Need advice on my bulk

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dylanzs2015
dylanzs2015 Posts: 6 Member
in Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
How's it going everyone, just looking for a little advice, I'm 19, 5ft 8in, 80kg I'm currently bulking, eating 2500 calories a day with a 40/30/30 macro split (carb/pro/fat) I'm just training for muscle mass and strength, I do a normal 5 day lifting split with a light jog at the end of every session to keep my cardio fitness up not for fat loss.

My question is should I keep bulking or just maintain my weight for a few months see how much mass I build and take it from there? I already have a decent amount of fat on me, my plan was to continue the bulk until December then start a slow cut. Any advice would be appreciated, thanks in advance

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  • Springfield1970
    Springfield1970 Posts: 1,945 Member
    edited March 2015
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    Thats 176lb. I've got you at 3139cals to MAINTAIN a day as a 3-5 hour a week exerciser, so your numbers are a bit skewed.
    You're gaining weight with those calories? Or your not being meticulous with counting perhaps?
    Macro splits are a bit out of fashion.
    Try .8g of protein per lb of body weight, and .35g of fat per lb of body weight, fill the rest with carbs.

    Though I suspect theres some miscalculations somewhere....
    Whats your body fat percentage btw?
  • dylanzs2015
    dylanzs2015 Posts: 6 Member
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    Springfield1970 wrote: »
    Thats 176lb. I've got you at 3139cals to MAINTAIN a day as a 3-5 hour a week exerciser, so your numbers are a bit skewed.
    You're gaining weight with those calories? Or your not being meticulous with counting perhaps?
    Macro splits are a bit out of fashion.
    Try .8g of protein per lb of body weight, and .35g of fat per lb of body weight, fill the rest with carbs.

    Though I suspect theres some miscalculations somewhere....
    Whats your body fat percentage btw?

    I have only just started counting my calorie intake, before that I was just going off the top of my head eating clean but high carb/protein meals, about 5-7 small meals a day.

    My calculating is more then likely wrong to be honest a friend of mine told me to times my body weight by 14 and that would be my maintenance caloric intake (1,140), anyway I'll aim for 3500 calories a day and see how I feel after a month, thank you for correcting my useless attempt ahaha.

    I have definitely been gaining weight, slowly though, more muscle than fat but I have put on a bit of extra fat with that muscle.

    As for my body fat percentage I wouldn't have a clue as I have never had it measured nor would I even know what I'm doing to measure it myself. I can still see my top two abs, not that that really helps, if I took a stab in the dark if say around 15-20 percent at the most but that's by eye so obviously not helpful. Anyway sorry for the wall of text and thanks for your help. :)
  • juggernaut1974
    juggernaut1974 Posts: 6,212 Member
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    dylanzs2015 wrote: »
    Springfield1970 wrote: »
    Thats 176lb. I've got you at 3139cals to MAINTAIN a day as a 3-5 hour a week exerciser, so your numbers are a bit skewed.
    You're gaining weight with those calories? Or your not being meticulous with counting perhaps?
    Macro splits are a bit out of fashion.
    Try .8g of protein per lb of body weight, and .35g of fat per lb of body weight, fill the rest with carbs.

    Though I suspect theres some miscalculations somewhere....
    Whats your body fat percentage btw?

    My calculating is more then likely wrong to be honest a friend of mine told me to times my body weight by 14 and that would be my maintenance caloric intake (1,140),

    That rule of thumb means weight in POUNDS (ie 176 x 14 = 2,464) not KG.

    And it is just an average - your actual maintenance can vary by several hundred calories off of that based on a variety of things.

  • NRBreit
    NRBreit Posts: 319 Member
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    I'm 172 lbs. and maintain on 2,500-2,600 cals working out 3-4 days per week (no cardio). If you are new to lifting, you can make some good gains without bulking. If you've been lifting for awhile and your strength has leveled out, you can continue to make strength gains by beginning to eat at a surplus. But you say you already have a fair amount of body fat on you so you may want to wait on bulking until your BF% is in a more ideal range (i.e. 10%-15%).
  • dylanzs2015
    dylanzs2015 Posts: 6 Member
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    NRBreit wrote: »
    I'm 172 lbs. and maintain on 2,500-2,600 cals working out 3-4 days per week (no cardio). If you are new to lifting, you can make some good gains without bulking. If you've been lifting for awhile and your strength has leveled out, you can continue to make strength gains by beginning to eat at a surplus. But you say you already have a fair amount of body fat on you so you may want to wait on bulking until your BF% is in a more ideal range (i.e. 10%-15%).

    I'm just getting back into lifting, I only had a solid year of lifting experience and I have been off for one year, my strength is no where near what it used to be, I would say I'm skinny fat, still kept a lot of my original gains though, I wouldn't mind gaining a bit extra weight slowly to help me out a bit. I'm just going to aim for around 3000-3500 calories a day, see how my body responds and take it from there.

