How am I supposed to track to make sure I'm at a 250 cal surplus? Weight fluctuates so much over weeks it's hard as fuck to track that. Furthermore as weight increases you burn more cals.
Suppose I miscounted and I've been sitting at maintaince, am I wasting gains?
250kcal is a general goal to shoot for. Really if you're trying to lean bulk its can be a window of like 200-500kcal, depending on how fast you want to go.
Weigh yourself daily and average out weekly. Also if you don't trust numbers enough you should be able to notice if you are putting on way too much fat given you're lean enough starting out.
I have a fitness tracker cause I have more money then sense
Just make sure your eggs aren't 10 grams to heavy or you will blow your cut surplus out of the water user.
This.
Also make sure you do the exact same routine every day, down to the step such as to burn any more or less calories. Don't let your TDEE bounce all over the place or you are FUCKED!
don't forget to measure your steps too OP and not to walk too fast. 100 extra steps will throw you 22 calories over.
Needs to count the number and volume of each breath or else his caloric counting will be way off
Also can't drink that extra 8 oz of water. Will throw his weight off half a pound and fuck up his TDEE calculation.
This is why I'm curious if eating at borderline maintaince is bad, I don't feel like being anal about small cals
Chances are some days you'll be over by a bit, some days you'll eat at maintenance, and some days you might even go under. As long as it net energy balance averages out to be positive over a period of time, you will get bigger. And even the days where you don't hit a surplus, you'll still see a very minor recomp effect and still build some muscle.
Thanks user, I just want to make sure I'm not wasting my time becausr watching for .25-.5 per week is awful with all the weight fluctuations
This is probably gonna be a huge shock to you, but TDEE is just an estimation. Also it can vary slightly day by day depending on many different factors. Just be reasonable about your diet, counting every single calorie and stressing out about it isn’t worth your time
In case you didn't pick up on it, anything less that +/-500kcal is a waste of time. Even if you weigh everything like an autist and don't fuck up you still have a variance in your TDEE that will make it inconsistent. On top of that if you knew the tolerances that nutrition labels get to play with you would come to the realization that +/-500 is the lowest surplus or deficit any reasonable person can maintain without getting lucky. Every day.
I used to cut 17lbs in 24 hours to make weight for my sport. I have taken a 2.2 pound piss. I float 3lbs overnight. You are fucking stupid. Drink a liter of water? Oh fuck just gained 2lbs. Have more salt than usually? Just retained more water. Easy day at the gym? Was 10 degrees hotter outside? Got full bowls because you don't eat the exact same thing every day and your fiber was low for a bit? over 9000 lbs.
The longer I lean bulk the more. I just want to traditional bulk.
My question is If I'm wasting gains doing this assuming I'm an intermediate lifter and no longer have noob gains
I agree user,
My point is if I as long as I know I'm not LOSING weight will I be okay?
Short answer, yes you are wasting gains. You are likely hitting maintenance or dipping below frequently which is affecting recovery. You are walking when you could ride a bike.
2.2 lbs piss is nothing man, thats like half a liter. I've dropped over 4 on a potty break. If have really nasty wet shit you can drop even more its very impressive.
This shit right here is why I stopped counting calories, period. I used to be all about that back when I was in college. And I also prefer cooking my own food instead of just eating prepackaged shit with labels, so you can imagine how autistic that can get measuring out base ingredients for a dish and trying to calculate the macros of the final product.
After graduation I just stopped that shit and got a lot more lax with my diet. And it's not like I lost my gains because I wasn't getting the meme amount of protein, and I just bulked intuitively by eating whatever I normally would, and then having a small snack at the end of the night as something extra.
You don't want to lose WEIGHT. You want to lose FAT. Weigh yourself daily immediately when you wake up and graph it. Apps like cronometer do it for you automatically. Look at the TRENDLINE as a GUIDE. Focus more on the mirror compared to past pics from the same angle at the same time. That is as good as you can get all things considered.
Or in this case gain muscle instead of lose it. Same shit. Since I'm Captain Autism and track my shit really well here's example of my current cut 30lbs in. Look at the trendline compared to the actual weights. Weight is deceiving as fuck. I only want to lose a pound a week, but lost .75lbs a week, which means I should decrease my calories for my goals. This is because from my previous TDEE I did not decrease from previous weightloss. Focus on trendline, and focus more on the mirror is my advice.
Thanks user I'll just watch the trendline and adjust accordingly