3rd test E batch, 500mg per week. Second run of Test E done last year, with a 5 months pause till the 3rd. Been on the third for 6 weeks now, I got shredded but I cant gain mass. Im in caloric surplus, with a minimum of 700 800 calories, training hard and doing manual labour in the extra time that I’ve got. Any advice to gain some extra mass? Should I add 400 mg of Deca per week? If yes, in how much time should I expect to see any results? Thank you
If you’re not gaining weight, you’re not eating enough.
3 Likes
What he said. You are either not taking in enough calories (I hope the 700-800 is a SURPLUS and not total) OR you are burning too many calories. You have enough AAS if its legit.
Perhaps cut out the “manual labor”. Sometimes less is more. You might also try heavier weight with fewer reps during your workouts. And get plenty of high calorie rest days
2 Likes
Yes, the 700 800 hundred are a surplus. Thank you for your advice, I will keep it in mind!
Eat more is the simple amswer. Tracking calories is great and all, but accurately gauging energy expenditure is difficult…your 7-800 surplus isn’t actually a surplus based on what you are describing. So, eat more.
2 Likes
Doesn’t matter the calories. Eat as much as needed to gain actual weight on weekly basis. If u don’t on 4000, eat 5000. Still no? Eat 6000. Etc.
4 Likes
I’ll be the 50th person to tell you to eat more.
3 Likes
Eat more 
You need 1000’s in surplus daily calories if you’re a hard-gainer
1 Like
I agree with Hank. I always used the feedback system. If you are trying to gain weight (put on mass), eat more. Check your bodyweight, strength at least weekly and see if they are increasing. If not, eat more. I always used a stabilizing metric too, though it is subjective. The mirror. Do you like the direction things are looking? If you are getting too fat for your liking, something is wrong. Make adjustments as you note. It is the old Shewhart’s Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA).
- Plan: Have a diet and training plan
- Do: Do as planned
- Check: Check what results you have thus far
- Act: Analyze what is right or wrong
Repeat (with adjustments made to Plan)
1 Like
How was this determined? You had RMR tested, calculated TDEE and added enough to account for weight gain? Or it’s a guess?
Everything is a guess, because maintenance would change by a lot if u take and extra walk or had an increased HR by 10 beats whole day. Same goes with food intake - we dont have exact numbers, we have only approximates. Weight of many foods will differ because of moisture in the room, and some fruits are sweeter than others so they dont have exact same calories, its all just approximate.
There is also the thing about individual differences. Going by calculators, my maintenance on a day i dont move much is 3500, but on more active days its around 4500… The thing is that i lose weight on 4500. And on some active days i need to eat 7000kcals to stay same weight so the calculators dont do shit for me.
1 Like
Well, there’s a “guess”, and there’s an educated guess using tools and resources to measure. At least attempting to measure RMR/TDEE would be more helpful than using an online calculator
Eat more.
I had never heard of these when I was competing.
It seems very clear that CPI (Continuous Process Improvement) is the very essence of bodybuilding. At the core of CPI is PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act).
But you do need to be very aware of how your body responds to everything you do. There is no holy grail program to achieve your optimal physique. But PDCA always improves over the long haul.
I for one do not believe in counting calories, and I never did. And I never counted calories. I was on the “idiot diet” as I called it when asked. It is simply PDCA. I always used a feedback system with a few metrics to respond to changes, or lack of changes.
RMR: hogwash! Gain more muscle, you burn more calories when you sleep! A very simple concept. You don’t need to measure it. Just sleep better knowing that you are burning more calories while you sleep than most do while awake.
Not gaining weight?
Actually, pretty simple.
I guess I am more OCD, esp if I have a particular goal in mind. I bought a package deal what included 2 RMR tests and 5 underwater BF % tests. Wear a tracker to get TDEE, which aren’t suppose to be very accurate but according to my weekly changes my Apple Watch is pretty damn close. I’m sure you don’t need all that science to make progress, but I like knowing
All my PDCA is based on science (that was available.) All I was trying to do is get better continuously. And the mirror is all that mattered.
You seem to like as much data as you can obtain. There is nothing wrong about that as long as you are not data rich, but information poor. I never knew my TDEE (empirical data), but through feedback, could tell if it was sufficient, yet not excessive to lose body fat and not muscle.
I spent much of my career working on boiler controls to optimize performance. There were some suggested settings to accomplish that, but my experience allowed my to adjust the inputs, seeing the feedback. I applied that same philosophy for competitive bodybuilding. Make an input adjustment and note the feedback. Did I get the result I was aiming to get? If yes, steady as she goes. If no, make an appropriate change, and check for improvement.
In my opinion, the feedback system is much easier than a formula based on data. As you know, we all respond differently to any one program/formula. But with the feedback system, we can learn exactly how we respond to any change (considering that we can down regulate to any stimulus.)
Nevertheless, to each his own. I only state what I felt worked best for me.
Are you tracking macros? A lot of people THINK they are eating a surplus when they’re actually at maintenance or even in a deficit when taking into account training volume/activity levels.
Obviously you can take drugs to compensate… but when the drugs are no longer an option… what then?
1 Like