Everyone talks about weight loss, but what about those who are desperate to gain a few kilos? Weight gain is as difficult as losing it, if you are naturally thin. Gaining weight is a problem for many people. They complain that they can’t put on any weight. Following are some tips to follow to gain weight. You will take some time to gain the weight you need, but be patient.

• Consume more calories than you burn. Choose healthy foods to add calories. Drink healthy beverages to add calories.
• Add healthy calories to breakfast with an extra slice of whole-grain toast and peanut butter.
• Mid-morning and afternoon snacks should be nutritious, not junk. It contains healthy nuts, dried fruits and can add healthy calories to your diet.
• Eat healthy food frequently, 5-6 times a day - 3 larger meals and 3 smaller meals alternately. Separate them by at least 3 hours so you can digest each meal fully. Don’t go without food for 5-6 hours after having a major meal.
  For example, if you wish to consume 3000 calories a day, you may eat 3 larger meals of about 650 calories and 3 smaller meals of about 450 calories.
• Have a balanced diet.
• Increase your protein intake. Your body needs a lot of protein to build new muscle. But since most of the calories for weight gain come from carbohydrates and fats, do not replace them with protein.
• You should daily eat about 2.2g of protein per kilogram (1g per pound) of your weight. For example, if you are 50kg (110pound), then you should eat 50×2.2=111g of protein spread over 5-6 meals in the day. Include high protein foods in your diet. Your protein intake should be from foods rather than from supplements. Good sources of protein foods: whey, fish, dairy products (low fat variety), meats, nuts and seeds (almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds).
• It would also be a healthy idea to add a small amount of flax seed oil and some psyllium powder in the diet to add some omega-3 essential fatty acids and extra fiber.
• Consume a lot of high-calorie snacks (not junk food) such as cheese sticks, milk shakes, muffins, dried fruits, yoghurt and breakfast bars.
• Drink a lot of fluids that supply nutrients and calories; milk, fresh fruit juices and energy drinks are good examples.
• Increase you water intake. A good formula for this is to multiply your bodyweight by .66 to get the required number of ounces per day.

Exercise important for healthy weight gain

                 Exercise regularly for healthy weight gain. Some thin people think that exercise is not good for them. This is not true, it keeps the metabolism high. Remember that eating alone is not sufficient. You don’t want to gain fat but lean mass, so exercise is important.

                  Resistance training exercises will help to increase your muscle mass, which in turn will increase your metabolism. Learn to distinguish between weight gaining exercises and weight loss exercises.
                  Note that if you do not get enough amino acids during exercise, the existing muscle may break down. Amino acids come from protein rich foods. Focus on free weight exercises (which do not require machinery) that target your large muscle groups. For example, you need dumbbells, not fancy gym machines.
The best weight training exercises for building muscle mass are free weight exercises like squats, dead lifts, bench presses, barbell rows, pull ups and bar dips.

These exercises are best done under supervision, but they don’t need machinery.

If you have a high basic metabolic rate — which means you expend a lot of energy even at rest — you need short intense workouts instead of long periods of low-stress activity.

               If you truly want to dramatically change your body, to learn how to build muscle mass fast, understands that it will be the power of all these factors working together that will propel you towards your goals - a precise combination of nutrition, exercise and rest will provide you maximum results.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 27th, 2010 at 11:11 am and is filed under Weight gain. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.