Staying lean while bulking

[blood_drinker]

by ms.
This is why sprinters can maintain a lean and muscular physique even though the exercise they perform is mainly glycolytic and not lipolytic. Because once they've stopped sprinting their bodies will burn fat at a greater rate for the rest of the day. Bodybuilders are really in the same boat as sprinters except that their high intensity intervals are lifting weights instead of running. There have been plenty of studies done that show that the main fat burning effect of exercise is from it's ability to maintain or increase body mass (=higher BMR) rather than it's ability to directly burn fat.

We are all concerned about gaining the least possible fat while bulking. Would it be more reasonable then, to jump onto a 5 day split where you do exercise 5/7 times of the week rather than 3/7 times, for instance - where you would have more of a chance to store bf due to the great excess of cals and lack of exercise (considering you do not do cardio).

chest / legs / arms /back / shoulders and tris

Do you think this will have any effect on fat gain?

 

[gymrat]

bump

 

[MS]

I think that the split that gives you the greatest LBM gains will be the one that keeps you leanest while bulking. For some this may be 3x or 5x per week. Some HITTers feel that once a week works well for them, but they are usually ectomorphs who have a hard time gaining fat OR muscle. Remember it's LBM that dictates the level of fat-burning during rest rather than the exercise you do. The other possibility is to mix 3-4 days per week on weights and do some sprint work on off days. Personally I find this too exhausting to do all the time because it kinda feels like weight training (but I'm not young anymore). The sprinter analogy was also possibly misleading since most top sprinters also spend a lot of time in the gym hitting the weights and working on 'explosive' training. Essentially sprinters are bodybuilders that incorporate a lot of sprint work.