The Importance of Nutrition When Cutting

The body's fuels

The body uses three energy sources: carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. Carbohydrates are the body's preferred fuel. If the body can't get enough energy from carbohydrates, it will switch to burning fats and proteins. It's a good thing the body uses fat reserves, as we want to lean out. It's less appealing that the body also uses protein as fuel, as proteins are the building blocks of our muscle tissue and are essential for maintaining the muscle mass we've trained so hard for.

Without doping, trained bodybuilders can't lose fat without losing muscle mass. This might be possible for beginner bodybuilders, but that's beside the point. Muscle loss is inherent to a calorie deficit. However, with the right nutrition, we can influence the amount of muscle mass lost. With the right nutrition, we can minimize muscle loss during cutting.

The right nutrition when cutting

Cutting is largely a matter of proper nutrition and, to a lesser extent, adjusting your training. Nutrition involves finding the right balance of carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and the right amount of calories.

The balance between carbohydrates, proteins and fats

A popular energy source ratio during cutting is 50% carbohydrates, 30% protein, and 20% fat. Experienced bodybuilders who have completed multiple bulking and cutting phases sometimes like to personalize this ratio based on their own experiences. After all, every body is different, and once you've figured out what your body responds best to, it's perfectly fine to deviate from this popular 50-30-20 ratio. However, in practice, it's likely that this won't deviate much from the 50-30-20 ratio.

To achieve the correct ratio of carbohydrates, proteins and fats you will need

should choose foods that are rich in protein and not high in fat.

Good sources of lean protein include chicken, turkey, lean beef, low-fat cottage cheese, and eggs. Animal proteins also provide high-quality protein; high-quality proteins contain many different types of amino acids, which are important for maintaining muscle mass. Because it's difficult to achieve the 50-30-20 ratio in practice, you can use protein shakes. Protein shakes are rich in protein, contain little fat, and are low in carbohydrates.

The Right Amount of Calories for Cutting

The number of calories you can eat daily while cutting depends on many factors. First, you'll need to calculate your daily energy needs.

Your daily calorie needs depend on your weight, height, age, gender, build, your daily activities, and how much and how strenuous your training is. Online calculators are available that take these factors into account when calculating your daily calorie needs.

When cutting, your diet should be 200 to 500 kcal below your daily calorie needs. 200 kcal if you don't need to lose much weight and 500 kcal if you need to lose a lot of fat. When you start cutting, you'll initially aim for 200 kcal below your daily calorie needs. The idea is to gradually reduce the number of calories in your diet. After that, it becomes a matter of frequently weighing and adjusting your weight.

For heavyweight bodybuilders (120kg+), a good guideline is to lose 1000 grams of weight per week. For lightweight bodybuilders (80kg-), a good guideline is to lose 750 grams of weight per week. If your weight falls between these two ranges, you can maintain a proportional share of this guideline. If you follow this guideline, you "know" that you are losing fat mass and not muscle mass (you can never be certain; every body is different). If you lose (much) more weight than this guideline, there's a good chance that you've lost muscle mass as well as fat mass. If you lose less weight than this guideline, you can still reduce your calorie intake without compromising your muscle mass.

If you don't lose enough weight with a 200 kcal reduction compared to your daily calorie needs, you'll need to reduce your calorie intake further. If you're already achieving good results with 200 kcal, stick to a 200 kcal reduction to prevent unnecessary muscle loss.

If you don't get enough calories from your diet, you won't lose enough weight. Ideally, you'll reach your target weight (or target body fat percentage) in 6 to 8 weeks, with a maximum of 3 months. Don't rush this, because if you get too many calories from your diet too quickly, you'll lose (too much) muscle mass.