Bulking up

Surprisingly spring-time has been chosen as one of the best times for you to start a bulking nutrition plan, and this may come as a shock to many of you who prefer to gain the pounds over Christmas, during your hibernation periods. But there’s a good reason for this;

Firstly all the junk food that you have stocked up on over Christmas like selection boxes and comfort foods are now gone and its back to the old diet again. But this means that you will be fuelling your muscle growth on more healthy, and protein high foods rather than empty calories stashed away for winter.

Secondly as its spring your less likely to pie out on comfort foods due to the increased vitamin D in the sunlight and the general feeling of content on a sunny day, and thus again you wont gain weight around your waist but on your muscles!

Thirdly, the lighter nights mean that you will have the chance to keep up your cardio programme and so burn off the fat that comes in the bulking diet. Mind you cardio should be kept to a once a week basis for the duration of a bulking programme, mainly just as a safeguard from any return of your gut.

Finally it’s a good way to add some t-shirt muscle mass, before summer, and don’t worry about summer bodies yet, you still have all of June to get shredded for your holidays, so just go for it!

Basics for bulking:

Nutrition: The key is to drip feed your muscles and get your body into an anabolic state so feel free to graze all day on high protein and carb foods, but keep it smart and aim for foods low in fat and in terms of carbs I mean good carbs, not sugar!

Aim to get 2-3 grams of protein, 3-5 grams of carbs and 1gram of fats per kilo of your bodyweight daily, i.e if you weight 75 kilos aim for at least 150grams of protein and only 75 grams of fat.

Also keep getting plenty of fruit and veg to supply your muscles with all the key nutrients.  This may seem like a lot of food, but its necessary to get your body into its anabolic state and after a few days you will start to notice the gains and increased recovery your body has started to make.

Training: In terms of training you want to aim for 8-12 reps per set and lift around 80% of your one rep max. Also keep your rest at a medium level of around 90 seconds-2mins at most! Train with weights 4-5 times a week with one cardio day and a few rest days to allow your body to grow.