Brand new cycle -> brand new diet!

[TheStrand]

Whats up guys, I wanted to put my diet and training in here for a review before I start my next cycle.

Stats
age - 22
weight - 200lbs (6'0)
bf - 12%

I've been competing for a few years now, doing 3 shows so far. My problem has always been building muscle without putting on fat. Seems like for every pound of muscle I gain, half a pound of fat comes with it.

So first things first, here's my diet. Now, I've always been high on carbs with fats around 100g and protein relatively high. But after reading up around here, I decided to see what people would recommend. My GOAL is to gain 15-25 pounds of lean mass.

Meal One
50 grams of whey protein, 1 cup of oatmeal and 1 tbsp. PB
(2 fish oil caps, 2 amino acid caps)
Cals 616 Carbs 59g/ Fats: 13g / Protein 62g

Meal Two
2 cups of brown rice, 6 whole eggs, veggies
874 / 92g /34g /48g

Meal Three
2 cups of brown rice, 8 oz. steak (or salmon), and vegetables
673 / 90g / 10g / 54g

Meal Four
2 cups of brown rice, 8 oz. chicken (or fish), and vegetables
883 / 90g / 24g / 78g

Meal Five (Post Workout)
50 grams of whey protein and 100 grams of simple carbohydrates
560 101g / 0g / 45g

Meal Six
50 grams of casein protein and 1 tbsp. PB
(2 fish oil caps, 2 amino acid caps)
280 / 4g / 8g / 49g

Totals: 4000 calories, 450 carbs / 90 fats / 350 protein


Training:
Monday - Upper body (power)
Tuesday - Lower body (power)
Wed - off
Thurs - Pull hypertrophy (back, traps, bis)
Friday - Push hypertrophy (Chest, delts, tris)
Saturday - Legs hypertrophy
Sunday - off

I usually do abs every other day, and cardio 2x per week.

[gbrice75]

Whats up guys, I wanted to put my diet and training in here for a review before I start my next cycle.

Stats
age - 22
weight - 200lbs (6'0)
bf - 12%

I've been competing for a few years now, doing 3 shows so far. My problem has always been building muscle without putting on fat. Seems like for every pound of muscle I gain, half a pound of fat comes with it.

So first things first, here's my diet. Now, I've always been high on carbs with fats around 100g and protein relatively high. But after reading up around here, I decided to see what people would recommend. My GOAL is to gain 15-25 pounds of lean mass.

Meal One
50 grams of whey protein, 1 cup of oatmeal and 1 tbsp. PB
(2 fish oil caps, 2 amino acid caps)
Cals 616 Carbs 59g/ Fats: 13g / Protein 62g


Good meal, but no need for the PB here. Can you do some eggs instead of all whey here? I'd rather see 25g whey, and the other 25g of protein from eggs/whites

Meal Two
2 cups of brown rice, 6 whole eggs, veggies
874 / 92g /34g /48g

Of course you're putting on fat. You're eating way too much fat, particularly in one sitting. Make it 2 whole eggs, 4 whites. Probably don't need that much rice either - 92g is ALOT. 1cup would be plenty, 1.5 at the most IMO

Meal Three
2 cups of brown rice, 8 oz. steak (or salmon), and vegetables
673 / 90g / 10g / 54g


Nice meal, but same as above regarding the rice. Also, rice would be my last choice as a carb. How about some sweet potato? Lentils, beans, quinoa, etc

Meal Four
2 cups of brown rice, 8 oz. chicken (or fish), and vegetables
883 / 90g / 24g / 78g


Ok, starting to see the pattern here. Again with the rice!

Meal Five (Post Workout)
50 grams of whey protein and 100 grams of simple carbohydrates
560 101g / 0g / 45g

That 2:1 carbs to protein ratio is old school BS. Not necessary. 50g carbs would be plenty, 75g at the MOST. Also, i'd go with 1/2 simple, 1/2 complex - assuming you want to stick with simple. You don't need to spike your insulin like that. More harm then good IMO

Meal Six
50 grams of casein protein and 1 tbsp. PB
(2 fish oil caps, 2 amino acid caps)
280 / 4g / 8g / 49g

Hmmm... I don't like this only because it's your last meal of the day, and you haven't had any real food since your workout. You're going to have to either fit a PPWO meal in like 30-45 mins after your PWO shake, OR make this meal a good one - lean steak and veggies, some olive oil. Something like that

Totals: 4000 calories, 450 carbs / 90 fats / 350 protein


Training:
Monday - Upper body (power)
Tuesday - Lower body (power)
Wed - off
Thurs - Pull hypertrophy (back, traps, bis)
Friday - Push hypertrophy (Chest, delts, tris)
Saturday - Legs hypertrophy
Sunday - off

I usually do abs every other day, and cardio 2x per week.

