Help for Skinny Vegan Dude

Hi Ben and community.

I'm a ~130-lb, 40-year-old, skinny, vegan male trying to put on more muscle and get rid of my excess fat (almost all of it concentrated around my mid-section). I have the typical office job: a lot of sitting and close to zero physical activity, but for health reasons, I picked up a couple of kettlebells and have been doing a full-body routine for a few weeks now - and I really like it.

Here are a couple of issues that I'm dealing with, and hopefully you can guide me through:

1) I prefer to exercise at home for efficiency... less time wasted driving to the gym, and waiting for equipment to free up. So my dilemma is this: I don't (yet) have a lot of equipment, and certainly no heavy weights (a 35-lb kettlebell is the heaviest thing I have), but I understand that heavy weights needed to bulk up. I'm willing to go to the gym a few times a week - for the heavy weights, but I wouldn't know how to mix training programs for both home and gym. I'm interested in the "Intermediate Strength and Conditioning" plan (gym) and also the "Train at Home" plan. Do I do one week gym and the other week home, or one day home and the next day gym, something else? To top it off, my gym doesn't have some of the equipment required (no kettlebells or bosu there). Confused... The end result so far is that I'm still stuck doing the same kettlebell routine I've been doing for a couple of weeks.

2) I'd like to make full use of the tools on your site, but I've realized that I don't even know what a proper weight goal would be for me. I have no clue how much weight I should gain to get to the "look" I'd like. Any advice?

I'm glad to be a part of the community. Thanks in advance for your input!

Hey man, welcome to Train With Me Online!

First off, if you'd like to gain some lean muscle mass then you need to eat more protein!! Amino acids are the building blocks for muscle and without enough protein in your diet, it will be impossible for you to gain any muscle or get any stronger!

So first suggestion to you is find some good sources of protein. Make sure 30% of your total daily caloric intake is from protein, 40% from carbs, 30% from fats. And make sure that every single meal and snack you eat during the day includes protein, carbs, fats.

If you'd like to mix your weekly routine up between the gym and home that's not a problem at all. Pick the days during the week that you are able to train and then alternate between the two programs. I'd suggest you train at least 3-4 days a week so if you could do 2 gym workouts and 2 home workouts.. I think that would be ideal.

I also have a couple of kettlebell workouts on the site that you can throw into the weekly rotation if you're feeling good and want to add in an extra day of training.

Kettlebell Conditioning Complex
Kettlebell Conditioning Circuit

And here are a couple of strength based workouts that you might want to try out as well.

Skinny Guy Workout
Upper Body Strength
Super Strength

I hope that helps a bit, let me know if you have any other questions!

Thanks for the quick response, Ben... and now I have my "marching orders"!

About my diet, I couldn't agree more about in-taking sufficient protein. Since before taking up weight training, I've been very careful to make sure that my protein levels are in the normal range. In fact I find it funny that my blood results showed that I had higher amounts of protein AFTER I became a vegan than when I was a 'carnivore'. I do take in a variety of protein sources (including some of the lesser known ones, such as quinoa, chia, spirulina, etc.).

My main concern is, to increase muscle mass, HOW MUCH MORE should I intake, compared to before. I've recently added a vegan (brown rice based) protein supplement too, and am considering a pure pea protein supplement.

I think your site and this community is great, Ben, and having first-hand, real-time access to your experience is awesome. Thank you.

"I think your site and this community is great, Ben, and having first-hand, real-time access to your experience is awesome. Thank you."

Thanks for the compliment, I really appreciate it!

You might want to check out Vega Sport, which carries a full line of all natural, plant based sport performance supplements. A friend of mine who is also a vegan has been using their stuff for a year or two now and really likes it.

Vega Sport Supplements

And you want to consume 1.0 gram of protein for every lb. of body weight. So if you're 130lbs. you want to get 130g of protein throughout the day divided up equally between the number of meals you eat. To go a bit further.. you should be eating approx. 3 meals and 2 snacks a day so you should be having about 25g of protein every time you eat.