Weight Gain Diet Without The Weight Training

...My question is: If I begin a weight gain diet, what will happen if I do not participate in any bodybuilding? Will i still gain weight? How will this effect my body? Are their simple exercises that can replace the bodybuilding aspect, pushups sit ups etc.? (from Super Skinny Darren)

When you consistently give the body a surplus of calories (calories in excess of its energy demands) it uses these calories to build tissue -- fat tissue or muscle tissue. The ratio of muscle to fat tissue you end up with is determined by genetics and what you signal to the body that you need to survive.

You can't change your genetics but you can change what your body perceives as its survival needs. This is the reason for weight training on a weight gain program. You are giving the body a need to build muscle tissue -- you are triggering the body's survival mechanism, telling it you require more strength in order to be able to thrive.

When you train in a way that demonstrates to the body a need to increase muscle mass, the body responds by increasing the production of hormones necessary for muscle building. These hormones (i.e. testosterone) cause the body to dedicate a greater amount of the surplus calories you are providing it through your weight gain diet to muscle building as opposed to fat building.

If you skip the training and fail to provide the body a reason to add and maintain muscle tissue, you will get fat tissue beyond what your genetic programming has predetermined is a reasonable amount of muscle. If given the choice, the body will opt to store energy in fat tissue rather than to add lean muscle tissue. Fat is much less troublesome to maintain.

Caution: Many skinny people approach weight gain with the idea that they really don't care what kind of weight they gain, they just want to add pounds, fat is fine with them. The problem with this approach is that the placement of fat tissue is completely determined by genetics as well.

People imagine that the fat will be pleasingly proportioned on their bodies. Unless they have the genetics for this, it isn't going to happen. In naturally thin people, fat tends to go disproportionately to the mid section - not what most envision.

A much wiser course is to set your goals at gaining lean muscle tissue as opposed to "any weight." Unlike fat tissue, muscle tissue likes to distribute itself proportionately and through your training you do have control over how it displays itself. The end results will be much more aesthetically pleasing.

In summary, yes you will still gain weight with a weight gain diet and no training. Your gains, however, will be maximum fat and minimum muscle. By adding proper mass gain training to the mix, you can instead move towards maximum muscle gain and minimal fat gain.

Without the use of weights, you can still encourage the body to build muscle. However, you have to keep in mind what triggers the body to increase muscle mass -- you have to keep pushing the body to handle greater weight loads.

Doing 100 push-ups doesn't encourage the body to increase muscle mass beyond what it needs to do 20 push-ups. It instead encourages the body to condition the muscle it already has in place. You are better off limiting your reps to 12 for most exercises and increasing the resistance if your goals are to gain weight and muscle.

This can be done without the use of traditional weights with a little creativity - some ideas in this post Muscle Building Without Weights. Ultimately, nothing is better than the use of free weights and as your goals progress, you may want to start considering adding some bodybuilding equipment to your arsenal.

Designing and Maintaining a Weight Gain Diet

Weight Training That Builds Muscle

JP Clifford

Making Multiple Sets Work

...I understand that multiple sets would be better but I don't know how to handle the explosiveness of the workout.. eg. If I try 3 sets, 8-12 reps to failure, I can barely reach the range on set 2, and even less on set 3, which ofcourse makes sense to me as my energy is slowly depleting through the sets, but then if I'm not hitting the rep range I'm not training correctly, am I? So, thats why I use only 1 set and give it my all. How Do you sustain the same output over multiple sets, should I not be going to failure on the first sets and stop at 12, even if I can give more, thus saving some of the 'tank' for later sets? (from Roland)

When you see a mass gain set calling for 3 sets of 8-12 reps, it is assumed that you will need to drop the weight in order to meet the rep range on the 2nd and 3rd sets. As you suggest, if you are working correctly with maximum effort, your muscles will tire. So if you bench press 120 lbs. on the first set, you may need to drop that to 100 lbs. for the second and 80 for the third.

How do you know how much weight to drop? There isn't an absolute formula to determine how much you will need to drop. It varies by individual and is dependent on many factors including your unique muscle fiber composition. The way you find out is through experience. Fairly quickly you will be able to fairly accurately estimate how much you may need to drop for additional sets.

If you get it wrong? That is not a big deal. When looking for muscle growth, the most important thing is that you never leave a set with anything left in the tank. If you do, you are sending a clear message to the body...

"Hey, no need to build more muscle. I have plenty, I'm not even using all of what I have."

The body will get that message loud and clear and you will not get muscle growth.

So, if you drop too much weight, do not stop just because you have reached your rep limit. Don't stop until you have given all that you can give. Track your results in your weight training log and the next time you work that muscle group, you will be able to more accurately gauge the best poundage for each set.

But always keep your eye on the big picture - You must challenge your muscles if you want them to grow. Don't get caught up in the details. Rep ranges are goals you would like to hit, maximum intensity is something you must always hit.

Exceptions? When your goal is to gain muscle mass, your focus should be on going to fatigue or failure on each and every work set. Sometimes, however, it can be beneficial to throw your muscles a change of pace to keep them from adapting. Cumulative fatigue training is one way to do that. For this you do a series of sets with the goal of muscular failure is only for the last set.

Rep Ranges

Training Intensity

JP Clifford