to predict your final macros is what I considered to be “overthinking.” Just let it happen as it happens.

If you were to hire Shelby, or JM, or one of these guys to do your diet, they wouldn’t be able to tell you where you’re headed either. They just reassess week to week.

22

[quote]Mdgray82 wrote:

[quote]audiogarden1 wrote:

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
I’m not sure what you’re looking for here. Everyone has unanimously given you the opinion to slowly add cals back.

ex:

next week: +100 cals

week after: +100 cals

Each week look at bodyweight. If you’re losing, keep adding. If you’re stalling keep adding. If you’re gaining at a steady pace…stay. If you’re gaining too much, scale back.

Week by week. No one knows where you’ll be in 6-8 weeks.

You are way overthinking this at this point. [/quote]

Yeah, ive acknowledged this approach several times now…

At this point i was interested to see if anybody had any criticisms for the tentative template i provided for macros and calories. Yes everybody’s different and will respond differently but i was interested to see if anyone who has taken a similar carb cycling approach for bulking would have any criticism or tips regarding the numbers provided.

And i know that adding calories back in slowly will require a good deal of instinctive training here to evaluate how things are going, but i’d like to have some sort of template for reference as an overall “end result” diet to help guide the manner in which i add back macros and foods.

If you feel i’ve received the best feedback im gonna get, so be it. I welcome any other opinions though. I dont think its “over-thinking” to want to explore every piece of advice or criticism i can get. Much of this is for the sake of discussion and to generate new ideas. If bodybuilding was so cut-and-dry it would take all the fun out of it. I appreciate the feedback provided so far though. [/quote]

The problem is that you won’t know if that end goal works until you get there. It may turn out that the template doesn’t work but you can’t know until you get there.
That is why everyone is suggesting the slow #s, because you’re going to have to adjust as you go and then at some point you’ll have found a balance with macros.[/quote]

Im aware of that. But there is such a thing as critiquing a diet, so if you take the transition from my current macros to the bulk macros out of consideration, i wonder what criticisms or advice there would be regarding the diet by itself.

The diet is a template, it will most certainly be modified and may eventually turn out to be completely different. I am not hung up on consuming those macros. But there are threads all the time to “Critique this diet” and i would like what ive provided to be critiqued as well. It may help shape the way i decide to go about adding back in calories over time.

23

[quote]jskrabac wrote:

[quote]audiogarden1 wrote:

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
I’m not sure what you’re looking for here. Everyone has unanimously given you the opinion to slowly add cals back.

ex:

next week: +100 cals

week after: +100 cals

Each week look at bodyweight. If you’re losing, keep adding. If you’re stalling keep adding. If you’re gaining at a steady pace…stay. If you’re gaining too much, scale back.

Week by week. No one knows where you’ll be in 6-8 weeks.

You are way overthinking this at this point. [/quote]

Yeah, ive acknowledged this approach several times now…

At this point i was interested to see if anybody had any criticisms for the tentative template i provided for macros and calories. Yes everybody’s different and will respond differently but i was interested to see if anyone who has taken a similar carb cycling approach for bulking would have any criticism or tips regarding the numbers provided.

And i know that adding calories back in slowly will require a good deal of instinctive training here to evaluate how things are going, but i’d like to have some sort of template for reference as an overall “end result” diet to help guide the manner in which i add back macros and foods.

If you feel i’ve received the best feedback im gonna get, so be it. I welcome any other opinions though. I dont think its “over-thinking” to want to explore every piece of advice or criticism i can get. Much of this is for the sake of discussion and to generate new ideas. If bodybuilding was so cut-and-dry it would take all the fun out of it. I appreciate the feedback provided so far though. [/quote]

Thanks for clarifying. There is no “end result” diet. And trying to predict your final macros is what I considered to be “overthinking.” Just let it happen as it happens.

If you were to hire Shelby, or JM, or one of these guys to do your diet, they wouldn’t be able to tell you where you’re headed either. They just reassess week to week.
[/quote]

Gotcha. I understand where you are coming from. To clarify a bit more, i guess that diet is more of a guide for how i will proceed to add calories back in. So if that diet were to remain unchanged right now, i would use it to determine how and where i want to add carbs/calories back into my current diet. So its more of a direction for me to head in, rather than trying to pin-point exactly where i think my macros need to be. It could turn out that i end of stopping way short or perhaps far surpass those macros. The ratios could change altogether. Providing that information in this thread will help to give people an idea of how my macros will be distributed though, or at least thats what im hoping.

Should i receive compelling criticism against that diet i will change it and thus, change the “direction” in which i will begin to add macros back into my diet. Its all VERY tentative right now.

In truth this thread is probably partially borne of my desire to stop dieting down after over 5 months of doing so, but i figure now’s as good a time as any to start getting advice and getting prepared to make this transition.

24

[quote]RATTLEHEAD wrote:
You probs know more than me but why aren’t you counting your fats? And why aren’t you wanting to cycle fats with the different carb intake, is this norm for carb cycling and I’m just slow?

In shelbys lean gain book he advocates when carb cycling in bulk season:

High Day: 2-4g carbs x bodyweight, 1-1.25g protein x bodyweight, low fat
Medium Day: 1-2g carbs x bodyweight, 1-1.25g protein x bodyweight, 0.25-0.5g fat x bodyweight
Low Day: .5-1g carbs x bodyweight, 1-1.25g protein x bodyweight, 0.25-0.75g fat x bodyweight

For you it would be 240 x bodweight so;

High Day: 480-960g carbs, 240-300g protein, low fat
Medium Day: 240-480g carbs, 240-300g protein, 60-120g fat
Low Day: 120-240g carbs, 240-300g protein, 60 - 180g fat

Currently you are :

Low day: 2500 calories/303g protein/71g carbs
Med day: 2640 calories/304g protein/147g carbs
High day: 3600 calories/320g protein/361g carbs

I think you should scrap your idea and move to shelbys template when wanting to start gaining (at the lower range of grams he suggests though).

Your protein would be staying the same at 300g each day. Carbs would be increased by 50g on low day, 93g on medium day and by nearly 120g on your high days. Since I dont know your fat intake its hard to gauge if that will be way above or below your calories the now and may have to altered to fit.

Start at the lower range of his suggestions then up it to the upper limits when necessary.[/quote]

Im not counting my fats right now while cutting because i honestly think there is no need to. I eat nothing but healthy fats, and only consume it with high protein meals (i try to avoid taking in protein without healthy fats alongside)

As long as i keep track of my calories and carbs, i lose fat steadily, thus there has been no reason/need for me to count fats.

I believe this becomes more important when bulking though.

I have great respect for Shelby and JM and hope to use both of them as coaches in the not-too-distant future, and would certainly be willing to do whatever they told me, but the template that Shelby prescribes is just not what i want to do right now. Im familiar with it, but im really not interested in going that high on carbs.

While i am planning to increase my carb intake, i’ve actually come to enjoy relying on fat more as a fuel source than carbs. I’ve noticed a change in the way my body reacts to carbs and i’ve definitely noticed an increase in endurance which has not only allowed me to keep my workouts intense even while reducing calories and carbs, but they have actually become MORE intense. I attribute this to the lower carb to fat ratio. Previously i was very high carb all the time, and believe me it killed me at first to reduce carbs and then try to hit the weights.

This is why i was wanting to keep fats moderately high and really only go crazy on the carbs on my one high day. Also, as i’ve mentioned i almost always try to consume a good deal of healthy fats with my protein.