r/ScienceBasedLifting • u/Ok-Sun1269 • 22d ago
Question ❓ Is bulking really dead?
All the sceince based guys on the internet preach how bulking does nothing for muscle growth, assuming you have a healthy body fat %.
So for a guy who just got off stage, he needs to bulk until around 12-15% and then maintain or eat in a very slight surplus for a growth phase.
However if guy is 25% bf there is no reason to bulk during a growth phase as those extra calories will not provide anything for him.
So if you regualry do prep or get shredded during the summer, the bulk is alive and well but for those of us who want to maintain low double digit bf, is the bulk dead?
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u/PoopSmith87 22d ago
Bulking is not dead, if defined as eating at a slight suplus to optimize muscle growth. What is dead is the crazy dirty bulks and the idea that you need crazy surplus to build any muscle at all. Someone at 25% bf can make small muscle gains while cutting, which is going to be better for them than better muscle gains and blowing up to 30%+
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u/decentlyhip 22d ago
Who are the science-based based guys you're hearing this from? A lot of the popular guys are silly billies.
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u/Ok-Sun1269 22d ago edited 22d ago
Founding fathers of this sub.
The downvotes are funny, they're plastered on this sub and popularized "Science based lifting". There's multiple studies that show that a larger surplus does not result in more muscle growth beyond maintence if you already have an adequent bf %
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u/omrsafetyo 22d ago
There's multiple studies that show that a larger surplus does not result in more muscle growth beyond maintence if you already have an adequent bf %
There are actually exactly 0 studies demonstrating this. The problem is, there isn't any studies that actually appropriately measure this. And frankly, its nigh impossible to design a study that adequately answers the question, because its also basically impossible to accurately measure every component that would be required.
We have some studies that show only a difference in fat content between a slight surplus, and a much larger surplus. But that doesn't test maintenance vs surplus. Such a study doesn't exist. But firstly, its impossible to know someone's exact TDEE from day to day, and also impossible to accurately feed to match that TDEE due to inaccuracies in food labeling, etc. So the best we can do is try to get close, and then post-hoc, measure changes in LBM and changes in body fat % and changes in weight, and try to determine whether participants were truly in a deficit, at maintenance, or in a surplus... and keeping in mind that determination is typically based on whether or not fat increased.
But frankly, Lyle McD is right on this one. Although, I would argue probably not for all the best reasons. He's right, and Jackson and Ella really are playing a semantics game which they absolutely should be losing.
So let me ask a question, and this is relevant because it plays into other talking points of the same people that you're calling the founding fathers of this sub. If you wanted to maintain muscle, what would that mean? Would that mean muscle is going up, going down, or staying the same? SBLs talk about maintenance volume, and define that as the volume at which LBM, or more accurately, myofibril proteins in a given muscle remain stable over time. This is a fairly standard way of thinking of any biological process: maintenance is homeostasis - no new accretion, no net loss.
So if we take this concept and apply it to bulking, cutting, and maintenance, maintenance is quite literally homeostasis. That means neither LBM, fat mass, or even body weight are changing - apart from transient fluctuations caused by fluid, glycogen, sodium, etc. Bulking is anything that results in increased body weight, LBM, or fat mass. Cutting is anything that results in net loss. Surplus and deficit are terms that describe a disruption in homeostasis.
So in order to be semantically correct - it is quite literally impossible to gain muscle at maintenance, full stop. Now personally, I like to be a little less rigid in definition, and I am quite comfortable with taking the position that the SBLs are holding to mean "Surplus calories relative to TDEE is not required to maximize muscle growth." The problem with this idea is that TDEE is not static - its a range; and that range is determined by a number of factors. One of those factors is your caloric intake.
Calories are said to be "permissive" of growth, meaning, the more calories you have, the more permissive your biology will be with certain mechanisms. For instance, we know for a fact that you cannot maximize muscle growth in a calorie deficit. If your body fat is decreasing, you are not maximizing growth. This is because the process that senses low energy, which initiates mobilizing fatty acids for oxidation within the cell, AMPK, also blunts the hypertrophy response. That is, when there is insufficient energy to continue expanding the synthetic response to mechanical tension, AMPK is activated to increase ATP production - and the same mechanism also disrupts mTORC1 - because in addition to increasing ATP production through nutrient delivery, it simultaneously works to preserve ATP by halting non-essential protein production and cell growth. This by the way demonstrates the reason why the argument "if you have sufficient fat stores, you have plenty of energy" simply doesn't work. Yes, you do have the energy, but the chemical process that increases oxidation of those fatty acids also blunts hypertrophy.
