What I Would Do…

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What I Would Do If I Were Hardcore Gaining Weight

The following is most relevant to a skinny guy who is trying to add some mass and muscle to his frame. The older you are, the more different the weight gain guidelines would be (i.e. a little more clean), but most of you are young anyway. Here’s what I would do.

1. I’d designate alternate weeks as chicken fried steak (CFS) and chili week. Luckily there are good recipes for both (see respective links). If you make plenty on Saturday or Sunday, then you’ll have it throughout the week. This is the best plan, because you don’t have to worry about making food throughout the week. Whether you are a student, working, or just lazy, making the majority of your week’s food all at once is going to work best.

2. I would ALWAYS make fried biscuits with the CFS and corn bread with the chili. The first time I had fried biscuits was the first time Gant invited me over for CFS, and it’s a perfect combo. Just get the easy-make biscuits and put the biscuits in some grease and pull them out after they are browned. Dip or cover them with gravy. Aside from having a delicious addition to your meal, the biscuits/bread will ensure you get extra calories and the carbohydrates for mass gaining. I shouldn’t have to repeat this, but if you’re older or already a bigger or fatter guy, then you won’t need as much. Skinny guys should eat until they are uncomfortable. If you regurgitate your meal, you ate a tad too much.


3. I would make corn bread as a staple too. When you have breakfast, I’m already assuming you’re having plenty of eggs and bacon (and cooking the eggs in the bacon grease). After this, take your already made corn bread, put a bit of butter in the pan, and then re-cook each side of your corn bread in the butter. This will make a slightly crisp and buttery exterior to the piece of corn bread that complements the bacon extremely well.

4. I would cook some other kind of meat throughout the week as well. A pot roast can break up the monotony and even add a third addition to your meal rotation. Ground beef, sirloin tips, and chicken cutlets can all be made in large quantities and stored. I name meats like this because if you’re young, busy, and possibly single, you won’t want to take a lot of time building your food. Prepare lots of another type of meat so that you aren’t eating CFS or chili three times a day.


5. I would make mashed potatoes a staple to the diet. Adding mashed potatoes to your meat mill will ensure you get yet another complete meal. Sure, you can have vegetables with this, but when aiming for mass you’re gonna try and get big hearty meals. When I was going through a linear progression and trying to gain weight I didn’t always get complete meals nor did I build easy meals such as these. I recommend you do because the quality of food will make you enjoy the process much more.

6. This is another thing I shouldn’t have to say, but I have a feeling it needs to be said. If you’re eating “clean” for the sake of aesthetics or health, treat yourself once in a while to an awesome meal. Being kinda weird about what you eat is all right, but being really fucking weird is really fucking weird. If you think you think you catch a cold from a hunny bun, you’re taking it a little far. Gant once said something along the lines of, “If you’re getting knocked out by a happy meal, you’re just not that elite.” Not only is drinking beer while watching football okay, but it’s going to be necessary to make sure you aren’t insane.

Those are just a few things I came up with as I was frying some corn bread this morning. For those of you who have already gone through this process (or those of you who still are), feel free to share any interesting/helpful tidbits. My aim here was to focus on ease and cost effectiveness. Some of you would argue that getting dollar fastfood hamburgers is a solid idea, but I never really cared for that approach (that isn’t to say I didn’t opt for fast food, but only in a pinch).

PR Friday Thread

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If you hit any PR’s this week, tell us about them in the comments. Otherwise, you can update everyone on your training and ask questions. There’s good football on this weekend, so enjoy it.

Here’s a picture of Nate and his buddy — they find a way to train hard while in Iraq. Nate recently hit a 380×5 squat set, pressed 185 for 5 singles, and deadlifted 460×5 at 185 pounds. He’s on his way. Nice job, Nate.

Picture from JSS McHenry, Iraq


The need for strong, red-blooded men and women isn’t a new idea:

Thanks to Shana W. for the pic.

Three Things

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1. Here is an interesting article that will be useful for a very small percentage of you. I’ll explain why in a later post, but it’s an interesting read.

2. I’ve explained this in a comment, but not everyone reads all of the comments.
I’m not hurting for writing ideas. When I write something for the site, I’ll write out my draft, then go back through it at least once and edit it to make it more concise and vigorous. The process of writing a simple post takes, at the minimum, 30 minutes for a useful and entertaining article (the average time would be over an hour). There are times when I a) don’t want to spend my night writing a post, b) don’t have time to spend my night writing a post, and c) am not in the mood to be moderately entertaining in the post. Hardly any of you care when I write about something in a dry manner (although its application is very useful for you — example). The two posts with the highest page views and individual visitors are this and this. The first post is me in a speedo and the second is Rachel in a sports bra. That’s totally fine with me (I’m amused by the former), but the reality is that hardly any of you will give a hoot unless I’m thoroughly entertaining.

If one of the above reasons occurs and I’m not planning on writing a proper article, then I’ll usually post a video, picture, or story as a filler. I’ll remind you that this website has posted five days a week for over a year, and I don’t have much compensation aside from the fact that I’m helping a lot of people. I’m not asking for anything, I’m just pointing out that it’s a variable in deciding whether or not I’m going to spend an hour or two out of my day providing daily content.

Luckily you can do something about this. You can send me videos, pictures, stories, questions, testimonials, and the like that have anything to do with 70’s Big (literal or allegorical), strength training, food, conditioning, fitness, women who train, etc. This will give me “filler” content in between posts where I actually do write out an original article/post.

3.