Triathlete wants to grow!

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Background: This is not me. I'm posting for my boy who's not an EF member yet.

He's extremely athletic, ex college hoop player, trains for triathalon's year-round. He eats simply and well. He's wants to build mass. He's on test 500/wk now week5 and isn't seeing results. He's lifting with extreme intensity, sleeping his 8 hours a night, and eating many meals.

I've begged him to eat more clean food and do less and less cardio. He's definatly a high-metabolic hard-gainer. Any diet/lifting advice? K and thanks to those who may have suggestions!


--------------below is his email to me--------------

6'2 185lbs
27 years old
athletic build

diet:

5am Carnation instant breakfast or Ensure
8am Scrambled Eggs, potato wedges, two turkey sausages, oatmeal, yogurt and banana
1030 Myoplex
1230 Salad with tuna fish and chicken salad
3pm Two turkey sandwiches
7pm Chicken breast, rice, green beans
11pm Myoplex

lifting schedule:

monday - chest/tri's
tuesday - back/ bi's
wednesday - shoulders/legs
thursday - cardio
friday - cardio
sat - chest/tri's
sun - back/bi's
mon - shoulders/legs

ab routine monday and friday
weighted ab machine wednesday
then switch the next week

thinking of switching around the weight routine again.

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any ideas? mahalo!

 

[ZGzaZ]

If he's trying to put on muscle and it's not working its 2 things. He's not eating enough, and he needs to cut cardio altogether during mass gaining periods, as he is obviously a hardgainer.

His 8AM meal is on the right track, but from there he barely eats for the rest of the day. Myoplex is definately a good MRP, however most types of it are for leaning as they are lower carb/calorie. Have him switch one or both of these for a gainer, or his own custom shake with at least double the cals of the myoplex.

Last thing, too big a gap between the 3pm and 7pm meal, another small meal or shake in at 5pm would be perfect.

 

[jumpshot]

good stuff, anybody else?

 

[Rabid_Goose]

I'm still working on several diet plans for when I need them and the best filler I can find anywhere for bulking, and just as a snack, is 2 ounce almonds and one cup of milk. I use 1% so with that, it should be 450 Calories with aroundish 20g of protein.

 

[fortunatesun]

I'm a little confused as to his goals. If he is a triathlete increasing mass could be counterproductive. He would want to focus on speed and strength.
I'm also going to agree with those that say diet is probably the reason. Triathletes expend an enormous amount of energy and can consume upwards of 800g. carbs a day.

I know there's quite a few books on the subject. Here's a link to a collection of short articles about this subject. I'd definately look at 'athletes diet:triathlon' and some of the basic training recommendations. Sometimes seeing it in print can make an impression.

http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/triathlon.htm

 

[Gymgurl]

The problem is he needs the carbs and the cardio to be a triathlete...so he will never get as big as he would like while running, swiming and biking

 

[jumpshot]

I'm a little confused as to his goals. If he is a triathlete increasing mass could be counterproductive. He would want to focus on speed and strength.
I'm also going to agree with those that say diet is probably the reason. Triathletes expend an enormous amount of energy and can consume upwards of 800g. carbs a day.

I know there's quite a few books on the subject. Here's a link to a collection of short articles about this subject. I'd definately look at 'athletes diet:triathlon' and some of the basic training recommendations. Sometimes seeing it in print can make an impression.

http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/triathlon.htm

Ok I should clarify...he's BEEN doing tri's for a while, and wants to now focus on building mass. Staying in tri-comp shape is not his goal. Thanks for the reply!

 

[jumpshot]

The problem is he needs the carbs and the cardio to be a triathlete...so he will never get as big as he would like while running, swiming and biking

Once again, my fault. I should have made that clear. He is no longer working to stay in competitive shape. He's shifted to building his body now. He's cut out the cardio except maybe once per week, is eating as you saw above, and lifting 5-6 days a week. At week6 he's not seeing much result. My recommendation to him was to eat much much more and switch up the lifting split to one he's not used to.

I thought he would be just perfect for building mass, as he was so lean and had room the size in the right places. I agree though, it really comes down to his diet.

Any other thoguhts with this update? K for replies! Aloha..

 

[poysyn]

he needs to rest..he doesn't have one full rest day. i agree with cutting out cardio all together..just eat, lift, and sleep (a lot)

 

[jumpshot]

last bump for ideas

 

[xblitz44x]

He definitely should have gotten this together BEFORE he decided to go on a cycle but...

Have him figure out how many calories he's consuming on a typical day. Use www.fitday.com. I think he'll find out he's not getting as much as he thinks. My guess is that he's sitting around 3000 calories per day (depending on what 'scrambled eggs' mean to him) IF HE'S LUCKY. And if 3,000 calories isn't enough to keep him growing he'll need to eat more. It's that simple. If he's able, have him try to drink a half gallon-gallon of milk everyday. This will give him an additional 500-1200 calories.

Next, does he have any sort of plan when it comes to training, or is he just going in there and "doing stuff" and hoping the juice will make the gains for him? It doesn't have to be 5x5 but it would be in his best interest to draw up a specific plan to slowly increase some of his core lifts. Let me know if you want me to write something simple up for him, but this "Well, it's Monday, guess I'll do some Tris" isn't cutting it.

Eating at his 3,000 maintainance calories and lifting the same weights over and over hoping for a sudden suprise strength gain is crap. Eating 500-800 calories over while progressively packing 35 lbs onto his bench will probably yield the results he's looking for.