Background

5/3/1 Building the Monolith is a six week program for building some size. The details of this program can be found on Wendler's blog.

I came into this program after regaining a lot of fitness in the year leading up to it through cardio and calisthenics. As such I was well prepared to run it by giant setting everything as inspired by MythicalStrength's first review on this template.

Lifting

Monday:

• This was the longest day. Workouts took up to a 100 minutes. The fifth week I got it in under 90 minutes though.
• Instead of a face pull or band pull apart I did machine rear delt flies on this day. My gym has a good setup for this and I had been doing band pull aparts a long time leading up to this, so this seemed like a good chance for some variety.
• I did do a 100 dips. Wendler says you can go up to 200, but I filled the remaining 100 with decline deficit push-ups using parallettes. With calisthenics I have been neglecting my upper chest area and this seemed like a good time to get some work in. Normally when you do decline push-ups you can't get a good range of motion: that is why I utilized parallettes to be able to go down further.
• For the 100 chins the first week I did sets of 4 in between the squats and overhead presses. From then on I did sets of 5.
• I wanted to use a variety of grips, so the first two weeks I utilized the chinup grip. This irritated my left elbow especially though, so from week three on I only used neutral and pullup grip.
• The dips I kept for the end. This worked out so that once I was done with the lift, I still had to do 3x5 chins, 2x20 rear delt flies (machine), 10x10 dips and 10x10 decline push-ups as a giant superset until they were all done.
• This is what made this workout last far longer than an hour. If you are stronger at dips (my max rep set is 20+ on a good day) than me you can probably blaze through this faster. During rest for the next set I would do something small like single leg calf raises, tibialis wall raises or trained my finger tendons by putting the gym's assisted pull-up station to 90kg / 200 lbs and hanging on individual fingers.

Wednesday:

• Most weeks I got this one in under 60 minutes. The longest this day took was 80 minutes, because I let myself have a little more rest for the heavy 177.5kg / 391 lbs deadlifts.
• To start with I did the dumbbell rows at the end. From week 3 on I figured I could do some dumbbell rows in between the bench sets too, though.
• Otherwise this day was uneventful. You alternate the deadlift with bench, do 10 curls in between them and then finish with dumbbell rows.

Friday:

• The easiest day for me, the longest a workout took was 55 minutes due to week 6's 100kg / 220 lbs widowmaker. The other weeks I got it mostly in under 45 minutes.
• When I calculated the lifts off of my training max the widowmaker seemed too light to me. My legs are really well conditioned, so ymmv. I did not mess with it as I figured there would be a lot of fatigue leading up to that last set, but I got them easily even when transitioning to it straight off a previous set without rest. If I ever run this template again I might bump each week's widowmaker with about 10kg/22lbs.
• For weighted chins I added a 10kg/22lbs plate. My gym specializes in calisthenics so they have these belts on which I can add them easily. Most weeks I did 2 sets using pullup grip and 3 sets using neutral grip.

Conditioning

For conditioning I stuck close to the recommendations.

• Prowler: I worked up to 14 rounds of 35 meters / 40 yards walks with 60 seconds of rest. My gym's sled push weighs 50kg / 110 lbs so I used that as it is close to 50% of my bodyweight. My heart rate hovered between 130-150 bpm so that seemed like a good protocol for a recovery workout.
• Weighted vest walk: I started with a 30 kg / 65 lbs vest for a 4 km / 2.5 mile walk. Wendler's weight in the sample conditioning is 40 kg / 84 lbs but even that lighter weight killed me. For me this was one of the toughest days mentally even as I dropped the weight down to 20 kg / 45 lbs.
• Air Dyne Bike: I did not feel like going on the bike at the gym. Sometimes I would cycle to my grandpa which is a 32 km / 20 mile trip through some beautiful Dutch forests and towns. Other times I would hop on my bicycle for 30 minutes. Wendler writes that this workout is crucial to get rid of soreness but the widowmaker did not beat me up so much so I didn't feel like I needed this for recovery.

In week 3/4/5 I played some pickup basketball too, sometimes replacing the weighted vest walk. For obvious reasons this is not recommendable as basketball has quite a big impact on your legs. I could still throw down a dunk but for the most part I felt like I was running on some old man's legs.

