How to Gain Weight and Build Muscle

While some of you might be having trouble losing weight and shedding that extra layer of fat off, others have the opposite problems - they are hardgainers and cannot gain weight. Hardgainers are usually ectomorphs, or people with very fast metabolism. However, mesomorphs can also have a hard time gaining muscle, because they might be doing something that they shouldn't be doing (if you do not know what body type you are, visit my article What Are the Differences Between Body Types and How Does It Reflect in Weight Loss?). There are many things that you need to consider when trying to build muscle mass: nutrition, workouts, supplements, etc. Combining all of them together, in perfect amounts, you can achieve great success in your bodybuilding career.

In the opening paragraph, I mentioned that there are two different kinds of people that try and cannot gain weight. First, I am going to talk about mesomorphs, or even endomorphs trying to gain muscle mass, but failing. The main mistake is that their nutrition is wrong and they eat bad foods. In my article, Nutrition for Weight Loss, I have covered the basics of nutrition for losing weight. However, the foods you need to eat for gaining weight are exactly the same. What matters is the amount of foods that you eat.

The biggest mistake most of the people make is that they either do not eat enough, or they eat wrong types of foods. For building muscle and gaining weight, consuming enough protein is extremely important. Protein is what builds your muscle, and how will you gain muscle without the building blocks? It is the same as trying to build a wall without the bricks. For bodybuilding purposes, you should consume about 1-2 grams of protein per pound of body weight. If it seems a lot, don't worry - that's what the supplements are for.

The second most important macro nutrient for gaining muscle mass is carbohydrates. Carbohydrates help you transfer protein into your cells, but that is just a part of what it does. The most important quality of the carbohydrates is the insulin spikes. Carbohydrate intake controls how much insulin your body produces. Why does that matter? Insulin is a growth hormone, and, while it could make you fat, if your foods weren't proper, it can make you build muscle in the same way. If we use an example of building a brick wall, carbohydrates are the cement used to put the bricks together. Therefore, both proteins and carbohydrates are needed to build a muscle mass. Keep in mind that fats are important as well for your general health, so do not cut them out of your diet, but don't go too high on fat either. Try to stay below 100 grams of fat a day.

Nutrition for Hardgainers

Now, if you are an ectomorph, situation might be a little different. Of course, you should follow with everything I explained above, but the main reason ectomorphs are called hardgainers, because they have fast metabolism and it is hard to gain muscle. However, it is not impossible!

For hardgainers, they have to eat more calories than they already do. Another major mistake many people don't eat enough calories to gain weight. In order to gain weight, you need to consume at least 500 calories more daily than your basal metabolic rate (BMR). For most people 2,500-3,000 calories is enough to gain weight. However, if you still do not gain weight, try eating 3,500 or even 4,000 calories to get the results. Keep in mind that if you need that many calories daily, you need to adjust your macro nutrients properly, so you would be eating more protein as well.

There are couples of mistakes that people do and still expect to gain weight, but they don't. The first one is cardio. While, when you are cutting and trying to lose weight, cardio is one of the main factors, when trying to gain weight, cardio might be your enemy. If you are doing any kind of cardio activity - running, bicycling, jump roping, boxing, etc - every day, then STOP! When gaining weight, you need to consume more calories than your body needs. When you do cardio, your body needs more and more calories, and that is not helpful. Suppose you need 2,500 calories a day to maintain your current weight. Then you need 3,000 calories a day to gain weight. If you do 500 calories worth of cardio daily, your daily caloric needs for building muscle will increase to 3,500 calories. That's just wasting time, money, and food.

However, I am not saying that you should drop cardio at all. It all mostly depends on your body type. If you are an ectomorph, you should probably stay away from cardio, maybe do it once or twice a week. If you are mesomorph, to prevent the fat gain, you should do cardio around 3-4 times a week. Endomorphs should do cardio 5 times a week, or more. However, when doing cardio activities, such as running, rowing, or bicycling, try not to go for more than 30 minutes a day.

The second most common mistake is not lifting the weights properly, if lifting at all. And I am not talking about the form of how you perform the exercises. I am talking about the intensity, reps and sets ranges. There are plenty of people going to the gym to do exercises of 15, or even more reps per set. You will never gain muscle by doing 15 reps per set. Yes, your muscles will get more endurance but that's about it. To gain solid muscle mass you need to cut down your rep range to 8-10, if you are endomorph, possibly 12. Ectomorphs might even go as low as 6, or even 4 reps. However, going for 4 reps per set will concentrate more on your strength but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

When we are talking about sets, I would say 3-4 set do the best. Of course, you are more than welcome to mix in 5 sets exercises. However, I don't think doing all the exercises for 5 sets will give you better gains than 3-4 sets. That being said, I do recommend, though, to keep mixing sets and reps ranges to keep your muscles shocked and exposed them to more possibility to grow.