How To Gain Weight: 5 Simple Steps

Gaining weight is often a misunderstood concept in bodybuilding circles, with the majority of newcomers assuming ‘weight gain’ simply means adding pounds onto the scale. The truth is, gaining high-quality weight means adding lean muscle tissue with as little fat as possible, a feat that is often easier said than done. Many assume that in order to add pounds of muscle you have to add pounds of fat as well, but with careful attention to your diet and workouts designed to add muscle, it can be accomplished.

Gaining weight comes down to one simple principle: Calories in must be greater than calories out.

This takes into account everything you’ve eaten throughout the day and every ounce of energy you’ve expended, including your workouts. If you have a surplus of calories on a consistent basis, you will gain weight. The trick to gaining muscle without fat is keeping your caloric surplus at no more than five-hundred calories per day, which will give you the energy needed to build muscle without an excess of calories that are stored as fat.

Let’s take a look at five simple steps you can take to maximize lean muscle growth while limiting excess body fat accumulation.

5 Steps: How to Gain Weight

Weight-Gaining Step #1 – Keep your workouts intense

Those extra calories need a job to perform or they will simply go towards fatty accumulation. Lean muscle tissue can only be built if there is adequate stimulation inside the gym. This means following a bodybuilding-friendly lifting regimen that will help you grow. Six to ten repetitions per set, fighting hard to finish each set, will ensure you are lifting hard enough to build muscle.

Weight-Gaining Step #2 – Limit the amount of cardio performed

Cardiovascular exercise is important in maintaining a lean physique and a healthy heart. However, if adding slabs of lean beef to your body is your goal, keep your cardiovascular exercise to a maximum of two to three sessions per week, lasting no more than fifteen minutes per session. This strategy will give you the benefits without burning too much energy.

Weight-Gaining Step #3 – Complex carbohydrates are your friend

One of the most important steps in eating to gain quality weight is to eat high-quality carbohydrates. These types of carbs help provide the fuel your body needs to power-through tough workouts, the fuel your body needs to repair and rebuild your muscle tissue, and the lasting fuel you will need to stave off junk-food cravings.

When you stick to high quality sources of carbohydrates such as oatmeal, yams, sweet potatoes, and other whole-grain sources, your body keeps it’s anabolic hormones in check and it’s fat-storing hormones at bay. Those who attempt to gain weight by eating anything and everything they want often end up gaining more fat than muscle, a direct result of the low-quality sources of carbohydrates that alter the optimal anabolic environment.

Weight-Gaining Step #4 – Supplement with a quality protein product

Most of us don’t realize just how much food it takes to achieve a daily caloric surplus; it is often more than the average person can consume. For this reason, it is important to consume two to three high-quality protein shakes everyday in-between meals, which supplies you with the quality protein and calories you need to grow. Some people naturally have a very high metabolism; if you are already very lean and struggling to gain weight then you’re probably in this category. This is the right time to take your supplementation a step further and consume a weight-gaining shake. These shakes are loaded with high-quality carbohydrates, proteins, and fats, important for the hard-gainer who is struggling to gain weight on diet and protein supplementation alone. Not all protein and weight-gaining supplements are created equal, so be sure to do your homework and get some product reviews before finding the right one for you.

Weight-Gaining Step #5 – Lean cuts of red meat provide quality calories

Red meat is a great weight-gaining tool because it is loaded with protein, contains more fat than chicken and turkey, and is rick in vitamins like zinc and iron, which help give you the power and strength needed to lift your hardest in the gym. Stick to lean cuts of beef such as Eye of Round and Flank steaks, which provide you with the benefits of red meat without the excess of fat found in the majority of cuts. On top of choosing lean cuts, be sure to remove any visible fat before cooking, as this will limit the amount of artery-clogging fat you consume.

Red meat doesn’t need to be consumed on a daily basis, but it does have its place within a solid weight-gaining strategy.

These five steps will give you a huge advantage on your journey to gaining weight.

