After you reach the level of definition you’re happy with, you’re going to want to do

one of two things: maintain or start lean bulking.

Both goals imply a raise in calorie intake.

For maintenance, you need to increase calories enough to eliminate the deficit but
not so much that you start to gain fat.

For lean bulking, the first step is to eat maintenance calories for two weeks. Moving
from a deficit straight into a surplus can cause rapid fat gain because your body is
metabolically adapted to store fat. To prevent this problem, you reset some of the
adaptation to dieting by spending 2 weeks at maintenance.
 
How to Raise your Calories to Maintenance
 
This is very simple.

After you’re done cutting, you take your current body weight and insert it in ​this
calculator​
. In the “set you goal” section, choose maintenance. This will give you a
rough estimate of your maintenance intake.

Eat that number of calories every day for a week and see how your body responds.

You should gain a little weight that week, about 1-3 lbs / 0.5-1.5 kg, but look just as
lean. The reason you gain weight is because you’ll have more food in your GI tract,
your muscles will be filling with glycogen from the increased carb intake, and you’ll
be holding more water. Don’t worry, that weight is not fat.
In some cases your weight may still go down even if you’re eating more. That’s
normal too, although I can’t explain why that happens. Metabolic magic?
 
Fine Tuning your Intake

● If you look just as lean or leaner after the first week at maintenance, great.
Keep things unchanged one more week. If your weight stays the same, you
have discovered your maintenance.
● If your weight still goes down after the second week, it means you’re still in a
small deficit. In that case, increase your calorie intake by 200 and check your
weight again after 7 days.
● If your weight still goes up after the second week, it means you’re in a small
surplus. It may be possible that your metabolic rate is decreased a little and
the calculator overestimates your maintenance by 100-200 calories.
 
How to Set your Calorie Intake for Lean Bulking
 

After you’ve maintained your weight for about 2 weeks, you can increase your
calories for lean bulking. Take your current body weight and insert it in ​
this
calculator​again. In the “set you goal” section, choose lean bulk.
 

 
Note: This will give you a rough estimate of how much you need to eat to gain
weight and muscle at the beginner and intermediate level. As an advanced lifter,
you can only gain 3-4 lbs (1-2 kg) of muscle per year, so bulking no longer makes
sense.

● As a beginner, aim to gain about 3 pounds per month.

● As an intermediate, aim to gain about 2 pounds per month
● As an advanced-intermediate, ai to gain about 1 pound per month.
● As an advanced lifter, focus on progressive overload, not weight gain.

Your ideal caloric surplus depends on your training experience and how much
muscle you can still gain.

According to ​
Lyle McDonald​
the maximum rate of muscle growth per year is this:
 Years of training Maximum Muscle Growth Potential

Year 1 20-25lbs (2lbs per month) / 9 – 11 kg (0.9kg per month)

Year 2 10-12lbs (1lbs per month) / 4.5 – 5.5 kg (0.45kg per month)

Year 3 5-6lbs (0.5lbs per month) / 2 – 2.7 kg (0.22kg per month)

Year 4 2-3lbs / 0.9 – 1.3 kg

Year 5+ 2-3 lbs / 0.9 – 1.3kg

Alan Aragon​ gives us another model, this time for beginners, intermediates, and
advanced lifters:

Category Maximum Rate of Muscle Growth

Beginner 1-1.5% of lean body mass per month

Intermediate 0.5-1% of lean body mass per month

Advanced 0.25-0.5% of lean body mass per month

What you can see is that our growth potential differs a lot depending on our
training experience. For each stage we want to eat enough calories to allow
maximum muscle gains but not more because that will lead to fat gain.
Why the Surplus you Set may not Result in the Expected Weight
Gain
You may find the calorie intake given by the calculator is insufficient for you to gain
weight. “Hard gainers” are real. Some people do have to eat a lot more calories than
others in order to gain weight.

In that case, add 200 kcal to your daily intake. If that is not sufficient either, add
another 200 kcal. Increase as much as needed for you to gain 1-3 pounds a month.