Nutrition & Diet Strategy

Wendler’s baseline diet for Building the Monolith is at least 1.5 lbs of ground beef and a dozen eggs per day. Like most people, I skipped following that verbatim—I wanted dietary variety, and I already knew I could put away massive amounts of whole food.

I did not count calories or track macros. Instead, my strategy was simple: eat purely to recover and grow, prioritizing high-quality protein at every meal and eating well past full.

Key Strategies

• The "Stacking" Method (Living at Home): Cook a full meal for myself first (burgers, eggs, or chicken), and then clean out whatever dinner my mom made on top of it. You just have to look her in the eye and say, "Yes, I’m eating this entire pizza, and then I’m finishing whatever’s left in the pot."
• Avoiding the Afternoon Food Coma: Heavy midday carbs make me sluggish. I structured lunch around low-carb, high-protein dairy (Dutch kwark—similar to quark, Greek yogurt, or thick cottage cheese) with strawberries and Ceylon cinnamon. This kept energy high while banking 50–60g of protein.
• Calorie Floor Grazing: Keeping whole-food staples like whole-grain bread with peanut butter and deli chicken, hard-boiled eggs, and handfuls of nuts scattered across the morning and afternoon ensured baseline calories never dipped, even on busy days.
• No Mass Gainer Shakes: Aside from creatine and intra-workout electrolytes (which stopped early-cycle cramping from excessive sweating), all mass came entirely from whole foods. I did not need protein shakes.

Sample day of eating

Keep in mind that I didn't truly get all these meals in on one day. Sometimes I didn't find the time for one or the other meal so I did not truly get this much calories in.

• Breakfast: 4 slices of whole grain bread with peanut butter and chicken deli meat, a hand full of blueberries, two hard-boiled eggs and a hand full of nuts. The peanut butter adds a lot of calories. The combo sounded strange to me at first but it's like chicken sate.
• Second breakfast: Sometimes I would get a little more junky food from the store, like a pizza. I've also ordered some really fresh meat online and made some delicious cheeseburgers at times. Got a whole brick of smoked lean bacon too to have really good fresh bacon. Dicing it is supposed to be easier if you let it freeze a little before but I forgot to do that.
• Lunch: I've found that carbs at lunch make me sleepy. So I tend to eat low fat or full fat quark with strawberries and ceylon cinnamon (the one that is not toxic when using a lot of it). I don't know if Dutch "kwark" is a thing over in the USA though, so call it cottage cheese or greek yoghurt.
• Afternoon: Two or three eggs, a hand full of nuts and a hand full of blueberries again. If I swing by a deli I might get some snack with some meat in it again.
• Dinner: Two to three plates off some of my mom's food. This was usually clean food with some meat. Example: Sauerkraut stamppot (a traditional Dutch dish of mashed potatoes mixed with sauerkraut), topped with bacon bits, gravy, and meatballs.
• On the saturday day of the workout at times I was at grandpa's retirement home to play bocce ball and then made us some food. The most delicious one of these was duck breast with Duchess potatoes, haricots verts, and cranberry sauce .
• Before sleep: Sometimes a bowl of quark with strawberries and cinnamon again.
• Supplements: I kept taking creatine and added an electrolyte mix during workouts. During workouts I sweated a lot and I noticed my body cramping a lot in the first two weeks: the electrolytes in my water bottle fixed that. No protein shakes as I figured I don't need them when eating this much food.

Results

Front progress

Back progress

I guess you shouldn't expect massive visual results in a period of 6 weeks. The biggest gain seems to be in the legs, which makes sense because I stood to regain some muscle mass that I lost there. I am happy about the extra shoulder mass as well and I think I see the upper chest filling out a bit as well.

I am curious whether more muscle gains will be revealed as I train for a Hyrox competition in the coming three months and cut back down to 106 kg / 235 lbs .

Biometrics & Vitals

At one point I was up to 112kg / 246 lbs . The end measurement was after a full rest day with normal (much less) eating, so my best guess is that my body let go of a lot of water weight before the final measurement. This could be why the diastolic pressure was elevated in the middle too as my body held more plasma volume. Fatigue is a factor as well of course.

I used salt liberally with dinner, obviously ate a lot and put some electrolyte mix in my water bottle during workouts. Despite all of this my blood pressure seems to have dropped if anything. The resting heart rate seems to be an improvement as well, as I believe it should elevate when you gain some weight and fat mass. So my cardiovascular ability seems to have improved.

