Former Fat Guy Scared of Bulking

Hi guys. I’m scared of bulking first of all I’ve never really done any weights until about a year ago, I used to be 18 stone and about 6ft tall growing up, I started running and doing some bodyweight stuff when I was 17 and lost 6 stone, I looked completely different and spent the next 5 years doing endurance sports with little to no weight training plans, I’m now 6ft 2-3, 200lbs around 15% bodyfat but I’m back playing rugby so would like to hit 225lbs for my league that is a good weight, I’m just scared of bulking really, I’m playing sports and on a 5 day weight training plan going as hard as I can in the gym and trying to eat around 3000-3500 calories a day, but mentally I’m worried I’ll end up looking like the fat guy I left behind.

My diet is pretty clean,
breakfast - is usually oats, protein powder, almond milk and low sugar yoghurt
Snacks - low sugar bagel, with natural peanut butter and a banana, rice cakes, low sugar cereal like shredded wheat
Lunch - 4 egg omellete with cheese and onion thrown in with low fat cottage cheese on side
Dinner - Chicken breast, brocoli, carrots, kale and salad (tomato, cucumber, lettuce, spinach, low fat cottage cheese) or low fat beef mince (drained of fat and oil) chopped tomato and an avocado on salad above
Snacks after dinner - protein bar and bowl of low sugar yoghurt

workout plan is
Monday - Chest, tri’s, shoulders
Tuesday - Back and Biceps
Wednesday - Legs
Thursday, chest, tri’s shoulders
Thursday, Back and biceps
Friday Legs

Any advice would be greatly appreciated

This depends on the position you’re playing but if I were you, and have been heavy before, I wouldn’t go above 15% bf. It gets harder and harder to drop the lard each time.

If you want to add muscle, slowly drop weight to about 10% body fat then add it at an even slower rate (about half the rate) until you hit 15% then repeat the cycle.

That should allow you to maintain performance when losing weight and put you in the caloric surplus for as long as possible to gain muscle.

If you’re playing rugby, I’d drop the bodybuilding approach and train for rugby. Any muscle you gain, you want it to improve your on field performance. Be critical of your training and ask how each part is contributing to your rugby performance.

For most sports, it’s about hips, shoulders and legs. Not tris and bis

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This may not be the answer you want to hear, but slow and steady gains are the best way to stay lean. Don’t go for too big a caloric surplus and you shouldn’t gain a great deal of fat. Just focus on getting stronger in a variety of rep ranges and keep the calories between 200-500 calories above surplus and you should be okay. If you start to see some unwanted fat, perhaps you could try some metabolic work like Nick Tuminello advocates.

+2. Seriously, bulking and cutting is bullshit.

https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/bulking-diet-delusion