Specializing and metabolic stress while cutting

L

Lance

New Member
For the last 5-6 months i've learned and tried alot of techniques laid out by Vicious and others. Like loaded stretches, pulses, higher frequency, etc.

This has all been great while trying to add weight, but now i'm ready to cut. I'm worrying that with all this extra work, cutting may lead to burnout.

I swear i've posted a thread on this before, but i can't find it anywhere. I've searched in so many different ways, even manually. So here i am again.

In my mind, you can't grow muscle while in a caloric deficit, so why bother trying to up the strain. Why wouldn't i just stick to working out 3xweek full body, with low volume. Same with metabolic stress, if on low calories, wouldn't it be just burning up your muscle glycogen? Also the higher fatigue could lead to burnout i'd imagine.

My program that i've been doing for a bit now is full body 5xweek. Loaded stretches for lagging chest and arms, as well as a bit more volume. Metabolic stress in form of a set of 15's for most exercises, but pulses on machine work for chest and arms.

I plan on using this program to cut, but after reading the Pimp My HST .pdf, i'm thinking i may just be spinning my wheels.

Only advantage i could see is:
Added strain from frequency, stretches, etc. = keep that muscle
metabolic stress = nice full muscles (when carbed up)

Disadvantages i see:
all the strain and metabolic work = fatigue and/or burnout
 
There are two things I'd like to ask, so I hope I'm not being too intrusive:

1) What exactly is meant by metabolic work, and what is the purpose?

2) How effective were the 'loaded stretches'? Did they bring up your lagging chest nicely?
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Chthonian @ June 06 2005,8:53)]2) How effective were the 'loaded stretches'? Did they bring up your lagging chest nicely?
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bump for this question

loaded stretches got a lot of attention but I have yet to hear any progress reports
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Lance @ June 06 2005,1:53)]In my mind, you can't grow muscle while in a caloric deficit,

Why wouldn't i just stick to working out 3xweek full body, with low volume.  

Same with metabolic stress, if on low calories, wouldn't it be just burning up your muscle glycogen?  
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This has yet to be 100% clarified in my mind, and maybe someone can tell me if my thoughts are wrong. Compensatory hypertrophy models show the tissue will grow, but the studies I have read don't elaborate on fed state. The two I have seen, Changes in rodent muscle fibre types during post-natal growth, undernutrition and exercise J Physiol. 1979 Nov;296:453-69 and Effects of pre and perinatal malnutrition on muscle fibres from fast and slow rat muscles Res Exp Med (Berl). 1978 Jul 24;173(1):35-40 aren't really compensatory models.

It would stand to reason, in my mind, that muscle will grow if the specific demand is placed even without adequate nutrition, albeit it wouldn't the optimum scenario. Perhaps someone can show me a reference, ;).

IMHO, to maintain what you have gained I would imagine it would work. Same with the issue of metabolic stress.
 
Muscles can grow without a caloric excess, albeit to a somewhat limited extent, unless you are obese, by taking from fat stores. This does not mean that fat is turned into muscle but, rather, the body is able to recompose itself depending on what and how much is available for use.
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Old and Grey @ June 06 2005,12:56)]Muscles can grow without a caloric excess, albeit to a somewhat limited extent, unless you are obese, by taking from fat stores. This does not mean that fat is turned into muscle but, rather, the body is able to recompose itself depending on what and how much is available for use.
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It would be nice to see a study on this.
 
Actually most of the recent hypertrophy studies support this although it is not specifically concluded. These studies look at growth using various exercise techniques, frequency, volume, etc. However, none of them specifically address a caloric excess. Therefore. it is not totally unreasonable to make the above assumption since the studies show increased size, and to a lesser degree, lower body fat. To achieve that, there is only one alternative available...body recomposition. I can't point to a specific study to support this hypothesis but I also can't find any studies that dispute it either.    
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A few years ago I read a study done on rats. Even on a starvation diet they were able to grow muscle. I don't remember the parameters of the study, nor can I find it, but I did read it, I swear!
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[b said:
Quote[/b] ]bump for this question

loaded stretches got a lot of attention but I have yet to hear any progress reports
Click to expand...

