Hello Everyone,

I have a quick question about my calories that I'm hoping some of you may be able to answer. I've been weight training for about a month now and trying to adjust my calories to meet a 0.5 lb per week gain goal. I just can't seem to get it right, though!

Before, I had the calories set at about 2800 per day and I ended up loosing half a pound. I brought it up to 3050 and still nothing. I do quite a bit in the form of cardio (30 min- 3x per wk, high intensity and about an hours total of walking per day) so I thought that might be the problem.

I bought up the calories to 3268 and never got the chance to accurately test it because I ended up missing two cardio days along with three of my 20 minute walks during the week. I weighted myself this morning and ended up gaining 1.5 lbs.

I know missing that much cardio affects the caloric equation, but to what degree? My question is, should I try and keep this 3268 goal with a normal week or bring it back down again?

Thanks and sorry if this was a bit confusing

Safeboy43

Have you considered maybe just laying off the cardio for awhile? When I bulk, my main goal is to build muscle, as I imagine your goal is too. Anything that gets in the way of that is a problem to me. Cardio uses up energy, so I don't do it when I'm bulking. I understand some people like to get in a good "heart healthy" run or HIIT session, but it can be hard to calculate how many calories you have to eat extra to make up for it. That's why I avoid it, to keep things as simple as possible. To me, 2 or 3 months without kill me, and my heart won't just be a fatty goo ball.

If you just have to do cardio, you will just have to keep playing with your numbers to find what works best. Also, you will have to be consistent with your cardio, otherwise, you will be eating extra, without burning extra.

Yes, I did lay off cardio for a bit but I found that I didn't preform as well on the weights as I was constantly tired. Add that to the fact that I love my running, I switched back to cardio on my days off the weights. As I wasn't very consistent with cardio this week, that might have been why I gained 1.5 lbs as opposed to the half pound I was looking for. Oh well, number crunching time I guess

Thanks!

Just wondering safeboy, are your lifts going up at all?

Yes, I bring my weights up every week or so. I take it that has some effect on weekly calories too?

Cheers