Change of Plans...

[Brazensol]

Here is my dilema. We are moving across country mid September and I know I will have about a month of limited workouts and poor dieting (lots of eating on the road) although I will do my best to eat as healthy as possible. That said, I think I will use my last 6-8 weeks here in Vegas as a chance to try a bulking diet (GB's lean bulk to be exact) and try to add some lean body mass (with minimal bf) before we move. I am currently sitting at 18% bf and hope to not exceed 20-21% with the move. After we get settled in I will once again start cutting down to 15% bf so I can do my first aas cycle hopefully no later than 1 April of next year.

Does this make sense or should I just continue with my cutting efforts? How do I get the most bang for my buck?

[-KJ-]

Cut until you reach sub 10%... And clean bulk from there before you think about aas!

That's my advice. Bulking at 18% is a bad idea! I know from experience when I started out!

[Brazensol]

What type of diet did you use? How much over TDEE did you consume? What was your lifting schedule like? Also ,did you still do cardio? I appreciate the advice but would like to know more about what went wrong with your bulking experience and how you went about it. Like I mentioned I certainly won't run a cycle until I hit a minimum of 15% bf (if nothing else the one thing I've learned here is no cycle above 15% bf or under the age of 25) so no worries there. If things start to creep out of hand I will jump back into my cutting diet without hesitation. Now that my test and thyroid issues are under control I can lose weight much like when I was 30 years younger.

[Brazensol]

Bump for any other opinions/options?

[-KJ-]

IMO a bulk at that bf % will just hide any gains you make.

I ate at 400 over TDEE, workout heavy traditional HIT split 4 days per week and cardio was 2-3 days per week! it was a relatively clean bulk but gaining fat at a high bf already made me demotivated and it is harder to lose!!

[RipOwens]

I was talked out of bulking at 18%....the logic finally made sense to me....if I'm not happy at 18, am I going to be happy at 20+ bf? I was eating way over TDEE, maybe 800 or so. For me, I decided to cut BF but slowly. I'm not in a hurry so that was a factor too

[Brazensol]

Thanks guys. I really do appreciate the input. I understand your reasoning. I've just been cutting for 3+ months now and need a change of pace if nothing else. For now I think I'll eat my cutting diet macros (TDEE - 450) on non lift days and TDEE + ~300 on lift days (4 days/week). This will put me right at TDEE each week. I will be hitting the weights like there's no tomorrow for the next 6-8 weeks. Started with arms and abs yesterday and walked out of the gym with nothing left in the tank. Tri's are already sore and I hope the bi's will soon follow. Feeling it in the abs too. I will keep a very close watch on weight/bf/lm and if anything looks amiss I will jump straight back into cutting. I'd like to get some of my muscle back after watching it dwindle bit by bit the last three months. Except for leg days I plan to hit cardio every bit as hard as I have been. I guess I'll just have to see how my body responds. Now that I'm on trt and t3/t4 my body actually responds to what I do to it now unlike before when it just laughed at me and said no. lol.

[Back In Black]

Cutting for 3 months you do need a break. Maintenance or slightly above will do you no harm at all. If you then want to cut again its likely your progress will be improved as a result. The last time I ran maintenance after a cut I dropped 3lbs in 2 weeks!

Are you doing cardio?

[-KJ-]

Whatever you decide to do mate keep us posted..would like to see your progress either way!

If your happy to do a cycle at 15% why not cut until your at 15% an then bulk from there? If you want to hold off on the cycle that is.

Good luck

[Brazensol]

Cutting for 3 months you do need a break. Maintenance or slightly above will do you no harm at all. If you then want to cut again its likely your progress will be improved as a result. The last time I ran maintenance after a cut I dropped 3lbs in 2 weeks!

Are you doing cardio?

I do fasted cardio almost every morning with a 15-30 mile bike ride. Average about 16 mph so a fairly moderate pace. I really like biking and it is very easy on the knees. Honestly I worry I might be doing to much cardio and it is cutting into the lbm...

I was kind of thinking along the same lines because the body loves to do the same thing everyday and sometimes you just have to shock it with something new.

[Brazensol]

Whatever you decide to do mate keep us posted..would like to see your progress either way!

If your happy to do a cycle at 15% why not cut until your at 15% an then bulk from there? If you want to hold off on the cycle that is.

Good luck

Thanks and I'll post my progress. Since I know I won't be able to cycle until at least early next year I just thought I'd see if I can add some lean without while adding only minimal bf. Anything over 2% and it's back to cutting so it will be walking a tight rope for sure. We'll consider it a science experiment! lol.