    Only thing I'm unsure of is if I should do 50/30/20 or 70/15/15 (c/p/f)
  • NRBreit
    NRBreit Posts: 319 Member
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    dylanzs2015 wrote: »
    NRBreit wrote: »

    Only thing I'm unsure of is if I should do 50/30/20 or 70/15/15 (c/p/f)

    The most frequent answer lately on this will be to not use percentages. Instead, shoot for a minimum of .8 grams Protein per pound of body weight, .4 grams/lb Fats, and fill the rest of your calorie target with carbs. For example, on a 2,800-3,000 cal/day diet, I usually shoot for approx. 180g Protein, 100g Fats, and 300+g Carbs. In my opinion, a diet consisting of only 15% fats would be very tough to maintain (that's only 50g fats for a 3,000 cal diet).
  • dylanzs2015
    dylanzs2015 Posts: 6 Member
    edited March 2015
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    NRBreit wrote: »

    The most frequent answer lately on this will be to not use percentages. Instead, shoot for a minimum of .8 grams Protein per pound of body weight, .4 grams/lb Fats, and fill the rest of your calorie target with carbs. For example, on a 2,800-3,000 cal/day diet, I usually shoot for approx. 180g Protein, 100g Fats, and 300+g Carbs. In my opinion, a diet consisting of only 15% fats would be very tough to maintain (that's only 50g fats for a 3,000 cal diet).

    Okay, think I'm getting the idea now aha, by my calculations I should be on a minimum of 140.8 grams of protein and 70.4 grams of fat. I'm going to be aiming for 78g fat, 175g protein and 525g carbs, I realise it isn't a lot of fat but I may adjust after a test run.

    Thanks a lot for your advice man, much appreciated.
  • NRBreit
    NRBreit Posts: 319 Member
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    dylanzs2015 wrote: »
    NRBreit wrote: »

    The most frequent answer lately on this will be to not use percentages. Instead, shoot for a minimum of .8 grams Protein per pound of body weight, .4 grams/lb Fats, and fill the rest of your calorie target with carbs. For example, on a 2,800-3,000 cal/day diet, I usually shoot for approx. 180g Protein, 100g Fats, and 300+g Carbs. In my opinion, a diet consisting of only 15% fats would be very tough to maintain (that's only 50g fats for a 3,000 cal diet).

    Okay, think I'm getting the idea now aha, by my calculations I should be on a minimum of 140.8 grams of protein and 70.4 grams of fat. I'm going to be aiming for 78g fat, 175g protein and 525g carbs, I realise it isn't a lot of fat but I may adjust after a test run.

    Thanks a lot for your advice man, much appreciated.

    Sounds good man. Some people feel better with higher carbs and others like higher fats. Whatever makes you feel the best and helps you achieve better workouts.
  • sjohnson__1
    sjohnson__1 Posts: 405 Member
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    At 15-20% bf, I wouldn't recommend bulking unless you're not concerned at all about putting on extra body fat. That said, the positive would be solid strength gains, especially if you're fairly new to training. If it were me, I would either recomp (at maintenance) or cut to a lower bf% before beginning a slow bulk. Based on a bf% of 16%, I have calculated your maintenance to be at 2740 cals. (I used the Katch-McArdle calculation that is widely considered the most accurate formula for those who are relatively lean. But, again this is best when you have a measurement of BF%, so using a guesstimate isn't going to be 100% accurate.)

    So, to be safe... maybe somewhere between 2700-3000 is your maintenance. Try eating at around 2850 for a week or two and see if your weight levels off. Then, either add 20% cals or subtract 20% cals for a bulk or cut. Macros can be adjusted once you figure out what your goal is.

    Hope this helps.
  • dylanzs2015
    dylanzs2015 Posts: 6 Member
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    sjohnson__1 wrote: »
    At 15-20% bf, I wouldn't recommend bulking unless you're not concerned at all about putting on extra body fat. That said, the positive would be solid strength gains, especially if you're fairly new to training. If it were me, I would either recomp (at maintenance) or cut to a lower bf% before beginning a slow bulk. Based on a bf% of 16%, I have calculated your maintenance to be at 2740 cals. (I used the Katch-McArdle calculation that is widely considered the most accurate formula for those who are relatively lean. But, again this is best when you have a measurement of BF%, so using a guesstimate isn't going to be 100% accurate.)

    So, to be safe... maybe somewhere between 2700-3000 is your maintenance. Try eating at around 2850 for a week or two and see if your weight levels off. Then, either add 20% cals or subtract 20% cals for a bulk or cut. Macros can be adjusted once you figure out what your goal is.

    Hope this helps.

    I'm not really concerned about gaining extra body fat, if I notice my self getting over weight and my muscle:fat ratio going askew I'll definitely cut back, but iv never had a problem dropping weight in the past, I find it rather easy (knock on wood) to be honest, my main focus at the moment is to add strength and mass, I definitely appreciate the added advice man and will take it on board for sure, thank you for your input.

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