Suggestions on diet above in bold

[TheStrand]

Suggestions on diet above in bold

Thanks man, really great advice and quick too. I agree with you about everything. The reason why I have a lot of fat and carbs in my diet per sitting is because if I remove the extra calories, I won't be gaining anything.

For that post workout shake, I'll do 1/2 dextrose and 1/2 blended oatmeal or something like that.

Also, I forgot to mention that the rice is not ALWAYS rice, I do switch it up between rice and sweet potato and the macros are almost identical.

My protein intake is already relatively high, but should I increase protein and drop carbs?

For the first meal, I can do eggs.
For the last meal, I'll do a bowl of green veggies and some steak (25g protein) and throw some olive oil in with 25g casein.

[Damienm05]

Funny story: I critiqued the entire diet and training schedule in depth before accidentally hitting "reply to thread" instead of "post quick reply" and I just couldn't bring myself to type it all out again. Sorry GB, I really tried to lighten your workload. On the bright side; yours was almost the same verbatim. You're in good hands bud.

[TheStrand]

Funny story: I critiqued the entire diet and training schedule in depth before accidentally hitting "reply to thread" instead of "post quick reply" and I just couldn't bring myself to type it all out again. Sorry GB, I really tried to lighten your workload. On the bright side; yours was almost the same verbatim. You're in good hands bud.

Lol, That's a shame! But I appreciate it anyway

[Damienm05]

Training:
Monday - Upper body (power)
Tuesday - Lower body (power)
Wed - off
Thurs - Pull hypertrophy (back, traps, bis)
Friday - Push hypertrophy (Chest, delts, tris)
Saturday - Legs hypertrophy
Sunday - off

I usually do abs every other day, and cardio 2x per week.

Alright, let me give you the training advice I'd typed out earlier now that the frustration has subsided, lol.

I think for general fitness and strength your split looks great but for the goal of simply getting bigger muscles on a cycle, let's face it: less is more. Train by body part with a lot of intensity and just as much rest. Let's take abs as an example. Sure it's a big muscle group and you CAN get away with training them several times weekly but since you're not an endurance athlete you SHOULD NOT. Higher intensity exercises such as fully declined sit-ups and leg lifts once per week will give you the best growth and yield a thicker, stronger core. As for the rest of the split, with sample exercises, here's what I'd recommend taking your current schedule:

Monday - Chest (Decline BB, Flat DB, Incline DB, Cable fly)
Tuesday - Back (Wide Pullups, Neutral Pullups, Bent over BB row, Deads)
Wednesday - Off
Thursday - Delts (Bent over rear delt raises, DB military press, upright rows, side/front raises, shrugs if needed. You could also do rear delt work on back day should you prefer.)
Friday - Legs (BB squat, leg press, leg curls, walking lunges, a movement for calves should they be lacking)
Saturday - Arms
Sunday - Off

The goal is to do high intensity workouts with reps/sets in the BB range but to allow plenty of time to rest between groups such as tris/chest, chest/delts, back/bis, back/rear delts. Just eat plenty of clean calories, get plenty of sleep, and let the gear work it's magic. Your current split looks like my training before I discovered BB and was training for Junior A ice hockey.

[TheStrand]

Alright, let me give you the training advice I'd typed out earlier now that the frustration has subsided, lol.

I think for general fitness and strength your split looks great but for the goal of simply getting bigger muscles on a cycle, let's face it: less is more. Train by body part with a lot of intensity and just as much rest. Let's take abs as an example. Sure it's a big muscle group and you CAN get away with training them several times weekly but since you're not an endurance athlete you SHOULD NOT. Higher intensity exercises such as fully declined sit-ups and leg lifts once per week will give you the best growth and yield a thicker, stronger core. As for the rest of the split, with sample exercises, here's what I'd recommend taking your current schedule:

Monday - Chest (Decline BB, Flat DB, Incline DB, Cable fly)
Tuesday - Back (Wide Pullups, Neutral Pullups, Bent over BB row, Deads)
Wednesday - Off
Thursday - Delts (Bent over rear delt raises, DB military press, upright rows, side/front raises, shrugs if needed. You could also do rear delt work on back day should you prefer.)
Friday - Legs (BB squat, leg press, leg curls, walking lunges, a movement for calves should they be lacking)
Saturday - Arms
Sunday - Off

The goal is to do high intensity workouts with reps/sets in the BB range but to allow plenty of time to rest between groups such as tris/chest, chest/delts, back/bis, back/rear delts. Just eat plenty of clean calories, get plenty of sleep, and let the gear work it's magic. Your current split looks like my training before I discovered BB and was training for Junior A ice hockey.

