How to Get Big and Stay Lean

A Real World Approach to Carb Cycling

As I promised in a previous article, I will now talk about the method I recommend for increasing lean muscle mass while maintaining body fat. Please note that this method is highly effective and should be used by lifters that are already pretty lean. If you need to loose a lot of weight, you should diet down first. If you need to gain a lot of weight (greater than 15 lbs), you should focus on taking in more calories. This approach is perfect for the trainee who is looking to critique their physique while making steady progression. So how is it possible to add muscle mass and not put on any fat? The answer is carb cycling.

Carb Cycling is an approach to eating that manipulates the amount of carbohydrates consumed on a given day. “By fluctuating macronutrients on a daily basis, we can ensure that performance and muscle building can be optimized on the days when it’s most important, while burning fat on the other days”(Starnes). The three possible days that we will utilize include “high carb” days, “medium carb” days and “low carb” days.

“High carb “days are utilized during the hardest training days. On these days, you want to feed your body a ton of carbs in order to put it in a highly anabolic state.

“Medium carb” days are utilized on training days that are less taxing on the body. On these days, the goal is to give your body just enough carbs to fuel your workout but not enough to put your body in a highly anabolic state. These days are maintenance days.

“Lower carb” days are utilized on your off days or days you are performing cardio or light conditioning. On these days, your primary goal is to burn fat. Since you are performing minimal activity, your body will not need carbohydrates. These days are fat burning days.

Now that we understand what carb cycling is and what variables must be manipulated, we need to know how many carbs we should put in our bodies on given days. Since we are varying our carbohydrates on certain days, our fat and protein intake will also vary. Here is an easy chart to follow. Please note that these numbers are based on grams per pound of body weight.

High day

Fat: minimal fat

Carbs: 2-3 grams

Protein: 1-1.25

Medium and low days

Fat: 0.15-0.35

Carbs: 0.5-1.5

Protein: 1.25-1.5

While I recommend you evenly spread out your carbohydrates, proteins and fats over the course of 5-8 meals, in the “real world” most people don’t have the time to count calories. NO WORRIES! If you follow these rules, you will not have to worry about counting calories.

-Have a complete breakfast everyday.

-Always eat veggies/fruit and lean protein with each meal.

-With the exception of breakfast, only eat starches (oatmeal, brown rice, baked potato, whole grain pasta, etc…) on medium and high carb days. Starches are your main source of carbohydrates and thus if you manipulate your starch intake you will manipulate your carbohydrate intake. To understand this fully please see the chart below:

Low Days- No starches! Only exception would be post workout shake after cardio or conditioning.

Medium Days- You will eat starches during your meal before your training session, during and post training, and than your first two meals following your training.

High Days- Eat starches with every meal. While this may seem like a lot of carbs, remember that these are your highly anabolic days. Check this out. If you weigh 200 lbs and you are suppose to take in 2-3 grams of carbs per pound of bodyweight; that equals 400-600 carbs that day! The only feasible way to get in the necessary amount of carbohydrates is to constantly feed your body starches throughout the day.

In addition to bulking up, please note that carb cycling is a great approach for shedding body fat. While the principles remain the same, you will need to vary how many high days you have vs. low days. Obviously, bulking up will require more high days than if you were cutting. For newbie’s to carb cycling, I recommend you start with 3 high days a week, 2-3 moderate and 1-2 low days. After a couple weeks, you can critique these numbers depending on your goals and what works best for you. The benefit of using carb cycling during a cutting phase is that it allows you to decrease body fat without loosing any size.

Now that you know the secret to putting on lean muscle while maintaining body fat, it is time to take action! For those of you that are still confused, don’t worry about the macronutrient breakdown on high, low and medium days. Instead, focus on your starch intake. Lastly, remember to follow my 8 rules for getting the body you want. Stay tuned for my next article, as I will discuss optimal food selection.

Joe Meglio

Performance Enhancement Coach
www.MeglioFitness.com
www.MeglioNutrition.com
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

Sources:

http://www.tmuscle.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance_nutrition/a_beginners_guide_to_carb_cycling

The Truth About Bulking Up

Bulking up Than Cutting Down: Smart or Dumb?

The first thing that comes to mind when it comes to bulking up is eating for size. Most gym rats divide their nutrition into a “bulking” phase and a “cutting” phase. The “bulking” phase is used to put on as much muscle as possible, while the “cutting” phase is used to strip all the excess fat off that was put on while “bulking”.

Unless you are a skinny bastard and need to gain over 20 lbs, there is a better approach to increasing lean muscle mass than using the conventional “sea food” diet to bulk up. Most natural trainees believe that they can put on 10 lbs of muscle in a month or even two months. Before I discuss a more sound approach to “bulking”, let’s see why natural trainees should not go on an all out bulking phase.

The problem with most “bulking” phases is that most trainees use the off season as an excuse to eat whatever they want. While it is true that if you are not consuming enough nutrients your muscle growth will be limited, natural trainees have a limited capacity to build muscle and the amount of muscle they can build is subject to their body's ability to synthesize new muscle tissue through their protein intake. This process, known as protein synthesis, is highly dependent on genetics and natural Testosterone levels, Testosterone to cortisol ratio, insulin sensitivity, and your muscle fiber makeup (slow twitch, fast twitch), along with other factors. Eating any amount of food you want will not change your protein synthesis limit naturally. In fact, by consuming more food than your body can handle, you will have an increase in body fat. (Thibaudeau 2006).

So how much muscle can we build in a month?

As I stated before the natural trainee is completely misguided when it comes to putting on muscle mass. By stepping on a scale and seeing a 10 lb increase in a month, they are convinced that the 10 lbs is all muscle. What they don’t realize is that an increase in muscle mass leads to an increase in water storage and glycogen. In reality, a natural trainee can only gain 1-2 lbs of dry muscle mass a month. The other 8 lbs is made up of fat, water storage and glycogen. The counter agreement to this by the trainee would be that they did not gain any fat. As Christian Thibaudeau has stated, there is a ''lean threshold” for men in which they will appear to look the same regardless of their body fat. For most men a lean threshold would be between 12-16% body fat. 10% would be considered pretty lean and over 18% would be considered fat. Anything in between is very vague and it is very hard to notice fat gains. Over a couple of months this could lead to an enormous increase in body fat with eventually noticeable differences in body fat.

Should we use the tradition bodybuilding method of bulking up and then cutting down or is there a better way to put on lean muscle mass?

By consuming a caloric surplus of just enough nutrients to promote lean muscle growth, you can gain around 1-2 pounds of dry muscle per month. When compared to the tradition bulking phase, the fat gains with this method will be minimal. Let’s take a look at this approach from a year long perspective. After a year you could gain anywhere from 12-24 lbs (1-2 lbs per month) of dry muscle and as little as 6-10 lbs of fat, water storage and glycogen.(Thibaudeau 2006). Like training, the key to increasing lean muscle mass is steady progression. It takes time, dedication and consistency. Do not use a tradition “bulking” phase as an excuse to eat like a fat bastard. Instead be consistent in your eating habits and gain muscle while minimizing fat! Stay tuned for part II of this article when I will discuss what methods to use for a clean bulking cycle.

Joe Meglio

Performance Enhancement Coach

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Sources: T Muscle