Determining The Optimal "Carb vs Fat" Percentages For Growth

[kyoun1e]

I'm currently on UD2 but I'm eying a bulking phase at some point. Since I never really tracked macros prior to UD2 I don't have a good feel for what my body "naturally" or "genetically" responds to the best.

Protein seems to be a given here -- get your 1g - 1.5g/LBM period. So it then comes down to fats vs carbs and this is where it seems to come down to what degree you are insulin resistant or sensitive.

I know you can get yourself tested for this, but I don't see this happenning. So, I'm wondering if there are certain questions you can ask yourself that help you determine if you should naturally go heavier carbs or heavier on fats on a bulk.

For example, some signals I get on UD2:

* Low carb dieting -- Some people respond poorly to this. Tired, no energy, etc. Not me. I live off of lean turkey or lean chicken breast and swiss cheese and I could give a damn about carbs. It's easy for me.

* Heavy carb consumption -- For example, on a UD2 carbup. For me, this is tough. I feel full constantly. While some can eat boatloads of carbs...and when they eat carbs they get even more hungry (i.e. Built). I also get terrible gas. That said, I don't get this "energy crash" some get and feel like I need to slip into a coma.

Understanding the above, it would "seem" that maybe I should go heavier fats vs carbs. Then again, I don't know.

Are there any other signals or "questions" that would aid the investigation?

I suppose you could test this with training -- favor fats vs carbs over x weeks and then switch it up over the next y weeks. I think that would be difficult though because one of these test cells will get the shorter end of the stick since you'll probably gain some bodyfat in the meantime (and thus have poorer calorie partitioning).

I'm rambling, hope you get my point and hope this is of value to others.

Thanks.

KY

 

[Yanick]

You really need to just bite the bullet and try IMO. People are so different that its impossible to say. For fats the recommendation is 0.5g/lb LBM/BW (whichever it is you choose to use) as a minimum. Everything else is kind of up in the air and very individual. I can survive on low carb diets but I'm not happy, I'm not full, my training sucks ass. When I eat 150-250g of carbs I'm in my sweet spot so to speak. I'm full at every meal, not bloated or feeling likes shit (ala refeed days), my training feels like I'm juicing (as compared to low carb diets of course) and I'm overall just happier. My GF is somewhat the same way although we are still tweaking things here and there for her and trying to figure out where she is happy but so far she swears that she doesn't get full of protein/fat and something like a slice of WW bread makes all the difference.

Get in your protein and essential fats and play around with the rest until you reach your sweet spot.

 

[Built]

I'm currently on UD2 but I'm eying a bulking phase at some point. Since I never really tracked macros prior to UD2 I don't have a good feel for what my body "naturally" or "genetically" responds to the best.

Protein seems to be a given here -- get your 1g - 1.5g/LBM period. So it then comes down to fats vs carbs and this is where it seems to come down to what degree you are insulin resistant or sensitive.

I know you can get yourself tested for this, but I don't see this happenning. So, I'm wondering if there are certain questions you can ask yourself that help you determine if you should naturally go heavier carbs or heavier on fats on a bulk.

For example, some signals I get on UD2:

* Low carb dieting -- Some people respond poorly to this. Tired, no energy, etc. Not me. I live off of lean turkey or lean chicken breast and swiss cheese and I could give a damn about carbs. It's easy for me.

* Heavy carb consumption -- For example, on a UD2 carbup. For me, this is tough. I feel full constantly. While some can eat boatloads of carbs...and when they eat carbs they get even more hungry (i.e. Built). I also get terrible gas. That said, I don't get this "energy crash" some get and feel like I need to slip into a coma.

Understanding the above, it would "seem" that maybe I should go heavier fats vs carbs. Then again, I don't know.

Are there any other signals or "questions" that would aid the investigation?