I've been doing loaded stretches for this past HST cycle. Before i had stuck with the main compound movements and some stupid isolations excercises on the side. My gains had been fair( 2- 3 lb gains) with the compound movements, but no real humongous gains until this past cycle. I've gained a solid 10 lbs with the compound + LS in HST style. I think it's made a difference, but it could be because i've gone crazy with my calorie intake and have just been eating more than ever. I would say its been quite a change compared to the usual only compound excercises.


btw, i had been on creatine during the compound excercise time, and i've been off of it for this entire cycle with the LS incorporated.

hope this is sufficient as a follow up with the LS :)

pzhang
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Old and Grey @ June 06 2005,12:56)]Muscles can grow without a caloric excess, albeit to a somewhat limited extent, unless you are obese, by taking from fat stores. This does not mean that fat is turned into muscle but, rather, the body is able to recompose itself depending on what and how much is available for use.
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I have read so many posts on cutting while trying to gain muscle... What O&G said makes sense.. (a link to a study would be nice though!) ..if you're not supplying your body enough calories to gain muscle, then energy would be taken away in the form of the fat that is stored on your body. So if I am entering a cycle trying to "cut" down my bf%, and I am eating a lot of protein, should I still be able to gain muscle?

I am probably answering my own question, but it would be suffice to say if I did have gains, they would be smaller than if I was on a "bulk" cycle where my caloric intake was much greater.
 
I can't give you a link at the moment, however, the following is a quote from Kerry J. Stewart, Ed.D., Professor of Medicine and Director of Clinical and Research Exercise Physiology at the John Hopkins University School of Medicine:


"We had a group of people take part in a supervised series of exercises for 60 minutes three times a week, combining aerobic and resistance exercises that worked the heart and circulation and all the majot muscle groups. At the end of six months, both aerobic fitness and muscle strength improved. Yet the participants lost an average of only four pounds. When we tested them using sophisticated imaging techniques, however, we noted a huge shift in body composition from fat to muscle. Most important for their hearts, they had dropped approximately 20 percent of their visceral fat." (That's the bad fat that a lot of men get as they age around their abs and internal organs.)

Yeah, yeah. I know this isn't a peer reviewed controlled study demanded by many and published by some obscure physiology magazine but I am sure he would gladly give you references to the actual study if you care to contact him. You can email him at kstewart@jhmi.edu
:)
 
It's not peer reviewed :mad: ;) Just kidding. One thing though on that O&G, it doesn't say what their caloric intake was.
 
It had to have been less than their maintenance. Probably no change from their previous caloric intake which, when combined with the exercise, resulted in the slight loss of weight. However, it is the body recomposition which is interesting.  
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It is not alchemy because the fat does not become muscle but, rather, that fat is reduced and muscle is built. Therefore, I contend that some people can gain significant muscle mass without a caloric excess if they have sufficient fat stores initially to allow this.
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Muscle growth is localised right? Isn't that part of the concept of microtrauma, IGF(and mediators) release...it's localised?

And when you cause microtrauma etc your promote the uptake of glucose and amino acids into those muscles (assuming you're eating at the right times - pre and post WO nutrition)...

So why is it unreasonable that muscles themselves can be placed into an anabolic state, but fat stores can still be utilised as an energy source, if you're in a slightly 'hypocaloric' state overall?

And that's a genuine question....is it hormones, breakdown of synthesised protein later on in the day, non-synthesis even in the muscles even after microtrauma&food intake...?
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Old and Grey @ June 09 2005,9:21)]It is not alchemy because the fat does not become muscle but, rather, that fat is reduced and muscle is built. Therefore, I contend that some people can gain significant muscle mass without a caloric excess if they have sufficient fat stores initially to allow this.
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So by that reckoning, we don't actually need to eat protein in order to build muscle, we just need the excess calories which could theoretically come from just carbs/fat. I don't think this is the case. (Or am I misunderstanding you?)

I think you're right about some people being able to build muscle whilst in a calorific deficit. If they're that fat, they're probably new to training and the ability to lose fat/gain muscle at the same time is the famous 'newbie' effect. I have no idea how this works but I don't think it's as simple as energy being removed from fat cells and being used to build muscle.
 
You always need protein and amino acids to build muscle. You can always go downhill in a car without gas but you still need it to go uphill. What I said, and what you quoted, was that you can build muscle without a caloric EXCESS. By that I mean you do not have to eat ABOVE maintenance and still build muscle IF you have the fat stores available. It naturally would not apply to, for example, an anorexic person.
 
Wouldn't a 5x5 strength program be ideal for preserving LBM during a cut? It seems you want to be creating as much p38 signaling as possible rather than just burning calories with mostly sub-maximum weights.
 
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