Are you Bulking or Cutting?
By Zach Bashore


Very few people possess the knowledge needed to successfully gain
muscle or lose fat. A person may know how to lose fat but most
of you don't know how to keep all of your hard earned muscle in
the process. On the flip side, you may know how to gain muscle,
but you need to learn how to gain this muscle without the fear
of fat gain. I am going to discuss the basics of bulking and
cutting and hopefully give you the knowledge needed to complete
your next bulking or cutting diet.

Bulking is simply eating more calories than what you are used to
eating, but it`s not as simple as it seems. Your calories need
to be from healthy bodybuilding foods and not from junk foods
like pizza, chips, and cookies. The other hard part of bulking is
determining your BMR or basal metabolic Rate.(Your BMR is
basically the number of calories you'd burn if you stayed in bed
all day.) To start, you should eat 500 calories over maintenance
everyday. If you your gaining to much fat after a week reduce
that number to 300. If you seem to not be getting any bigger then
you should increase that number to 700 calories.

While cutting, your prime concern should be keeping muscle loss to
a minimum. That is why you don`t want to crash diet and try losing
weight to fast or you're most likely going to lose most of your
hard earned muscle. To start, you should lower your calories from
your BMR to roughly 300 fewer calories a day. You can change that
number according to the results but 300 is a good number to start
out at. You can either eat less food or do more cardiovascular
exercise to burn these calories. How you do it will depend on
the individual.

Some bodybuilders like to bulk up to the size of elephants before
they decide that they`ve gained to much fat, and then they go on
a cutting diet. Others seem to always be sporting a low bodyfat
percentage year round and slowly gain muscle as time goes on. Again,
how you go about it will depend on personal preference. I always
try to stay relatively lean even during the off season because I
cannot stand the thought of gaining fat.

So can I gain muscle while losing bodyfat as well? Some
bodybuilders genetics allow for this while most of us sit in awe
wondering how they did it. The use of steroids allow for fat
loss and muscle gain at the same time but they are illegal and
have unhealthy side effects.

You need to decide what you want to do with your body right now.
Do you carry around to much fat, are you to skinny, to small in
the upper body? All of these factors determine what you decide
to do with yourself. You are the only one responsible for the
results you receive.

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Four Day High Intensity Training Program

For each exericse do 3 sets 12, 10 and 8 reps adding weight each
set. For each exercise only the last set intended to be performed
to failure. Any sets prior to the last are simply warm-ups.


Monday
Chest and Triceps

Incline Barbell Presses

Hammer Strength Machine Presses

Incline Dumbbell Fly

Cable Crossovers

Skull Crushers

Dips

Tricep Pushdowns

Tuesday
Quads and Calves

Leg press

Hack Squat

Leg Extensions

Standing Calf Raise

Seated Calf Raise

Wednesday
Rest Day


Thursday
Back and Biceps

Deadlifts

Bent-over rows

Lat Pulldowns

Standing Barbell Curls

Preacher Curls

Alternating Dumbbell Curls

Friday
Hamstrings and Shoulders

Stiff Leg Deadlifts

Leg Curls

Overhead Press

Side Lateral Raises

Rear Lateral Raises

Shrugs

Saturday & Sunday
Rest Days.

Do forearms, and abs when convenient. I try to hit abs and forearms
twice a week. Make sure your nutrition is top notch and ensure
high-intensity effort in your workouts, that is the key to the
whole program.

Lose Fat, Gain Muscle, Shape Up. Sign up for our Free Weekly Bodybuilding,
Fitness and Health Tips Newsletter,and you will be automatically entered
in our monthly drawing to win Free Supplements and other great prizes.
Stay informed, stay motivated, win free stuff, join today!

Click Here To Sign Up Free