This is always up for debate, but I fall into the camp of believing that while YES a caloric surplus is needed, the amount of calories required doesn’t need to be near what most people think.
Muscle gain is not an excuse to eat everything in sight.
What’s more, piling on a ton of excess adipose tissue can actually HURT your chances of muscle building and likely hurt the efficiency of your upcoming cut/prep. Why? The more fat you accumulate the longer and harsher you’ll likely need to diet. This increases your risk of catabolism (muscle eating) and impaired metabolic function (slower or stuck fat loss).
Your best bet is to eat as much as possible during your growth season WITHOUT letting weight (and bodyfat) spiral out of control.
Some tips-
1 Be Realistic
Muscle gain takes ALOT of time, especially as a natural. For advanced lifters a gain of .25-.5lb of lean muscle a month (according to Alan Argon) is solid. In other words your 10 lb weight gain in a month is NOT muscle. It’s largely fat. Individual factors will also play a role. Using myself as an example, I’m a hardgainer with a fast metabolism. I’m female. Those both put me at a disadvantage. I have been training for 15ish years. Another disadvantage. And I have a digestive illness. In other words, muscle gain, for me, is S L O W.
2 Get Lean First.
If you’re not lean enough to use the extra calories you’re consuming, your insulin sensitivity (ability to use incoming calories as fuel) decreases and this can cause what’s known as fat hyperplasia. This means your body will increase the number of fat cells as a result of overeating. This does two things, 1) makes fat storage easier and 2) makes fat loss harder. And the more fat you gain, the more you change your physiology to actually favor storing fat versus growing muscle.
3 Keep Your Caloric Surplus Moderate.
It would be awesome if the food we ate went just towards muscle growth but it doesn’t work that way. If you take PEDS you can elevate protein synthesis all damn day, but natural athletes need a moderate surplus to avoid gaining too much bodyfat. Usually a adding 200-400 calories on TOP of maintenance (depending on your metabolism) is a good place to start.
4 Eat carbs
Please. They’re protein sparing which means they help prevent muscle tissue breakdown and are crucial when it comes to building muscle. I know some people do better on a higher fat diet but in my opinion too many athletes have carb-phobia and it winds up limiting their progress.
5 Keep Most of Your Food Whole and Unprocessed
In other words eat clean. John Meadows wrote in “The Bulking Diet Delusion” about the damage that results from a dirty bulk (crappy calories) including decreased insulin sensitivity and anabolic resistance. Neither of these are desirable. Because the body is being bombarded with excess calories, fat and sugar, it’ll begin storing the excess not just in fat tissue, but within the muscles. This is called intramuscular fat storage and it makes the muscles look big and mushy or soft. Fat in the muscles also blunts protein synthesis and therefore, muscle growth.
Basically, growth season should not be synonymous with muffin top. Gain weight? YES. Gain excessive sloppy weight? No.
Ryan is a former college wrestler and fitness fanatic who specializes in supplements for building muscle. He has written for online publications like TheAthleticBuild.com and FitnessTopFives. He is also an expert lawn mower and has been known to slay apple pie with little regard for his own safety. Hit him up on Linkedin below so he feels the love.