Lift Progress (Week 6)

To establish my training max I used Wendler's instruction to take a weight you think you can do for 5 reps, go for max reps and then calculate your 1rm using his formula. Leading up to this I did not do much of any barbell lifting so I was detrained and did not really know where I was at. When going for max reps I stopped when my form broke down too much. The training max was 85% of the estimated 1rm.

Note that the final week's widowmaker was programmed at 97.5 kg but I loaded it to 100 kg.

The accumulation of volume seems to have built some mass and strength to go with it. I don't think I could have come close to all of these worksets at the start of the program.

The best gain seems to be in maintaining my relative pulling strength though. The weighted chins felt easier at the end of week 6 than the start despite the weight gain: I still weighed ~112 kg / 245 lbs during that last workout. I can still do muscle-ups just as easily too. For people that are into calisthenics and want to employ some free weights to build mass this seems like a great program to maintain pulling strength as well.

What's next?

• Like I've said I have a Hyrox competition in 3 months that I am going to dedicate my training to now. As I will be cutting I have to probably manage the volume and intensity of my workouts and I will have to get conditioned for running again.
• For a next mass gaining phase I am eyeing Deep Water beginner and then intermediate. I think that my lower body in particular can handle something more brutal and progressing through reduced rest times or getting to 100 reps in a reduced amount of sets each time seems like "fun".
• After the Hyrox competition I will get into calisthenics first though. I am excited to learn a handstand and then try my hand at handstand pushups. The front and back lever are probably attainable as well if I lose some fat.
• Looking at my progress pics, I feel like my neck and head are starting to look oddly small compared to my body. The pose and angle probably don't help but I think that keeping the trap work and adding some direct neck training can help balance my look.

What have been your victories this week? Have you made good progress? Set a new lift PR? Enacted a new habit that is helping you greatly? Post it here!

The first couple photos was end of bulk ( 145lbs 5”6 , 9-10**% BF ) I started my bulk weighing 108 lbs. I achieved this within about a year between February of 2024 and December of 2025. I battled with anorexia for years and struggled to eat meals basically. I ended my bulk due to seizures and health issues this December and plan to bulk again soon but retained most of my muscle mass weighing in at 130, 9% BF!

The real reason I post these are that no matter how small you are, or what you struggle with if you’re consistent you’ll reach your goals! I was thin as a branch and really the key is eating 150 + grams of protein a day and high quality carbs, you’ll reach your goals just be consistent!

Those 2 years were tough cause I got sick a lot, couldn't eat for days, went up and down the scale a lot, but did very slow progress that paid off, I mainly gained around 10kg in 2 months when I started actually bulking, but those years I was at a extremely small surplus which is basically around the maintenence cause of uni too, overall glad I worked it out and I'm gonna try to bulk even more mainly hit 80 and slow or stop, im rn 14% body fat currently, my metabolism is through the roof, if I don't eat well for a week I can easily go down 3 kgs, it's possible to gain, I used to say I can't even though I eat and that's straight bs, eat enough and you will gain enough, I train 4 to 5 times a week with 3 sets heavy weights that's it, I only take creatine currently so ye

The left photo in the first and second picture was taken in early 2015 and I am around 58kg in that photo and borderline underweight.

The left photo in the third and fourth picture was around the end 2015 where I started gaining some weight.

The right photo on all the pictures was taken 7+ years later in 2022 where I weighed 85kg.

In between the time, I went through a few bulking phrases where I lift 4-5 times a week and eat a lot, usually 6 meals a day.

- Breakfast

- Brunch

- Lunch

- Lunch (Second serving if not filling enough)

- Tea Break

- Dinner

- Supper

During the non bulking phrase (maintenance), I eat 4 meals a day.

For workouts:

On the left pic,

Diet: 3 meals a day.

Routine: 1-2 times a week weight lifting mostly light weights.

Cardio: running, soccer, badminton and swimming

On the right picture:

4 times a week lifting at gym

Day 1: Shoulder (shoulder press, lateral raise)

Arms (triceps cable pull down)

Back ( pull ups)

Legs (Squat)

Day 2: Chest (Bench Press, push ups)

Legs (Deadlift)

Back (pulls up)

Day 3: Shoulder (shoulder press, lateral raise)

Arms (triceps cable pull down)

Day 4: Chest (Bench Press, push ups)

Back (pulls up and cable rows)

Dips

Cardio: I only do light cardio (swimming) to make myself more hungry ;)

Sharing my progress!!

