The Importance of Maintenance Phases and Diet Breaks

The Importance of Maintenance Phases and Diet Breaks

By Taylor Noriega, NSCA, Pn1, CPPC

The Importance of Maintenance Phases and Diet Breaks 

One of the biggest misconceptions of nutrition programs is that they’re all about losing weight or gaining muscle.  This couldn’t be further from the truth!  It’s actually really stressful on the body to be constantly cutting and gaining all the dang time.  The truth is, the most beneficial phase your body can be in is maintenance.

When we’re in a calorie deficit for too long or the deficit is too intense, our bodies have to adapt. In this case we see metabolic down regulation, which in order to do so your body must down regulate thyroid hormones, drive up cortisol, decrease muscle mass, and slow digestion among other things.  All of that combined contributes to a decrease in sleep quality and exercise recovery, which ultimately brings the opposite of the expected results from a deficit.  Recovery is where all the magic happens for fat loss, so if we’re not recovering, we may not see any loss.  In some cases we see water retention, muscle loss, weight plateau, and overall burnout of the body and brain.  Taking regular diet breaks and eating at your new maintenance once in a while (or “refeeding” as some like to call it) helps keep your metabolism upregulated, eases the stress off your body, and allows for sufficient recovery.  Check out more tips on efficient fat loss here.

On the other hand, when we’re in a surplus for too long or the surplus is too intense, our bodies have to adapt in a whole other direction.  Our metabolism can up regulate over time which can then make the surplus less effective, however the answer isn’t always to continue increasing calories.  For the first few weeks you should see an increase in muscle and maybe a small increase in fat mass.  Over too long of a period of time, the surplus can actually induce insulin resistance which is why we then start to see more of an increase in fat than muscle.  It is at this point (or even before your body hits this point) that you should take a break, recalculate your new maintenance at your increased body weight and aim for those numbers for a while before going back into your surplus.

A maintenance phase gives your body the break it needs.

Don’t use maintenance only for breaks, make sure you’re including entire phases of it in your nutrition periodization.  Maintenance is when your body is perfectly fueled and it doesn’t have to compensate for under or overconsumption of calories.  This phase is the time in which you can really focus on proper recovery, exercise performance and sense of wellbeing.  Some people fear the increase or decrease in calories after a cut or bulk phase because they think it’s going to reverse their results to a degree.  However, a maintenance phase does exactly what it means. It maintains your current body composition.  Yes, there may be a slight weight change due to water retention or release, but at the end of the day, maintenance is the best way to preserve your hard earned results and set you up for success with future goals.  How this can be applied to you and how to effectively periodize your maintenance phases are key concepts we go over in our Fuel-U guide at Red Dot Fitness which ensures our people are not only hitting their goals, but maintaining them long term as well.