Hey everyone, I've been working out for a year now but results have
stopped and I want to try to figure out how to get them again. I'm a
5'10 guy who weighed a normal 157 pounds or so entering college, but
then my senior year I ended up losing a lot of weight. By the time I
graduated, I was only 117 pounds. I knew this wasn't good at all so I
decided to lift weights for the first time in my life. I bought a ton
of whey and took five shakes a day (American Whey brand, so 20g in each
shake), and ate a healthy diet that included the kashi high protein
cereal, chicken, tuna, turkey, etc. By mid August I had gained 20
pounds of muscle and had gotten significantly stronger, so I was real
happy with my progress. Then the muscle gain stopped entirely, and
it's almost a year later now so I'm wondering what to do. In November
I got a job and unfortunately had to move away from home, but luckily
my work has a gym even though it only has a couple machines and
dumbbells, no bars. While I was waiting to get a physical to use the
gym, I ended up losing about 5 pounds, but since then I've completely
stabilized and haven't gained anything. I only have access to the gym
Monday through Thursday, so on Monday I do chest and triceps, Tuesday
biceps and back, Wednesday shoulders, and Thursday an assortment of
things and some legs (there aren't any leg machines so all there is to
do is dumbbell squats really).
I'm still taking my whey shakes, usually I have one a half hour
before I work out (35 or so minutes during my lunch break), one
immediately after I work out, and then the remaining three over the
course of the afternoon. I also usually have a couple protein bars a
day, and sometimes I get turkey and almonds also (I don't have a stove
to cook eggs and chicken during the week, only on the weekends when I
don't have a gym to use). I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, I
honestly haven't seen any difference (and the scale reflects that)
since last August, although I have gotten stronger. I wonder if the 35
minutes isn't enough, but a lot of my friends are telling me that's
plenty if I use the time efficiently which I think I do. I try to do
sets of 10, 8, and 6 with each exercise, though I don't always get
there due to failure. One of my friends is saying I should be doing
15-12-10 to bulk up, but this goes against everything I've read.
Another says to go even less than 10-8-6 with even higher weight, but
with a lot of the exercises if I increase the weight anymore I can't
even do one rep (for example, on the dumbbell bench press I do 10 at
45, 8 at 50, and 4 to 6 at 55, but I can't even do one at 60).
Is there any way I can change things up that should help me start
getting results again? I've worked really hard at this over the past
year and it gets kind of frustrating when people tell me I look sickly
and should start lifting weights. Should I be eating a lot of
carbohydrates in the morning and then pretty much all of the protein
afterwards? Is the 35 minutes really too low and should I sacrifice
some sleep to go to the gym at 5 am for an hour before work instead of
at lunch? Should I be doing pushups and another equipment-less
exercises Friday through Sunday when I don't have gym access? Also,
for some reason I rarely feel sore even though I go to failure. Any
help would be greatly appreciated, sorry for the long post.
General fitness, health and nutrition · Public discussion
Routine and Diet Help
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- Original section
- General fitness, health and nutrition
- Published
- 10 July 2005
- Last activity
- 15 July 2005
- Original author
- Senator Urine
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It's called a "plateau".
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Senator Urine said:
I honestly haven't seen any difference (and the scale reflects that)
since last August, although I have gotten stronger.If you lost weight while not working out, you simpley arent eating
enough calories to support whatever weight you had gained. You will
need a surplus of calories to gain weight. So log your food intake at a
free site like Fitday at http://www.fitday.com and increase as needed.
Add in high quality dense carbs & good fats to your meals, and use
alternate forms of protein as much as possible over that many
shakes/bars per day. If you find it hard to eat alot, then switch your
plain protein powder to a weight gainer product.joanne
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I talked to some people at work in the gym, and they recommended
instead of doing 10-8-6 with increasing weights, just to do 6-6-6 at
the highest weight I can do. I tried that yesterday and I'm actually
sore today, for the first time in probably a year, so this is hopefully
good news. They also said to eat more, so I guess I'll have to try to
do that also. How many calories a day are you supposed to generally
eat to gain muscle (and not just get a gut)?
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