Cardio when BULKING

[Pushtoday]

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Do you need Cardio while Bulking?
I personally do LISS cardio 2-3 times a week while Bulking. Of course I'm trying to add size, but it shouldn't make me unhealthy.
Below are a couple of the articles which help me confirm these reasons for doing cardio while on a Bulk.

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Cardio While Bulking (maximuscle.com)
Do You Really Need To Do Cardio While Bulking?
Bulking up is not just about packing as much mass on as possible. If you ditch exercise and up calories you’d gain lots of body fat – but that’s not a successful bulk. Instead, the key to a successful bulk is to build lean muscle mass and keep body fat levels down.

Obviously, the way to bulk is to increase your caloric intake. Unfortunately, this often means excess energy being stored as fat. One way to help prevent this is to perform cardio while bulking.

Unfortunately, there’s a lot of misinformation around cardio for people trying to put on weight. From ‘cardio kills gains’ and other silly comments you might have read on the internet, people are left with the idea that performing cardio might work against them.

This is untrue. Proper cardio while bulking provides lots of benefits. Here are a few:

Cardio Reduces Body Fat
By eating at a calorie surplus, you’ll be building mass. However, not all of it will be the ideal form of mass (muscle). Cardiovascular workouts are good at burning carbohydrates and fat stores. The increase in calorie burn and the appetite stimulating effect of low intensity cardio means you can often eat more on a cardio day.

Too much cardio can inhibit growth, as it will burn the excess calories you’re eating. But most people won’t ever be in danger of doing too much. Instead, a mixture of low and high intensity cardio through the week alongside your bulk will help minimise body fat.

Cardio Increases Your Recovery Time
The additional cardiovascular exercise can help decrease recovery times in between workouts, as low intensity cardio stimulates blood flow and increases the nutrient uptake of your muscles. Essentially, this means that you can recover from a heavy leg day (which is great for bulking up) quicker if you do a low intensity exercise afterwards.

This means less downtime and more lifting, which in turn means more potential muscle growth. Rest is still vital though – so don’t skip it.

Cardiovascular Health Should Never Be Ignored
Cardio while bulking is important for the same reason cardio is important at all times. If you focus on mass and neglect cardio, you’ll end up tired out when walking upstairs or performing a light jog. Does that sound like the mark of someone who is fit to you? Thought not.

Cardiovascular conditioning will benefit your body whether you’re bulking or not. When you complete your bulk and go back to more regular styles of training, or cutting, you’ll find cardio extremely testing if you’ve not kept at it during the bulk. Health is just as important as gains, so get your cardio done.

How To Do Cardio While Bulking
Despite all of this, it is true that excess cardio will inhibit growth. This is because the excess of exercise will burn the calorie surplus you’re eating, undoing the hard work.

However, to get the benefits of cardio, you’ll need to keep your activity levels up with low and moderate intensity exercise. High intensity cardio burns far too many calories to incorporate into your bulk.

This means that you need to stick to low intensity exercise that promotes cardiovascular health without burning too many calories. Walking, jogging, cycling and elliptical machines are all good options for this.


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How Much Cardio Should I Do When Bulking? (By Heather Hitchcock/Livestrong.com)

To increase muscle mass in the bulking phase, you have to increase your caloric intake to supply your body with the raw materials for muscle growth. For some people, this can lead to fat gain instead of muscle gain, especially if the calorie intake is too high.

A moderate amount of cardio exercise will help you stay lean while you bulk, and it's good for your health, so plan to include a few cardio sessions per week. The only exception is if you're a beginner weightlifter who has problems putting on muscle mass. In that case you may want to lay off cardio for the first couple months of your training program.

Benefits of Cardio Exercise
Almost everyone should be doing some type of cardio during the bulking phase. To build mass you have to eat a large amount of calories; regular cardio will enable you to eat more calories without gaining a lot of fat.

Cardio exercise also increases blood flow, delivering more oxygen to your muscles and removing waste products, such as carbon dioxide and lactic acid. The increase in blood flow to the muscles promotes muscle building by delivering fresh nutrients to the muscles needed for growth and aiding in recovery.

Last, you probably do more in your daily life than just lifting weights. To have the stamina to play a football game with friends, or even climb a long flight of stairs, you need to keep up your cardiovascular fitness with cardio exercise.

Cardio While Bulking
People with an ectomorph body type are naturally skinny and have trouble keeping on body weight and building muscle mass. They can often eat whatever they want without gaining fat. These people have a tough time building mass. If you're one of them, you know it.

According to the American Council on Exercise, ecotomorphs are individuals with a naturally fast metabolism. This can be a disadvantage if you are trying to bulk up. ACE recommends only doing the minimal amount of cardio required to maintain your cardiovascular health — three times per week for 30 minutes.

If you are part of this group, often referred to as "hardgainers," keep your cardio at minimum for eight to 12 weeks, getting your training and diet dialed in until you have put on 15 to 20 pounds of mass.

According to an article published in the February 2017 the European Journal of Translational Myology, performing high volumes of aerobic exercise negatively impacts muscle growth — the primary goal during the bulking phase.

When to Do Cardio
When you do your cardio depends on your training schedule. If you're on a three-day training schedule, you can do cardio on your off days. Lower intensity cardio is great active recovery. If you're on a four or five day training schedule you'll probably need to do cardio on the same day, at least some of the time.

You can do your cardio after lifting, but not before. You want to devote most of your energy to making every lift count. If you have to do cardio before consider doing it no less than three hours prior to lifting to give your body a chance to recover. Your best bet is to do your cardio as far apart from lifting as possible.

[MONSTRO]

I dont do any because its hard for me to gain weight , but same time is hard to breath in this heavy weight body . Should i do some cardio even with fast metabolism?

[Pushtoday]

I dont do any because its hard for me to gain weight , but same time is hard to breath in this heavy weight body . Should i do some cardio even with fast metabolism?

Yes brother, Low Impact Steady State cardio a couple times a week. It won't cost you any muscle mass.

[MONSTRO]

Bike? treadmill? stairs?
Fasted or after workout?
30min maximum?
2 to 3 times week?

[Pushtoday]

Bike? treadmill? stairs?
Fasted or after workout?
30min maximum?
2 to 3 times week?

Right after training. 20 mins on the bike or stairs.
2-3 times a week. Not on leg day.
If you have a rest day, then that would be a good day also. (Not fasted.)

[MONSTRO]

Fasted cardio is not a good option for athletes with alot muscle mass? even pre contest is not good option?
I always done in the past and pre contest i done 1 hour fasted 7 days a week but i lose alot of legs and arms size and the deep cuts in my legs gone.