There is one really cool study that shows ​the effects of overfeeding on spontaneous
physical activity​
. In this study numerous non-obese adults (age between 25-36
years) were fed 1000kcal over maintenance for 8 weeks. The results are pretty
amazing:

Variables Means Range

Weight Before (kg) 65.8 53.3 – 91.7

Weight After (kg) 70.5 58.8 – 93.1

Weight Gained (kg) 4.7 1.4 – 7.2

Fat Gained (kcal/day) 389 58 – 687

Fat-Free Mass Gained (kcal/day) 43 15 – 78

Baseline dietary intake (kcal/day) 2824 2265 – 3785

Baseline resting energy expenditure

1693 1470 – 1990
(kcal/day)
Overfed resting energy expenditure
1772 1460 – 2040
(kcal/day)

Baseline Thermic Effect of Food (kcal/day) 218 89 – 414

Overfed Thermic Effect of Food (kcal/day) 354 133 – 483

Baseline Total Energy Expenditure

2807 2216 – 3818
(kcal/day)

Overfed Total Energy Expenditure

3361 2508 – 4601
(kcal/day)

*table from AARR May 2012

What you can see is that the total weight gained is much less than what you’d
expect. On paper, 1000 calories over maintenance for 8 weeks should results in
about 7.2kg (16 lbs) of weight gained. But in this well controlled study only an
average of 4.7 kg (10 lbs) was gained.

If we do the math we’ll see that only about 400 calories out of 1000 were stored and
the rest were burned off. And more than two thirds of the burned calories were
dissipated through NEAT.

However, the energy burned through NEAT varied drastically between subjects.
You’ll see that the highest NEAT responder burned 692kcal per day while the lowest
responder only 98kcal. The former is probably one of those people who cannot
gain weight no matter what and the latter is one of those that gets fat just by
thinking about food.
What this study shows us

This study shows that we cannot always estimate how many calories are necessary
to gain 2-3 lbs a month. The surplus we set on paper and the one that actually
occurs may be very different.

The naturally skinny guys probably need 500kcal+ over maintenance to gain at the
ideal rate while some other people may only need 200kcal.

How to Adjust your Calories if you’re not Gaining Weight

I suggest you increase your calorie intake by another 200kcal.

If you still gain slower than the rates given in the tables, then increase calories again
by 200. Remember to make small increases in calories. This way you’ll avoid
unnecessary fat gain.

 
  
 
Macro Split, Food Choices and Diet Structure
 
When maintaining or lean bulking, the danger of losing muscle and strength is no
longer there. Recovery is also greatly improved. For these reasons you can allow
more flexibility in your nutrition plan.

Macro Split

I recommend you focus on hitting only protein and calories. Fats and carbs can vary
between days - now more than when cutting. Because you’re eating more carbs
overall you can now allow more dietary fat in your plan if you want. But make sure
carbs are still the dominating macronutrient in your diet. Carbs fuel weight training
performance and you need them to make good strength gains.

Food Choices

A big mistake people make when transitioning for cutting to maintenance is that
they change the foods they eat.

They give up on whole food protein, veggies, fruits, and potatoes for more
convenient choices like protein shakes, high sugar snacks, and fast food. Satiety
immediately declines. They find they no longer feel full on the same number of
calories.

As a result they end up eating more.

Don’t give up on filling foods for convenience. Always keep filling foods as the staple
of your diet. Aim to get at least 70-80% of your calories from whole foods, rich in
micronutrients.
Remember health is not about avoiding “bad” foods, it’s about including nutritious
foods.

Diet Structure

For maintenance, I recommend keeping the same Intermittent Fasting plan you
used for cutting. You still need to put emphasis on managing hunger and cravings.

For lean bulking though, you can use a diet structure that includes more meals. If
you find you easily overeat even in a surplus, keep doing IF. It will make it harder for
you to go over your calories.

But if you find it difficult to eat all your calories in a 8-10 hour window, eat a meal in
the morning as well.
Is Reverse Dieting Necessary?

Before we wrap up, I want to address the subject of Reverse Dieting. If you’re busy, you 
can skip this section. The short answer is: you don’t need it.  
 
You’re probably familiar with reverse dieting ­ slowly increasing your calories to 
maintenance over a period 4­6 weeks.  
 
