2-3 weeks progress? (Since I've been at the forum)

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prodigymytch

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So here are my progress pictures for about 2-3 weeks into my training. Unfortunately, it's hard to stick to my diet. I have no real "plan". I just try to eat as much as possible and watch what it is that I'm eating. I struggle to hit 3000 calories a day.

Anyway, here's my progresss pictures. Is this okay? Any tips?

Left is 2 weeks ago, right is just this evening.

2weeks.jpg
 
prodigymytch said:
I just try to eat as much as possible and watch what it is that I'm eating. I struggle to hit 3000 calories a day.
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I'm amazed when I read comments like that, and I seem to read them a lot. I'm also bulking, I eat 95% clean and have to struggle NOT to eat 3000 cal! I'm shooting for 2750, but I have to really watch myself not to go over, especially on days when I do a lot of exercise. I wonder if I just have an abnormally huge appetite or something...

About your question, I'm no expert, but maybe there's a little prog? But I don't think 2- 3 weeks is very long.

prodigymytch said:
I have no real "plan"
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Why DON'T you have a plan. If you have a plan with just about anything in life, you're more likely to succeed.
 
With all due respect to your reply, it wasn't very helpful.

1. Fact of the matter is, I DO struggle with getting my calories and you said it yourself, you see it a lot. While I'm happy you struggle with not getting your calories, and you're obviously successful, your reply in that aspect was somewhat condescending.

2. Again, fact of that matter is, I have no plan. The obvious answer to WHY I don't have a plan is because I don't know HOW to construct one properly. So while you may have some idea of what is right in saying "if you have plan in anything about life, you're more likely to succeed", it is nonetheless, once again unhelpful.

So once again, while I'm certainly glad that YOU are bulking fantastically, my post was not made so that you could compare how well you're doing to how bad I'm doing.
 
Hey dude, I think you're doin pretty good. I can already notice progress there. Notice the chest and delts?

Are you sure you are counting your calories correctly? I don't think it's very difficult to get to 3000 calories (though I'll be honest, I don't really count), but then again I'm alot bigger and fatter than you and I may just be able to eat more. You can probably get another 250 calories just from a protein shake, do you take any?

I do agree that 2-3 weeks isn't a long time though, maybe 2-3 months would be a good time to check back. But if you have the time, take a picture every week or so so you can look at it over the span of 2-3 months, I think it'd be pretty cool to see changes over a period of time.
 
I try to keep track of the foods I eat on Fitday. But I really only put in the actual meals and snacks. I do drink a lot of shakes. I take 4 strawberries, a banana, creatine, or whey, depending, a raw egg, and milk and make a shake out of it. I do this about every other day. However, I don't know how to calculate my calories into it. Whenever I plug my stuff in on FitDay though, I'm averaging around 2200 calories.
 
2-3 weeks isn't enough time to judge progress, in my opinion. I'm with phil, make yourself a plan. What do you mean when you say you don't know how? Crunch some numbers, piece together meals for the day, and start eating them at that time, every day.

Good luck!
 
prodigymytch said:
With all due respect to your reply, it wasn't very helpful.

1. Fact of the matter is, I DO struggle with getting my calories and you said it yourself, you see it a lot. While I'm happy you struggle with not getting your calories, and you're obviously successful, your reply in that aspect was somewhat condescending.
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I think you took what I said the wrong way. I am just surprised when I read that people have a hard time eating 3000cal, so I'm kind of wondering if I have a problem - i.e. I'm a glutton and I eat too much!! I was really just thinking aloud and criticizing myself - it seriously wasn't meant to be condescending.

prodigymytch said:
2. Again, fact of that matter is, I have no plan. The obvious answer to WHY I don't have a plan is because I don't know HOW to construct one properly. So while you may have some idea of what is right in saying "if you have plan in anything about life, you're more likely to succeed", it is nonetheless, once again unhelpful.
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I was just trying to motivate you Mytch. You WILL do better if you have a plan and so I'm just trying to push you to do that. If you get the software version of FitDay it's much faster and easier to use than the 'online' version. You can punch in your meals/snacks pretty quickly - probably about 10-20 min total for a day. You can also plan meals in advance, see what the calorie/nutrition breakdown is and tweak them accordingly.

Just the process of writing down plans helps you to follow through on things and reach your goals, not only weightlifting, but in many other areas of life. I'm not trying to be condescending, I'm just trying to share something I have learned in my 39 years. Actually, I admire you for doing this now, I wish I had been doing this when I was your age!

prodigymytch said:
I do drink a lot of shakes. I take 4 strawberries, a banana, creatine, or whey, depending, a raw egg, and milk and make a shake out of it. I do this about every other day.
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Okay, just punch in each individual ingredient of the shake into FitDay and that will give you the total. If you make the same shake each time, you could add it as a custom meal for speed.

prodigymytch said:
So once again, while I'm certainly glad that YOU are bulking fantastically, my post was not made so that you could compare how well you're doing to how bad I'm doing.
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C'mon Mytch, I never said or implied this! :eek: In fact, this is my first time bulking, and I'm not sure how the results are going yet. It's also been about 3 weeks for me, and I think it's a little early to tell. I have noticed a bit of extra pudge on my gut - I don't know if that's fantastic! :rolleyes: That's the reason I'm concerned about eating toooo much.

We're all learning together, and that was the only reason for my post - to share and bounce ideas off of each other.

BTW where's Robinson? I grew up in the Chicago area.
 
We are here to help you. But you have to assist yourself with a plan. Winging it, will compromise your results and bring "wing it" results. This is the plain truth of the matter.

If you do not have a plan or a focus on what your goal is and what you want to become, and you post pics of progress--I think it logical for persons on the forum with integrity interest in assisting you to constructively criticize that you dont have a plan, no? Its like driving without a license or driving on a road without a destination. With all due respect to you, this doesnt make sense.