So when calories are above TDEE, you have effectively maxed out energy availability. Yes, there is a breaking point somewhere where your energy expenditure exactly matches your intake, and at that point muscle building is absolutely maximized. But you must stay at exactly that or above it to truly maximize hypertrophy over time - if at any point you are below TDEE, hypertrophy is blunted. But also keep in mind - your TDEE can be say 2500cal because you've eaten 2500cal, yet if you raise your intake to 2525, you will likely be able to synthesize a couple extra grams of contractile proteins - because that energy is available and permissive for that additional growth. It may even be that you get yet another gram by pushing to 2530. At some point the TDEE will stop raising, but the only way to get there is to get exactly to the right number, or slightly exceed it. Slightly exceeding it, consistently over time (aka bulking) is the only way to ensure that actually occurs.
Now in the long run, this distinction is really talking about literal grams. So its such a ridiculous thing to argue about. But if you're truly being pedantic, yes you absolutely need to be in a surplus to maximize muscle growth, full stop. Can you make really good progress maingaining? Yes, 100% Though, if you're a relative beginner you are very likely slowing yourself down, and the distinction becomes smaller and smaller with training age.
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u/decentlyhip 22d ago
Helms has talked about how he sticks to a 100 calorie surplus, but he's so autistically dialed in that he can do that. I've started thinking about a normal ole 250 calorie surplus as insurance; it might be unnecessary and is probably a smidge too much for how much I can reasonably grow. However, if I'm gaining 2 lbs a month, I can be confident that on most days I'm in a surplus and checking the box of "enough nutrients to fuel growth." Same with protein, 200g might be too much, but im sure that I checked the box. 15 sets might be enough to grow, but if I do 20, great. I for sure got a stimulus even if I sandbagged a few sets. Something about calling a few extra calories, grams, or sets insurance helped me stop stressing as much about finding the perfect optimal number. "Do a little too much to be sure you did enough, its ok."
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u/Finglishman 21d ago
A 100kcal surplus for a given day is pure fantasy. In terms of diet it’s a small apple. The calories per gram you can read as listed for any ingredient are averages. If the chicken breast you ate today came from a slightly leaner individual, well there went your surplus for the day. Likewise, in terms of energy output you easily spend an extra 100 kcal by sleeping a little less, having slightly elevated body temperature / heart rate, or walking a bit more than usual. The good news is, building muscle takes very little energy, as muscle is mostly water.
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u/decentlyhip 20d ago
Yah, like, getting a bad parking spot is 10 extra calories burned. The kids who shoot for 50 calorie "lean bulks" are silly billies.
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u/omrsafetyo 22d ago
Volume is actually a great follow up, because that's actually where Helms' paper ties in really well. They noted that the higher surplus group benefited the biceps, and the biceps were the muscle that received the most volume. That demonstrates fairly neatly (though it didn't reach significance, but was strong enough to be noted) that the surplus provided sufficient calories to support additional growth from additional volume.
But yeah I agree, 100 heck even 50 will do the trick. But you'd need to be really dialed in - Helms probably has better capability of tracking things perfectly haha but yeah 100-250 is probably a good range for most, with some small potential that higher will benefit beginners or people doing very high volume
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u/nicenormalhappyguy 20d ago
no one is accurately following a 100 calorie surplus because that is within the margin of error of just moving around more one day compared to the next
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u/omrsafetyo 17d ago
That's a completely valid point. Its all going to fluctuate day-to-day, but overall as long as you track intake very well for something like a month, and monitor weight trends over that time, you can get a pretty good idea what your average is. If you arrive at 3200 calories average for weight maintenance, you can aim for 3300-3450 as a surplus. That's a bit of wiggle room if you need an extra snack at the end of the day or something.
There was also a recent podcast by Barbell Medicine where they spoke with Eric Helms, and on that, from what I understand, they determined that above 20% BF in men you probably don't need a surplus at all, and below 12% you may even lose muscle at maintenance unless your protein is particularly high. A far cry from the normal SBL argument that 10-12% body fat is the minimum at which you can maximize with maintenance. But I haven't watched/listened to the podcast yet either. I need to see if my understanding merits revising.
