Fighting The "Bulking" Belly

_Dominick_ once said, as several others have mentioned, that when you bulk you should prepare to get a bit of a belly. I understand this and all but it is starting to really get to me. I've gone from 155 to 185 and am sitting pretty steady now at about 177. I took about 3 months off of the diet due to ACL injury and general burn out so I naturally lost a bit and slimmed down due to the lack of calories. But now I'm back on the diet and pushing hard again.

My question is, though, what can be done to minimize the amount of jiggle that you gain through such a diet? I can run it off but doing so will jeapordize the amount of calories that go to building muscle.

I don't expect to hit 190+ and be wripped. That takes time as well as a cutting diet once you exceed your target weight. But this is really starting to bother me as I can feel it.

bulking isnt about getting fat..... youre taking 2 steps forward and one step backwards, and wasting months of time..... the problem is youre eating too much. start counting calories strictly and dont just eat whatever. eat 200 or so calories above maintenance, no need for 500+++ the weight will come much slower but you wont turn into a fatass


read this article [url]http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1268956[/url]

[QUOTE=Sockomalo;32237911]bulking isnt about getting fat..... youre taking 2 steps forward and one step backwards, and wasting months of time..... the problem is youre eating too much. start counting calories strictly and dont just eat whatever. eat 200 or so calories above maintenance, no need for 500+++ the weight will come much slower but you wont turn into a fatass


read this article [url]http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1268956[/url][/QUOTE]



great advice!, slow and steady wins the race

[QUOTE=nads786;32242411]great advice!, slow and steady wins the race[/QUOTE]

true words! people think "ok im bulking now i gotta eat everything in sight" (when just last week they were cutting and eating at a caloric deficit) and next thing you know in a few weeks theyre back at square one! so what do they do? they cut! they lose some fat, and most of the muscle they gained!! and then what? time to bulk again! and in the end you got a never ending cycle of going nowhere!!

[QUOTE=Traug;32233591]_Dominick_ once said, as several others have mentioned, that when you bulk you should prepare to get a bit of a belly. I understand this and all but it is starting to really get to me.[/QUOTE]Just to clarify, what I said was that for a lot of us starting out as skinny ectos who couldn't put on a pound, letting go of the abs for a while can help the process of building muscle. [B]I've never advocated building a spare tire[/B].

Can it be done while maintaining visible abs? Yes. But that process might be a lot slower unless you're incredibly disciplined with your diet. In my case I drew a line in the sand and said "no love handles or tits." I've held myself to that. The abs I can live without since I'm not a teenager looking to get laid every weekend. Everyone is different there.

One other thing: certain body types obviously look worse than others with a little ab flab. A taller guy with wide shoulders and a narrow waist might carry it better than a short guy with narrow shoulders and a thicker waist. With the "skinny fat" look, you can choose to focus on fat loss or gaining muscle. Some people go from say 140 to 170, realize too much of it is fat, start rapidly cutting, and wind up not far from where they started. A year wasted. Instead they could see it more as only temporary, commit to being more disciplined, put on more muscle around the delts, traps, lats, chest, legs, etc., and shoot for a solid looking 200-220.

[QUOTE]My question is, though, what can be done to minimize the amount of jiggle that you gain through such a diet? I can run it off but doing so will jeapordize the amount of calories that go to building muscle.[/QUOTE]It takes greater patience and more discipline with the calories. The key is a [B]slow steady bulk[/B] that accounts for [i]realistic muscle gains[/i], smaller meals with greater frequency (i.e. 5 or more a day), limiting fats to the healthy types, and timing your carbs so your body can use their energy most effectively (i.e. when you're most active and not lying around playing video games or sleeping).

The biggest problem by far is impatience. People try to bulk too fast and get fat. Then you've got the flipside, cutting too fast and they lose a lot of muscle. Go slow in both directions.

[QUOTE=Sockomalo;32243331]true words! people think "ok im bulking now i gotta eat everything in sight" (when just last week they were cutting and eating at a caloric deficit) and next thing you know in a few weeks theyre back at square one! so what do they do? they cut! they lose some fat, and most of the muscle they gained!! and then what? time to bulk again! and in the end you got a never ending cycle of going nowhere!![/QUOTE]

i know ive made that mistake in the past, and ive had to learn the hard way

[QUOTE=Sockomalo;32243331]true words! people think "ok im bulking now i gotta eat everything in sight" (when just last week they were cutting and eating at a caloric deficit) and next thing you know in a few weeks theyre back at square one! so what do they do? they cut! they lose some fat, and most of the muscle they gained!! and then what? time to bulk again! and in the end you got a never ending cycle of going nowhere!![/QUOTE]Precisely. They wind up spinning their wheels going nowhere for years.

