Chasing Clarity: Health & Fitness Podcast ERIC HELMS: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN WEIGHT GAIN & RATE OF MUSCLE GAIN: IS AN ENERGY SURPLUS NEEDED TO MAXIMIZE MUSCLE GROWTH?
Feb 9, 2024
Guest Eric Helms, fitness expert and researcher, discusses the relationship between weight gain and rate of muscle gain. They cover the new weight gain study by Helms et al. and explore the impact of energy surpluses and deficits on lean mass accretion and fat gain. They also discuss the limitations of calculating lean mass gain and the importance of considering individual differences in research studies. Additionally, they explore the benefits of tracking progression in compound and isolation movements.
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Deficits Reduce Hypertrophy On Average
- Large energy deficits progressively impair muscle gain and a ~500 kcal/day deficit often halts average lean-mass increases.
- Individual factors (bodyfat, training status) cause wide variation around that average outcome.
It’s A Graded Energy–Muscle Relationship
- The relationship between deficit size and muscle gain is graded: larger deficits make gains less likely, smaller deficits may still allow growth.
- Getting out of a deficit helps, but larger surpluses may not linearly increase muscle gain.
The Roseneck Novice Weight‑Gainer Example
- Roseneck's classic overfeed on untrained young men showed massive gains when adding ~2000 kcal/day, almost a pound/week of mostly lean mass.
- That effect was driven by youth and novice status, not generalizable to trained lifters.