LEAN BULK: A COMPLETE GUIDE TO BUILD MUSCLE WITHOUT FAT

WHAT IS CLEAN OR LEAN BULKING?

Most of us are familiar with bulking. Whether you’ve been eating meal after meal of chicken and rice, or drinking mass gainer shakes  – everyone who heads to the gym has experimented with a bulk in order to pack on mass.

The problems start when you begin to build body fat as well as muscle. You have also heard about dirty bulking. Well a ‘dirty’ bulk is not healthy, but many bodybuilders might experiment with one to gain mass at any cost. Doing so is simply not a cerebral approach to building muscle though since it is much harder to get rid of excess fat once you gain it. Following this, they’ll have to perform a tough cutting cycle. Hence, dirty bulking is an inefficient way to go about improving your body composition since getting rid of large amounts of body fat is very time-consuming and not a fun experience.

Clean or lean bulking is a far more efficient way to try and build muscle mass. By focusing on building muscle with minimal amount of fat, you may see slightly slower results but you won’t need to go through a tough cut. Therefore, this guide is going to teach you about the principles of lean bulking, as well as how to create your own nutrition, training, and supplement regimen to build muscle without gaining excessive amounts of fat tissue.

WHEN TO START FOR LEAN BULK:

First you should confirm that you are lean enough to start lean bulking. Because the fatter you are, the worse your calorie partitioning will be. And the worse your calorie partitioning is, the better your body will be at storing excess calories in the form of fat rather than muscle.

When you start while in an already fat state, you’re going to have problems like your ratio of muscle to fat gains will suck, and you’ll end up gaining more body fat (and less muscle) than you should be, you need to spend lot more time in cutting phase to get rid off that huge amount of fat. Hence, you should always make sure they are lean enough before starting to bulk.

The ideal body fat percentage to start lean bulking is question: For Men it should be 12% or less and for women it should be 22% or less.

If you are within these ideal body fat ranges, you’re good to go. If, however, you are above these body fat ranges, then you must focus on losing fat until you reach this ideal level of fat percentage. To reach there, you should be in caloric deficit (mostly from carbohydrates) like 10-20% below your maintenance level, get sufficient amounts of protein (about 1 gram/pound of body weight), and train hard with a properly designed workout plan. Once you reach that fat percentage level, then you can star your lean bulking.

 Lets talk about some nutrition basics.

MACRONUTRIENTS

The three main energy-containing macro nutrients are proteins, carbohydrates and fats.

This energy comes in the form of heat called calories;  carbohydrates and proteins contain approximately 4 calories per gram, while fats contain about 9 calories per gram. Water is also categorized as a macronutrient, but it is devoid of energy (calories).

1.        PROTEIN:

Proteins are an essential macronutrient in terms of aiding the building/repairing process of muscle tissue. For this reason, many bodybuilders and fitness enthusiasts alike often eat a large amount of protein compared to the average individual.  01 gram of protein contains 4 calories.

All proteins are made up of molecules called amino acids, which can be thought of as the building blocks of proteins. Amino acids bond together to form 3D structures that give proteins their specific functions in the body. When you eat protein, the body breaks down the amino acids into smaller peptide chains and individual amino acids and puts them to work.

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2.      CARBOHYDRATE

Carbohydrates are molecules composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. They are usually categorized as either simple sugars or complex. Simple carbohydrates include commonplace household ingredients such as table sugar (sucrose), dextrose (glucose), corn syrup, fruit sugar (fructose), molasses, etc. Sources of complex carbohydrates include grains like whole wheat, oats, barley, quinoa, rice, as well as foods like lentils, potatoes, and others. Carbohydrate works as fuel for the human body. 01 gram of carbohydrate contains 4 calories.

3.      FAT

Many people assume that the more fat they eat, the fatter they will get. Fortunately, that is not exactly how the body works and fats are quite an essential part of everyone’s diet.

Fats are essential for maintaining cell structure integrity and play a variety of roles with regards to cellular mechanisms. Therefore, fats are imperative, especially for active individuals.

 Fatty acids come in either saturated or unsaturated forms. The reasons certain fat sources, like butter and margarine, stay solid at room temperature is because the melting point is elevated compared to unsaturated fat sources, like olive oil. This is to say that saturated fat sources have a higher melting point than unsaturated fat sources. Best sources of fats are olive oil, avocados, fish oil, chia seeds, nuts, peanut butter, flex seeds etc. 01 gram of fat contains 09 calories.

          

MICRONUTRIENTS AND FIBER

Micronutrients are constituents of foods that don’t provide caloric energy but still perform a range of physiological duties and are paramount to maintaining optimal health; these include vitamins, minerals, polyphenols, and organic acids. Many of these compounds serve as antioxidants in humans, which are crucial for reducing oxidative stress.