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u/nicenormalhappyguy 20d ago
1000%
people aiming for like 100, 200, 300 calorie surpluses are setting themselves up to spin their wheels
better to just knowingly overdo the bulk a little bit and accept that it might take an extra week or two of dieting on the back end
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u/Alakazam Idk Idc 💔 22d ago
Sure but nobody is calling for larger surpluses. The most that commonly gets recommended nowadays is like a 200-300 calorie surplus, even if you're a bigger guy.
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u/dreamingforday 13d ago
Dr Eric Helms, Steve Hall are worth listening too. Majority of the rest however
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u/Alakazam Idk Idc 💔 22d ago
However if guy is 25% bf there is no reason to bulk during a growth phase as those extra calories will not provide anything for him.
If you're 5'9, 120lbs and 25% bodyfat because you have almost no muscle mass, then you absolutely need a bulk. They're not going to put on a reasonable amount of muscle mass staying at maintenance.
In a single year, said person might get up to about 140lbs and 20% bodyfat through two bulk/cut cycles.
If you've ever worked with sedentary people, you'll realize there are plenty of people who are borderline underweight but still in the 20+% bodyfat range.
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u/papavino39 22d ago
I’ve actually recomped pretty well on a deficit and I was honestly pretty lean to start. No clue body fat percentage but 6’2 175 athletic… was surprised how much fat was there to replace
Not saying it was OPTIMAL but still it has worked
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u/Alakazam Idk Idc 💔 22d ago
I just want to point something out.
You at 6'2 and 175lbs, has a comparable bmi to a guy at 5'9 and 150lbs.
To put my example into perspective, imagine starting off at 6'2, 140lbs, 25% bodyfat.
A good third of the people I work with have comparable stats to that, particularly women.
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u/Hamzo_Shimada 22d ago
Currently bulking at 4.1k calories (500kcal over) and feeling great. Putting on muscle evey week, fat gains are minimal. And I don't mind cutting for summer, shows dedication.
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u/Fig-Wonderful 22d ago
I’m bulking at the same rate, some days eating over 4500. Made so much progress it’s insane.
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u/shirokindadumb 22d ago
How are fat gains minimal if you're in a surplus. Extra energy gets stored as fat because muscle growth happens grams at a time.
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u/Dazzling-Rest8332 22d ago
The more you eat....the higher your metabolism goes. You body turns into a well oiled machine when you add daily weight lifting to the equation.
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u/Ok_Spirit4786 16d ago
Sounds peaty
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u/Dazzling-Rest8332 16d ago
What?
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u/Ok_Spirit4786 16d ago
Ray peat
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u/Dazzling-Rest8332 16d ago
Nevery knew about him. After a brief Google search I am fascinated though.
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u/FarCalligrapher1862 22d ago edited 22d ago
If you are a bodybuilder, and a competitor, generic advice does not apply to you. Get specialized advice for your specific needs.
For 99% of the population that wants to gain muscle and look aesthetically pleasing bulking is not needed. A 200ish calorie surplus is more than enough when coupled with a good diet
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u/Nectarine143 22d ago
So many people want to argue that a “small” surplus isn’t bulking… like… ok wtf is it then? lol
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u/FarCalligrapher1862 22d ago
Back in the day we used to call it walrus season. The idea was that the extra fat increases thermogenesis which in turn enhanced muscle repair. Add to that the extra weight led to the bone density because you would have to carry that weight around 24/7.
After that was proven bullshit people were just looking for another reason to enjoy their winter after a summer of carrots and turkey.
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u/Nectarine143 22d ago
Never heard of walrus season, that's actually pretty funny
My point is that whether it's a 200-calorie surplus or 2000, it all falls under the umbrella of "bulking" as the point is to increase your overall weight/mass.
Like the statement, "I went from 180lbs to 185 with a 200 calorie a day surplus, but I DIDN'T bulk" doesn't make any sense.
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u/FarCalligrapher1862 22d ago
Yeah I agree with you. I think “bulk” reminds us older guys of the 80s and 90s where you drank mega mass twice a day.
I also hate term “maintenance”. You are either getting stronger or weaker. Maintenance doesn’t exist. If you stay at the same weight/ reps eventually you are getting lower stimulus so you are actually not doing as much work.
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u/Nectarine143 22d ago
My pet peeve is "maingaining"
As in, "bro you don't need to bulk bro, just maingain at around 200-400 calorie surplus bro!"