There is no single ‘Super-food’, no ‘super supplement’, and no ‘magic bullet’ to gaining solid muscular weight. The biggest secret is perhaps knowing what it takes to achieve the goal; consistency. It takes a smart bodybuilding routine combined with a solid weight-gaining eating plan, executed regularly and consistently over a period of weeks, months, and years. As with anything else in life, putting the plan into action and sticking to it over the long haul will help you achieve the results you are looking for.

How To Gain Muscle: My Two “Magic” Secrets

Muscle building can seem like an incredibly frustrating process. On one hand you have the 5% of lifters who appear to make it look easy. On the other hand, you have the rest of the pack who for the life of them can’t figure out what in the heck they are doing so wrong.

Believe it or not the muscle building process is rather simple. There are a limited number of rules that, if followed, lead to rapid success.

This article will tell you exactly how to build muscle. You will be provided with the 2 primary rules of lifting. Follow these rules and you will exceed your goals. Ignore them and you will continue to spin your wheels like every other confused and frustrated gym rat.

Secret #1 – To Build Muscle You Muscle Remain Consistent

An obvious secret of success, but an overlooked one.

Take 100 lifters who aren’t making quality gains and ask them how often they are missing workouts. I would wager than only a very small handful of this group missed less than 5 workouts during the last 365 days.

If you want to be successful then you need to get your butt to the gym. Muscle will not be built sitting on the couch. Sure, rest is an essential part of the muscle building process, but only after the hard work has been done.

Excuses kill gains, legitimate or illegitimate. If you can’t, or don’t lift, then you’re going to have the body of someone who doesn’t lift. Period, end of story. Far too many guys enter the gym all gung ho, wanting to kill themselves by training 6 days per week, or with a crazy amount of volume. This is often a recipe for failure. Why?

Training too often leads to burnout. Training too often also leads to missed workouts. Life gets in the way. Life always gets in the way. Not many guys can stick to a 5-6 day per week split and not miss workouts. If you can great.

The same thing applies to volume. If you go into the gym with the sole purpose of beating the living crap out of your body, then that’s likely to be the outcome. While this is seen as the right thing to do, it sure doesn’t make it easy for you to spring out of bed the next day, full of motivation, and hit the iron again.

You will most likely wake up unable to move. The next logical step – you start to miss workouts due to intense muscle soreness (DOMS), or due to lack of motivation. It is far better to start slow with only 2-3 training days per week using a moderate volume. Allow yourself time to develop the habit of not missing workouts.

Learn your limits, work on improving exercise form and don’t pressure yourself to destroy yourself in the gym. Get in, make progress and get out. Understand that it is a long journey, but a journey that hinges on consistency. Do everything you can to maintain momentum.

Train hard, but train smart. Live to fight another day.

Secret #2 – To Build Muscle You Must Get Stronger

We are all aware that the body adapts to specific demands rather quickly. If you go out and run, you will be in pain the next day. Continue to run, day in and day out, and within a month your body will have adapted quite nicely.

The same thing applies to muscle building. If you hit the gym and bench press 135 pounds for 5 reps, you will feel sore the next day. If you never attempt to add reps and/or weight to this workout, your body will rapidly adapt to this demand and will have no additional incentive to build more muscle tissue.

It doesn’t matter what style of training you utilize – drop sets, slow negatives, low rep sets, Wendler’s 531 with Boring But Big, Starting Strength, Stronglifts, Doggcrapp, HIT, or high volume – if you are not pushing yourself for more weight of the bar over time, muscle gains will stop.
This does not mean you have to get as strong as an Elite level powerlifter. It DOES mean that you can never get complacent with your training. Thought bodybuilders will tell you they don’t specifically train for strength, which is true, I have yet to meet a single weak bodybuilder.

Anyone that wants to build a substantial amount of muscle mass must build a substantial strength base from head to toe. You can’t expect to curl 25 pound dumbbells and have monster biceps. You can’t expect to leg press 135 pounds and have tree trunk quads.

The addition of strength, or progressive overload, needs to be the cornerstone of your training.
When you push sets as hard as possible, for as many reps as possible, you are maximizing progression and strength gains. You are also maximizing workouts and speeding up the muscle building process.