I suppose you could test this with training -- favor fats vs carbs over x weeks and then switch it up over the next y weeks. I think that would be difficult though because one of these test cells will get the shorter end of the stick since you'll probably gain some bodyfat in the meantime (and thus have poorer calorie partitioning).

I'm rambling, hope you get my point and hope this is of value to others.

Thanks.

KY

KY, your satiety with carb intake begs the question "what kind"? For carbups, the operative is "white": dextrose and white rice are staples of my carbups. Have you tried this approach?

You really need to just bite the bullet and try IMO. People are so different that its impossible to say. For fats the recommendation is 0.5g/lb LBM/BW (whichever it is you choose to use) as a minimum. Everything else is kind of up in the air and very individual. I can survive on low carb diets but I'm not happy, I'm not full, my training sucks ass. When I eat 150-250g of carbs I'm in my sweet spot so to speak. I'm full at every meal, not bloated or feeling likes shit (ala refeed days), my training feels like I'm juicing (as compared to low carb diets of course) and I'm overall just happier. My GF is somewhat the same way although we are still tweaking things here and there for her and trying to figure out where she is happy but so far she swears that she doesn't get full of protein/fat and something like a slice of WW bread makes all the difference.

Get in your protein and essential fats and play around with the rest until you reach your sweet spot.

Yankic, out of curiosity, is your gf an "apple" or a "pear", and has she ever been fat?

 

[kyoun1e]

I was afraid someone would say that.

Carbs scare the crap out of me. I previously convinced myself that they were the source of all evil and they were the primary culprit of gaining bodyfat and lousy bulking efforts. On the flip side, I'm now starting to think post UD2 (and actually tracking all macros with great detail) that maybe I'm off base with that hypothesis...and I essentially need to start over.

Still, if I were to bulk at 500 over maintenance or at 3,400 calories, it could look like this:

* Protein: 250g/day = 1.5g/lbm or 1,000 calories
* Fat: 167g/day = 1g/lbm or 1,335 calories
* Carbs: 250g/day = 1.5g/lbm or 1000 calories

Jesus...250g/day. That seems like a mini-daily refeed.

Would be interested to hear how others have arrived at their "sweet spot."

KY

 

[kyoun1e]

KY, your satiety with carb intake begs the question "what kind"? For carbups, the operative is "white": dextrose and white rice are staples of my carbups. Have you tried this approach?



Yankic, out of curiosity, is your gf an "apple" or a "pear", and has she ever been fat?

Built,

I'm actually headed into my next UD2 carbup in about five hours after my tension workout. Here is pretty much what I use in my arsenal:

* Waximaize / whey asap post workout
* Bagels
* White rice
* Skim milk
* Goodies: Fat free breyer's ice cream, baked doritos, chocolate chex (while of course not crossing the 100g sucrose barrier)

You'll never find me eating a baked potato or oatmeal on a carbup.

KY

 

[Yanick]

Yankic, out of curiosity, is your gf an "apple" or a "pear", and has she ever been fat?

She is very much a pear (very thick thighs/butt). A few years ago when we met she had an average body, not really skinny but meaty in all the right places (sorry I'm terrible with BF estimates...especially on women). Her diet was atrocious and combined with the stress of a difficult school curriculum, problems at home, constant lower back pain from scoliosis and a disc herniation which also led to barely any activity she gained a bunch of weight. She's made some amazing progress so far but because she is so unexperienced with manipulating macro's I take her feedback with a grain of salt. She is going to try IF with me for the next few weeks to see how she fairs, and I eventually plan on guiding her through the full gamut of macro portions/diets to see where she is most comfortable to make a lifestyle out of.

 

[Built]

She is very much a pear (very thick thighs/butt). A few years ago when we met she had an average body, not really skinny but meaty in all the right places (sorry I'm terrible with BF estimates...especially on women). Her diet was atrocious and combined with the stress of a difficult school curriculum, problems at home, constant lower back pain from scoliosis and a disc herniation which also led to barely any activity she gained a bunch of weight. She's made some amazing progress so far but because she is so unexperienced with manipulating macro's I take her feedback with a grain of salt. She is going to try IF with me for the next few weeks to see how she fairs, and I eventually plan on guiding her through the full gamut of macro portions/diets to see where she is most comfortable to make a lifestyle out of.

