By Nick Nilsson
Author of Metabolic Surge - Rapid Fat Loss
The dream of everyone who trains is to lose maximum fat and build maximum muscle in the shortest period of time possible.
While it is definitely possible to both lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, in my experience, the best results come from concentrating on one major goal at a time.
Let me put it this way: to lose fat, you need a caloric deficit. To build muscle, you need a caloric surplus. If you try to do both at the same time, you may just remain exactly where you are.
So the question before us is - how do we maximize both fat loss and muscle gain, two very much opposing goals, in only 30 days?
It's simple - we focus on both goals in the same program but not at the exact same time!
By alternating rapidly back and forth between reduced-calorie fat loss training and higher-calorie mass-oriented training, you can not only accomplish both goals at the same time, you can actually use the two opposing goals to feed on each other and send your results through the roof!
To illustrate my point, remember how quickly you gain weight when coming off a strict diet? Remember how quickly you lose weight when you start to diet and you haven't been careful about what you've been eating? That's your body rapidly adapting to a stress. One of the most powerful features of this switching back and forth is in the change itself - your body changes far quicker when you give it a powerful reason.
What is the result of this switching back and forth? Extremely rapid fat loss and extremely rapid muscle gain.
To maximize the effects of this switching, you must tailor your training, diet and supplementation towards your specific goal during that particular time. Proper manipulation of these factors will greatly enhance the body's hormonal response to this program, which is the real key to maximizing your results.
For five days, we will target everything about your training and nutrition towards fat loss.
- You will reduce your caloric intake below maintenance levels to promote fat burning.
- You will reduce the rest periods between sets in your weight training to increase the intensity of the workload and boost the metabolism.
- You will increase your training volume, performing more sets for each bodypart.
- You will not push your body to muscular failure - pushing to failure can be too stressful to the muscles when on a reduced-calorie diet. Stop one rep short of this point.
- You will include cardio training, preferably High Intensity Interval Training for best results, to burn calories and further boost your metabolism.
- You will NOT take creatine during this time (I'll explain why below).
- It is best to follow a low-carb diet during this time for maximum effectiveness. Eating this way will be especially powerful when you switch to the next phase of the program.
After five days, your metabolism will be just starting to get used to the training and nutritional program you're following. Now we'll throw it a curveball and change everything.
For the next five days, you will be focusing your training, nutrition and supplementation completely on muscle building.
- You will increase your caloric and protein intake to promote gains in muscle mass.
- You will increase your rest periods in between sets to allow for more recovery and increased strength in your sets.
- You will decrease your training volume, doing fewer sets but with greater intensity. This is the time to really push your muscles to the edge! You're feeding them now, so don't be shy about training them hard.
- You will eliminate all cardio training in order to maximize muscle gain. Cardio training can burn calories that should be used for the muscle building process.
- You will load creatine for the first three days of the muscle-gain phase. This will take advantage of and greatly enhance the flood of water and nutrients into the muscles.
- You will NOT follow a low-carb diet during this time. We want lots of carbs to provide energy and promote insulin release (the body's primary storage hormone). This insulin release will help shuttle protein and other nutrients into the muscles to help with building.
The body's hormonal response to this huge change in training, nutrition and supplementation is tremendous. Sensing a feast after a famine, it will greedily take in all the nutrients it can and store them in the form of glycogen (for carbs), muscle mass (for protein) and fat (to some extent). Since you will only be doing this phase for 5 days, however, fat gains will be minimal so don't be shy to eat!
It is important to note that you should eat a lot but you should eat clean - loading up on junk food will not give you the best results. You've got to provide your body with quality materials to rebuild with or you may not gain as much muscle and you may add too much fat.
After five days of this training, your metabolism will be cranking along, happily building muscle. Now we'll pull the rug out and go right back into fat-loss training for five days.
Since your body is used to getting more food and your metabolism is still moving fast, switching to fat-loss training at this time will immediately result in your body burning far more fat than if you were using a conventional fat-loss program.
In 30 days, you will complete three rounds of this rapid-adaptation training. As you will soon experience, this switching back and forth between a short, targeted fat-loss program and a short, targeted muscle-building program can have a tremendous and rapid impact on bodyfat and muscle mass levels.
What does this mean for you? It means you can lose fat faster and gain muscle faster, taking FULL advantage of your body's natural reaction and rapid adaptation to massive change.
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