help me gain weight

im a 5foot 7 skinny weighing in at 60kg. i would like to gain some more muscle mass so i can keep up with the bigger fellas on a fast bunch ride.
help me get BIG

Are you talking an overall gain in muscle mass? Or just your legs? And just getting your muscles BIGGER will not improve your speed or endurance. Training for increased strength, power or endurance is different than just training for larger muscles. So do you want advice on how to get bigger? or How to get faster and have more endurance and/or explosive power?

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my main concern right now is to gain some body weight... dont get me wrong; strength, power and endurance are important to me also but they are factors which i will concentrate more on later down the track.
i am good in the hills but i feel that my slim build is letting me down on the flats. so i reckon i need some bulking up. ideally i would like to gain about 5kg. should i limit my riding to acheive this? any advice would be appreciated

If you only want to gain weight, and not muscle for riding. Stop riding and concentrate on doing weights.Make sure you sonsume enough protein, carbs and water. As well as vitamins and minerals to allow your body to heal properly. And get enough sleep ie 8+hrs a day is good. Can't give you too much advice, perhaps someone else on the board can give you some info that would allow you to gain weight and still improve your riding ability. If you really are serious about gaining muscle mass, perhaps buy yourself a book regarding bodybuilding or check some sites.

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Gaining mass will just slow you down! Why activly try to gain mass when you try too lose mass off your bike. I think that with the correct type of training (i.e. intervals and endurance rides) you will be leading the group and they will complain as they can't hide behind you.

Don't remember Marco Pantani having a problem keeping up with a bunch and look how big he is!

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very good point 2lap

i feel sorry for the guys in the bunch tho because i dont provide enough slipstream for them to use

someGuyHavingFun: i will concentrate on eating more but i dont think i can stop cycling....i enjoy it too much. i wanna bet bigger but just cant justify compromising pleasure to achieve this.

thanks guys

btw 2Lap, what do you mean by interval training....and how can this help me achieve my goals?

Emmtee. Although size is in part related to strength, if you read some of the other threads you will realise that strength isn't as important think for endurance cycling! Instead there are four factors that are improtant in endurance performance that importantly will alow you too keep up withyour team mates....

1. VO2 max (your aerobic capacity)
2. Lactate threshold (an indication of your sustainable rate of aerobic energy production)
3. Economy/efficencey (how well you use the energy)
4. Oxygen Uptake Kinetics (how quickly you can use oxygen to produce energy at the start and during intensity changes in exercise)

Gaining mass to improve your cycling performance (unless you have a clinical illness needing you to gain mass) will have a negative effect on all of the above and therefore is likely to make you slower!!! However hard training, endurance riders below and up to lactate threshold and intervals at and over lactate threshold will allow you to improve these factors.

Interval training is basicaly bouts of intense cycling exercises with periods of rest in between each bout. By exercising in this way you can extend the amount of time you spend at an intensity and therefore increase the training benefit. Different intensities have different training effects and these need to be selected based upon your ability and training history. These intensities are ususly defined using power or heart rate.

One thing is for sure though gains in mass are likely to hinder rather than help performance!

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wow 2Lap...that is quite a lot to digest! untill now, i was always under the impression that
size= strength=power= faster

in a practical sense, how can i go about improving on those abovementioned factors.

in regards to interval training... i dont have access to either power or heart rate monitors... how can i approach this type of training

emmtee, take a look on the cycle training board and start your own thread; there are loads of training tips on there!

With regards to HR and power, you may wish to get a HR montor as you get more experianced as they are the cheaper of the two. Without this type of feedback you can ride on feel or for lengths of time and although not ideal, speeds. Pacing also becomes easier as you gain more experiance.

Also consider getting a coach or asking some of the better riders about the types of training that they do. Ultimately the best way to get better on a bike is to ride and ride and ride!

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thanks 2Lap!

Beer and pizza work for me. 96kg and counting.

LOL blimp: maybe i'll try that eh?

What's up emmtee

Nice you meet you and everyone else here.

My body type is called "Hardgainer" cause it's hard to gain weight and size. Those days are over now, I'm getting bigger and stronger each day cause I know what to do to get results. I use a few products by a brand called EAS, and eat good body building meals. You need to eat like 5 to 6 meals a day to gain size, plus workout. Start a weight training program, and use these EAS supplements: Myoplex Mass, SyntheVol 2 HP, Ribo Force HP, ZMA HP, and Myoplex® Ready-to-Drink.

Myoplex Mass gives me 500 calories, 33g of protein, and 76g of carbohydrate. SyntheVol 2 HP, Ribo Force HP and ZMA HP are my favorite body building supplements, to learn more about what they will do for you, check out the EAS website. My wife and I use "Myoplex® Ready-to-Drink Shakes" after we been riding around for a while, I don't want to loose what I've gain, so the shake keeps my muslces happy.

A Good Tip After riding for a long time each day, you should put back the calories in your body that you burned off while riding. Drink a Myoplex® Ready-to-Drink shake while in the streets or a Myoplex Mass shake when you get home. If you ride your bike all day and don't feed your muscles, you will loose them.

Eat a meal every 3 hours, drink a gallon of water a day. Also, make sure you use a good Multi Vitamin every day, I use "GNC Ultra Mega Gold".

I eat 4 meal plus 2 myoplex mass shakes a day. You'll need about 2500 to 3000 calories a day to gain mass. You can go to http://www.eas.com to learn more about the supplements I use. If you would like me to help you out some more just ask.


Peace.

Ringo

Ah Ringo just got my goat!

EAS, the company that Bill Phillips has made a fortune out of produces expensive products with (in my opinion) lack of 'real' nutrition.

No sports bars, drink or 'alternative' food will give miraculous results. There is no substitute for real food! Why drink a artificially flavoured drink layded with aspartame and other junk when you can get the same nutrition from a couple of slices of brown toast with 1 whole egg and 4 whites scrambled?

Don't get me wrong, sports drinks have there place - I can't tolerate chewing on the bike but EAS products won't give you anything more than your standard quality sports drink. Personally I prefer Purdey's or Red Devil - the caffenie in the later makes 15mph feel like 30 to me!

Give me the choice between a Mynoplex or McDonlds chocolate shake and I'm riding through the drive thur. this is from a man who hasn't been in a McD's for 8 years!

Keep spinning...
P.s. Anyone know of any hills in the Bucks, or Oxon area that take longer than 15 mins (at 15mph) to ride up?