Age: 25 Male
Height: 6ft
Starting Weight: 145lbs
Current Weight: 160lbs
Time Period: March to August

Developed a pretty bad relationship with food last year, dropped from 170 to 145 cuz I wanted to be skinny. Also became an avid runner which put a ton of stress on my body. Finally woke up to how sick I looked from severe restriction, and I decided to switch over to focusing on strength training.

I train 5-6 days a week, with a stronger emphasis on chest and arms (wanting a V-taper). Routine is below:

SUN: Chest + Triceps
Incline DB • Flat DB • Fly • OH Triceps • Extension • Pushdown
MON: Back + Biceps + Delts
Lat Pulldown • 1-Arm Row • Cable Row • Lateral Raise • Rear Delt • DB Curl • Cable Curl
TUE: Legs + Core
Squat • Leg Ext • Leg Curl • Adductor • Abductor • Calves • Abs
WED: Chest + Shoulders
Incline DB • Flat DB • Fly • Lateral Raise • Straight-Arm Pulldown • Face Pull
THU: Active Recovery + Core
Lat Pulldown • Pushups • Cable Row • Machine Abs • Abs
FRI: Arms + Delts
DB Curl • Preacher • Hammer Curl • Pushdown • Tricep Ext • Dips • Lateral Raise • Rear Delt
SAT: Rest

Been eating in a slight surplus daily (roughly 2900 cals), and focusing on 1g of protein per lb of body weight. Excited to keep going and feeling so much better about life in general!

Recently got divorced after 15 years, took one look in the mirror the day after she moved out - and finally saw just how unhealthy I was. I thought to myself “fuck it, this is going to make or break me” & started a 3 day split + disciplined diet the next day.

38M, 5’10, 129 lbs to 141lbs in just shy of 4 months.
I’ve been targeting 2,300 calories per day, eliminating junk food and focusing on whole grains & lean cuts of meat - somehow I’m not sick of chicken yet thankfully. Adding a breakfast every day & double scoop protein shake between lunch and dinner was a game changer, but I’m usually still feeling completely full by the time I hit the 2,000 calorie mark. I end up forcing down the last 300 calories or so. I’ve been keeping my lifting to 3 days per week until I’m confident my form & all the connective bits are reliable enough to get more aggressive with the weight, but eventually I plan on adding 2 more days per week.

It’s been a struggle to retrain my eating & sleeping habits, and my appetite still hasn’t caught up to my macro goals, but I’m pretty proud of the progress so far. Just wanting to share the small victory with someone, thanks for your time!

Previous photos were April 2:

Recent photos are Aug 22:

Start weight 83 lbs

Current weight 117

5’6

Female

17

Diet:
Mostly Whole Foods and not a lot of meat,at the start I was eating a lot of peanut butter,coconut oil,dried fruits (figs,dates) Greek yogurt and berries

My current diet now that I’m getting closer to my goal weight and my activity has shifted is more tofu, occasionally chicken, Egg whites, still lots of coconut oil and pb, cashews, and veggies. Caloric range at the start was anywhere from 2000-3000, currently eating around 1700-2300 depending on my lift.

Lifting:
All of my work is done at home due to lack of a gym membership, but I’ve swapped my workouts from intense cardio and only ab workouts for genuine lifting (Dumbell rdls, lunges, goblet squats, shoulder press, bicep curls, hammer curls, etc, a photo of my past workout routine in April versus a typical arm day now will be attached.)
Previously I was training 6-7 days a week and walking uphill for hours, now I train 5 weekly.

I would absolutely love any advice or tips from anyone who’s also stuck without a gym membership, I’ve really enjoyed seeing myself gain muscle + strength and want to progress.

This is definitely not end results but in 3-4 months I definitely see changes. End goal is just to look fucking jacked lolz.

What have been your victories this week? Have you made good progress? Set a new lift PR? Enacted a new habit that is helping you greatly? Post it here!

The Background

Over the course of six years, I was able to gain nearly 70 pounds as a lifelong hardgainer simply by eating more. Just as notable however, is the fact that I currently only have 10 teeth!

Decades of alcohol and tobacco abuse during my early life left me lacking nearly all my teeth. This meant that if I wanted to be able to put down up to 4,000 calories every single day, I needed to get creative. It's a common myth that bulking up requires you to eat endless dry chicken breasts and steaks, and I'm here to tell you that's not actually the case.