People that do it claim it offers 3 benefits: 
 
1. It prevents rapid fat gain when you move into maintenance 
2. It builds metabolic capacity 
3. It prevents binge eating after the diet is over 
 
Are these claims actually true? Not entirely. Let’s analyze them one by one to see why.  
 
I recommend watching ​ this video ​
where Eric Helms, Menno Henselmans, Layne Norton and 
Peter Fitschen debate the subject of Reverse Dieting. Lots of great info in there.  

Does Reverse Dieting Prevent Rapid Fat Gain when you Move into
Maintenance?
 
If you think about it, the answer is obvious. If you bring your calories back up to
maintenance​ , how are you going to store fat?
Maintenance means eating just as many calories as your body burns for energy, not
more, not less. So if there’s not calorie surplus or deficit, your weight and body
composition will stay the same. I personally don’t see how moving from a deficit
into maintenance can lead to fat gain. It defies the very definition of maintenance.

Now here’s where I think people make the mistake.

They think their maintenance calories are the same as they were before the diet.
For example if they started cutting at 200 lbs and their maintenance was 3000 kcal,
now that they weigh 185 lbs they think their maintenance is still 3000 kcal.

Of course it doesn’t work like that.

There are several factors that decrease your maintenance when you lose
weight:

● Most importantly, when you weigh less you burn fewer calories both at rest
and during any kind of activity. Moving a 200 lbs body takes more energy
than moving a 175 lbs body.
In addition to that, body fat is metabolically active tissue, despite what most
people think. A pound of fat takes about 2 calories per day to maintain at
rest. If you lose fat, your basal metabolic rate will be lower even if your lean
body mass is the same.

● Leptin levels decrease when you’re lean which means your resting metabolic
rate decreases slightly as well. These adaptations are normal and your
metabolic rate will probably never go back to pre-diet levels unless you
regain the lost weight.

● Because you’re eating less food overall, the energy required for digestion and
absorption (TEF) is also decreased. The thermic effect of food is about 15% of
the total calories consumed so if you’re eating 3000 kcal TEF is about 450. If
you eat 2500 kcal TEF is only about 370 kcal.

● Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) also goes down in a deficit.

Studies show that when we’re in a deficit, our body tries to conserve energy
by reducing our spontaneous movements such as fidgeting. And considering
 that some people can burn up to 1000 calories through NEAT you can
imagine how much a reduction can affect your energy expenditure.

So I think the reason people gain less fat when they reverse diet compared to
moving straight into maintenance is because it’s much ​ easier for them to discover
their new maintenance intake. If you increase your calorie intake by 100 every
week, you can’t miss it.

On the other hand the people that jump straight into maintenance usually eat too
much. They think their maintenance is the same as before and they actually go into
a surplus. That’s the reason I think people see rapid fat gain.

I believe increasing your calorie intake by 100 every week takes waaay too long. In
my opinion you should eliminate the calorie deficit from the first day.

*Oh and something else, everyone agrees that taking a full diet break (one or two
weeks at maintenance) is a good idea. But no one talk about reverse dieting your
way to a diet break. Why not? Isn’t it the same thing? You’re going to eat at
maintenance which means fat gain right? No...that’s just stupid.

Does Reverse Dieting Build Metabolic Capacity?

Here’s a story I hear often.
One guy was in a deficit and his weight was not going down at all. Then he started
reverse dieting and lost X number of pounds and got leaner while eating more!
Conclusion: Reverse Dieting builds metabolic capacity and helps you burn fat.

Well… not exactly.

First of all, there is no way someone can be in a deficit and not lose body weight (fat
included). It defies the laws of physics.

Undisciplined guy says: “That’s not true! I’ve stayed in a deficit for weeks and didn’t
lose any weight.”

I don’t buy it.

If that was true, government agents would come and take him away for lab
experiments. His genes would solve world hunger. He would be the solution for
space exploration. Imagine the headlines: Scientists discover a man that doesn’t
need food to maintain weight.

Let’s be honest. No way he’s in a deficit. ​

The guy is in denial​
.