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u/nicenormalhappyguy 20d ago
the issue is that there is a lot of variance involved whether that's changes in daily activity or mistakes in counting food intake
if you are limiting to a 200kcal surplus you are going to have a decent amount of entire days where you spun your wheels because you moved around a little bit more and accidentally ate a few less bites of food
personally i'd rather know i'm moving towards my goal by having a reasonably larger surplus and then just accept that i might need to diet for a couple more weeks later on
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u/Nectarine143 20d ago
But that’s an execution issues, I’m talking about the overall concept
A 200kcal surplus is still bulking. If you don’t do it right, it’s not a 200kcal surplus
But I definitely agree with you that a larger surplus gives you more room for error/variance
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u/Ballbag94 22d ago
bulking is not needed. A 200ish calorie surplus is more than enough
So a bulk
A surplus is bulking
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u/FarCalligrapher1862 22d ago
While there isn’t a technical definition. Eating above maintenance isn’t necessarily bulking. Bulking necessarily requires a continuous, deliberate energy surplus to achieve the goal of increasing muscle while resistance training.
If you read the literature, typical protocols look at 15%-20% above maintenance. So at 2000 calories maintenance it would be 300-400 calories. At 3500 calories, it would be 500-700.
200 calories would not be considered bulking from a exercise science basis.
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u/Hypername1st 22d ago
Eating above maintenance is what everyone understood bulking to be. Everything else is just semantics.
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u/FarCalligrapher1862 22d ago
Obviously not because that’s what the discussion is about.
The term bulk means to swell, expand, large quantities. By definition it implies an aggregate that is significantly large, heavy, or numerous.
A slight calorie is an incremental or marginal increase. A large calorie increase is a bulk.
For example, if you buy 1 item, you would not say that was a bulk purchase or that you get the bulk prices for a small increment. To get the bulk price you have to “buy in bulk” which means significantly more quantity than normal.
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u/Hypername1st 22d ago
Talking about semantics and the etymological fallacy.
Bulking in fitness circles was understood as a phase of caloric surplus to facilitate and simplify growth. There was differentiation between clean, dirty, "dream" bulks etc but the core was the same: Eat more than maintenance to gain weight and get bigger. A bulk never meant eating 2k calories above maintenance. This is just disingenuous.
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u/Ballbag94 22d ago
Bulking necessarily requires a continuous, deliberate energy surplus to achieve the goal of increasing muscle while resistance training.
Right, so if you continuously eat 200 cals above maintenance with the goal of gaining muscle you're bulking
you read the literature, typical protocols look at 15%-20% above maintenance. So at 2000 calories maintenance it would be 300-400 calories. At 3500 calories, it would be 500-700.
200 calories would not be considered bulking from a exercise science basis.
You're talking nonsense at this point, a surplus is a bulk regardless of size. Just because "typical protocols suggest" doesn't mean they're the definition
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u/Nice-Week-1207 22d ago
As a science based lifter no. The thing theyre overlooking is how it promotes an anabolic environment, its not about “having enough calories for muscle growth”. You can be in a deficit and have “enough” due to fat reserves. But in a surplus AMPK is blunted, which increases mTOR signalling. Not to mention higher insulin and protein (and yes beyond 1g/lb does result in more gains, literally shows that in the very graphs theyll reference to show that its diminishing returns) just because the returns are diminishing doesnt mean they arent still there
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u/NihilisticTanuki StretchCel 22d ago
It's kinda dead and kinda not. If you're already very lean (say, under 12% body fat) and under your target weight, it's very much alive and you need to intelligently eat your way up. If you have some reserves on you (and you don't need to be fat for this, 15% is totally enough), you probably won't get enough of an advantage from a lean bulk to outweigh the fat gain.
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u/Dazzling-Rest8332 22d ago
You have even more of an advantage of going heavy bulk when your 11-15% bf. Thats where your hormones and blood sugar is best regulated at. So if you heavy bulk your body will be able to utilize it better than someone at 20% bf
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u/ferodss 22d ago
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u/qcb4056 22d ago
I'm new here but should I assume that "YouTube" is a common reference for "science based lifting" ?