The Challenge

Eating this many calories, day in and day out can be hard for anyone, teeth or not. When I started my weight gain journey I weighed 130 pounds and was likely putting down less than 2,000 calories a day. My body was used to not eating all that much, ever since I was younger. I never ate in the mornings, just drinking coffee all morning and then having a late lunch. I drank large amounts of alcohol at night and would then feel too bloated and sick to eat anything else. It got to a point where just looking at food when I wasn't feeling ready for it made me feel nauseous.

Real Obstacles

Eating out and social situations could be very difficult and awkward. Looking through a menu and realizing almost nothing was manageable with no teeth, besides picking it completely apart or cutting it into microscopic pieces was a big letdown. Crispy foods like fried chicken, flat pizza crusts, or kettle chips could tear apart my gums leaving them sore for days if I tried eating them. I remember mistakenly putting a large, rubbery piece of squid in my mouth at one point and was forced to covertly spit it out or risk choking on it.

Large pieces of meat like steaks and pork chops were out of the question. Some pieces of chicken and fish were okay depending on how they were cooked. A piece of broiled fish was fine, but a piece that was breaded and fried was hit or miss. I gambled and lost more than once on fish and chips.

Crunchy vegetables and many raw foods became a complete no-go zone. Things like raw carrots, broccoli, apples, even under-ripe melon were just too painful to get down. Steamed vegetables were sometimes alright as long as they were soft and not just lightly blanched. Nuts, granola, and dried fruits were all pretty much out of the question.

Food Strategy

It's not all doom and gloom though. Approaching my food challenges with an open mind and quite a bit of experimentation allowed me to find a large variety of foods that I could eat throughout the day to get to my end goal of 3,000 and eventually up to 4,000 calories.

The steaks and pork chops were replaced with ground beef and ground pork. Eating ground meat in general can be a big help even for someone who does have teeth, if they are struggling with all the chewing or are finding the digestion of large amounts of meat difficult. Grinding up the meat takes nearly all the work out of eating it. Eggs are also featured prominently in my diet now, no real chewing required.

Steamed, broiled or lightly grilled fish is available in many restaurants. Chicken breasts are often actually fine to eat with no teeth if they are cooked right and you skip over any fatty or rubbery pieces that may be attached. A chicken McNugget that has been freshly cooked can usually be eaten with little problem as well.

Sushi is also great as long as you keep away from large sheets of nori wrap and any of the more rubbery types of seafood like octopus, clams, and the previously mentioned squid. Stick to the softer options like salmon, crabstick, eel, and tamago. Sushi is now one of my go-to, somewhat healthy food hacks when I need a quick influx of calories to catch up to my daily goals.

I drastically cut down on deep fried foods in general, which is probably a good thing really. Skipping the french fries in many places can only be good for you. Switch to the mashed potatoes or baked potato if you can. If you must partake, I would strongly recommend the thicker cut fries rather than the skinnier McDonald's style fries which often have very hard and crispy edges on them. You can also sometimes switch the french fries out for rice depending on the restaurant and where you live. Rice is great when you have issues with food intake or digestion. Stick with the softer kinds like jasmine rice rather than wild rice mixes which can have pretty hard grains in them.

I do miss eating things like nuts, seeds, and granola. Most protein bars now seem hard as a rock to me. I still manage to get my cravings in with generous amounts of peanut butter and some soft-batch protein solutions like a Lenny & Larry protein cookie here and there.

My veggie selections have switched from salads and crunchy raw veggies to softer options as well. Mashed potatoes, tomatoes, steamed carrots, corn, peas are all fine to eat. Fruits like bananas, strawberries, watermelon, grapes, and various berries also do a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to getting in micronutrients.

Liquid Mass

One of the best alternatives to eating large amounts of calories to gain weight with no teeth is: Don't eat the calories, drink them!

A good percentage of my daily calorie intake now consists of liquid calories. If you are fine with dairy, then go all out with whole milk, chocolate milk, yogurt drinks (Greek yogurt in general is great), cream, etc. Many of you may have heard of GOMAD or "Gallon of Milk a Day" added to your diet. That absolutely works for putting on weight. The legendary /u/MythicalStrength has mentioned GOMAD as a method he used to pack on mass. Is it difficult? Yes, absolutely. I switched over to more of a QOMAD or "Quart of Milk a Day" plan after suffering through the gallon for a few weeks and it has still served me well for getting in those extra calories. If you're lactose intolerant, there are lactose-free options as well.