On the other hand, if you choose to push only 10 to 25% of sets for more reps, you are dramatically slowing the muscle building process. Imagine taking the beginner gains that happened during the first year of training, and purposely stretching them out so that they now take 5 to 10 years to come to fruition.

If only 10 to 20% of your sets are maximized during a given workout,t hat’s exactly what you’re doing. This lack of focus on progression is a major reason why so many gym rats spin their wheels month in and month out.

6 Ways To Build A Training Program With Purpose

Complacency is a death sentence for any training program. Use these methods that create sustainable plans of action to lift, run, and live with purpose

Every training career goes through highs, lows, and middling lulls. Not only is this normal, I believe it's a necessary process in order create lasting habits. If you're on a downswing, though, it can feel like you'll be stuck there forever. Trust me: You won't. There are multiple reasons why your training has derailed, but the truth is that there's not one answer. What you were doing before simply wasn't working; what you do next is the real test.

Each of these strategies has helped me to get back on track in times like these. Approach them with an open mind, and a few minutes from now, you'll own the tools to reinvigorate your physical life.

1) TAKE A WEEK OFF
Let's start with the advice no avid lifter wants to hear: Downtime is the first step to overcoming dead-end training. A stale mind is often the result of an overstimulated body. The first sign of overtraining in motivated iron athletes is a lack of drive to train. Rest is necessary before you refocus and push forward again, and one rest day isn't going to cut it.

Training exists on a continuum which begins from stress and progresses to recovery. Let this idea settle in, and something profound becomes apparent: rest and recovery are training, as much and maybe more than anything you do in the gym. Hold that perspective, and it's easy to accept how a week of rest fits into your program. You're still teaching your body to adapt to all the stress you've inflicted on it up to this point, and will continue to in the future.

If training seems like a chore, get out of the gym. Accelerate your adaptation with low-level aerobic activities like long walks and extended mobility routines. Bike rides, hikes, and shooting hoops are all great for physical rejuvenation and clearing the mind. Throw yourself into activities that you enjoy—and perhaps haven't done in a while—at a different intensity than you're used to.

"IF TRAINING SEEMS LIKE A CHORE, GET OUT OF THE GYM. ACCELERATE YOUR ADAPTATION WITH LOW-LEVEL AEROBIC ACTIVITIES LIKE LONG WALKS AND EXTENDED MOBILITY ROUTINES."

2) EXAMINE YOUR GOALS
If you don't have a defined goal, your program will lack direction. Without direction, staleness is inevitable.

But even if you have a goal, ask yourself this: What does it mean to you? Why are you chasing it? If you don't have good answers for those questions, you've still got some thinking to do. Some folks aren't great goal-setters—that's fine. A simple question I recommend you ask yourself to set goals is: "What do I suck at?" It shouldn't be too hard to find something!

Once you determine your weaknesses, embrace the project of changing them and set a goal to put your weaknesses on par with your strengths. When you achieve that goal, reevaluate by asking the tough questions again. Set a new goal, and attack it.

3) ISSUE YOURSELF CHALLENGES
I often remind the children I coach that life isn't supposed to be easy or comfortable. The sooner you can accept that, the quicker you'll make progress.

Training problems happen when we familiarize ourselves with a program and become complacent. Challenges introduce struggle, and struggle introduces us to ourselves. Staleness can't thrive in a challenge-laden environment.

"CHALLENGES INTRODUCE STRUGGLE, AND STRUGGLE INTRODUCES US TO OURSELVES."

The process is simple: Take on one challenge per week that scares you. You've no doubt heard the saying "do one thing every day that scares you," but one each week is more sustainable and may allow you to think bigger. Systematically make yourself uncomfortable.

Each day is still an opportunity for growth and change. There are always ways to improve your form, mindset, and execution. Pick one of these per day and hammer it until you undeniably improve. Combine daily small challenges with larger weekly conquests, and your training will be filled with purpose.

Need a challenge to get started? Build up to doing 100 kettlebell swings with the heaviest weight you can swing with good form in five minutes. This is harder than it sounds, and it'll test your ideas of what "strength" and "endurance" mean.

