Should i bulk or cut

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nutellaboy152
nutellaboy152 Posts: 7 Member
in Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
Hi I’m 18 ang 84 kg I been going gym for 2 years and i have build a good amount of muscle but now I don’t know what to do with my calories, i want to get bigger but I think that my body fat is too high so I don’t know if i need to reduce iy before building muscle, my body fat is 23%
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  • watts6151
    watts6151 Posts: 887 Member
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    @23% it’s time to cut and see
    The results of the last 2 years work
    Then start another slow bulk
  • nutellaboy152
    nutellaboy152 Posts: 7 Member
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    This is my body i think is lower than 23% to be honest
  • steveko89
    steveko89 Posts: 2,216 Member
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    nutellaboy152 wrote: »
    This is my body i think is lower than 23% to be honest

    I would agree that 23% is high, though I don't think that changes the plan. If you're starting to feel like your BF% is getting too high, then cut. Since BF% can be difficult to reliably measure for the average person/resources, I've also heard the advice to generically cut as low as tolerable in terms of performance/energy and bulk until you don't like what you see in the mirror.
  • mmapags
    mmapags Posts: 8,934 Member
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    You're probably lower than 23% but not a lot. 18% to 20% would be my guess. Still room to cut.
  • nutellaboy152
    nutellaboy152 Posts: 7 Member
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    I used a machine at the gym and seeing that made me mad because I thought i was at 15% or below but I’m going to cut and the bulk to gain more muscle, but i want to lift heavier but if I’m eating less and I don’t think i will be building a lot muscle
  • GaryRuns
    GaryRuns Posts: 508 Member
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    These "expensive" scales and devices at the gym that measure body fat, use electrical impedance to do so and they're NOT accurate. There are really only two accurate, accessible ways to measure body fat, a hydro test, where they weigh you while submerged in a dunk tank, and a DEXA scan. Barring those two techniques, you're better off letting someone who has some experience give you an estimate based on eye-balling you.
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,013 Member
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    FatBicycler wrote: »
    nutellaboy152 wrote: »
    This is my body i think is lower than 23% to be honest
    How did you determine your body fat percentage? Looking at the picture no way you are over 10% body fat. I’d guess whatever you used to measure your body fat isn’t taking into account how much muscle you have.
    At my gym they have an expensive scale that measures your Muscle mass electronically, and gives an accurate reading of how much body fat you have. I thought I was 18 percent body fat but after I used that scale I was found out I was only 11%!!
    Standard measurements don’t take into consideration muscle mass and they assume it’s fat.

    Scales are not an accurate way to measure body fat, and 10% BF is really low, like ripped athlete level low.
    Unfortunately gyms and companies selling workout DVDs have grasped onto the inaccuracy of BIA scales and totally confused people about BF%. On one of the Beachbody workouts I do frequently, the trainer gushes over the fact that one of the guys is at 8% BF from doing the program. But he's just a normal fit looking guy, and probably more like 15%. Which is amazing, it's in the "fit" range, but false advertising nonetheless.


    OP, as with a lot of these questions, it's really up to you. If you bulk, you will put on both muscle and fat. That's why it's typical to alternate bulk/cut cycles - bulk up muscle and fat, then when you get fluffy, cut to lose the excess fat, then bulk up muscle and fat, then cut.

    You've got a couple of guys in here with far more experience than I do, so I'll quit while I still kind of know what I'm talking about :smile: Good luck!
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,607 Member
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    You're way below 23% body fat.
    And you already look ripped to me.
    That said a small cut will make you LOOK even more ripped.

    But, you probably won't progress much, or at all, while cutting.
    And at 2 years of going to the gym you're entering a phase where muscle growth will be a bit harder in spite of having age to your advantage.

    That said, a question: why are you trying to get physically bigger than your current 84kg?

    Is it because you're trying to lift more weights? Or because you're tying to look even more strong? Or do you have some other athletic competition/target in mind?

    Assuming you've looked at things such as optimizing your programming with people who know about these things, one option is to keep doing what you're doing and neither bulk nor cut.

    Another is to introduce bulk and cut cycles and coordinate them with your lifting program.

    If you were asking if it was time to END a bulk I would probably say you still had a few months of low (2lbs a month type of) bulking left in you assuming you didn't mind losing some ab definition and were going to follow it with a cut. But starting a bulk right now? Probably not.


