• 4 mins read

Hard Gainer? What You Are Not Doing to Gain Weight.

So you’re a hard gainer? You poor soul. Do you know how many people would kill to have that issue? Jokes aside. I get it. You want to pack on muscle and get bigger. And I don’t blame you. While I’m not a hard gainer myself (quite the opposite actually) I have seen the transformation of several. There is one thing they are doing that you are not.

Before you begin your protests I will just say them for you so we can skip all the excuses. I know your “already eating a lot of food” and “working out” and drinking your “mass gainer shake”. This is all great but here is what hard gainers are forgetting. You likely have a very efficient and active metabolism. So while the rest of us are storing all this extra energy as fat, your body is doing an excellent job of dispelling this energy. The body is great at adapting to things. In your case, rather than packing on more mass, your body is just getting better and better at metabolizing. So you need to do something else to signal to your body to get bigger and stronger.

I know you’re working out. I get it. I’ve seen a lot of “hard gainers” working very hard in the gym lifting weights. Here is the one thing I catch most of them doing wrong.

THEY ARE NOT USING A BARBELL.

Before you freak out and tell me that you are. Even if you are. You are probably not loading your body appropriately. We have all been there. We think we need to go into the gym and bench until it feels like our arms are going to fall off. But that is not going to help you. At least not when you plateau. What your body needs is to be put under load. A barbell is the most effective way to do just that. Lets use squat as an example.

Let’s say you are trying to add mass to your legs. So you go into the gym and you grab some heavy dumbbells and start doing lunges. I don’t care how good you are at lunges. You cannot possibly hold in your hands the same amount of weight that you could safely load onto your back with a barbell squat. The same goes for benching, pressing, and deadlifting. And even if you are doing these exercises with a barbell, I would guess that you are not loading it appropriately. In fact, what I would say is if the weight you are adding you are able to do for more than 5 reps you are not loading enough. Your body is put under a different kind of stressor when you are doing fewer reps with near maximal weight.

What your central nervous system needs is a signal that says, “Get me stronger because this dude/gal is putting a lot of stress on me”. Remember, the body is great at adapting to change. For most of you, this is the change your body needs to signal growth. Try it. If nothing else, you will get stronger. But I am confident that if this is something you are not already doing, it could be a game changer for you.

Just remember when doing these lifts especially under heavy load it is critical that you perform the movement safely and with proper form to avoid injury. Find a trainer here at PILLR fitness or in your local gym if you feel that you need help with these movements. You can also look at the PILLR fitness free resources page for help with form and technique. Happy lifting and get those gains!