4) MASTER NEW SKILLS
We live in a fascinating training era with a wealth of ideas, implements, and practices. Bodyweight strength work is undergoing a fascinating revival. Kettlebells and the Russian philosophies that spawned them litter gyms from Indonesia to Indiana. Olympic lifting has surged in popularity, and powerlifting and bodybuilding remain steadfast. You're not starved for training options and skills waiting to be mastered.

KETTLEBELL SWINGS

There's nothing wrong with being a renaissance man or woman, but weighing too many options will leave you sitting on your ass rather than taking action. Find a novel interest and explore it with intense passion!

If the old way of doing things is feeling old, devote yourself fully to a style of training with a different purpose. If powerlifting is wearing out its welcome, attack the clean and snatch. If you're sick of worrying about aesthetics, switch it up and master all that kettlebells have to offer. What's the risk? You can always go back!

5) COMPETE
Competition nurtures focus. There's nothing like pitting yourself against your peers to reinvigorate your training intensity.

The type of competition is irrelevant. Powerlifting, strongman, 5ks, and bodybuilding shows all accomplish the same foundational goal. It's the preparation that matters. Make the commitment, and know that every training session brings you one step closer to standing toe to toe with other athletes who want to beat you.

There's a special type of freedom and mental acuity that accompany a pre-competition program, no matter how you end up placing on game day. You work hard and focus just as hard, confident that everything you're doing is leading to something greater.

There's no definitive measure to determine when you're ready to compete, but that's part of the fun. First, find a competition 3-6 months away. Then, hire a coach or find the simplest training program you can follow. Then get after it! All of a sudden, the physiological changes that accompany your training—more strength, better movement, better physique—are just an added bonus.

6) CHANGE YOUR PERSPECTIVE
For many of us, training is a big part of our lives. It's the heart of our physical development and a staple of our personal growth. But the world outside is much larger than iron, sets, and reps.

There are people who will never use their legs again. Others are terminally ill. Some people don't have the financial means to train and work three jobs to feed their children. Take a global view, and you'll see that merely being able to enrich your days with physical training is a rare privilege.

Spend this precious time wisely. Use it to grow and to enhance your life, and don't waste your energy making mountains out of molehills. There's no definitive approach, just like there's no definitive physique. Invest in yourself, challenge yourself, and restore your lifting life force!

7 Training Tips To Power Up Your Lower Chest!

For many guys, the lower pecs are the most difficult area of the chest to fully develop. That's about to change. Not because we're the proud owners of a magical exercise that'll finally build that slow-to-grow region, but because we've developed seven strategies which take direct aim at shallow lower pecs.

To add thickness to your lower chest, start by abandoning the "one lower chest exercise is enough" mentality when it comes to chest day. To focus on a stubborn area, it's too late to pick your parents, but not too late to dig deep into your bag of chest-training tricks.

Besides adding specific lower-pec exercises, you can also manipulate your routine and boost your training intensity by adding techniques such as dropsets, rest-pause sets, or even negative reps. Addressing all of these elements is your best option to re-ignite muscle growth and give your lower pecs a big lift.

Try these seven tips to power-up your lagging lower chest!

1) Train lower chest first

Many a chest workout has deservedly started with the bench press, but when you prioritize a particular area, you should start your training day with an exercise for that area when your energy is fresh and your strength is high. In this case, do a lower-pec move like decline barbell press right off the bat.

"DO A LOWER-PEC MOVE LIKE DECLINE BARBELL PRESS RIGHT OFF THE BAT."
If you traditionally do declines later in your workout, you will notice right away that you're significantly stronger when doing them first. That's the idea: tackle the target area with weights it hasn't had to push before. Above that, don't be afraid to push heavier weights for lower reps than you normally do. If you typically do declines for sets of 10 reps, increase the weight and do sets of 6-8. Don't underestimate the impact that a novel training stimulus has on a target muscle.

