E. 144 How to Make The Most Progress in a Maintenance Phase

In this episode, I break down one of the most misunderstood phases in physique development: maintenance.

I walk through when maintenance actually makes sense — whether you’re coming out of a fat loss phase trying to drop dietary fatigue, or stepping down from a build because life stress is too high to support a surplus. We also talk about the biggest mistakes I see: treating every day as 1:1 energy balance, over-adjusting food based on activity, fearing scale weight increases, confusing reverse dieting with maintenance, and assuming you can’t train hard without a surplus.

If you’re trying to improve recovery, regulate body composition, or strategically place a maintenance phase into your annual plan, this episode gives you the framework to do it correctly.

Timestamps:

- [00:00 – 01:13] – Why maintenance is not a “vacation phase”

- [01:14 – 04:17] – When to use maintenance (post-fat loss vs. post-build scenarios)

- [04:18 – 07:09] – What maintenance actually is (energy balance explained)

- [07:10 – 10:08] – Auto-regulating calories based on activity (without overcorrecting)

- [10:09 – 14:10] – Common mistake: fearing strength loss when leaving a surplus

- [14:11 – 15:40] – Daily scale weight & normalizing fluctuations

- [15:41 – 18:57] – How to approach training & recovery at maintenance

- [18:58 – 23:24] – Taking inventory of habits: sleep, stress, food adherence

- [23:25 – 26:12] – Fear of weight gain & using cardio to “cancel out” food

- [26:13 – 27:34] – Reducing cardio strategically during maintenance

- [27:35 – 29:22] – Reverse dieting vs. maintenance (they are not the same)

- [29:23 – 33:27] – Can you build muscle at maintenance? Final considerations

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