That's very interesting. My experience with this branch of my research has been that "pear" shapes do better on lower carbs and higher protein and fat, but the relationship is far from a perfect association.

Do you have her macronutrient breakdown? And how tall is she, what is her weight?

 

[Yanick]

She is 5'2" hovers around 130 right now (she was just under 150lbs and wants to get to 125'ish) and the last fitday she logged (we're trying IF so we aren't meticulously tracking intake as Pilon suggests) she was at

1350kcals
56g F
69g C
141g P

As she is leaning out, she is not happy eating this way. I was going to implement 2x/week 6-8hr refeeds but she decided to try out IF with me instead.

 

[Built]

Those are some low-assed calories there! Why so low?

 

[Yanick]

Because she doesn't listen lol. I forget exactly what I wrote out for her now but I believe it was more like 1400-1500/day but she is being a woman, no offense. She also focuses on the scale too much and wants to see the number go down faster (she's been losing about .5-1/week which is perfect, but not for her). I'm not really too sure but her maint. is probably only about 1900-2k (never quite figured it out because she was afraid to go over 2k/day when I made her take a 2 week break a couple of weeks back).

 

[jbish8]

I was afraid someone would say that.

Carbs scare the crap out of me. I previously convinced myself that they were the source of all evil and they were the primary culprit of gaining bodyfat and lousy bulking efforts. On the flip side, I'm now starting to think post UD2 (and actually tracking all macros with great detail) that maybe I'm off base with that hypothesis...and I essentially need to start over.

Still, if I were to bulk at 500 over maintenance or at 3,400 calories, it could look like this:

* Protein: 250g/day = 1.5g/lbm or 1,000 calories
* Fat: 167g/day = 1g/lbm or 1,335 calories
* Carbs: 250g/day = 1.5g/lbm or 1000 calories

Jesus...250g/day. That seems like a mini-daily refeed.

Would be interested to hear how others have arrived at their "sweet spot."

KY

I thought about using UD2 to bulk but have since just decided to keep my macros consistent each day. I don't believe there is any reason to cycle on a bulk unless you still have satiety issues during this phase (this is unimaginable to me as I am ALWAYS stuffed while bulking). Right now I'm using a macro spread that Built helped me with, with a few minor tweaks as I've decided not to cycle since I still get plenty of carbs even on low days. I figure I might as well just divide em up equally. Interestingly enough, while bulking, it ends up being very similar to what I was doing previously on BFFM, with a bit more fat, a little less protein and believe it or not, MORE carbs. The key, I've found (through Built), is not using percentages for macros. I've been gaining steadily at about 1 lb. per week for the last month and a good 1/2lb of it is LBM.
Here's what's working for me.
I have 155lbs LBM
I am eating 3600 cals per day
I am eating 275g protein (1,100cals)
90G of fats (810 cals)
422 in carbs (1690 cals)

I guess that's my "sweet spot"

 

[kyoun1e]

I thought about using UD2 to bulk but have since just decided to keep my macros consistent each day. I don't believe there is any reason to cycle on a bulk unless you still have satiety issues during this phase (this is unimaginable to me as I am ALWAYS stuffed while bulking). Right now I'm using a macro spread that Built helped me with, with a few minor tweaks as I've decided not to cycle since I still get plenty of carbs even on low days. I figure I might as well just divide em up equally. Interestingly enough, while bulking, it ends up being very similar to what I was doing previously on BFFM, with a bit more fat, a little less protein and believe it or not, MORE carbs. The key, I've found (through Built), is not using percentages for macros. I've been gaining steadily at about 1 lb. per week for the last month and a good 1/2lb of it is LBM.
Here's what's working for me.
I have 155lbs LBM
I am eating 3600 cals per day
I am eating 275g protein (1,100cals)
90G of fats (810 cals)
422 in carbs (1690 cals)

I guess that's my "sweet spot"

Holy crap...422 carbs!

