I have not been updating my blog for some time now, mostly because I had nothing to update. I am still doing the same exercises and still trying to gain weight irrespective of my fat %. The good news is that I have finally reached a weight of 130 lbs. This has been my dream ever since I started working out some 2 years ago. The journey has not been easy at all. For some time I was stuck at 125 lbs (which was my previous high before I decided that I had to lose fat before I start gaining again). My body seems to have some kind of resistance at my previous weight set point of 125. I could not break it no matter what I did. But before going into more details, take a look at my graphs first.
Weight Chart
Fat % Chart
Lean Mass Chart
As you can see, I was trying to break 125 since early June. But no matter how much I tried, I could not break it. I was about 125 for a full 2 months. I got really frustrated. I was eating the same kind of food and about the same amount every day. I did not change my workout in those 2 months either. Progress in weights was also not going well. I was stuck at the same weights or was going down. Noticing how my the effort is going down the drain, in late July I decided to change the exercises a bit hoping that the muscle confusion might help me gain some weight. This is after nearly 2 months of wasted effort.
Suddenly it looked like the change in exercises have done something. I was able to break 125 and it looked like I was gaining weight albeit slowly for the next 3 or 4 weeks. The gains were very slow and mostly came from gain in fat. As a result, I was still where I started 3 months ago when it came to muscle mass. I gained some fat and so my weight went up. I thought about this hard. For some reason my body type just wants to sit at some preset weight. It is like stocks. There is a resistance point beyond which my body resists moving to. But once you break the resistance, it becomes the support. So you don't normally go below it unless some measures are taken to lose weight.
Having turned the knob on one of the variables, I set about tuning the other variable in weight gain, which is diet. I decided to increase my calorie intake by another 300 calories. I hate diet changes because then I am always bloated and always feel like I am gaining too much fat too quickly. Moreover I have to force myself to eat more and I feel like throwing up. But you have got to do what you got to do. And there in was a pleasant surprise waiting for me. I finally started seeing very quick weight gains. I was gaining both fat and muscle at an accelerated rate. In 3 weeks after increasing my calories, I went from 126.6 lbs to 130.2 lbs. A full 3.6 lbs weight gain. About 1.2 lbs/week. Of course my fat was gaining pretty quickly too. But as I mentioned in one of my previous post, I decided to not worry about fat. The most important thing for me is to move my weight set point from 125 to 135. Which is my next goal. At this rate I should be able to reach my goal in 4 weeks. But of course I know this will not last long. As soon as I gain muscle that can eat away the extra 300 calories, I will again stop growing.
What is sad about this whole exercise is that I wasted a full 3 months not knowing what to do. All I had to do was increase my calories intake. Hope I can remember this moral for the next time.
Hello, my friend. I was like you, and i started with p90x first. The before-and-after pictures convinced me that p90x was the solution to getting the girls. As you can guess, I was not even seeing much results, and i came across one post in your blog, which directed me to stronglifts.
ReplyDeleteI have since used stronglifts 5x5 and i have been gaining mass steadily. I have gained about 16pounds since i first started till now for 3 months, but my bodyfat rose from 8% to 13% and have since steadied itself at there for a month. However, i am still growing stronger and stronger.
I am eating clean like you, but i find it really difficult to get a high calorie intake by eating clean. I understand your frustration too. Having no choice, i just indulge in some fast food such as the double quarter pounder burger from McDonalds. None of their fries and their soft drinks of course. It contains a lot of fat, but its the easiest way to get calories. But i do it once a week.
I also drink 1 litre of milk a day and eat loads of chicken breast. I try not to remove the visible fat on it because the extra calorie would serve to benefit me instead. I also eat a pack of nuts because of the high amount of good fat in it. Beef is better but due to cultural reasons is it not available in many stores here.
I thought i would just share with you what i did because of one post from your blog. I hope that post would convince others that p90x does not build mass, and compound movements with weights is the better way to build slabs of muscle your body.
Thank you and good luck for your future endeavours. Lets get ourselves from skinny to strong!
Hey monkey reaper, it is always nice to hear stories about people like me.
ReplyDeleteI think commercials have a strong impact and almost every ectomorph I talked to said that they started with p90x, which is completely useless for the skinny folks.
Glad to hear that you switched to stronglifts. I routinely alternate between high intensity 5 reps with medium intensity 8 reps, just to make sure I am don't hit the dreaded plateau and also to keep my motivation up.
Eating clean and eating the number of calories that we ectomorphs need is really hard. I am eating some unhealthy stuff too to maintain my calorie count. However it seems like you are less concerned about gaining too much fat than me, which is a very good trait to have for ectomorphs, because you gained a lot in 3 months. On the other hand I keep trying to lose fat once I cross 12% BF and by doing so tend to lose a lot of muscle too.
Thank you for sharing your experiences and I wish you all the very best for you continued progress.