quick bulking question

[gov]

Hey I'm kinda new to the boards, so to start out:

I've read most of the sticky's on the all the threads and Madcow's training page, but I still wasnt completely positive about this...

I'm male, 19, 6'0", 181lbs, lifting for about a year now. I started bulking about a week ago, with the calculator I found I need ~3500cals/day for my bulk. I'm following the tables in Bill Starr 5x5 Linear Progression, so I lift M/W/F and do cardio T/R/S for about 40-60 mins.

But my question was, am I supposed to take in 3500cals everyday, even if I only lift every other and not on weekends?

I understand taking days off is to give times for my muscles to grow but, I find it very difficult to take all the necessary cals on cardio days, especially sunday when i do neither. I just wanted to make sure that I'm not going to end up with 2lbs of fat for every 2lbs of muscle if I keep going like this (I eat clean most of the time too).

[Kane]

What category did the 3500 cals come from? Highly active, mildly active? That is an important factor because your level of activity will dictate an increase or decrease in calorie intake. From your stats you are similar in weight and heigth to me, meaning you probably have a high metabolism. If that's the case then you need the high cals.

Regardless of your metabolism, protein intake should be high and to avoid gaining fat (which is inevitable during a bulk) you can limit your fats, but you still need fat in your diet so dont cut it out completely.

You don't grow in the gym, you grow out of the gym so your intake needs to be high everyday. 3500 cals from my experience is not very much once you start trying to pack on some serious muscle. I'm highly active, with a high metabolism and I'm taking roughly 5000-6000 calories per day, everyday of the week. The calculator gave you a baseline and it will take some time to find out what works for you, start with the calculated number and evaluate the results after a couple weeks. If there is no weight gain, then increase it by 500cals and repeat the process.

You're doing an effective program and you should be able to judge the effectiveness of your diet fairly quickly. Best of luck.

[gov]

I chose moderately active, I wasn't exactly sure which way to go with that since I don't do too much outside of the gym. I do walk everywhere (since im in college) and do sail for a few hours once a week. Other than that, I don't play a sport or anything... If you're going with 5-6k everyday, 1- I should stop complaining, and 2- maybe I'm even a little under or just at what I need.

My first weigh-in put me up +3 lbs on the week though (+/- 1-2ish for the scale), so I guess it's a good start to figure out exactly the amount of cals I need.

I think I might have still been stuck on my cut mentality from a little over a month back. I'll have to ask my roomates to make sure I keep eating.

Thanks for the quick info.

[Kane]

Originally Posted by gov

I chose moderately active, I wasn't exactly sure which way to go with that since I don't do too much outside of the gym.

You have to look at what you do as a whole, not just outside the gym. 3 60min bouts of cardio plus Bill Starr seems pretty active to me. If it were me I would be using the numbers for highly active, but everybody has a different metabolism and results will vary individually. What you did was good, gauge your results on a per week basis and adjust. I forgot to mention that the mirror is your friend for this too. Just because the scale moves doesnt mean your gaining muscle, use the mirror too and judge how your appearance is changing and factor that in as well.

Originally Posted by gov

Thanks for the quick info.

Anytime bro

[gov]

Oh, I never really thought to include my gym workout, it just seems ordinary to me now. I guess including that will put me at ~4000... I need to buy more food, but I guess I'll try to increase slowly to see what affects me the most. Thanks.


I also always thought the mirror wouldn't show too much dynamic changes during a bulk, but maybe pinching will show more of the amount of fat im gaining too. Maybe I'll invest in some calipers for that, might come in handy for the next cut.

Thanks again man, I'll keep you updated on how it's going. (too bad there's no eating icon)