Hey, I am a new guy and this is the first post. I have a question about gaining weight. I am 5’9’’ and around 170. It has been awhile since I’ve checked my bodyfat, but if I had to guess I would say that it was around 16-18 (hopefully not more than that), particulary because I have gained 12 pounds since the end of summer. I just got into lifting in August and I wanted to know, is it possible to gain and keep the fat off. Or do I simply have to just bulk up and then slim down later. It would be muchh apprechiated if someone could share some advice with me.
According to Berardi, it’s always better to drop the fat first before you bulk. That’s explained here:
His Massive Eating diet may fit your needs though as it’s supposed to minimize fat gain while bulking. There’s a link to it in the article I pasted above.
Here is a good place to start:
After that go to the main page and put Appetite for Construction into the search box. Read all of those articles.
If you eat clean you can keep fat gain to a minimum.
The previous issues are full of information. Start at the beginning and work your way forward.
Good luck with your training.
Travis,
Seeing as you just started lifting in Aug. you should be able to easily add LBM while cutting Fat.
The first thing you need to do is get your diet in line. Start a food log. Check out the frequently asked question section on the main page for diet and training info…
Another great read will be JB’s 7 Habits article. It will give you the basics to follow. Nail them and you are well on your way. Here is the article:
http://www.t-nation.com/nation_articles/291seven.jsp
Figure out what your maintenence Kcals are and then adjust a little from there for your goals. Being a newbie, (if you are training hard) I would suggest eating slightly over your maintenence level, 250 kcals or so to start, if your goal is to get big and cut fat. You should be getting major gains the first few years of training, and that growth needs food. So the slight increase in intake will help there, along with the new LBM chewing up some of that unwanted BF. Also as you add LBM you are going to burn more kcals, be ready to adjust.
Hope that helps a little, any further ?'s just ask and I am sure someone will help. Get that diet nailed down,
train hard (concentrate on compound lifts), and read up.
Phill
For your situation, you should probably try and lose some of the fat you have and try to get it down to around 10 percent or less. Then once you get down to that level, start bulking up. I read somewhere on T-mag, that even if you lose bodyfat, the fat cells will still be there. As far as your other question, when you are on a bulking cycle, you can gain weight, without putting on fat, but you would need to pay extreme attention to your diet and really control your insulin. As everybody knows, it is extremely hard to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time, but it surely is not impossible. I would recommend following John Berardi’s massive eating, it’s worked wonders for me. Also read some of his Appetite for Construction columns that he wrote.
This was talked about a while back by nate dogg and a few others…I copied and saved it into word a while back…Heres what i still got from that thread…The first part is one of the guys actual plans(what he followed)…i cant remember who it was, but i remmeber his pictures where awesome, as far as the progress he made, gaining muscle, with almost no fat gain, then the end of this is where nate dogg summarized the whole thread…Hope this helps
Here’s the real plan:
P+C Meals (3)
Protein: 60g (mostly whey)
Carbs: 70g (mostly dextrose/malto)
Fat: 3g
P+F Meals (3)
Protein: 60g (mostly caseins, animal)
Carbs: 5g (Fiber)
Fat: 40g (Olive & Flax oil,nuts)
I usually work out around noon, so my schedule looked like this:
*P+C meal
*P+F meal
*Workout (7 scoops ICE + 30g dextrose & 30g maltodextrin + 1L water, during wo)
*P+C meal (post workout, 2 scoops Surge + 20g Dextrose & 20g malto)
*P+C meal
*P+F meal
*P+F meal
Supplements:
*r-ALA = 100-200mg w/ P+C meals
*Fish Oil = 6g EPA/DHA (sometimes more)
*Surge
*ICE
*Antioxidants
*Power Drive + Vinpocetine & Huperzine
*200mg Caffiene + 25mg Ephedrine once a day, sometimes not at all.
I am looking to hit 215lbs @ 5% by the end of the month, so I have upped my protein a bit, dropped the carbs a bit, and added these supps to the list:
Methoxy 7: 4 serv/day
Tribex: 3caps am/ 3caps pm
I anxiously await the day we won’t have to suffer through hearing personal trainers and strength coaches say “You have to put on some fat if you want to gain muscle, blah blah…”
Summary
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Consume at least 1.5 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight.
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Meal combinations are important (P+C or P+F). Read Massive Eating for details.
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A low-carb diet (T-dawg 2.0, Don Alessi recommendations) will work better for certain individuals.
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A moderate carb approach (Temporal Nutrition/Massive Eating) will work best for others.
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Nutrition is the key factor when trying to gain LBM and not gain fat and/or lose fat.
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Supplementation will play an important role in keeping the fat off ad gaining the mass but only after nutrition has been dialed in perfectly.
Supplement recommendations would be:
A) Basics (multivitamin, fish oil caps, etc.)
B) Surge or other post-workout shake
C) Hot Rox (to keep fat to a minimum)
D) 4ADEC or MAG-10 to help put on LBM quicker.
E) BCAA’s consumed before and during exercise (see Temporal Nutrition Part 2 for details)
F) Others?
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It will take a certain amount of trial and error to figure out just how many calories and carbs you can consume while accomplishing the above.
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A certain amount of P+C meals will be ideal for filling glycogent stores and “filling out the muscles.” In addition, P+F meals before training and before bed will help keep fat to a minimum. As Debo suggested, we may need to think about higher calorie P+C meals and lower calorie P+F meals. This will take more research and experimentation.
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Following a healthy approach should be paramount.
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A consistent and periodized training program is a necessity.
Anything else?
The new methoxy-7 when it comes out. It will help you to not lose muscle during a cutting cycle and to keep your same amount of bodyfat or even lose bodyfat during a bulking cycle.