That looks very similar to what I used to do, but then I plataued and changed it up. I've been doing the one I posted for about 2 months. It's brought up my delts and back, but not other parts. My philosophy about this split was that I wanted to hit my muscles 2x per week so they would have two times per week to be stimulated. If I'm doing 1x per week, how many sets per bodypart should I be doing? With twice per week I do 6-8 sets per.

I always thought about how I would work my chest on monday for example, then after 48 hours there would be no growth. Or am I wrong there?

Thanks for the reply, I appreciate the time you put into the advice!

[TheStrand]

The other thing is I do A LOT of supersets, drop sets, all that stuff because I love the intensity and I have a hard time doing a straight set and then waiting 1-2 minutes for another set. I used to do a ton of straight sets and was never satisfied!!

Anyway.. here's what I'm thinking. I like how you set it up.

Monday - Chest (chest thickness lagging)
Decline BB 4-5 sets x 6-8
Flat DB 4 sets x 8-10
Incline DB 3 x 8-10
Cable fly 3 x 12-15
Abs too

Tuesday - Back
Wide Pullups 5-6 sets of 6-10 (weighted)
Neutral Pullups 4 x 10
Bent over BB row 3 x 6-8
Deads 3x6-10
Rear delts 4 x 8-10

Wednesday - Off

Thursday - Delts (delts are lagging)
DB military press 5 x 6-10
side/front raises 3 x 10-12
upright rows 3 x 10 -12
shrugs 4x8-10
abs too

Friday - Legs
BB squat 4x12,10,6,4
leg press 4x 8-10
walking lunges 3xdistance
leg curls 6x6-12 (hamstrings are lagging, my quads have a crazy amount of mass.. need more sweep)
Calves 4-5 sets of 6-10

Saturday - Arms (triceps lagging, especially the lateral head. The lateral side of my arm in general lacks)
I always used to superset tri/bi movements. What should I do for arms?

Dips 4x6-10
Skullcrushers 3x8-10 (with closegrip benchpress after failure)
tricep cable extensions 3x8-10
barbell curls 4x8-10
cable concentration curls 4x10-12
forearm work

Sunday - Off


Edit: Thought it might be useful to give you an idea of my lifts.
Bench - 245 x 5
Squat - 365 x 4-5
DB press - 80 x 4
Deadlift - 375 x 5

[TheStrand]

Just thought I'd give this one more bump

[gbrice75]

Hang tight bro, i'm sure Tbody will be around to check your routine out soon enough.

Good lift numbers, surprised DB press isn't more though - seems to be out of line with the others. I can hit 95's for 7 on incline, but can't dead or squat as much as you - something doesn't add up!

[TheStrand]

Hang tight bro, i'm sure Tbody will be around to check your routine out soon enough.

Good lift numbers, surprised DB press isn't more though - seems to be out of line with the others. I can hit 95's for 7 on incline, but can't dead or squat as much as you - something doesn't add up!

Thanks man! But yeah, that goes to show where my strengths and weaknesses are. I've brought up my shoulders A LOT, however, my legs are strong and grow like crazy while my shoulders/chest and triceps lag behind!

[Damienm05]

Routine looks good actually. I've never said that before but I seriously wouldn't change a thing at this point. Overhead DB extensions are great for overall tricep growth. Maybe every other week you could do3 sets instead of skullcrushers. Still do close-grip on its own.

Make sure your form for chest is on-point. Look up some videos and such.

[dominick2417]

My GOAL is to gain 15-25 pounds of lean mass.

In two or three years?

[TheStrand]

In two or three years?

two at the most

[TheStrand]

I find it hard to get my chest and triceps to grow. ESPECIALLY the triceps.

"Overhead DB extensions are great for overall tricep growth. Maybe every other week you could do3 sets instead of skullcrushers. Still do close-grip on its own."

My tricep routine (typically done on arm day with biceps after triceps)

Close grip bench (sometimes dips) 4x6-10
Overhead DB extensions 4x8-12
Cable extensions (underhand, overhand or rope) 3x8-12

then 3 exercises for bis.