I think the key here is eating healthy foods when you bulk. Some people use the bulking excuse as a reason to eat fatty hamburgers, pizzas, all kinds of saucy things and other fatty crap. You have to eat healthy foods. With that being said, eat alot of them. You should be staying relatively lean while putting on muscle. Of course, you might lose some abs, but that is to be expected. If you're gaining a gut, however, than somethings wrong.

Is it ok to CLEAN bulk if your already fat? :)

[QUOTE=Sockomalo;32237911]bulking isnt about getting fat..... youre taking 2 steps forward and one step backwards, and wasting months of time..... the problem is youre eating too much. start counting calories strictly and dont just eat whatever. eat 200 or so calories above maintenance, no need for 500+++ the weight will come much slower but you wont turn into a fatass


read this article [url]http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1268956[/url][/QUOTE]


Great article!

The thing is that my diet is pretty solid:

- 2 eggs and a piece of wheat toast for breakfast
- protein shake w/ a half cup of oats (or 1/3 cup of steel cut oats depending on what I have on hand)
- tuna fish/egg salad sandwich on whole wheat
- protein shake w/ a half cup of oats (during work out)
- chicken breast/pork chop/round steak w/ a cup of rice and a helping of a vegitable

And I guess that I should clarrify what I'm talking about w/ the "jiggle". I'm not getting a gutt but rather sometimes I feel bloated after I eat. And I'm working my ass off with my abs but am finding it difficult to get any sort of reduction in what little body fat I have in that area. It feels as the influx of calories, which is working well towards my goal, is working against me in terms of reducing what body fat I have.

I realize that you can't really bulk and cut at the same time but is there a happy medium? I'm not looking to get that fashion model six pack look though it would be kind of nice. I just dislike that bloating feeling that I get at times.

Does that make any sense or am I just rambling?



PS> I'm at about 2600-2700 calories a day which puts me around 300ish above maintenance. I'd like to think that the above is considered "clean".

[QUOTE=Traug;32398871]The thing is that my diet is pretty solid:

- 2 eggs and a piece of wheat toast for breakfast
- protein shake w/ a half cup of oats (or 1/3 cup of steel cut oats depending on what I have on hand)
- tuna fish/egg salad sandwich on whole wheat
- protein shake w/ a half cup of oats (during work out)
- chicken breast/pork chop/round steak w/ a cup of rice and a helping of a vegitable

And I guess that I should clarrify what I'm talking about w/ the "jiggle". I'm not getting a gutt but rather sometimes I feel bloated after I eat. And I'm working my ass off with my abs but am finding it difficult to get any sort of reduction in what little body fat I have in that area. It feels as the influx of calories, which is working well towards my goal, is working against me in terms of reducing what body fat I have.

I realize that you can't really bulk and cut at the same time but is there a happy medium? I'm not looking to get that fashion model six pack look though it would be kind of nice. I just dislike that bloating feeling that I get at times.

Does that make any sense or am I just rambling?



PS> I'm at about 2600-2700 calories a day which puts me around 300ish above maintenance. I'd like to think that the above is considered "clean".[/QUOTE]

I'm assuming your not a beginner in which case you won't be able to get those beginner gains where you'll burn fat and build muscle simultaenously... Losing fat will be hard to do while you're in any calorie surplus, on the point of your diet its as clean as it gets and your calorie surplus looks fine

On a clean bulk, roughly how many weeks do i have to wait to see an increase in weight?

I look like i'm gaining muscle and the waist is smaller than before but the scale doesn't increase. Should i up my calories after a month of not noticing any increase in weight on the scale?

[QUOTE=Pullup17;32421581]On a clean bulk, roughly how many weeks do i have to wait to see an increase in weight?

I look like i'm gaining muscle and the waist is smaller than before but the scale doesn't increase. Should i up my calories after a month of not noticing any increase in weight on the scale?[/QUOTE]

you look like youre gaining muscle and your waist is getting smaller.... why change anything? ditch the scale, youre working towards a certain physique, just go by what the mirror says

[QUOTE=Pullup17;32421581]On a clean bulk, roughly how many weeks do i have to wait to see an increase in weight?

I look like i'm gaining muscle and the waist is smaller than before but the scale doesn't increase. Should i up my calories after a month of not noticing any increase in weight on the scale?[/QUOTE]

try to gain 2pounds a month, i believe that would make sure you are gaining mostly muscle, if after a month u are not gaining any weight increase the calories by 200 a day

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