Building muscle (take 2)

nitromaster

Basically..I'm almost 18, pretty skinny guy (believe i have a fast metabolism as i dont seem to gain weight no matter what i eat) but tbh have basically no muscle.

So i've been looking into building muscle (abs specifically) and it seems you need to do two things:
1. Eat good. Vegetables, protein, etc all vital...and obviously stay away from fatty foods/crap.
2. Work out.

I think i could manage 1 pretty easily....but for number two, anyone got any thoughts on any plans/etc i should follow? (looking for a six-pack foremost tbh...:o then strenghtening other muscles...)

I've been doing a bit of googling, came across multiple ways which apparntly help you to muscle in the abdominal region such as the following video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fU_8kJeXeE but no idea whether these will work or not, or whether there's anything betteri should be doing. (heard about stuff like the p90x plan and stuff...maybe they'd be better?)

If anyone has any thoughts/input please let me know
Thanking you in advance

SpookyBastard

Ah a kindred spirit. I'm sure better minds then mine will come along to advise on the working out part but since you sound like me (skinny, food burning machine) you might want to consider a mass shake. I found I just couldn't get enough food into me when I started out and a mass shake a day really helped to keep me fed. Protein is handy of course but you're gonna want to work out hard and I found the extra carbs gave me the energy. When you're like us you really really need to put the food in. Just my 2c

Khannie

Bump.

Khannie

My own advice is this: Have a calorie surplus every day. Fast metabolism, fast metaboshlism. If you eat enough you'll get bigger. If you're happy enough to put on some fat while you gain muscle (then diet it off later), have a large calorie surplus every day (1000 calories or more). This is the faster route as I understand it. If you're not willing to gain fat, a smaller calorie surplus will do it for you (around 500 a day is the number I've heard for "clean" bulking).

Lift weights. Compound lifts are best. Squat.

Parsley

nitromaster wrote: »

I think i could manage 1 pretty easily....but for number two, anyone got any thoughts on any plans/etc i should follow? (looking for a six-pack foremost tbh...:o then strenghtening other muscles...)

what you say here about a 6-pack... a couple points. firstly, a decent 6-pack consists of strong abs to give it a decent shape, and a very low bodyfat so they're visible and defined. most typical "core ab blast workout 9000" things won't actually be much use in either regard here.

My recommendation would be to start a good all-round strength programme. Starting Strength (google it) seems to be the most popular and successful programme for total beginners, it will guide you through everything you need to know about beginning weight training for strength and size. The 6-pack part - doing big compound lifts like squats and deadlifts, while learning them, will require you to use your abs to stabilise yourself as you put yourself in weird new positions under heavy weight. This will strengthen your abs (first point i made above). By all means, if your abs are an area you really want to concentrate on, then do some extra exercises like reverse crunches, ab pulldowns, leg raises etc.

The visibility of the 6-pack as you've already figured is down to diet - which you seem to have the gist of - but if you want to build muscle you'll have to eat more. you say you can't gain no matter how much you eat; you just need to eat more and more. try calorie dense foods such as milk, peanut butter, bananas and such. lots of protein as you've guessed. healthy fats. some carbs. yadda yadda. you say you're skinny enough already so you needn't worry about yourself putting on fat for a while starting out - it should be mostly muscle.

Magic Eight Ball

Khannie wrote: »

Fast metabolism, fast metaboshlism. If you eat enough you'll get bigger.

Fully argeed. I've yet to see a 'fast metabolism' that could stand up to milk and almond butter!

chadmustang

Heavy Lifting and lots of eating.

Will Heffernan

nitromaster wrote: »

Basically..I'm almost 18, pretty skinny guy (believe i have a fast metabolism as i dont seem to gain weight no matter what i eat) but tbh have basically no muscle.

So i've been looking into building muscle (abs specifically) and it seems you need to do two things:
1. Eat good. Vegetables, protein, etc all vital...and obviously stay away from fatty foods/crap.
2. Work out.

I think i could manage 1 pretty easily....but for number two, anyone got any thoughts on any plans/etc i should follow? (looking for a six-pack foremost tbh...:o then strenghtening other muscles...)

I've been doing a bit of googling, came across multiple ways which apparntly help you to muscle in the abdominal region such as the following video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fU_8kJeXeE but no idea whether these will work or not, or whether there's anything betteri should be doing. (heard about stuff like the p90x plan and stuff...maybe they'd be better?)

If anyone has any thoughts/input please let me know
Thanking you in advance

Have heard this lots of times...actually here two variations of this:

1. I eat everything I can lay my hands on and I can't gain weight.

or

2. I eat nothing and I can't lose weight.

In my experience I've had no problem proving both of these to be untrue.

If you are truely a hard gainer your diet is more important than your training....often find that these people end up 'over training' trying so hard to gain weight...a good program...3-4 sessions a week at most and actually eating everything and anything you can lay your hands on generally solves the problem.

the drifter

Will Heffernan wrote: »

Have heard this lots of times...actually here two variations of this:

1. I eat everything I can lay my hands on and I can't gain weight.

or

2. I eat nothing and I can't lose weight.

In my experience I've had no problem proving both of these to be untrue.

If you are truely a hard gainer your diet is more important than your training....often find that these people end up 'over training' trying so hard to gain weight...a good program...3-4 sessions a week at most and actually eating everything and anything you can lay your hands on generally solves the problem.

So basically consistent training + consistent eating == Profit.

Will Heffernan

the drifter wrote: »

So basically consistent training + consistent eating == Profit.

It's not very sexy is it?

That's pretty much the problem. I am trying desperately hard to try to find ways to present what is essentially a very simple message in a much more complicated manner. It seems to be the secret to success.

TheZ

I have always struggled to put on weight - fast metabolism etc. About a month ago I decided to start tracking calories as best I could - I now use an app called Fitday (I think it is called that) which is great as it has lots of UK and Irish foods (brandnames) so takes a lot of guesswork out and makes the thing reasonably accurate. I don't think it is 100% accurate because I don't weigh food but it is enough to give me a good idea

I am now aiming to eat 3000 calories a day and what I found from the app was that I was regularly eating up to 1000 calories less than that a day and have to force the last 500 especially in

I think people fool themselves about food and how little or much they ear and blame fast or slow metabolism for being under or over weight. I was quite surprised in first few days of keeping a record of how consistent my calories were day in and day out (eating crap or eating "clean") until I made the effort to reach a target and keep eating each day until I ate the target

By the way I would echo above comment - if you struggle to get calories in peanut butter and almond butter are loaded with calories. I would skip Mass Gainers and just eat a big toblerone instead.

Mellor

GOMAD - gallon of milk a day

do that for a month and see how fast you think your metabalism is now. (btw, US gallon = 4 litres or so)

Dathai

When you start squatting and deadlifting you'll see them coming through. Due to my gut, I still haven't seen mine coming through yet.. some day, some day.. If god didn't want me to be fat, he wouldn't have made food taste so good.

But yeah, anyone I know who has gone for well defined abs has done the above exercises and also done bicycle crunches. I've tried these myself and they hurt like hell, especially when you introduce weights into it.