ExRx.net

Hello again.

I'm 6', 190-195 pounds depending on the day. I'm also built strangely - broad shoulders, broad hips, and long monkey arms. My diet is a fairly strict paleo, averaging about 2200cal/day. I'm currently doing a modified SS routine with the following numbers:

Squat: 245
Deadlift: 265
Bench: 165
Press: 140
Pullups: 3x5

I think that I need to define my goals a bit. As a former fatty I'm a little paranoid. My personal lifting goal is to squat 400, but I don't want to be 245 and fat again to do it. I'm plateauing on almost all my lifts.

A problem is that I can tell its going to be super hard to eat an excess of calories eating strict paleo. I have a bad reaction to non-vegetable carbohydrate sources (bloating, gas, general misery) and I really don't want to deal with it.

I was wondering if anyone out there thinks that GOMAD might be a viable option for me? I see it recommended for skinny guys all the time. I've started getting comments from my parental units and friends that I need to stop getting any thinner, but I still kind of feel skinny-fat. Bottom line is I don't want to turn into the stay-puft MM Man but I need to feed the machine in order to get bigger and reach my goals.

Thoughts?

you can bump your calories up by just adding fattier meats and oils to your existing diet.

as far as your lifts stalling, try switching it up. Change the reps/sets, or the exercises you do, or even try an entirely different program.

depending on the individual, GOMAD can make you pretty damn fat, however if you're training hard enough you'll also put on slabs of muscle.

You could start off by just drinking 4 pints, and take it from there.

Frigginwizard gave you some good advice

Follow-up question. I thought that the insulin boost from the milk was part of what made it so magical and wonderful. If I bump 24 tablespoons of olive oil a day I'm not going to get that insulin spike, but I'll get the ~2400cals. Will that provide the same kind of nutritional input I need to get bigger, or is that insulin spike necessary? In other words, for growth, is a caloric surplus a caloric surplus, regardless of source?

The insulin spike is something you may want imediately after working out because your muscles are starved for glycongen and primed for an infusion of protein. That is the ONLY time in which you want an insulin spike. Any other time, especially when in a calorie surplus, as you would be in a bulking diet, insulin will cause fat gain.

Olive oil is not really the best oil for gaining weight. It's highly monounsaturated and therefore better than corn oil, however, you will do better with saturated fats from meat, butter, cream and coconut oil (and milk). The saturated fats will stimulate testosterone production and also help clear fat from the liver and abdomen. These fats are also associated with higher fat soluble vitamins than olive oil. The best fat to consume is fish oil, both for muscle gain and fat loss. The best place to get fish oil is from fresh oily fish or if that's not available, from canned fish, especially sardines, salmon and smelts. Watch out for sardines packed in oil. the oil is soy oil and is counter-productive. Go with water packed, or my favorite, mustard.

Sorry to be a pain in the butt - I just want to make sure I'm tracking.

Is the below a good plan?

A pint of milk with some protein powder, immediately after working out, will give me the insulin spike that I need, and the rest of the time I can pig out on pork (fatty meat) and sneak in a lot of extra tablespoons of olive oil to bump my calories to where they need to be?

Yes. Instead of just pork, get a variety of meats like beef, pork, chicken, along with eggs and fish. Read my second post about the oil.

http://www.health-report.co.uk/saturate ... nefits.htm

Please don't consider this to be a pain in the butt. In fact this sort of feedback is essential. I would far rather know what your understanding of the advise given is, than not get any feedback. One frustration about providing advise on a forum is that if the OP doesn't respond, you never know if he got the message or not.

Please keep posting. It will encourage others to offer their opinions as well.

Stu

Sounds like a plan, Stu. And thanks for your help in my other threads too. Pleased to make your acquaintance.

Matt

A straight answer from someone who is a similar build (just add a couple of inches and 10-12lbs) is that it added too much fat, thankfully it went away quite easily though when I did HIIT. so I did retain some bennefit from 6-7 weeks of it. I did only do about 1/2 or 3/4 gomad though as I had already recently upped my calories by other means and a GOMAD would have had me hitting around 4800 cals - too much IMO - went for something around 4k.

So yea I'd just go with the above - my strength did go up, but in terms of ratio (lean vs fat, strength vs weight gain/fat gain) it was hardly optimal, my blood test also showed elevated potasium which (although I have no real evidence of) I believe was due to all the milk I was drinking.

Thanks for the first-hand info. I see the GOMAD plan advertised often for skinnies which I am really not. The funny thing about my body I guess is that I can gain weight like crazy when I eat starchy carbs but then my stomach ends up a total mess - started a few years ago. Then, when I eat paleo, I can't stop dropping weight. So when I'm lifting it's tough for me to find the right balance of inputs to stop the slow creep downwards. I literally can eat probably 3 lbs of meat a day and a couple pounds of veggies and still lose weight. But like Stu said it's probably that the meats I eat are too lean.

And like I have said in a couple other posts outside of this thread, after lifting days I am literally STARVING.

I'll try the fats and see what happens.

Okay, so here's a quick update.

I've started doing the following :

0600: 3x baked egg muffins with 2 tbsp of sour cream each, large iced coffee
0800:(3) scrambled eggs with 4 strips of bacon
1000: half cup of pepperoni
1200: ~1lb meat product with ~1lb salad (heavy on the romaine)
0200: whey with light cream and water
0400: large iced coffee
0535: eat something, maybe 2 egg muffins and/or a 1/2lb meat product, workout on MWF
0700: cup of whey after workout with light cream and water
0745: ~1lb meat product, ~1lb non starchy vegetables cooked (typically cabbage, cauli, broccoli, or frozen assorted, 4x 1000mg Fish Oil capsules, 1x Multivitamin

Thoughts? Tried to work in some fats through the cream.

assuming the iced coffee isnt loaded with sugar, it looks good to me.
On a side note, I had to google what a baked egg muffin was, needless to say, I know what Im having for dinner tonight.

I only drink black coffee. I cant stomach anything else.

The muffins are the cat's tookus. I load mine with smoked turkey and chopped peppers and mushrooms. Super convenient, even if you have to be that guy who awkwardly buys a muffin tin.