  • nutellaboy152
    nutellaboy152 Posts: 7 Member
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    I want to get stronger because i play American football so i want to increase my weight and everything to be more powerful
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,607 Member
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    Are you not getting coached/advised? Depending on position you may benefit from different strength and cardio combinations? And you have to factor playing weight too and when. So bulking may still be on the table...
  • nutellaboy152
    nutellaboy152 Posts: 7 Member
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    No I’m not getting coached 😅 that’s why I’m confused but I want my weight to increase and strength, so i was thinking about bulking from now on and then cutting at the start of next year
  • GaryRuns
    GaryRuns Posts: 508 Member
    edited August 2019
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    FatBicycler wrote: »
    Good scales that measure electrical impedance with nodes on both the hands and feet are accurate to within 10-15% which is accurate enough for these purposes. m5mn9kyd3433.jpeg

    As you can see in the chart above 23% body fat is considered overweight just a few points under obese. No one after looking at that picture would consider you overweight. Go see a real nutritionist and see what they have to say.

    Where'd you get that chart? Found it. It looks to me like that particular table is specifically referring to non-essential body fat, or storage fat. I don't believe there's a test that can distinguish between essential and non-essential body fat. Any measurement you do is going to include both essential+non essential body fat, including BIA. For women that means you need to add about 12% to those numbers and for men about 3%. Those numbers aren't really informative for the general population. Pretty much they're only of interest to professionals in the field.

    Here's the source I found for that table:
    https://us.humankinetics.com/blogs/excerpt/normal-ranges-of-body-weight-and-body-fat

    and here's one that's more useful to those of us that aren't researchers in physiology
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_fat_percentage

    I have no idea where you're pulling that 10-15% figure. Maybe there are some BIA devices that are that accurate, for some people, but I doubt the one at your local gym, that probably hasn't been calibrated since it was bought and has dozens of people using it daily, is that accurate. They all vary pretty significantly based on hydration level even if they're calibrated perfectly. If you're consistent about when you measure yourself they can help you track changes in body fat, but absolute accuracy isn't there.
  • mmapags
    mmapags Posts: 8,934 Member
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    GaryRuns wrote: »
    FatBicycler wrote: »
    Good scales that measure electrical impedance with nodes on both the hands and feet are accurate to within 10-15% which is accurate enough for these purposes. m5mn9kyd3433.jpeg

    As you can see in the chart above 23% body fat is considered overweight just a few points under obese. No one after looking at that picture would consider you overweight. Go see a real nutritionist and see what they have to say.

    Where'd you get that chart? I recommend immediately wiping the cache on your phone and losing the link to whatever site you got it from. A woman at 8% body fat isn't "Athletic", she's probably hospitalized with anorexia, or dead! That may be a slight exaggeration, but not much of one. At the very least she's miserable, hasn't had a period in months, is starving all the time and probably can't get warm.

    If you're going to get numbers start at a reputable site. At least wikipedia has some crowd-based accuracy and is a good starting point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_fat_percentage

    I have no idea where you're pulling that 10-15% figure. Maybe there are some BIA devices that are that accurate, for some people, but I doubt the one at your local gym, that probably hasn't been calibrated since it was bought and has dozens of people using it daily, is that accurate. They all vary pretty significantly based on hydration level even if they're calibrated perfectly. If you're consistent about when you measure yourself they can help you track changes in body fat, but absolute accuracy isn't there.

    Totally agree. That chart is pretty ridiculous.
  • steveko89
    steveko89 Posts: 2,216 Member
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    mmapags wrote: »
    GaryRuns wrote: »
    FatBicycler wrote: »
    Good scales that measure electrical impedance with nodes on both the hands and feet are accurate to within 10-15% which is accurate enough for these purposes. m5mn9kyd3433.jpeg

    As you can see in the chart above 23% body fat is considered overweight just a few points under obese. No one after looking at that picture would consider you overweight. Go see a real nutritionist and see what they have to say.

    Where'd you get that chart? I recommend immediately wiping the cache on your phone and losing the link to whatever site you got it from. A woman at 8% body fat isn't "Athletic", she's probably hospitalized with anorexia, or dead! That may be a slight exaggeration, but not much of one. At the very least she's miserable, hasn't had a period in months, is starving all the time and probably can't get warm.

    If you're going to get numbers start at a reputable site. At least wikipedia has some crowd-based accuracy and is a good starting point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_fat_percentage

    I have no idea where you're pulling that 10-15% figure. Maybe there are some BIA devices that are that accurate, for some people, but I doubt the one at your local gym, that probably hasn't been calibrated since it was bought and has dozens of people using it daily, is that accurate. They all vary pretty significantly based on hydration level even if they're calibrated perfectly. If you're consistent about when you measure yourself they can help you track changes in body fat, but absolute accuracy isn't there.

    Totally agree. That chart is pretty ridiculous.

    If you change the labels on the human kinetics chart to start with "competitive body builder" and drop "athletic" down over "good" you've probably got a better indication than the wikipedia graph that's going by the ever-fatter average population.

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