#27: Four-Time Mr. Olympia Favours The Lean Bulk

As a four-time Mr. Olympia winner, Jay Cutler’s undergone his fair share of bulking and cutting cycles. But you’d be surprised to know that after going through it all, Cutler still prefers the ‘Lean Bulk’.

If you want a refresher as to what the Bulking/Cutting cycle is all about, simply click here. Essentially, bulking requires one to eat in a caloric surplus whilst training at the gym to pack on muscle. Then, through ‘cutting’, the same lad creates a caloric deficit to burn fat. Many folks swear by the method even if the downside is gaining a lot of bodyfat through the bulking phase.

Though a bodybuilder, Cutler was well known for his emphasis on healthy nutrition even throughout a professional career that specifically entailed guzzling down calories.

You can listen to the man speak his mind by clicking here.

As you can imagine, dieting played a critical role in his development as a bodybuilder and his overall health. Especially when the time came to dethrone the ‘king’ of bodybuilding, Ronnie Coleman. During that time, he was consuming a whopping 140 egg whites per day.

And even though now, in retirement, he claims to eat ‘only’ 20 egg whites per day, Cutler still tends to lean towards health above all else. Especially when considering the rising death toll in the bodybuilding world.

“Go chase the lean physique,” Cutler said. “If I was to train someone, and they were bulky - I hate the word bulky - but if they had a little more body fat, I would tone them down more before I really started feeding them a lot of calories.”

Cutler insisted that the idea of putting on muscle mass whilst staying relatively lean is always possible. But having your own, specific goal is crucial.

“Diets are a life saver” Cutler said. “I think having an end goal is important. To people who want to set a certain timeframe: I always say give it at least four months. Obviously, people that are extremely overweight will have to diet for longer.”

“Can you lean bulk or can you go from bulking to being lean and still grow at the same time? I think you can. I think it’s easier if you lean down some and get the metabolism flying before adding the calories. That way you’re staying down, and you can get lean muscle mass and not just be bulking. It looks a little better. That’s my opinion.”

Cutler maintained that athletes, for the most part, should focus on achieving a leaned-down physique before taking things to the next level with added muscle mass.

Packing on muscle whilst trying to remain lean was already discussed in: ‘#4: Do I Have To Bulk Then Cut To Get Muscle?’ If you would like to give it a shot, give it a read and do so.