There are two main reasons people may not lose weight when dieting:

1. They don’t actually stick the deficit, they just say they are. For them the weekend
binge doesn’t count.
2. Water retention masks the reduction in weight. When you’re dieting cortisol
levels go up which can make you hold more water and it makes it seem like your
weight in not changing.

So if their weight was stalling while “being in a deficit” why did they start to lose
weight when they began reverse dieting? Answer: They were still in a deficit.

Think about it, if you start reverse dieting from a 700 calorie deficit and you add 100
calories this week, what happens? You are now in a 600 calorie deficit.
In the second week you will have a 500 calorie deficit so of course you’ll lose fat. In
the fourth week you’ll have a 300 calorie deficit.

I don’t get how people don’t see this.

Guy says: “I reverse dieted for 5 weeks and I lost a lot of fat during that time”. Well
of course you did, you were still in a deficit. People seem to think that when you
start reverse dieting you are no longer dieting when in fact you still are – for at least
a few weeks.

Also, eating more carbs may bring down cortisol levels and help flush out the water
you’ve been holding. It would seem that you’re losing a lot of weight all of a sudden
but that’s just water finally being flushed out.

What about Slowly Increasing Calorie Intake to Build Metabolic

Capacity?
 
There is no research that supports the fact that you can speed up your metabolism
by gradually increasing your caloric intake. Studies show that ​ Resting Metabolic
Rate only slightly increases in response to overfeeding​. It takes a very large surplus
of calories to speed up your metabolic rate by merely 10%. Also, that increase only
stays there if you continue to eat a high surplus.

But why do people claim they can maintain their weight on more calories than
before when they reverse diet?

It can all be explained by 4 things:

1. An increase in caloric expenditure through training more

2. An increase in NEAT
3. Gaining weight so their metabolic rate goes up
4. Not actually realizing they’re gaining fat

When you eat more you feel more energetic which means you can train harder and
burn more calories. NEAT also goes up when the body senses an energy surplus.

Not realizing you’re gaining fat is a huge factor as well. Eating 200 calories surplus
every day only leads to about 3 pounds gained in one month. You can think you’re
gaining muscle because two pounds of fat are very hard to notice in the mirror.

This actually happened to me in the past. I kept increasing my calorie intake

thinking I had built my metabolic capacity but in reality I was gaining fat without
realizing it. Interestingly enough there was a 2 week delay between the time I
increased my calories and when I noticed my weight going up.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t try to eat as much as you can without gaining
fat. Of course we should do that. But we it to support training performance and not
to speed up our metabolism.

Reverse Dieting to Prevent Binge Eating

 
And now finally let’s talk about avoiding binge eating after the diet is over.

Reverse dieting is often recommended for bodybuilders and physique athletes to

prevent binge eating after a show. I completely agree with this approach.

I’ve heard stories of bodybuilders regaining all the weight they’ve lost in 6 months
of dieting in only 3 weeks of binge eating. That must be devastating… seeing all that
hard work thrown away.

Reverse dieting helps prevent binge eating in this case because it keeps people on a
structured plan even after the diet is over. Instead of feeling free to do whatever
you want you know that you gradually have to increase your calorie intake and ease
off the cardio over the following weeks.

That way you get to maintain your physique very close to your stage condition.
But I see no reason why the average Joe that cut down to 8% body fat needs to
reverse diet like a bodybuilder. His desire to binge is probably not physiological like
in the case of bodybuilders, it’s all psychological.

Most people just want to reward themselves with a binge for finishing the diet. As
we talked about in ​
the article and video on Moral Licensing​
that’s mainly a
self-image problem.

We feel the need to reward ourselves for being lean only when we believe we’re not
normally like that. If we believe being mindful of how much we eat is our normal
behavior then we don’t feel the need to binge or reward ourselves for it.

So for most people I don’t see how Reverse Dieting – basically extending the diet by
5 more weeks – somehow solves the binge eating problem. If someone at 8% body
fat feels the need to binge, I think the problem is in their mind, not related to their
diet.

That’s my take on reverse dieting. I think it’s unnecessary to take 5-6 weeks to
return to maintenance. You’d be much better off in my opinion if you returned to
maintenance as soon as you decide the cut is over.