From Hugo Rivera,
Your Guide to Bodybuilding.
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If you want to get your body ready and in top shape for this 2008 Spring Break, then this is the ultimate bodybuilding guide for you! In this guide you will find information on how to lose body fat while retaining lean muscle mass, how to gain solid muscle weight without turning into a blimp, and what sort of routine is best to help you achieve your bodybuilding goals quicker.

Losing Body Fat While Retaining Muscle
We all know that in order to lose weight we need to take in less calories than what we put in. Once the body finds itself on a caloric deficit, weight will be lost. However, the key here is to lose fat weight and not muscle weight. Therefore, you need to pay attention not only to how many calories you take in, but also to the amount and the quality of the nutrients that make up those calories. For instance, if you were to eat 2000 calories worth of chocolate bars the result would be entirely different from a diet consisting of the right amounts of proteins, carbohydrates and good fats. In the first diet, you will mainly lose muscle weight while in the second diet, you will mainly lose fat while retaining muscle. There are other factors as well that you need to account for, such as meal frequency and nutrient ratios. In a nutshell, 5-6 small meals are required in order to keep muscle and lose fat as well as a diet that consists of approximately 40% carbohydrates from slow released sources mainly, 40% low fat proteins and 20% good fats.

For more information on this subject, please take a look at the articles below:

• Bodybuilding Nutrition Basics
  
  
• Sample Bodybuilding Diets
  
  
• Simple Bodybuilding Diet Tips That Help You Get Cut And Ripped In No Time
  
  
• Five Common Bodybuilding Dieting Mistakes
  
  
• Will Brink's Unified Theory on Bodybuilding Nutrition

Gaining Solid Muscle Weight Without Turning Into a Blimp!

If, on the other hand, you are already pretty ripped and need to gain some solid muscle weight, then you need to go into a bulking plan.

The key to bulking up and gaining solid muscle weight without looking like a ballon is to first and foremost ensure that you are at below 10% body fat before you embark on a bulk up program. Otherwise, once the body goes above 10% it is easier for it to store body fat from the extra calories than it is to gain muscle. The reason for that is because the more body fat you carry the more estrogen receptors you will have. Estrogen likes to store fat, and yes, even us guys have some estrogen. Therefore, if you are not below 10% (13% for women), then follow a program with emphasis on body fat loss.

Assuming that you are below 10% then the key to gaining solid muscle weight is to eat slightly more calories than what you burn on a daily basis and ensure that these calories come from clean sources of food. Some bodybuilders feel than bulking up means a free for all when it comes to eating. If you eat garbage, I can guarantee you that most of the weight gained will be garbage as well.

For more information on this subject, please take a look at the following articles:

• Bulking Up Rules for the Natural Bodybuilder
  
  
• Sample Bodybuilding Weight Gain/Bulking Up Diets For Hardgainers
  
  
• Dave Draper's Bodybuilding Advice for Gaining Muscle Weight

Bodybuilding Routines To Achieve Your Spring Break Goals

Are high reps for cutting and low reps for building? This is a question I get asked plenty of times. Truth be told, periodized bodybuilding programs bring about the best results so you will use high reps, low reps and everything in between! Does my workout change when I want to gain muscle as opposed to when my main goal is losing fat? Not really. My weight training workout remains the same. I always train to gain muscle and in order to accomplish this you need to tax the body to the maximum. Lighten up the weights to ridiculous amounts in an effort to lose body fat and the muscle will see no reason to stick around. The only thing that I do change is the amount of cardiovascular exercise that I do. I do less cardio when I'm gaining and more when I'm losing.

So, how will you lose body fat then if you are still training for muscle gain? The answer is simple. Let your diet and the cardio take care of the fat loss and your weight training take care of stimulating new growth. Worst case by stimulating new growth constantly your body will retain muscle as you lose body fat. Best case, as it has happenned to me many times, you still gain some muscle in the process. If you just keep a very slight caloric deficit some muscle gain is still possible but obviosuly not even close to what you could gain if you would have eaten over your caloric requirements.

The routines on the next page are all suitable for any bodybuilding goal that you may have. Remember that it is the diet and the cardiovascular components the ones that will determine whether you mainly lose body fat or mainly gain muscle.

Spring Break Bodybuilding Routines