I'm 18 years old and I have several offers for playing Division 3 soccer. All of the coaches, however, have said I need to put on weight. Right now I weigh 135. I'd like to shoot for 145-150 by August, when preseason starts (for any school.) I've been lifting hardcore pretty much since November, and drinking Whey protein shakes within 30 minutes of each workout. What else should I do? Anybody reccomend multi V-s to take? What about creatine? Any special weight gain diets you can share? Help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
Ok Im in the same boat Right now Im in the weight room taking creatine. Its will get you big but you have to drink a lot of water when using. What Im thinking about doing is using weight gainer which may be the fastest way of gaining weight. http://www.gnc.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2776078&cp=2522433.2169540.2169546&parentPage=family I have never used this nor have any friends so Im not quite sure about it. Thats what Im doing and thinking if im wrong I would also love to hear advice
Your body weight is influenced by many things, not just what you do in the weight room. I hesitate to reply as this is an area for expert advice and I have very little knowlege. But here are my thoughts: 1) Look into the difference between fat-burning exercises and muscle-and-fat-burning exercises. Your over-all exercise program may be counter-productive. Intensive strength training is often scheduled for the off-season in soccer. 2) I would re-interpret "put on weight" to mean increase lower and upper body strength (i.e., increase muscle mass). You can focus--instead of your weight on the scale--on increasing your strength, which can track by performance over the weeks. 3) Everyone is different, but on average men put on some additional weight after high school as part of their normal physical development, apart from any exercising. For you it is going to be whatever it is going to be over the next few years. You should not worry about what you cannot (and should not) control. That is why I suggest you focus on increasing upper and lower body strength instead of on weight. Don't interpret 1 and 2 above to mean that you should skip flexibility training. Don't skip it. Good luck, and I hope a trainer will see your post and give you some better advice.
Thanks for the response. Thats what my goal was at first, getting the most strength I could out of the body I have now. However, that can only go so far. What I need is more mass to throw my weight around, and to hold guys off and stick tackles. 10-15 pounds would give me that extra punch.
THat stuff you showed me is good, and I used it i think freshmen year when I was REALLY skinny. From what I recall, it is not very convenient. It requires a blender to properly mix, and even then its chalky and frankly, a hassle. Maybe I'm wrong, or its a different product, but I've seen weight gainers that are just shakeable, so I can drink them within the proper time.
Make sure you're taking in a lot more calories than you are burning. You won't put on any weight if you don't have excess calories. An average person can only put on 1/4 to 1/2 pound of muscle a week so don't get discouraged if you're not seeing results right away.
try to stay away from creatine and stick to a whey protein or possibly check out muscle milk. Creatine helps you get big fast but youll notice that youll become considerably slower on creatine. in addition to this, alot of the muscle you gain on creatine youll lose shortly after you stop taking it, and theres no way you'll be able to take creatine during your actual season as it, along with hard practices, would dehydrate you to a point where it would be almost impossible to drink enough water to stay healthy.
You won't actually gain any muscle with creatine, it has no anabolic properties what so ever. What it does is increase muscular endurance so you can workout harder and it makes muscles seem fuller (muscles fill with water) I'm sure plenty pro footballers use creatine.
I was in your shoes in HS - I was only 5'10 and 135. Now I'm topping 150. Here's what I did - Start doing the rippetoe 3x5 (http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=720275) but replace the power cleans with Pendlay Rows (you can look up how to do all these excercises on Youtube). Record your progress in a book - write down how much you lifted, how many times, and any mistakes you made/notes you have. Make sure your form is perfect, and dont be afraid to start small and make slow progress. Start drinking protein shakes - Whey right after you work out, casein at night before you sleep. Optimum Nutrition makes the best powders, IMO. EAT A TON OF FOOD. ALL THE TIME. You just HAVE to make yourself eat. Drink tons of whole milk and eat as many hamburgers as you can a day. LOTS of protein. As much red meat as your mom will buy. That's pretty much it. Stick to a consistent routine and you'll be fine. lift ONLY 3x a week and no more, and not on the same days that you play soccer or run. Like I said, I gained 15lbs of lean muscle, even with several large setbacks. You just gotta keep at it. oh, and as for creatine, you can use it but it does not make you gain weight, as somebody said -it just increases muscular endurance. It has similar effects to caffeine but far more intense. If you use it, be sure to hydrate very well. As for muscle milk, it's a ripoff. It's just whey protein in soy milk for twice the cost as either of the ingredients.