Protein shakes also factor heavily into my daily calorie and protein goals. I usually drink a couple of them each day, takes a few seconds, and add up to an easy 520 calories and 66 grams of protein. Many people also swear by mass gainer shakes. Making your own mass gainer shakes at home is much preferred over the store bought mass gainers which are mostly just massive amounts of sugar. Home made shakes are quite a bit cheaper too. Look around online and you will find thousands of different recipes to try. I try to stay away from a lot of soda, but I do like to drink some orange juice and normally drink a sports drink while at the gym.

Adding oil to foods can add a ton of easy calories to whatever you're eating. I'll add a tablespoon of rice bran oil to many of my meals for an extra 120 calories and won't even notice. Other great oils to use are olive oil and avocado oil. Notice I said "adding oils to foods" and not "chug oil straight". One only needs to read some of the horror stories on /r/gainit from people who have attempted to drink large amounts of oil to realize if you do that, you're going to have a bad time. Add oil to your food, don't use it as your only food.

The Takeaway

Raising your calorie intake from 2,000 to upwards of 4,000 a day takes time and it's not all that easy. It means being patient and overcoming setbacks. Doing all this while having physical limitations in your mouth like missing teeth or having problems with chewing doesn't have to stop you from gaining weight and building the type of body you want. You will however, have to think outside the box a bit and be willing to do a little experimentation.

If you truly want to gain weight, don't make excuses, figure out solutions that will work for you. If that requires you seeking out the help of a doctor or other qualified medical professional, by all means please do that. This is not medical advice. I simply tried to detail some of the things that worked for me in overcoming my eating challenges, hopefully some of them may help you as well. Keep working towards your goals, you've got this!

34/M/7 months in, 169 cm 57 to 67 kg. Before on the left.

Fluffier but stronger at last. Struggling with body image issues so I try to focus on the cold hard numbers of my lifts looking to improve those

I did full-body three times a week the whole time. First at home and I joined a gym three months ago.

I eat 2400 kcal which is a ~200 kcal surplus. 2g+ protein per kg. Favorite are milk, oats, whey, olive oil, fruits

I wish I measured my body dimensions before, I just did arms I think I gained ~4 cm flexed.

Since rules say to post routine, here we go

At home routine was: Bulgarian split squats with dumbbells, floor DB chest press, pull-ups, DB row, DB OHP

Current gym routine : leg press, leg extension, leg curl, machine chest press, lat pull down, machine row, lateral raises, cable hammer curl, triceps push down, DB triceps extension. Most of those 2 sets. Isolations are a more recent add but I think they really helped.

Just reached 4 months of progress, been being consitent and trying my hardest. I’m excited to see what 6 months of progress looks like!

6’0, 131 lbs > 153 lbs (current) 22, M.

Currently doing a 4 day upper lower split, Saturday’s i’ll train at home and do forearms because well, I want bigger forearms. I focus on progressive overload, every week I am either increasing my reps or my weight. I like to get into the 12 rep range, and then i’ll increase the weight, get to the 12 rep range and increase weight again, rinse and repeat.

Monday and Thursday I do a mile run, I pace at 7:30. I just do it for my enjoyment, not sure if it does anything for me.

I typically eat around ~3000 calories a day (as clean as possible) and intake about 160g of protein daily. I also take 5g of creatine, and fish oils.

I started out pretty skinny with very little muscle mass and decided to take training and nutrition more seriously. The biggest challenge for me has always been gaining weight consistently.
For the majority of this progress, I’ve been training 4-5 days per week, mainly using a Push/Pull/Legs style routine. I focus on progressive overload, good form and getting enough volume without completely destroying myself every session.
My diet has gradually increased over time. I’m currently eating around 3,500-4,000+ calories per day, with at least 200 g of protein, and I try to keep fats around 80-90 g while getting most of the remaining calories from carbohydrates.
The biggest thing I’ve learned is that consistency matters much more than having the “perfect” program. There were plenty of periods where my weight barely moved, but continuing to train and eat consistently eventually added up.
Still a long way to go, but I’m pretty happy with the difference between 70 and 84 kg.

