photo credit: visualpanic
This is part two of the carb cycling series. In part one I covered carb cycling to lose body fat.
What is Maintenance?
To maintain, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, means to keep in an existing state.
Maintenance is a often a gray area for fitness enthusiasts, and is most likely unknown territory for competitive bodybuilders and figure athletes. Most people spend a majority of their time focused on gaining weight in hopes of building more lean muscle mass, or dieting to remove the fat they gained in the process of building their physique. Bodybuilders and figure girls are constantly working on their physique, hence never having anytime to focus solely on maintaining what they have built. They’re usually very focused on their next competition; therefore their diets are usually either hypo caloric or hyper caloric depending on how far away their next show is. You will rarely ever see one of these athletes on a maintenance diet, and if you do, its not for any substantial length of time (maybe a few weeks).
However, sometimes people actually do reach a point of satisfaction with their physique, would like to maintain their level of development, and focus on other hobbies or interests.
Maintaining ones physique is relatively easy if they have a firm grasp on their specific range of maintenance calories. Of course, this takes discipline in recording and keeping track of your energy intake, but in my opinion, keeping track of calories is a small price to pay for keeping your six pack year-round. If you can get away from counting calories and easily maintain your weight, more power to you.
How Can I Use Carb Cycling for Maintenance?
Using carb cycling for maintenance is my favorite maintenance approach, because it allows me to put more calories around my workouts and ensures proper recovery, plus it allows me to eat a little more than usual 3-4 times per week.
Basically, you first determine your daily maintenance calories and adjust from there. Of course a person could eat the same caloric amount daily, and maintain just fine, but I personally prefer this method as I feel it’s more optimal in terms of recovery. For my example I will again use a 200lb man with a maintenance caloric intake of 3000 calories per day. He will be doing 3 workouts per week with volume in the middle range and his sole focus is to maintain his strength, hence maintaining his muscle mass.
To make this simple, I will set his protein at just above 1 gram per pound of bodyweight, and set his fat intake at a static amount of 80 grams per day. So, every day he will be consuming 225 grams of protein and 80 grams of fat regardless. The only variable in his diet that changes is his carb intake. Of course, one could potentially make their diet very low in carbs and exchange the carb energy with calories from fat. If he were consulting with me I would set his calories slightly above his maintenance intake on workout days and slightly below maintenance on his rest days. An example of his intake:
Workout Days (maintenance calories +300)
225g protein
345g carbs
80g fat
Rest Days (maintenance calories -200)
225g protein
295g carbs
80g fat
This is just an example, and anyone can manipulate the macros as they like, just make sure to get at least 1 gram per pound of bodyweight in protein, and allow enough room in the diet for EFA’s and other healthy fats. Having more fat in a diet also makes for a more interesting food selection.
On such a plan, it is possible for someone to see minor gains in strength and mass over time due to the slight caloric surplus on training days. This is the reason I prefer this method over eating the same amount of calories every day regardless of my training schedule. I believe the extra calories will go a long way in terms of recovery and adherence for a long term maintenance plan.
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