Cutting After First Bulk: How To Adapt Program?

GainingTheGains

Im a male, 5'11, and during my first bulk I went from 150 to 180 lbs. Recently I started cutting to drop some body fat (10 pounds give or take) while maintaining muscle I gained. Right now I am eating 500 under me TDEE while keeping my protein high and cutting a lot of carbs. My workout program is purely weight resistance for 6 days a week (nSuns if youre familiar with it). My question is do I need to continue lifting as hard as possible weight wise, or should I lower weights and increase reps? I can already feel the effects of not eating as many carbs during sets. Also, is cardio so important to body fat lose as some people say, when Im already cutting diet wise? Thanks.

fb47

GainingTheGains wrote: »

Im a male, 5'11, and during my first bulk I went from 150 to 180 lbs. Recently I started cutting to drop some body fat (10 pounds give or take) while maintaining muscle I gained. Right now I am eating 500 under me TDEE while keeping my protein high and cutting a lot of carbs. My workout program is purely weight resistance for 6 days a week (nSuns if youre familiar with it). My question is do I need to continue lifting as hard as possible weight wise, or should I lower weights and increase reps? I can already feel the effects of not eating as many carbs during sets. Also, is cardio so important to body fat lose as some people say, when Im already cutting diet wise? Thanks.

It's all about being in a caloric deficit, cardio is only a tool to help you acheive it...but it can be cancelled if your diet is poor (basically you're still in a surplus). I lost 25-30 lbs in 4 months with not one single day of cardio and as long as I was at a 20% calorie reduction of my maintenance, I would still be losing a pound per week wether it was with cardio or not.

jseams1234

GainingTheGains wrote: »

Im a male, 5'11, and during my first bulk I went from 150 to 180 lbs. Recently I started cutting to drop some body fat (10 pounds give or take) while maintaining muscle I gained. Right now I am eating 500 under me TDEE while keeping my protein high and cutting a lot of carbs. My workout program is purely weight resistance for 6 days a week (nSuns if youre familiar with it). My question is do I need to continue lifting as hard as possible weight wise, or should I lower weights and increase reps? I can already feel the effects of not eating as many carbs during sets. Also, is cardio so important to body fat lose as some people say, when Im already cutting diet wise? Thanks.

No, do not lower the weight and increase reps. You should maintain intensity (weight on the bar) - try to increase it if you can. Lower VOLUME if you have to. Instead of doing 4 sets maybe do 3. Instead of doing 8-12 reps try increasing the weight and do 3x5 - but do not lower the weight and increase reps... great way to lose that hard earned muscle.


Lyle McDonald:

"...something has to be cut back. And in this case, again assuming that someone wants to add some type of metabolic weight training to their heavy weight training, what has to be cut back is the volume and possibly frequency of heavy training."

"The basic conclusion, again from both research and practical experience is that both volume and frequency of training can usually be cut by up to 2/3rds (that is, to 1/3rd of what you did to improve it) but with one massively important caveat: the intensity of that training must be maintained.

Put another way, you could maintain volume and frequency at the same level but if you cut intensity, you will lose the adaptation. Basically any combination that’s ever been looked at only works if intensity is maintained."

https://bodyrecomposition.com/training/weight-training-for-fat-loss-part-2.html/