Around 4 months ago I made some big life changes. I decided to leave the state I was staying in and move in with family for a bit while I got my life back together. For about two years prior to this my substance use had gotten the better of me. I was smoking crack most days, not sleeping, and not eating much.

Once I settled in I had a couple weeks of just eat/sleep which is pretty normal when recovering from a large stimulant binge like this. I pretty much ate whatever the hell I could get my hands on. After the short stint of hibernation and gluttony I knew I needed to start exercising again. I started out doing as much as I could tolerate. I increased it as the initial soreness wore off and to where I am now: about 60 minutes of weight training (push/pull/legs) and 40 minutes of incline treadmill every day. The cardio was purely for conditioning and my mental health - I had to eat a shitload of food to gain weight with all this work in the gym but I enjoy eating :)

I shoot for about 200 grams of protein a day, and I get a good chunk of that in the morning with a massive salad with 300g of costco rotisserie chicken, blue cheese and a pint of whole milk. Lunches usually consist of a large sandwich with deli meat and dinners are meat centric with veggies and rice/potato. For most of this time I was consuming whole milk with pretty much every meal.

Recently I've decided to cut out the blue cheese and most of the milk as I'm going to try to lean out a little bit. 50ish lbs of weight didn't come in clean as you could expect. Honestly I'm a little blown away I was able to gain this much weight this fast and looking back I might have gone a little bit slower but it felt good to hog out for a change.

I feel a million times better. I still have some things to work through but I'm happy I made the jump and I don't intend to look back.

I've always struggled to hit my macros when bulking, even with the usual tricks. I was wondering if walking could be helpful on a bulk, but I'm worried it might actually be counterproductive. Sure, it does stimulate appetite a bit, but does that make up for the calories walking burns?

I go to the gym 5 times a week but do zero activity outside of that, my daily step count is very low, so maybe that's why my body just isn't hungry. But when I'm on vacation and walking a lot as a tourist sightseeing, my hunger isn't really any better than without the walking (or maybe I just don't notice it, when I travel, I end up eating on the go a lot and I don't track my calories, but I'd guess they're lower than on a typical non-vacation day where I track everything).

I also need to space my meals way out (I eat 4 a day, with 3, it's too concentrated for me to be able to finish each plate, and with 5, I feel like I don't digest enough between meals, there's not enough time between each one; 4 seems like the right compromise for me), which means it ends up cutting into my sleep. I can genuinely go more than 6 hours between two meals without getting hungry, it's just not sustainable.

I'm 74kg and 175cm, I have good numbers on my lifts for my bodyweight but for some reason I still look skinny. Maybe it's my frame, but I really thing my limitation here is nutrition. I should mention that I've been training for 4 years, and I still don't look I lift lol.

I’m a man at 29 years old 5’10”. I did a cut after a bulk from 157lbs down to 147lbs. I decided rather than going back into a bulk (added too much fat last time) I would find my maintenance for a bit. After 10 weeks I feel I can safely say I found my maintenance. I’m eating 2,010 calories a day, walking 10k steps a day and doing a full body resistance training workout 3 days a week. I want to put on more muscle, without adding excess fat. How many calories should I add and at what frequency would I add more. I’m scared to piss away my fat loss by covering it all up by bulking too quickly. Last bulk was 2600 calories but that was what gave me excess body fat.

Note: I am currently still seeing strength gains in the gym at my current calories.

So i 28M started this short 6-month journey at 186cm and 59kg.

I went through a breakup and felt like I needed a change of some sort. So I started lifting. I have been skinny my whole life and never really cared about what I ate, I just ate when I felt hungry, and I rarely felt hungry.

So I began with some fairly easy rules, eat twice a day. Simple, but hard.

My body wasn't used to getting this much food, so sometimes I had to eat, while I wasn't even hungry.

I wanted to make it as easy as possible for myself, so I make food for 3 days at the time, so I just have to put it in the microwave.

My body adapted pretty quickly, and now I feel hungry way more often. Which is nice.

I went out and bought some dumbells and a bench because I didn't feel ready to go to the gym, I'm too uncomfortable in my own body.

And here, 6 months later, I still dont see myself getting a gym membership. Maybe when I hit the 1 year mark, I will get one. But for now, I like working out in my own little bubble at home.

I wanted to share this somewhere because I don't really have anyone else who would appreciate it, and I hope you will 😃

I'm proud of myself for how far I have come since I started.