Having a desire to shape yourself is not enough without a clear picture. Educate yourself on the things "required" and "necessary" to shape this self and picture, then coordinate a strategic plan of attack to get there, modify this as time goes on (from bodily responses).

Get a weight program schedule together couple with a diet plan. When getting this together you have decide whether you want to cut or bulk. I think in your case you need to bulk some.

I would like to see your next post be a favorable comment on talk on what your plans are on improving the things you want to improve.......THEN the forum members can adjust and assist you in a manner that is much more constructive.

Best wishes

Always,


Chillen
 
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I may have taken what phil took incorrectly. However, "I am surprised you have troubles getting 3000 calories. I have to try not to", is not my idea of constructive criticism. In fact, his entire post actually made me feel more ignorant on the subject than I already am. Chillen, I don't even know what a "weight program" is.

His follow-up post made it clear that that wasn't his intent. Nonetheless, it could have been more carefully worded.

In response to Chillen, I can't help but reiterate I have no idea how to make a plan.

My goals are to:
Get more tone
Bulk up

I would like to have a six pack, put a little more meat over my ribs, and increase the size of my arms.

What I'm doing right now:
Working out 3 days a week.
Aiming for 3k calories a day.

How I go about my 3k calories:
Like Chillen pretty much said, I pretty much just wing it as efficiently as possible. You have to keep in mind, before this, I was eating chips as my meals, and 7 mountain dews a day. The fact that I've reduced to one pop a day maximum is a miracle. I do try to make my meals Monday evening and then try to store them so that they're there and all I have to do is microwave them. However, I don't seem to cook enough. I don't know how much to spend at the grocery store to get me through the week but I am on a very tight budget. I have been studying the nutrition forum diligently and have invested in rice, chicken, tuna (twice a week), tilapia and pork chops. However, this got me through 3 days and I spent like $30. I don't have a plan like "Mondays I eat chicken", "Tuesdays I eat fish." type thing.
 
A Weight Program is a structured "Weight Lifting" Plan that you schedule certain exercises for a given time period.

For example: Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Rest Saturday and Sunday, and then repeat.

For example (for simplicity's sake), schedule a full body workout on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and then rest on the weekend. The program should be complimenting the sort of diet you have and the goals you seek.

I recommend a writing down the exercises, weight being used, and then keeping track of the reps completed---to track progession, and if need be enable FORCE progression techniques. The KEY to training, is PROGRESSION. Trying with FULL THROTTLE to progress from one workout to the next (whether its an increase in reps or weight or both).

For example: you used 40lbs on Standing curl and did 8 reps. The next workout with the bi's you want to get 9 reps, and so on and so forth. If the target cut off rep range is 12 (for example), then you would increase about 5 lbs. This is progression in its simple basic form.

I believe you have to track progress because its CRITICAL to ones success and to strength and/or muscle gains.
 
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i agree with chillen all the whey.
i do see progress in your pics too.
i recommend you do as chillen says, and start a fullbody workout mon, wed, fri
focus on compound exercises, getting stronger and progressing.
and even though its important what you do in the gym, you have to realize that your diet(what you eat and when you eat it) will determine a vast proportion of your progress.

you can PM me if you want me to explain anything. il help you out
 
Proteinboy said:
i agree with chillen all the whey.
i do see progress in your pics too.
i recommend you do as chillen says, and start a fullbody workout mon, wed, fri
focus on compound exercises, getting stronger and progressing.
and even though its important what you do in the gym, you have to realize that your diet(what you eat and when you eat it) will determine a vast proportion of your progress.
you can PM me if you want me to explain anything. il help you out
Click to expand...

RIGHT ON! :)
 
Proteinboy said:
i agree with chillen all the whey.
i do see progress in your pics too.
i recommend you do as chillen says, and start a fullbody workout mon, wed, fri
focus on compound exercises, getting stronger and progressing.
and even though its important what you do in the gym, you have to realize that your diet(what you eat and when you eat it) will determine a vast proportion of your progress.

you can PM me if you want me to explain anything. il help you out
Click to expand...

:yelrotflmao: That made me let out a little laugh lol. +rep for amusing me! Out of interest was it intended that 'whey' or do you just have it on the brain ;) lol.
 
2300 is definitely not a bulking diet. Maintenance at most I'd say.

Of course, I could be wrong... Dammit, I hate it when I could be wrong. But still I stick with 2300 is not a bulking diet.
 
sexanoe said:
whoa 3000 calories?
from some calculator it said i only need 2300 calories to bulk and im older and bigger
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Sex, That's an excellent point! PM, you may not even need 3000cal. I'm also bigger than you and I'm doing around 2700. I did a lot of reading before starting bulking, and I think I finally settled on that amount by using this formula from an article I read:

* For a bodybuilder that trains hard we multiply 15 x your bodyweight to get maintenance calories
* For the average person it is 12x your bodywieght to get maintenance calories
* EXAMPLE:
1. So for a 200 lbs bodybuilder that trains hard his maintenance calories would be 3000 calories per day.
2. 200 x 15 = 3000
3. So a 200 lbs bodybuilder lifting weights hard needs to eat 3000 calories a day to stay the same weight.

Now, I am going to let you in a little secret. In order to gain muscle you only have to eat 500 calories over your maintenance ! Thats right only 500. NO , there is no need to be consuming 5,000 calories a day like most people tell you. Your muscles have a predetermined recovery ability. No matter how much you eat you cannot recover faster then your set ability. Eating only 500 calories above your maintenance will ensure you do not put on fat during the bulking season. This way you will be lean and be able to take your shirt off year round !

Here's a link to the whole article:



There are also tons of other bulking articles on that same site.
 
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