I'm going to be petrified of fat gain after dropping from 18%+ down to the 10% neighborhood. I'd rather bulk slow and minimize fat gain. That's one of the reasons UD2 mass is appealing, but I'm going to need a looooong break from UD2 to go on an extensive bulking phase with UD2...it just wears you out.

On the flip side, using UD2 I don't have to figure out all this carb vs fat thing...the lever as I understand it is calorie level on depletion and maintenance days and upping the carbs from say 50g to 100g on depletion days. Carbup would remain the same.

KY

 

[jbish8]

Holy crap...422 carbs!

I'm going to be petrified of fat gain after dropping from 18%+ down to the 10% neighborhood. I'd rather bulk slow and minimize fat gain. That's one of the reasons UD2 mass is appealing, but I'm going to need a looooong break from UD2 to go on an extensive bulking phase with UD2...it just wears you out.

On the flip side, using UD2 I don't have to figure out all this carb vs fat thing...the lever as I understand it is calorie level on depletion and maintenance days and upping the carbs from say 50g to 100g on depletion days. Carbup would remain the same.

KY

I know 422 seems like alot, but I've tried the whole "bulk slow/minimize fat gain",and for me all I got was "slow fat gain/minimized muscle growth". As far as using UD2 to bulk, it doesn't seem like it would work any better than just keeping calories and macros consistent as the science behind it only makes sense (to me) in a deficit. I figure that while bulking, even on low days, you would be taking in too many carbs for any of the depletion workouts to be effective and instead could possibly be too much volume and even start to hinder progress. As far as being complicated, I would think keeping macros and calories consistent would be alot less complicated than a UD2 bulk. Who knows though, I considered using it myself and even asked around here a couple times about a month ago if anyone had tried it with any success and got nothing. So far I'm glad I went the route I went as I feel I'm gaining at least as much LBM as my body will allow. Yes I'm gaining fat, but I'm going to cut in a couple of weeks and I doubt if I'll even reach 10% BF by then. I've decided the most effective way to gain mass is gain a lb. of weight per week for short periods of time (4-6 weeks) and then just cut the fat for 2-3 after that. In theory you would never have to gain more than 2-3% in fat but would ensure that you are gaining as much LBM as possible. So far the bulk is working awesome, but it's the cut that has been my issue (too much LBM loss). Hoping UD2 backs up it's claims, and I will be able to back up all my talk.

 

[kyoun1e]

I know 422 seems like alot, but I've tried the whole "bulk slow/minimize fat gain",and for me all I got was "slow fat gain/minimized muscle growth". As far as using UD2 to bulk, it doesn't seem like it would work any better than just keeping calories and macros consistent as the science behind it only makes sense (to me) in a deficit. I figure that while bulking, even on low days, you would be taking in too many carbs for any of the depletion workouts to be effective and instead could possibly be too much volume and even start to hinder progress. As far as being complicated, I would think keeping macros and calories consistent would be alot less complicated than a UD2 bulk. Who knows though, I considered using it myself and even asked around here a couple times about a month ago if anyone had tried it with any success and got nothing. So far I'm glad I went the route I went as I feel I'm gaining at least as much LBM as my body will allow. Yes I'm gaining fat, but I'm going to cut in a couple of weeks and I doubt if I'll even reach 10% BF by then. I've decided the most effective way to gain mass is gain a lb. of weight per week for short periods of time (4-6 weeks) and then just cut the fat for 2-3 after that. In theory you would never have to gain more than 2-3% in fat but would ensure that you are gaining as much LBM as possible. So far the bulk is working awesome, but it's the cut that has been my issue (too much LBM loss). Hoping UD2 backs up it's claims, and I will be able to back up all my talk.

