Skinny vegan looking to be less skinny n gain muscle

[russelkuskie]

Hi,

I’m 20, 6ft1 and weigh 9st1lb, (v light i know lol)been vegan for about a year n half n veggie a couple years before that. I’ve always been very skinny throughout my life and never seen the effects of weight gain from food put in my body.

I’m looking to fill out a bit n lose the skinny arms n legs, this is a very recent idea but something i 100% want to go through with.
From looking online i need to massively increase my calorie intake to bulk up and put some weight on.

Basically looking for any advice yous would have into this from thoughts on how often to be going gym, what foods to eat, good vegan high calorie shakes etc… literally anything that you know that would help or guide me in anyway would be hugely appreciated.

At the moment i’m looking at this meal plan but want a more rounded view instead of clicking on the first vegan meal plan n going with that!

Not sure what the end goal is but definitely want to not be over 6foot n barley weigh 9stone lol; would also love a bit of toned muscle as well.

Like I said this is a brand new world to me and because i’ve never ever gained weight in my life it seems like an impossible task but I know i can do it, so any advice at all is hugely appreciated!

Happy to answer any question on my lifestyle etc x

Cheersx

 

[1luv]

@russelkuskie

1. Work on figuring out what your daily caloric needs are to maintain your current weight. Then plan on eating about 500 cal/day more than that. This is trial and error so you just start with a reasonable estimate based on available online calculators and then adjust based on results.
2. Make sure whatever you eat you're getting sufficient protein--rough rule of thumb for his is about 1g for every pound of lean body mass you want to have. Fill in the rest with carbs and fat, as long as you're getting a decent amount of each.
3. Put together a strength training plan that makes sure you train each of your major muscle groups 2 or 3 times a week. You could do 3 days of total body, or 6 days that are like upper body-push, upper body pull, legs, rest, repeat. As an example.
4. When you do strength training, you need to go hard enough that you're pushing yourself to get stronger in pretty much every workout--one extra rep on one thing, an extra set on another, bumping up in weight in something, etc. You need to progressively overload your muscles by giving them new challenges and they will respond and grow if you're also resting well and eating well.
5. Focus first on the big muscle groups and doing compound exercises that work them. Learn how to do squats, deadlifts, rows, pullups, bench press, overhead press, even if you're doing some with light weight, no weight, or with assistance to start. As a rule of thumb, you can start by doing about 3 sets of ten reps each for the exercises you do. The last 2 or 3 reps should be pretty challenging, and the last rep or two on the third set of an exercise should be very challenging, maybe you can't even do it.
   
6. Sleep.
7. Get used to getting your calories in by having a bowl of peanut butter and oats or something like that if you need it. There a million ways to go about this but the bottom line is don't forget to eat--make sure you have some foods that are calorically dense if not eating enough calories is an issue for you.
8. Track what you're doing so you can see your progress and make adjustments if it's not happening for you in a way that you expect. You can also get better feedback when you have information and data to share.

 

[enlightenmyway]

@1luv This is it!

 

[avery123]

@russelkuskie I came here to say stuff but unusual_seesaw_5156 nailed every point.

The only thing I’ll add is the recipe for my 75gram of protein 960 calorie smoothie:

2.5 cups of soy milk

1 banana

1 cup frozen berries of your choice

6 tablespoons of hemp hearts

1 scoop of vega protein powder

 

[hot2trot4christ]

@russelkuskie Look into thomas tadlocks program. Lots of greens and flaxseed. Super healthy but muscle building if approached with his strategy.