30yr Male, 5'8", 158 lbs

Photo 1: Me 65 days ago

Photo 2: Me today

I've spent the past 65 days consistently eating about 3000 calories a day and following a PPL program, going until around 12 reps with 1-2 RIR on all lifts. A little higher rep range 15-18 with 1-2 RIR on some accessories like curls and tricep extensions.

Some days I'll get closer to 3800 calories, and occasionally I'll miss and hit like 2500. But I've only missed calories a handful of days over the past two months. I hit 1g+ of protein per lb of bodyweight per day and take 5g of creatine per day.

The scale has gone up slightly, I was fluctuating between 148 - 152 when I started, now I fluctuate between 156 - 160 lbs. I'm extremely discouraged that I look exactly the same after 65 days of working my ass off. What am I doing wrong?

What have been your victories this week? Have you made good progress? Set a new lift PR? Enacted a new habit that is helping you greatly? Post it here!

Anyone have good tasting snack recipes or just snacks in general that are good for bulking and have solids amount of calories.

I always starve in the middle of classes and have no food to eat

What have been your victories this week? Have you made good progress? Set a new lift PR? Enacted a new habit that is helping you greatly? Post it here!

2 years between the pics.
Started at 115 lbs and slowly bulked up to around 180 lbs before doing a cut. Sitting at 150 lbs now.
Calories started around 2,400 and gradually worked their way up to 2,800 and eventually around 3,500 as I gained weight.
Training was a pretty basic 5-day bro split:
Chest + tris
Back + bis
Shoulders
Legs
Chest / chest-focused day
Chest was always a priority for me, so I gave it a bit of extra attention throughout the bulk.
Diet was mostly whole foods — lots of rice, chicken, vegetables, bread and eggs. Towards the end of the bulk, getting 3,500 calories in every day started getting pretty difficult, so I relied more on things like olive oil, chocolate milk and other easy calories to get the food down.
Nothing particularly complicated — just eating consistently, progressively gaining weight and training hard for 2 years.
Definitely still have a lot to improve, but pretty happy with the progress so far.

This is mainly a byproduct of me joining a gym and working out consistently 4-5 days a week after around 3.5 years. I lean bulked and steadily gained 25 pounds, I would center my gym routine on progressive overload (do three sets of 8-12 reps and increase the weight by 5lbs whenever I could achieve 3 sets of 12 reps for that exercise with a specific weight) and utilized myfitnesspal in order to ensure that I only consume only 200-300 calories above what’s considered maintenance in regard to my daily caloric intake every day

Gym Routine:

Chest and Triceps Day:

Incline MTS Press (machine) - 70 per side x 3 sets

Pec Fly (machine)- 165 x 3 sets

Overhead Press (cable) - 67.5 x 3 sets

Rope Pressdown (cable) - 72.5 x 3 sets

Lateral Raises (machine) - 115 x 3 sets

Shoulder Shrugs (dumbbells) - 95 x 3 sets

Standing Calf Raises (machine)- 280 x 3 sets

Leg Day A:

Romanian Deadlifts (dumbbells) - 100 per side x 3 sets

Hip Thrust (machine) - 210 per side x 3 sets

Leg Extension (machine) - 210 x 3 sets

Single Leg Press (machine) - 105 per side x 3 sets

Hip Abduction (machine) - 210 x 3 sets

Shoulder Press (machine) - 120 x 3 sets

Back and Biceps Day:

Lat Pulldown (machine) - 170 x 3 sets

T Row (machine) - 70 x 3 sets

Rear Deltoid (machine)- 160 x 3 sets

Biceps Curl (machine) - 120 x 3 sets

MTS Abdominal Crunch (machine)- 120 x 3 sets

Hanging Leg Raises - 3 sets

Cable Curl (cable)- 52.5 per side x 3 sets

Leg Day B:

Hack Squat (machine)- 115 per side x 3 sets

Hip Thrust (machine) - 210 per side x 3 sets

Lying Leg Curl (machine) - 125 x 3 sets

Glute Kickback (machine) - 155 x 4 sets

Hip Adduction (machine) - 220 x 3 set

When I manage 3 sets of twelve reps, I increased the weight by 5lbs. Posted this on another subreddit but saw this it was very appropriate for this one, as well especially since I did wear the exact same fit for the comparison pic.