If you’re looking to build muscle, you need to train AND eat properly. In this article, you’ll learn three important weight-gain diet strategies that will help you build all the muscle you want.
First, we’ll look at calorie intake. How many calories should you eat if you are looking to build muscle?
Next, let’s take a look at protein. If muscles are made up mostly of protein, shouldn’t eating more protein lead to building more muscle? Well, there’s a systematic approach we can take to make sure we’re getting enough.
Lastly, we will cover the MOST important component of muscle building nutrition, which may surprise you.
With these three items in place, your diet will no longer sabotage your muscle-building efforts, and you’ll be set to gain more muscle than ever before!
Let’s start…
How many calories for a weight gain diet?
If you’re looking to gain lean body mass, you have to eat MORE than you’re used to.
A famous strength coach required all of his students to drink at least a gallon of milk EVERY DAY to ensure they were eating enough.
Calories provide much of the raw material needed to fuel and build muscle.
So how many calories should you eat?
Here is a simple formula-
Depending on how easily you gain body fat, your calorie intake should be between 19 and 25 times your body weight.
For example, if you weigh 150 pounds, you want to eat between 2,850 and 3,750 calories per day.
The more easily you tend to gain body fat, the more you want to err on the smaller end of that scale.
(and if you’re really trying to LOSE a more substantial amount of body fat, aim for even less, around 16 times your body weight in calories.
What about protein intake to gain muscle?
If you ask 5 different gym junkies how much protein you need to eat to gain muscle, you are likely to get 5 different answers. A typical response is around 2 grams per pound of body weight, per day.
This is too much! Don’t waste your money on expensive protein powder. You don’t really need that much.
Many TOP muscle gain experts recommend between 1 and 1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight, per day.
So if you weigh 150 pounds, that means you should be getting between 150 and 180 grams of protein per day.
The most important part of your diet to build muscle
Finally, WE ARE ALL DIFFERENT.
Your body will not respond to the same diet in the same way as another person. Therefore, you need to pay attention to what you eat and how your body responds.
And what is the best way to do this?
KEEP A DIET DIARY
Are you gaining too much fat? You may want to reduce your calorie intake.
Are you getting 1-1.2 grams of protein a day?
You don’t need to get neurotic about it and write down every last calorie consumed, but DO write down what you’re eating and familiarize yourself with approximately how many calories, grams of fat, and grams of protein are in the foods you eat. . All these data are freely available on the Internet.
If you have a hard time gaining weight and have had a hard time gaining weight, try writing down your meals for a couple of weeks and compare your nutrient intake to the guidelines above. You’ll be surprised how little you’ve been eating!
Finishing things…
So now you have a good idea of how many calories it takes to gain weight, what daily protein intake is best for muscle gain, and why keeping a diet journal is KEY to dialing in your nutrition for muscle growth.
Now all that’s left for you to do is train hard, eat right, rest well, and soon you’ll be packing on more muscle than you can handle!