2) Do a seconв lower-pec movement later in your workout

Who says you have to do only one lower chest exercise per workout? While you normally want to do various angles to hit all the muscle fibers in your chest—often flat bench, incline, and decline—by using a decline bench set to a different angle than your first decline exercise, or using a totally different decline-focused machine, you can work those lower-pec fibers in different ways for better development. Just avoid doing lower-chest exercises which closely mirror each other, such as the decline barbell press and Smith-machine decline press, each done on a bench of the same angle, or decline dumbbell presses and barbell presses at the same bench angle.

In addition to introducing a second exercise from a different angle, train the muscle in a slightly different rep range. So if you did the first exercise heavy for sets of 6-8, do the second with slightly lighter weights for sets of 10-12. The multiple relative intensities are great for increasing strength and size.

3) Target the lower pecs with single joint exercises

"The high cable crossover (with pulleys attached to the top), decline bench fly, and cable fly all target the lower chest while eliminating contribution from the triceps" 

The high cable crossover (with the pulleys attached to the top), decline-bench fly, and cable fly all target the lower chest while eliminating contribution from the triceps. With single-joint exercises, use a slightly higher rep range than what you'd do for presses. Like other isolation moves, these are best done at the end of your chest workout.

4) Incorporate new lower  
Chest movement
Granted, there aren't a lot of "new" choices here, but anything you haven't done in a while becomes "new." For example, if you tend to always use the barbell, it's time to choose dumbbells or a machine.

Besides changing equipment, you can also make slight adjustments to the equipment you already use. Set the decline bench a notch above or below your usual setting. Another favorite of mine: Sit sideways on the Hammer Strength decline machine—which has independent arms—so you can push across your body rather than just straight out.

Weighted parallel-bar dips are another great compound movement to try. To target your chest, lean forward by bringing your feet up behind you, and allow your elbows to travel away from your sides as you come down.

5) Train chest after a rest day
This is a strategy pro bodybuilders use because you typically have more energy and a fully stocked glycogen supply after a full day of rest and solid nutrition. If you do chest in the middle of your training week, however, make sure you don't train delts or triceps the day before; they need to be fully rested.

6) Turn up your training intensity with advanced techniques

Training to failure is your first step to building muscle, but training past failure for 1-2 sets of several lower-chest exercises can push you into the growth zone. There are many techniques to increase intensity; here are four great ones!

Forced reps: Ask your workout partner to help you lift the weight after you reach muscle failure so you can do a few more reps.

Heavy rest-pause: Choose a weight in which you can do just 6 reps (your 6-rep max), but do just 3 reps. Rest no more than 20 seconds, and then do 3 more reps. Alternate this work/rest sequence for five cycles and you'll end up doing 15 reps with your 6-rep max, an impressive growth-producing stimulus. Choose an exercise which allows you to quickly get into position, like a machine chest press.

Negatives: Once you reach failure, instead of ending your set, have your partner help you lift the weight, and then take five seconds to lower the weight on your own. Do as many reps as you can until you can no longer hold the eccentric contraction for five seconds.

Dropsets: Once you reach muscle failure, immediately reduce the poundage by roughly 25 percent and continue repping to failure. You can even do this a second time when you hit muscle failure again.

7) Finish with a bang
Here's a lower-chest finishing move I learned from a trainer named Tucano in Rio de Janeiro many years ago. I swear the guys down there don't know physical limits, and it shows.

Do unweighted parallel-bar dips to finish your chest workout. Start at the top, arms extended, but not locked out. Take a full 10 seconds to lower yourself, counting slowly. Instead of pressing back up, place your foot on the apparatus and "walk" your way back to full arm extension, pushing off the footplate to raise yourself. Immediately do another 10-second negative and again walk back up to the top.

Controlling the speed of the descent gets increasingly more difficult; your set ends once you can no longer make 10. By then, you'll have achieved the lower-pec pump of your life.

The lower chest exercise list

Press (multi-joint exercise)
- Decline Barbell Press
- Decline Dumbbell Press
Fly (single-joint exercise)
- Cable Crossover
- Decline Dumbbell Fly
- Decline Cable Fly

Bodyweight Moves
- Incline Push-up (feet on floor)
Bodyweigh dips