Most people don’t need to scrutinously track their micronutrient intake so long as they are eating a generous amount of fruits and vegetables throughout the day, Also, certain supplements, like multivitamins, can help ensure your meeting your micronutrient needs.

Fiber is another important component. Both soluble and insoluble fibers aid the digestion process, help maintain intestinal integrity, assist with mineral balance, improve heart health and improve blood lipids.

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HOW TO CALCULATE YOUR CALORIES FOR LEAN BULKING:

1.     Calculate your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) by multiplying your bodyweight (in pounds) by 14  or you can simply calculate with the help of an online BMR calculator.

2.      Determine your Total Daily Expenditure (TDE)/Maintenance Calories by using any online maintenance calorie calculator or you can simply multiply below numbers with your BMR according to your activity level:

o    For Sedentary — Sitting at a desk most the day with no formal exercise → Multiply BMR by 1.2

o    Moderately Active — Moderate exercise 1 to 3 times per week with little activity otherwise → Multiply BMR by 1.3

o    Highly Active — Rigorous exercise 3 to 5 times per week and modest activity otherwise → Multiply BMR by 1.4

3. Extremely Active — Rigrous exercise 4 to 6 times per week and a labor-intensive day job (construction, landscaping, etc.) → Multiply BMR by 1.7

 Since our goal is to build muscle, you need to be in a caloric surplus (particularly on training days). On rest days you can cut down your calories from carbohydrates.

So now the question is how big should the surplus be? How many calories should add to start lean bulking?

The ideal caloric surplus needs to be small enough to keep fat gains to a realistic minimum, but yet big enough to still maximize a person’s achievable rate of muscle growth. So here are the ideal calorie surplus what tend to be best for most of the people:

For Men: 200-250 calories above maintenance.

For Women: 100-125 calories above maintenance.

For example, if your estimated maintenance level is 2000 calories, a man would eat 2200-2250 calories per day and a woman would eat 2100-2125 calories per day. These would be the initial calories to add on some muscle or ideal point to start lean bulk.

At this point, you have got your figure to start your lean bulk. You should take these calories from Macronutrients viz. protein, carbohydrates and fats. Now lets talk about how much protein, carbohydrate and fats are required during your muscle building phase:

·        Well your protein ranges between 0.7 gm to 01 gm per pound of body weight. I would highly recommend to start from the lowest figure ie. 0.7 grams.

·        Fats ranges somewhere between 20-25% of total calories

·        And rest of the calories would be coming from your carbohydrates.

Let’s take an example, suppose a person is 25 years of age, weighing 65 kgs (144 pounds) and height 5’7”. Then the entire calculation for lean bulking would be:

BMR= 144* 12= 1728 cal

Maintenance calorie (suppose he is moderately active)= 1728*1.3= 2246 cal

Now this 2246 are the calories that are required daily to maintain his current body weight.

Now for lean bulking he needs to add 250 calories more to his maintainence calories that means his intial caloric intake would become 2246+250= 2496 calories.

Now lets calculate the macronutrients:

Protein = 0.7* body weight (in pound)=0.7*144 lbs= 101 gms approx (101*4 gms=404 calories)

Fat= 25% of 2496= 624 calories= 624/9 gms= 69 grams

Carbohydrates= 2496- (calories from fat and protein)= 2496- (624+404)= 1468 caories= 1468/4gms= 367 gms

Hence, this guy has to consume 101gms of protein, 69 gms of fat and 367 gms of carbohydrates on training days whereas on non training day 200 calories can be removed from carbohydrates. This figure need not be changed until hits the plateau. He then add 200-250 gms more calories and apply the same procedure to find out his daily macronutrient intake.

To weigh your food you need to purchase a kitchen weighing machine. you can buy it from amazon by clicking below image

IDEAL RANGE OF MUSCLE GAIN DURING LEAN BULKING:

You should really be looking to gain 0.25 to 0.5 pound of muscle per week with minimul fat percentage. This seems to look slow but remember you are gaining quality muscle and less fat. Also keep in mind more experienced lifter or advanced lifters may progress even slowly especially if they are already near their genetic/natural potential in terms of muscle mass. However, beginners may be able to add on even 2 pounds of muscle per week for first few months or even more.

HOW SHOULD YOU TRACK YOUR PROGRESS?

Well its simple, just use weighing machine and weekly or biweekly photograph of your body. Take picture from the same positions/area under same lighting and weighing yourself on an empty stomach first in the morning. However, sometimes the weigh fluctuates due to certain factor so need not rely completely on weighing machine and take photographs to track your progress.

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