Should I bulk up or keep cutting fat?

Question

I'm hitting gym for 6 months, When I started I had about 20% of body fat, I was a skinny guy with big fat belly. Now after 6 months of weight training and cardio I reduced body fat to 14% without lossing or gaining weight and I a have a better upper body.

Now I like to put on 5kg (11.5lbs) and I want to reduce body fat to 10%. My current wieght is 65kg (143Lbs).

1) Should I keep reducing my body fat, and once its reaches 10% start caloric excess diet?

or

2) Should I start a caloric excess diet and gain weight, once I reach my goal cut the fat to 10%?

3) If I do second approach, will I gain more body fat on weight gain?

Answer 1

TLDR: You should eat a small caloric surplus and lift heavy weights.

If you cut down to 10% bodyfat now, and start adding calories later to gain mass, you will also increase your bodyfat again. Even if it won't be a lot of fat, you will also gain some fat.

It would be best to have a small caloric surplus, let's say about 200-300 calories above the amount of calories you need to stay on your current weight. This will allow you to gain mass while not overdoing it and gaining a lot of fat while doing so.

You should also hit big lifts, and hit them heavy. Don't just do isolation movements at 12 reps, this won't make you grow as effectively as a natural lifter. Combine heavy weight and low reps on compound movements with lower weight and high reps on isolation movements so you will gain muscle and burn calories during the workout as well (things like deadlifts actually burn quite a lot of calories).

Example: when training legs, do 5 sets of 5 reps on squats, after that, do things like lunges or leg extensions for 4 sets of 8-10 reps.

Example 2: when training back, do 5 sets of 5 reps on deadlifts, after that, do things like pull-ups, rows, lat-pulldown for 4 sets of 8-10 reps.

I hope it helps, it definitely helped me.