How Can Hardgainers Achieve a Positive Energy Balance?

So far we’ve determined that in order to gain weight healthfully you need to participate in a Hardgainer Specific Bodybuilding Workout Routine that is designed to stimulate muscle growth. Today we’ll talk about the next thing you’ll need to do to gain weight healthfully.

The second requirement of a weight gain program is the need to attain a positive energy balance each and every day. Or in other words calorie intake must exceed calorie expenditure in order for muscle gains to occur.

A positive energy balance can be achieved by:

• Consuming more calories
• Decreasing energy expenditure
• Or by doing both

In our case training less is not going to be a viable option due to the fact that we need at least 2 training sessions a week to stimulate muscle growth. So eating more is going to be the key to attaining and maintaining a positive energy balance.

Approximately 2300 to 3500 calories excess calories are needed to put on 1 pound. But the body does not necessarily make more muscle solely because extra calories are consumed. A combination of the Hardgainer Specific Bodybuilding Workout Routine you’ve already chosen and a positive energy balance are what determine how much weight you gain. Even then you can’t control how fast or how efficient your body will gain because our bodies are programed to use whats needed to recover and adapt and then the rest is stored as energy aka FAT.

So with that said, the goal is to provide the body with just enough calories so that it can create new muscle tissue without exceeding caloric requirements (to reduce the amount of fat stored in the body)

The amount of food we must eat to support muscle growth is highly individual so there is no set number of calories anyone should eat to maximize the amount of muscle vs fat gained. If you are concerned with gaining fat any increase in caloric intake should be minimal (no more than 250 kcals per increase).

Maintenance Calories

A weight gain goal of 1/2 a pound to 1 pound a week is generally accepted as the best method to avoid gaining too much fat while bulking up. This can be done by adding around 300-500 additional calories per day to your the amount of calories need to maintain your weight.

The amount of calories you need to eat to maintain your current weight depends on:

1. Your body type (Ectomorphs tend to have high metabolisms thus needing more food)
2. The Intensity and Number of days your workout – The harder you work the more you’ll need to eat
3. Your Genetics

Finding your maintenance caloric goal is a good starting point for determining how many calories you’ll need to gain weight. The formula below will help you find this number.

Dietary Reference Intake (DRI) Method: Estimated Energy Requirements for Adults

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Note: If you are having a problem with calculating this formula leave a message in the comments box and I’ll help you out. (I’m also going to provide an example for you guys sometime soon)

The number you get from above will give you an estimation of how many calories you need to eat to maintain your weight a day. You can then add 300-500 extra calories to that number and theoretically that will be enough to add half a pound to 1 pound a week to your current weight.

Monitor your weigh every 2 weeks to see whether your gaining or not. If you are gaining weight, don’t make any changes and if you are not add another 250-500 kcals to your diet and continue to monitor bi-weekly.

Macronutrition Breakdown

The last thing you need to worry about is how you’re going to breakup how much Protein, Carbohydrates and Fat you’ll consume from the amount of calories you’ll be taking in each day.

A lot of Bodybuilding Magazines, Books and Websites preach that Protein should make up the biggest percentage of food intake because it is essential for protein synthesis.

I agree that protein is important but Carbohydrates are even more critical because they are our bodies main energy source. They need to be present in our diets or our bodies will use protein to make energy and that’s something we don’t want. As a result of this carbohydrates should be the the largest portion of the additional calories we take in (anywhere from 55% to 60% of total calories taken in).

In case you’re concerned I’ll be talking about Protein Specifically in Part 3 of this series so Subscribe to Stay tuned in.

If you need an example of how I break now my Macronutrional Ratio check out my Transformation Page, additionally feel free to leave questions at in the comments box below and I’ll try my best to get to them.

This is Part 2 of the How Can Hardgainers Gain Weigh Healthfully series.