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  1. #1
    Registered User Gene's Avatar
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    Maintenance calorie diet = no progress?

    Let me ask a wierd question here. I train 4-5 times per week, I use a customized creatine (5-7) + protein (40) + carb (70) drink post-workout, glutamine with creatine upon waking on workout days and sometimes glutamine before working out. Also multi's and sometimes zma.

    Onto my question; if bulking and cutting requires surplus and deficit caloric intakes, respectively, what happens during maintenance? Considering I take 6 meals per day (including my supplements), will my strength (neuromuscular I suppose) in the exercises I perform improve but I will neither get bigger or more cut? Someone explain please.
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    Registered User Luke530's Avatar
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    you'll still put on some muscle but it will be very minimal and it will take a long time to see results, it's better to stay a little over maintnence since you are not cutting, if you go above maintnence only about 200 or so calories you'll gain and you won't gain any fat, but you still won't gain as much as if you were bulking. Your strength will improve on a maintnence diet but it will be more neural than actual hypertrophy of muscle fibers.
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    Registered User thegame2183's Avatar
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    there is a reason they call it maintainance calories

    maintainance calories=maintaining muscle (not building or losing)
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    Registered User plornive's Avatar
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    Originally posted by thegame2183
    there is a reason they call it maintainance calories

    maintainance calories=maintaining muscle (not building or losing)
    maintenance calories=maintaining weight
    changes in body composition are very possible for people who aren't incredibly lean and follow maintenance calorie diets.
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  5. #5
    Registered User labouche's Avatar
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    for about 1.5yrs i trained in the Max-ot way on a maintenance diet.

    what happened was that i slowly increased my strength and mass. the total amount of wt i gained was about 5lbs.
    however, i did lose a few %'s of fat. therefore, the actual amount of change i experienced in my overall body composition was very noticable.

    but the amount of gain wasnt, imo, worth the amount of energy, time and $$ i put forth. not even close.

    as soon as i listened to Bigcat and others about going with a 'bulking' or as Valcore likes to say, a "muscling up" diet, the RATE of my gains increased dramatically. again, not even close.

    excess calories is the way to go if u actually want to gain some significant strength, mass, and wt.
    "...but fools despise wisdom and discipline."
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    Registered User scottyo's Avatar
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    the other part of the question is the term maintenance calories. most people dont know exactly what there maintenance level is (not a completley exact science since calories expended fluctates as do other factors) thus even on a maintenace level diet your either slightly anabolic or catabolic...thus like the others said A. you will increase neuromuscular strength and B. the slight (like 100 or 200 cal) increase you have will have you gain muscle, the problem is that since 3500 cals=1lb...it will take like a month to gain a pound. not very noticable
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    Registered User plornive's Avatar
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    Originally posted by scottyo
    the other part of the question is the term maintenance calories. most people dont know exactly what there maintenance level is (not a completley exact science since calories expended fluctates as do other factors) thus even on a maintenace level diet your either slightly anabolic or catabolic...thus like the others said A. you will increase neuromuscular strength and B. the slight (like 100 or 200 cal) increase you have will have you gain muscle, the problem is that since 3500 cals=1lb...it will take like a month to gain a pound. not very noticable
    If you are not lean then your body will use fat energy to build muscle. You could gain 1 lb of weight and 3 lbs of muscle.
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    Registered User scottyo's Avatar
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    very true....however i assumed (maybe incorrectly) that he was a fairly lean individual in pretty good shape (training 4-5 times a week)....for many people this is true, when first starting out and not eating properly...they will see great results for a couple months but then hit that plateau because there body uses fat stores for energy. my example was just a simplification but the point was that the term maintenance calories can be misleading because there really is no maintenance levels, one's body is always changing
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    Registered User Gene's Avatar
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    I'm more of a veteran than beginner when it comes to training, I guess I'm lean (you can check my picture I posted it in the Post Pictures forum today). The reason I asked, actually, and scottyo sort of nailed this point, is that since no one really knows their maintenance calorie requirement (this figure is impossible to determine), its in actuality possible to gain muscle and burn the fat gained with the muscle more or less simultaneously on a day to day basis (but actually, who says that 24 hours = 1 day? Why not bulk for 12 hours then cut for 12 hours? but thats another topic). Since you can be bulking one day, cutting the next, your maintenance requirement is constantly fluctuating and so it the muscle building / fat burning process associated with it. no? Sorry if this sounds confusing, I guess I'm just a bit confused myself.
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    Registered User scottyo's Avatar
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    Since everything is inexact, most people would find it pretty pointless to bulk half a day and cut the other since A it probably wouldnt make a difference since overall calories effects body comp way more than time of day (with certain exceptions) and B. you couldnt really tell the difference then if someone ate moderately all day long...with such little changes in overall calories and protein the big picture is there is little overall body comp changes
    Bit confusing but thats my 2 cents
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  11. #11
    Registered User labouche's Avatar
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    yes, i was lean but i wasnt a beginner or one with a bad diet. i was just someone whos training and nutrition were like most peoples: incorrect.

    however, its important to know that those body comp changes took place early on and pretty quickly and for the remainder of that year and a half or so, while on the same diet as before(maintenance), the gains were very slow and i did not lose muscle.

    yes, when u have some xtra fat u can "build muscle and lose fat" at the same time. but, im not talking about that. once i got to a point where my bf% was as low as it was going to b without cutting, the mass and strength gains from that point on (maintenance diet) were very small.

    it just wont work. or should i say, the RATE is just too damn slow and negligible for me.
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  12. #12
    Registered User scottyo's Avatar
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    exactly my thoughts. you might gain a little, but if your bustin you balls every day at the gym why would you only want a "little"
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