Well, I think the science behind it that is the key is that even if you raise those calories on depletion days you are still depleting glycogen so when you flip into anabolic mode those incoming calories go to muscle not fat.

The successful UD2 mass person is elusive I must say.

I think I'll be more comfortable with your bulk/cut approach especially if I have Lyle's RFL (Rapid Fat Loss) in my arsenal. I figure I could go 6 - 8 weeks bulk then a quick RFL to get rid of the fat. Prior to summer I'd add UD2.

But getting back to my original point, I wish I knew what ballpark I'm in or what ballpark my body wants me in in terms of carbs vs fat. That's the question. I don't feel like spinning my wheels learning.

Lazy.

KY

 

[Built]

I don't know that there's that much fiddling involved - go by how you feel, how you look in the mirror, how your training feels. Monitor your intake, try not to gain too much too fast. If you notice you're looking squishy, back off the calories a bit and let the weight dial back before you proceed.

 

[jbish8]

Well, I think the science behind it that is the key is that even if you raise those calories on depletion days you are still depleting glycogen so when you flip into anabolic mode those incoming calories go to muscle not fat.

The successful UD2 mass person is elusive I must say.

I think I'll be more comfortable with your bulk/cut approach especially if I have Lyle's RFL (Rapid Fat Loss) in my arsenal. I figure I could go 6 - 8 weeks bulk then a quick RFL to get rid of the fat. Prior to summer I'd add UD2.

But getting back to my original point, I wish I knew what ballpark I'm in or what ballpark my body wants me in in terms of carbs vs fat. That's the question. I don't feel like spinning my wheels learning.

Lazy.

KY

I say just get in the protein and fat and the rest doesn't matter too much. I just recently learned this too, infact I think it was less than a month ago that I had started the same thread. Don't overthink it and just make sure your eating enough calories and training intensly and you shouldn't have a problem adding mass.

I say if you believe UD2 will work better on a bulk, go for it. I'd love to see how it works for you as all I have are theories and conjecture. At least someone here will be able to say they've tried it.

Now...I have a question. I was under the understanding that the RFL program was geared for more overweight individuals. Like I said in my previous post, my plan is to find the best program for cutting without losing any LBM in the fastest time possible. UD2 claims to allow a person to cut without losing LBM which is why it interests me. Would RFL do this to....faster? And does it work for leaner individuals at say around 10%?

 

[Built]

RFL has guidelines for different bodyfat levels, and you can indeed use it at 10%. This is a "category I" dieter.

I use RFL to kick-start my cuts; 12 days on, a two-day refeed, a couple of weeks of carb cycling and four-day-a-week lifting, build up my endurance base and work capacity a bit, then launch into UD2.0 for a spell if you want to at that point.

My .02

 

[kyoun1e]

RFL has guidelines for different bodyfat levels, and you can indeed use it at 10%. This is a "category I" dieter.

I use RFL to kick-start my cuts; 12 days on, a two-day refeed, a couple of weeks of carb cycling and four-day-a-week lifting, build up my endurance base and work capacity a bit, then launch into UD2.0 for a spell if you want to at that point.

My .02

That is exactly how I plan to use RFL. I see RFL and UD2 as a potent 1-2 punch.

KY

 

[jbish8]

RFL has guidelines for different bodyfat levels, and you can indeed use it at 10%. This is a "category I" dieter.

I use RFL to kick-start my cuts; 12 days on, a two-day refeed, a couple of weeks of carb cycling and four-day-a-week lifting, build up my endurance base and work capacity a bit, then launch into UD2.0 for a spell if you want to at that point.

My .02

That is exactly how I plan to use RFL. I see RFL and UD2 as a potent 1-2 punch.

KY

Cool. Thanks. Ya learn somethin' new every day here at the Ironmag forum.