It’s that time of year...

MichaelK1007

It’s that time of year again and I am coming off a 16 week cut. It’s once again time for another lean bulk with the challenging goal of adding lean muscle with minimal fat. During my cut I have really began to see the benefits of cardio and want to continue during my lean bulk. I’d like your thoughts on the type of cardio, HIIT, LISS or both or non at all. My current plan is for 15-20 min of cardio per day and on off days maybe add a second cardio session. Thanks.

sijomial

Your cardio should be appropriate to your fitness goals and also what you enjoy, or will endure.
What are your goals from your cardio? What is your current fitness level?

No cardio at all isn't healthy IMHO.

LISS might be appropriate or it might not depending on the individual, steady state also doesn't have to mean low intensity (most of my winter SS is moderate to high pace). Downside of LISS is that it can be dull.

HIIT is difficult as what most people call HIIT simply isn't, it's just being misused to describe any old interval routine or even circuit training. If people say they enjoy it or do it multiple times a week or do it for an hour then that's a huge clue it's not HIIT they are actually doing.
Real HIIT (cardio, bursts of maximal effort and then recovery periods) is hugely fatiguing and requires substantial recovery - antagonistic to someone training hard in the weights room. Even if appropriate for an individual it would be used sparingly.

As an example my bike training yesterday was 2mins at very fast pace (a pace I couldn't sustain for 4mins) and 3mins recovery and repeat for an hour. That was very intense but it is not HIIT, it's just interval training.
One of the upsides to intervals as compared to SS is that it's mentally far more interesting and time seems to pass quicker.

sardelsa

Nothing wrong with keeping cardio in during a bulk (probably a good idea to do some), just make sure you can keep up with your calorie intake, recovery and it doesn't impact your lifting performance. As mentioned, true HIIT can be really taxing and it can really interfere with your lifting so I probably would not recommend it often or at all during a bulk. Since you goal is to add muscle, you really want to make sure your lifting is top priority.

I very minimal cardio during a bulk (if at all). Would I recommend that? Not really... but I am active in my day to day life. I just cannot keep up with the intake. So that works for my goals.

MichaelK1007

sijomial wrote: »

Your cardio should be appropriate to your fitness goals and also what you enjoy, or will endure.
What are your goals from your cardio? What is your current fitness level?

No cardio at all isn't healthy IMHO.

LISS might be appropriate or it might not depending on the individual, steady state also doesn't have to mean low intensity (most of my winter SS is moderate to high pace). Downside of LISS is that it can be dull.

HIIT is difficult as what most people call HIIT simply isn't, it's just being misused to describe any old interval routine or even circuit training. If people say they enjoy it or do it multiple times a week or do it for an hour then that's a huge clue it's not HIIT they are actually doing.
Real HIIT (cardio, bursts of maximal effort and then recovery periods) is hugely fatiguing and requires substantial recovery - antagonistic to someone training hard in the weights room. Even if appropriate for an individual it would be used sparingly.

As an example my bike training yesterday was 2mins at very fast pace (a pace I couldn't sustain for 4mins) and 3mins recovery and repeat for an hour. That was very intense but it is not HIIT, it's just interval training.
One of the upsides to intervals as compared to SS is that it's mentally far more interesting and time seems to pass quicker.

Thanks for the great insight. Cardio for me has become more about general heart health than anything else but I am also hoping it will serve to help minimize fat gain during the bulk. Lifting will of course be the priority and I could see the benefits of SS and HIIT. To clarify my SS whether on the spinning bike, stair master or jogging with the dog my average heart rate is around 75-80%. When performing HIIT my heart rate jumps to 95-100% and then back down to 70%. I limit HIIT to 15 min as this is about all I can handle. Not sure if I could continue this intensity as I gain. I also don’t want to risk losing any muscle I gain during the process.

sijomial

mkgoodson1007 wrote: »

sijomial wrote: »

Your cardio should be appropriate to your fitness goals and also what you enjoy, or will endure.
What are your goals from your cardio? What is your current fitness level?

No cardio at all isn't healthy IMHO.

LISS might be appropriate or it might not depending on the individual, steady state also doesn't have to mean low intensity (most of my winter SS is moderate to high pace). Downside of LISS is that it can be dull.

HIIT is difficult as what most people call HIIT simply isn't, it's just being misused to describe any old interval routine or even circuit training. If people say they enjoy it or do it multiple times a week or do it for an hour then that's a huge clue it's not HIIT they are actually doing.
Real HIIT (cardio, bursts of maximal effort and then recovery periods) is hugely fatiguing and requires substantial recovery - antagonistic to someone training hard in the weights room. Even if appropriate for an individual it would be used sparingly.

As an example my bike training yesterday was 2mins at very fast pace (a pace I couldn't sustain for 4mins) and 3mins recovery and repeat for an hour. That was very intense but it is not HIIT, it's just interval training.
One of the upsides to intervals as compared to SS is that it's mentally far more interesting and time seems to pass quicker.

Thanks for the great insight. Cardio for me has become more about general heart health than anything else but I am also hoping it will serve to help minimize fat gain during the bulk. Lifting will of course be the priority and I could see the benefits of SS and HIIT. To clarify my SS whether on the spinning bike, stair master or jogging with the dog my average heart rate is around 75-80%. When performing HIIT my heart rate jumps to 95-100% and then back down to 70%. I limit HIIT to 15 min as this is about all I can handle. Not sure if I could continue this intensity as I gain. I also don’t want to risk losing any muscle I gain during the process.

Minimising your fat gain is down to the size of your calorie surplus relative to your potential rate of muscle gain - not whether you do cardio or not.
Cardio doesn't burn muscle if that's what you are concerned about, that's a myth, muscle isn't a fuel (especially in a surplus).
If you are using cardio just to burn calories then HIIT is a poor choice, it's a relatively low calorie burn due to the short duration and recovery periods. It can also massively increase hunger and the fatigue can mean you do less the rest of the day.

The biggest issue I think you should be cautious of is creating too much fatigue and impacting recovery. Impaired strength training could be the indirect way your choice of cardio impacts your rate of muscle gain. You don't have to go all out for heart health, high intensity work would be just a part of an overall cardio training plan for improving fitness levels which doesn't seem to be your goal.

BTW - I hope you aren't regularly hitting 100% HR as that would be a pretty awful way to train and probably counter-productive as it's massively fatiguing. I couldn't train at all for three days after my maximal effort test in a sports science lab, felt like I had been hit by a bus!
Unless you have done a max HR ramp test hopefully it's more probable you are hitting 100% of your estimated max HR which can be very different to 100% of your actual and very personal maximum.

latestarter75

I think your lifestyle plays a big part in your decision to keep cardio in depends on your daily activity levels really,for instance on my last off season I did no cardio (have a very physical job) and still had to eat 7300 calories a day by the end to progress and that was still keeping bodyfat sub 17% so in cases like that cardio would only mean I’d have to eat even more calories. If I had a sedentary job though I’d certainly keep cardio in.

Keto_Vampire

Lol, thought this was going to be a New Year's gym rant topic based on title...

LISS seems less counterproductive vs. HIIT (can impede recovery/similar intensity energy system (glucose) as weight lifting) especially if you want to incorporate cardio on a close to daily basis. I stick with LISS but really determine how much based on total daily activity (step goals, TDEE goal)

Nothing wrong with throwing in a HIIT session fairly infrequently on off days (sometimes changing exercise up can be helpful for keeping things interesting, fresh, maintain motivation, etc.). We're not all striving to be a 300lb Ronnie Coleman I am assuming