The Bump Phase For Joe Shofner
Eat more. On purpose. For 2 to 4 weeks.
You have been cutting a long time, through a stretch where work and life have been anything but calm. Driving you harder into a deficit right now is the wrong move. So we are going the other way for a short block: calories up, body gets a genuine rest, training gets fueled properly. Then when things settle we come back down and cut from a much better starting point. This is not a break from the plan. It is the part of the plan that makes the next bit work.
What Changes From Monday 17th
One lever moves. Everything else stays exactly where it is.
Calories are the only thing moving. Protein stays at 190g, steps stay at 12k, training stays exactly as it is. If we changed four things at once and something went sideways, we would have no idea which one caused it.
Why We Are Doing This
Three reasons, and none of them are "you have earned a break".
- You have been in a deficit a long time. Your body adapts. It gets quietly more efficient, you burn a bit less, and progress slows even when you are doing everything right. Pulling calories back up resets that.
- Life is loaded right now. A hard cut is uncomfortable and it demands you be in a decent place to support it. Between the flooding, the long days and the kids, you are not in that window. Stacking a tough cut on top of a tough month is how people fall off entirely.
- The cut afterwards works better. Coming into a deficit from a well fed body, with energy and training moving, gets a far better result than grinding down from an already depleted one.
Put simply: we give your body enough calories to feel good, carbs up, training pumping, sleep solid. Then when the weather turns we bring you down into a proper cut with somewhere to go.
How To Actually Add It The Hard Part
You have been averaging around 1,800 a day. Getting to 2,600 means finding roughly 800 more calories, and that is more food than people expect. If you wing it you will land at 2,100 and wonder why nothing happened.
- Double the carb at lunch and dinner. One fist becomes two. Rice, potatoes, sweet potato. That is roughly 400 calories across the two meals and it is the single easiest win.
- Make breakfast a proper one. More oats, an extra couple of eggs, a banana in with the berries. Another 250 or so.
- Add a real fat source back. A spoon of nut butter, a handful of nuts, a proper drizzle of olive oil on the veg. Around 150 to 200, and fats are the most calorie dense way to close a gap without feeling stuffed.
- Keep the evening protein hit. Same as always. It still earns its place, especially now.
Same foods, bigger portions. Do not close the gap with snacks, takeaways and pastries just because the number is higher. The whole point is a well fueled body, and 800 calories of junk does not do the same job as 800 calories of food you actually cook.
Your Stupidly Simple Eating page still applies. Same breakfast, same lunch, dinner is the only real decision. We are just running bigger portions through the same shape.
What To Expect
Knowing this in advance is what stops you bailing in week one.
Week 1
The scale goes up. Expect 2 to 4 lb.
- That is water, glycogen and food volume in your system. It is not fat. You cannot gain 4 lb of fat in a week eating 2,600 calories, the math does not allow it
- You may feel fuller and slightly heavier. Normal
- Hunger can go up before it settles. Also normal, and it passes
Week 2
This is where it starts paying.
- Energy picks up, in the gym and outside it
- Lifts should start moving again, especially the machine and leg press work
- Sleep usually improves
- Weight settles and stops climbing
Weeks 3 and 4
If we run the full block.
- Weight roughly stable, maybe a slow drift up. That is fine
- Training should feel genuinely strong
- This is the state we want you in before the cut starts
What To Watch Not The Scale
For the next few weeks the scale is the least useful number you own. These four tell us whether this is working.
Keep weighing daily and keep logging, because I still need the data. Just do not read anything into a single morning. If those four are heading the right way, it is working, whatever the scale says that day.
Message Me If
None of these are likely. But do not sit on them for two weeks if they show up.
- The scale is still climbing hard into week 3. Steady drift is fine, a pound a week every week is not
- You feel worse, not better, after 10 days. Energy down, sleep down, training flat. That means something else is going on
- You cannot get near the calories. If 2,600 feels impossible, tell me rather than quietly eating 2,000
- Your shoulder, knee or lower back flares. Nothing to do with the food, but I want to know either way
- You are finding the extra food stressful. This is meant to take pressure off, not add it
The Timeline
Two weeks minimum, four at most, then we cut.
- New target goes live in your app. 2,500 to 2,700 calories. Nothing else changes
- I will come to you for weight, training, sleep and mood
- If it is doing what it should, we run the full four weeks
- If it is not, we adjust rather than push on
- A gentle cut, not a crash. We come down from a well fed body with room to work with
- This is the whole reason we are doing the bump
Calories up to 2,500 to 2,700 from Monday, everything else untouched, the scale will rise in week one and that is meant to happen, and we judge it on energy, lifts, sleep and mood rather than bodyweight.
Built for Joe Shofner · SupraHuman Coaching