Jeremy Ethier argues dirty bulking (500+ calorie surplus) builds no more muscle than lean bulking (250 calories over maintenance) but adds unnecessary fat. A study of 39 lifters eating 3,600 versus 2,900 calories gained similar muscle in 10 weeks, but the higher surplus meant more fat to cut later.
Questions this video answers
A caloric surplus greater than 500 calories above maintenance.
A moderate surplus of around 5–10% above maintenance, roughly ~250 calories.
39 strength-training athletes; ~3,600 kcal (high surplus) vs ~2,900 kcal (moderate surplus) for 10 weeks.
1,265 men.
From ~10% to ~14–15% within 1–2 months, eventually reaching ~18% by the end.
Foreign.
What'S going on guys? It's Jeremy here, back with another science based video and today we're going to be talking about dirty bulking and why it's a waste of time when it comes to building muscle and why I advise you to stay relatively lean during your bulk instead, otherwise known as a lean bulk. I want to first cover why research seems to agree with lean bulking being more favorable and and then I'm going to talk about one study that actually directly compare the effects of lean bulking versus dirty bulking. And finally I'm going to talk about my personal experience when it comes to the two methods. And as always, please don't forget to support me by hitting that like button and hitting that subscribe button and also turning notifications on for my channel. This will all really help me out.
And I appreciate the support. So first let me start by explaining the difference between dirty bulking and clean or lean bulking. Now, most of you are probably under the impression that dirty bulking means that you only eat junk food like pizza, burger, burgers, fries and so on in order to gain weight. Whereas clean or lean bulking, you basically eat chicken and rice and keep everything clean. Well, this ideology is a little bit misguided when it comes to building muscle. The ultimate goal for both methods of bulking is to build muscle and strength. However, a better way to think about dirty bulking and lean bulking is with regards to caloric surplus. Dirty bulking can be referred to a diet in which you consume a caloric surplus of greater than 500 calories above your maintenance caloric intake. Whereas lean bulking refers to a very moderate surplus of around 5 to 10%, which roughly equates to around 250 calories above maintenance. This means that you can still lean bulk while fitting in foods that you enjoy as long as you stay at this moderate surplus. Now that you know the difference between the two methods, I'm going to discuss why dirty bulking is a waste of time for the vast majority of natural lifters. The biggest problem with dirty bulking is that you simply gain too much fat by using this method. And not only will this take a toll on your appearance, but gaining fat can further accelerate fat storage and slow down muscle growth. And this happens for several reasons. It's well known and has been demonstrated in scientific literature that as body fat levels rise, your insulin sensitivity drops. Studies also show that as your body becomes more resistant to insulin, its ability to burn fat decreases, the likelihood of excessive weight gain increases and protein synthesis is suppressed as demonstrated in those respective studies. Simply put, the more sensitive your body is to insulin, the better it can build muscle and resist excessive fat gain, which is why I suggest you stay relatively lean when you bulk. Another thing that occurs when you increase body fat is a change in your hormone levels, primarily testosterone and estrogen. The study by Lopez et al. Examined the hormone levels in 1265 men and how they change with a variety of factors including percent body fat. The researchers found that as percent body fat increased, the subject's testosterone levels decreased and their estrogen levels actually increased. Since testosterone is the primary hormonal driver of muscle growth and high levels of estrogen promotes fat storage, it's clear to see that this effect is detrimental to our goal of achieving an attractive physique. So basically, long story short, what all this research is telling us is that getting to a high body fat percentage is not ideal when it comes to building muscle. And to further prove my point, I want to show you guys this pretty interesting study by Garth et al. Which is one of the very few studies out there that directly compared the effects of a large versus a small caloric surplus on muscle and fat gain. The study was done on 39 strength training athletes of around around the same weight and age. The athletes were randomized into two groups. One group that ate at a high caloric surplus, which consisted of around 3,600 calories, and another group that ate at a moderate surplus which consisted of around 2,900 calories. Both groups stayed at this caloric intake for 10 weeks while regularly strength training. The researchers found that strength improved in both groups, which was expected. But what's interesting is that there was no significant difference in the amount of muscle gained in both groups, but the higher calorie group gained significantly more fat than the lower calorie group, as you can see in this graph. Based on these results, the researchers concluded that excess energy intake in a weight gain protocol should be considered carefully due to undesirable increases in body fat.
The findings of the study seem to.
Agree with my personal experience with the two methods.
What I found when I dirty bulk is that during the first one to two months of my bulk, I gained a lot of muscle and a lot of strength, but at the same time I gained a lot of fat with.
A and within this short period I.
Went from around 10% body fat to around 14 to 15% body fat. And I found that as I continued bulking after I had reached this point, I started to gain significantly more fat compared to muscle and my strength didn't improve as much as it did before. By the end of it I was around 18% body fat and just sick of stuffing my face with food every single day and just overall unhappy with the way my body looked and felt.
And it also took me a long.
And really unenjoyable cut to get rid of all the excess fat that I had gained during my dirty bulking phase. Whereas when I used a lean bulking protocol, my strength and muscle gains improved.
At a slower rate but more consistently week after week.
And I also put on a lot less fat, which meant I only needed to cut for a few weeks at a time to get rid of the small amounts of fat that I would put on. And in addition, my body just looked and felt so much better than it did when I was dirty bulking and I had no problems with my appetite. I was just able to gain more muscle and more strength using the lean bulking protocol as compared to dirty bulking. So to conclude, I highly recommend that you use a lean bulking protocol instead of dirty bulking. And if you guys want to learn exactly how you can go about to do a lean bulk in terms of macros and caloric surplus and so on, then you want to check out this video that I made on topic and I'll also leave a link to it in the description box down below. And that basically wraps up the video. Guys, I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful as always. Please don't forget to hit that like button and leave a comment down below and subscribe. Subscribe to my channel if you want to see more science based and informative videos like this in the future. I really appreciate it and I thank you guys for supporting me. So I'll see you next time.
