Let’s face it, the hardest thing that a natural lifter can do in a calorie deficit is to maintain all of the muscle mass that he has been building for months or years on end. But what if I told you that it doesn’t really have to be that way?
In this article, I will go over 5 ways you can maintain or even build muscle mass when you’re entering a cut without any sort of steroid use.
Without further ado, let’s get straight into it:
1. Find your level of cardio
What I mean by this is that if your goal is to lose weight but still be able to keep all of your muscle mass, you should find the right balance of cardio that you do per day. Doing too many high intensity cardio sessions per week may accelerate muscle loss and leave you underperforming in the gym which might result in an injury overtime if you’re not careful.
Don’t eliminate it completely from your routine, but program it in a way that makes you feel recovered and not on the verge of ripping someone’s head off because you’re hungry.
2. Train the same way as you did before
Just because you’ve entered a calorie deficit, it doesn’t mean that now you have to do a lot of high rep work or to take it ‘easy’ in the weight room. Your muscles react due to a stimulus that is placed upon them and by trying to reduce way too much of your volume/weight, you are most likely gling to lose a big portion of them and have to start all over again to get back to your starting point.
Train with the same intensity while applying progressive overload, so that you will look more ripped and not appear skinny/frail.
3. Don’t lose too much weight too quickly
Trying to just lose more than 1-2 lbs per week is just going to result in accelerated muscle loss and not to mention that mentally you will start to feel like shit too.
Be patient with your approach, eat more protein + drink more water during the day to feel more satiated and before you know it, you will start to get the beach body look that you want without sacrificing any gains that you’ve made.
4. Steady state>H.I.I.T
The reason behind this is that you can recover way more better from steady state cardio and not to mention that it’s going to be way more easier to stick to than H.I.I.T.
There is nothing wrong with it, but if your main goal is to preserve as much muscle mass as possible in your cut, you should consider doing something that won’t impact your recovery, so that you’ll get the look that you want.
Plus, both burn almost the same number of calories, so it won’t make as much of a difference in terms of which one you choose.
5. Don’t fast
If you want to lose weight and be able to reach your aesthetic goals, then the last thing you want to do is to fast. The reason why is because you aren’t fueling your body with the right nutrients that it needs in order to maintain the muscle mass that you’ve built and not to mention that you will just have to starve yourself for no reason.
Instead of doing that, try to have a deficit of around 200-300 calories, so that you’ll stick to your diet, feel better physically/mentally and get to your desired results without too much hassle.
I hope you’ve found this article helpful and that you are making progress towards your goals.
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