{"id":15438,"date":"2020-02-24T05:40:21","date_gmt":"2020-02-24T10:40:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nomeatathlete.com\/?p=15438"},"modified":"2023-11-08T09:52:04","modified_gmt":"2023-11-08T14:52:04","slug":"gain-weight-vegan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nomeatathlete.com\/gain-weight-vegan\/","title":{"rendered":"The Skinny Vegan’s Guide to Gaining Weight"},"content":{"rendered":"

You hear a lot about how to lose weight on a plant-based diet<\/a>. Not so many of us are trying to gain it.<\/p>\n

This article would be so much cooler if it had a headline like, “How I Gained 20 Pounds of Muscle in 30 Days (On a Vegan Diet).” And if it included dazzling before and after photos, it would probably do a lot to show people it’s possible.<\/p>\n

That’s what I had in mind when, earlier this summer, I took a look at myself in the mirror, realized I had gotten too thin, and decided it was time to hit the gym and build some muscle<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Actually, even for a small guy like me (I was all the way down to 132 lbs when I decided it was time to start putting weight back on) a goal like 20 pounds in 30 days wasn’t as crazy as it sounds.<\/p>\n

Twice in my life, once in college and once shortly after, I’ve gone from 140 to 160 pounds very quickly, drastically increasing my strength<\/a> and staying fairly lean at the same time. The only difference now, being a plant-based athlete<\/a>, would be the absence of chicken breasts and milk — two foods I absolutely relied on during any rapid muscle gain diets I did the past.<\/p>\n

I’m fond of pointing out that getting enough protein on a plant-based diet<\/a> isn’t the issue most people think it is. But for bulking up? I wasn’t so sure.<\/p>\n

I also knew that adding weight wouldn’t be any help to me as a runner, but I was okay with that. I needed a break and a change of pace, and I didn’t like being so skinny. And if in the process I could show a bunch of people that it is<\/em> possible to put on a ton of muscle really quickly on a vegan diet, then all the better.<\/p>\n

How it really turned out<\/h3>\n

I didn’t gain 20 pounds in 30 days.<\/p>\n

I did, however, gain 17 pounds in about 6 weeks, topping out at 149. Not exactly a strike-fear-in-the-hearts-of-enemies number, I know, but it’s a lot more than 132, and a total weight increase of almost 13%. And although the point wasn’t to gain strength but to gain mass, I got a lot stronger too, increasing my chest press from 130 to 195 pounds for a 7-rep set.<\/p>\n

But my results could have been a lot better if not for two interruptions to my regimen:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. I traveled a lot and was not able to maintain the volume of eating I could do at home. This killed my momentum on three separate weekends. I suppose I could have been more disciplined with my eating, but a large portion of my calories came from a “fat shake” that I just couldn’t make on the road (more on the fat shake later).<\/li>\n
  2. I got injured when I made a careless mistake in the gym. Six weeks after I had started, I tore a disc in my back when I inadvertently loaded more weight on one side of the barbell than the other for a deadlift and tried to lift the unbalanced load. When I learned this would keep me out for three weeks, I decided I was done with muscle gain.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Still, 17 pounds is nothing to shake a carrot at, especially for a skinny guy who has always found it harder to gain weight than to lose it. So here’s what I did, the vegan-adapted version of what I found success with the other two times I’ve succeeded at quickly putting on a bunch of muscle.<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    If you can’t gain weight, you’re probably making this mistake<\/h3>\n

    Shortly after I got interested in fitness in college, I wanted desperately to get bigger. I drank all these Myoplex shakes, ate six meals a day, and lifted like crazy. And yet I just couldn’t get past 140 pounds.<\/p>\n

    After every trip to the gym, I’d eagerly weigh in, feeling all puffed up from my lift and sure I’d tip the scales. And every time, I’d see 140. F’ing 140.<\/p>\n

    So I did some research, and came across Anthony Ellis, a guy who went from 135 to 180, and finally discovered what was wrong:<\/p>\n

    Trying to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time is completely counterproductive.<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Prior to learning this, I thought the road to muscle gain was more lean protein along with more lifting, and of course some cardio to keep the fat off. Wrong.<\/p>\n

    I made three big changes as a result, and experienced drastic, immediate muscle gain.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. I stopped running and all other forms of cardio.<\/li>\n
    2. I started lifting fewer<\/em> times each week, training each muscle group only once per week.<\/li>\n
    3. I started eating more fat. Way more fat. Like, getting up in the middle of the night to make a peanut butter sandwich.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      And I gained weight. I went from 140 to 160 pretty quickly. I don’t remember exactly how long it took, but I figure it was about six weeks.<\/p>\n

      \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

      My approach this time<\/h2>\n

      Really, putting on weight is about only two things. Lifting, which is important. And eating, which is more important. I’ll explain what I did for each, started with the food.<\/p>\n

      The eating<\/h3>\n

      As I wrote before: The major difference between this time and previous ones was my diet. I wasn’t vegan then, or even vegetarian. When I wanted to bulk up in the past, I just ate tons of cheese, milk, steak, and chicken breasts, and it was pretty easy.<\/p>\n

      Not that I doubted it was possible for people to get big on a vegan diet. These days, there are plenty of plant-based bodybuilders.\u00a0But for me, a guy whose equilibrium size is more sapling than mature oak, I wasn’t so sure.<\/p>\n

      In looking at my diet, it was pretty clear that it was lower in both protein and fat than what had worked for me in the past. So I focused on adding those two nutrients to my current diet, without<\/em> reducing carbohydrates, hence increasing total calories. (In other words, this wasn’t a vegan paleo diet<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

      I also tried to eat larger portion sizes in general, and found that after just a few days this became comfortable. I did eat fewer salads and raw vegetables, since they take up a lot of room without providing many calories. (That’s just one reason why I would never stick with\u00a0 diet like the one described here long-term, nor recommend it for all-around health.)<\/p>\n

      Looking back at the journal I kept of my meals, I see that the protein and fat increases came primarily from protein powder, almond butter, flax and coconut oil.<\/p>\n

      Here’s what a typical day looked like (I don’t have calorie counts, because I just hate counting calories, even with mass-gaining):<\/p>\n