Cardio Whilst Bulking

I have endomorphic traits so whilst bulking I still have to do some form of cardiovascular training such as HIIT, Burpees,Interval training etc around twice a week. Recently I have come across a new form of cardio called tabata which looks promising. Have any of you tried Tabata with say squats, deadlifts or clean and jerks and if so how do you rate it for fat loss ?

I would advise against tabata deads, cleans and jerks, those lifts are too technical. Tabata is great for fat loss though.

[quote]chimera182 wrote:
I would advise against tabata deads, cleans and jerks, those lifts are too technical. Tabata is great for fat loss though.[/quote]

i agree. you’d more than likely hurt yourself with deads or clean and jerks using tabata. i have used front squats and thrusters (a squat and overhead press with db’s) before and they both work very well.

I would personally save Tabata for fat loss phases. I feel that energy is better utilized under the bar during a mass gaining phase.

I’ve had the best luck with plain ass steady state cardio for bulking. I usually ride my wind-trainer in the morning for 20 minutes at a moderate pace. Trying to hit that g-flux sweet spot.

[quote]analog_kid wrote:
I would personally save Tabata for fat loss phases. I feel that energy is better utilized under the bar during a mass gaining phase.

I’ve had the best luck with plain ass steady state cardio for bulking. I usually ride my wind-trainer in the morning for 20 minutes at a moderate pace. Trying to hit that g-flux sweet spot. [/quote]

I kinda agree with this. I’ve never liked using weight training to induce fat loss like that unless it’s indirect.

Offseason is a great time to do HIIT though. I’ve used Tabata Bike Sprints with myself and client with good success in the past. That’s how the original study was done anyway.

Right I kind of understand what you mean. I find burpees are very underestimated so how would Tabata Burpees sound ?

[quote]X7502 wrote:
Right I kind of understand what you mean. I find burpees are very underestimated so how would Tabata Burpees sound ?[/quote]

Like a lot of intensity.

Remember if you are bulking your first goal is to add muscle. Bust your ass lifting weights. If you have any gas in the tank after that do whatever form of cardio you like.

You may find you do not have enough energy for burpees and may prefer some lower intensity stuff.

Cardio, whilst bulking, IMO, shouldn’t be too intense. The idea is to juuuuust do enough to keep fat gains at bay, while not affecting lean body mass gain

I’m also bulking, and while I know some fat gain is inevitable (that’s just that name of the game), I’ve still stayed fairly lean by doing cardio on my off days only (basically these days I work on MMA technique).

I plan on hitting the track workouts HARD when it’s time to cut, and when I have a enough muscle so that losing some while cutting, won’t be the end of the world.

EDIT - I just remember though, everyone responds to stimulus differently. I know some people who get JACKED just running sprints and doing body weight exercises. I agree this is not the case for the majority of individuals, my point is only that you should try it all out, and see what works best for you.

It took me a LONG time to figure out how to keep BF acceptable, gain muscle on a caloric surplus and not overdo my cardio.

Well, I should have mentioned that I’m also bulking. I do interval sprints after my workouts, for 20 minutes and have rugby training three times a week. I’ve found I can still make gains, even with all the extra running, so cardio isn’t always going to keep you from gaining muscle while bulking, just eat enough.