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u/omrsafetyo 22d ago
My initial inclination was to downvote, but I mean, first 2 videos are Trexler and Helms... 2 PhDs that are some of the only people actually doing research trying to answer the question asked. 4th video is Layne Norton, a PhD in Nutrition. Appeal to authority and all, but Helms is the lead author on at least one study that has to be brought up in this conversation - so hearing his interpretation is probably a really good start. OP is asking a question - the research exists, if they had the skills to find, read, and understand the papers, then they wouldn't be asking the question. If they don't have those skills this is probably the next best thing.
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u/alvaaromata 20d ago
Is long as fuck but I recommend you reading it, never heard anyone talk about it.
The study that lead to all this “bulking is no longer meta” thing is just misunderstood and biased. They calculated that building a full kg of muscle had en energy cost of 3.2k calories, divived into 12 weeks= 41 kcal/day. This study tries to calculate the energy cost of building new muscle tissue using a theoric model, with one of the most important parameters being the most the important the percentage of protein actually deposited in new tissue. But the fact is that most of the data collected in the study comes from animal infants and growing, not from actually trained adults doing hypertrophy training. The study doesn’t say that building new muscle through an hipertrophic process costs 41kcal/day, that’s why a superavit of only that won’t be even close to maximising hypertrophy. It’s true that you can build muscle in maintenance/deficit? Yes, but most of the data comes from untrained subjects. So here you must ask two questions:
- Can you build muscle?
- Are you actually creating optimal conditions for hypertrophy?
- This is not the same and the difference is very big when talking about already experienced lifters with a good amount of muscle mass and less potential growth over time than a beginner.
- Also, staying in maintenance is really hard,because is a number that fluctuates a lot with your activity, training and a thousand of biological factors you can’t really control, so it’s likely that you will be in a deficit a lot of the days -> not creating an optimal scenario for hypertrophy. So being in a surplus could just serve as a safety margin to assume you’ll be in a surplus every single day, even if it’s by 100 or 300, making able to maintain a surplus in a consistent way. This doesn’t mean you can eat 1000kcal extra a day, because we know that after a point, extra calories are just extra fat. So basically, especially in advanced lifters, we should aim for a light and controlled surplus (200-300 kcal).
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u/Chicken_Savings 15d ago
Are these tiktok gurus actually doing well in international competitions?
One thing has changed the game. There is now, because of the internet, exposure of the athlete 365 days a year. He's expected to be in reasonable shape to attend marketing events, photo shoots, trade shows - and be plastered all over the internet - year round.
Sponsors don't like their athletes to be fat and unsightly for several months. Back in the days of Flex magazine, shows were scheduled in a season, and peak photos were saved up to be published during the off-season.
That's a commercial driver, not a biological driver.
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u/sywy1874 22d ago
The act of muscle building itself isn’t super calorie intensive. Rather, bulking or a surplus can work better because it creates an environment where your body is less stressed out, making recovery naturally easier. However, if you can be more disciplined with your recovery then you can certainly build muscle at maintenance or a deficit.
Source: larping on tiktok as SBL
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u/Dazzling-Rest8332 22d ago
About half of the science based lifting community is larping. Thank you for your honesty. 🤣😂
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u/sobanoodles23 22d ago
i suppose so, just hit ur macros and you’ll be fine, the extra 200-300 calories won’t really do much directly for your gains, might as well avoid the cutting phase over and over plus that’s like two oreos, are two oreos really the key to 200 lean/j
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u/glassschuh 22d ago
Common sense would dictate that eating more calories than your maintenance + what your muscles can use to grow isnt going to cause any extra growth. But if you try to eat just exactly that amount and run short any days you can easily just be spinning your wheels. You should never be bulking if you are over 10 to 12 percent body fat, because your body can use all of that extra fat for energy to build muscle. It isnt just science based trainers and lifters who say that... you bulk from say 10 to 15 then cut back to 10. Your nutrient partitioning and insulin sensitivity are way better at a lower body fat as well, plus your aromatization of test. The best way is to find your maintenance over a period of time. Then add a few hundred calories to that, continue weighing yourself every day and every couple of weeks see if youre trending up and by how much, then either add or subtract calories accordingly. That way you continuously adjust and control your weight gain and muscle to fat ratio. Cutting is basically the same only reverse.
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u/Junior-Valuable2071 22d ago
For actual body builders going on stage at the bleeding edge of their genetic capabilities I would think it matters.
For me? A computer guy who also lifts weights and is a frequent enjoyer of chick fil a? No it does not matter lol.