“Learning about your own body and understanding how you respond to specific training stimuli or psychological factors is key.”
We all have different starting points, but everyone has a starting point. Some of us are naturally skinny and have visible ribs while others are heavier and have unlucky fat distribution. Chances are, if you’re a hardgainer and haven’t been active for some time, you might define yourself as “skinnyfat”. Skinny-fat is a term describing an individual who’s naturally skinny but has accumulated some fat over time. They may have skinny arms and legs but at the same time have a belly.
The “bulk or cut” question that is so common often comes from but is not exclusive to, this group of skinny-fat individuals.
And it’s a fair question. A cut is when you eat in a caloric deficit and lose weight, while a bulk is the opposite of that. The idea of bulking and cutting is to put on muscle then cut off the fat in order to reveal the gains you made during the bulk. However, many people and fitness professionals claim that it may be more beneficial to bulk while lean, being easier to gain contractile tissue.
So whether you’re skinny, fat, or a little of both, what do you do?
Reasons to bulk
If you’re going to gain weight and be heavier, you’re going to be stronger. If your ability to lift heavier weights goes up, you’ll likely see some gains. Bulking is something everyone should consider when interested in putting on muscle. We will have to always be bulking if we want to grow, only stopping to lean out for something like a bodybuilding competition or photo shoot. If getting fat scares you, consider a lean bulk. The amount of weight that you add on a bulk is ultimately up to you.
Remember that bulking is essential to gaining muscle and the idea here is to provide your body with the nutrients or building blocks needed to develop and grow contractile tissue (muscle).
Provide your body with just enough, and you’ll see muscle gains with little fat. Provide more than enough food, and you’ll still get those muscular gains but adipose tissue (fat) will develop at a higher rate as well.
If you’re at a crossroads, wondering whether or not you should cut or bulk, you’ll still have to bulk at some point. You can either start now or cut first then start bulking.
You may be wondering if bulking is more effective when lean or heavy, and the truth is- we don’t know for sure. There is some science suggesting that a lean bulk is more effective at putting on muscle, while other studies can provide insights on why bulking at a higher body fat is better.
This is a hot debate in the scientific fitness world and there is no clear answer yet.
So you want to put on some muscle, but you don’t know if you should cut or bulk to start. Let’s look at some benefits of bulking at different body fat percentages.
Reasons to bulk with a higher body fat percentage
More anabolic hormone levels become available at higher body fat percentages, including more estrogen which can be especially beneficial. There is not a lot of nutrient conservation once you exit the lean stages. If you are lean, your body is likely going to protect nutrients so a higher body fat level frees up a lot of those nutrients needed to develop new contractile tissue.
It is also worth noting that higher body fat while bulking is going to be psychologically easier and perhaps improve the mental state when dieting due to less strict eating habits.
The heavier you are, the more weight you are going to be able to lift. Everyone is different and if you’ve got a few years of lifting under your belt you should have an idea of what kind of training works for you. Anecdotally, some individuals claim that gaining muscle is easier when they lift heavy, while the other camp claims that low weight/high volume workouts do the trick for them.
If you respond well to heavy weights, then bulking at a higher body fat will likely be beneficial for you. Also, some individuals are just more comfortable when they’re a bit heavier. Our bodies can be quite stubborn and while many of us are “stuck” at the learner levels, many people feel more natural at heavier levels and will likely be more motivated to exercise if they feel good.
If you like being a little fluffy, then bulk fluffy.
Reasons to bulk with a lower body fat percentage
Now, there is an argument to be made for lean bulking. Lean bulking is when you eat in a caloric surplus (albeit a small one) and reduce the amount of adipose tissue gained during the bulk.
As mentioned above, some individuals are naturally on the lean side of the spectrum and their bodies are going to gravitate toward that, being reluctant to put on fat. If you are skinny-fat, this is probably you. The takeaway here is that you want to be comfortable and feel good in order to keep motivation levels high. If you like being lean, then lean bulk.
Studies show that individuals with higher body fat often experience increased systemic inflammation. High inflammation has been linked to a reduction in muscle growth. When we cause micro-tears in our muscles when we workout, there is a signal activated by the inflammation of those muscles, essentially indicating that a response for muscle repair is required. However, this signal can be masked or buried among all the other inflammation signals throughout the body.
To simplify, high systemic inflammation in one’s body renders the inflammation from damaged muscles undetectable, resulting in poor muscle repair.
As mentioned above, the current literature leans both ways, and there is no clear answer as of yet, whether bulking lean or heavy is more beneficial.
So do I bulk or cut?
Well, it’s ultimately up to you. Don’t worry about screwing up, because taking action and doing something is more than most people can fathom.
You have to ask yourself, “What do I want to look like, and at what cost do I want to get there?”
This website is all about gaining. That hopefully means muscle, but many individuals including myself, don’t care- they just want to be bigger. And that’s ok because beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Learning about your own body and understanding how you respond to specific training stimuli or psychological factors is key. Hopefully, you have some intuition when it comes to your body fat levels. If you like being strong and you like heavy weights, lean toward a heavier bulk. If your gut says that you’re a lean person and you feel good lean, then lean bulk.
If you’ve made it this far and you still have no idea whether to bulk or cut, then flip a coin. I’m sorry to be blunt but at the end of the day, you just need to pick one and go with it because everything is going to become a little bit easier when you have a direction and a goal. If you pick the “wrong” direction- you’re not doing any damage and I would argue that you’re not wasting your time.
If you want to learn more about bulking as a hardgainer, go here.
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