My Story and Why Nutrition is Key

In my personal opinion, nutrition is the golden element to your muscle building success. Without proper nutrition, you will not see the gains you are trying to make in the gym. Personally, this was always an issue for me. I was the type of person to work hard but yet I would eat junk food and not worry about how many calories or quality foods I would be taking in on a daily basis. Needless to say, my results were poor.

 Inevitably, this caused me to lose motivation in the gym and stop working out almost altogether. I would lift weight about once a week, just to maintain a kind of "athletic" build. I was never happy with this, but I was too lazy to want more. I woke up one morning and looked in the mirror, my scrawny frame stared back at me. It was at this point I realized I didn't want to look like this anymore. I didn't want people to look at me and comment on how I was a "stick". Right then and there I dedicated myself to getting the body I want. I started to eat properly for the first time in my life, and began to hit the gym again. This time was different, I was not losing my motivation. Instead, each time I left I could not wait to get back again. The reason for this was for the first time I was seeing REAL results. 

When I decided to make the change I initially weighed 170-175 pounds and I'm 6'3". I looked like a stick even though I did have some muscle to me. However, three weeks later when I stepped on the scale I was a solid 182. I figured I had put on about 5 pounds of muscle and the rest was water weight. The key to this gain was my nutrition, I was finally allowing my body to adapt to the stress rather than to struggle with it. I also noticed my strength increasing a great deal. The best part though, was running into people I hadn't seen in weeks, who immediately commented on how I look "thicker".  Let me tell you, it is a GREAT feeling. Since then I have managed to add about 15 pounds to my frame. I weigh in at about an even 200 pounds. This transformation all occurred with me in a period of about six months. The reason being was that even though I had trained in the past, I was never serious about it. I almost felt as though this was the first time I was lifting weights. I will share my before and after diets below and hopefully they will help to guide you to success. 

My old diet:

Wake up- eat anything, or even nothing most times as I was in a hurry to get to work or school.

Noon- fast food or packed lunch with no quality food.

5- pre-workout, protein shake

Post workout- Protein shake, creatine drink.

Dinner- Whatever was cooking.

As you can see, this diet left me NO ROOM to grow, I was barely taking in enough calories to maintain my current weight. Once I realized this. I was able to change it and make it happen so to speak. 

Here is my current Diet:

6:00am- Oatmeal, Eggs, Toast, Milk or Juice and Whey Protein. 

9:00am- Protein Shake

12:00- Quality protein source with some brown rice or other complex carbohydrate, fruit.

2:00pm- Protein Shake 

5:00pm- Pre workout Supplement

7:00pm- Protein Shake, Creatine, PB sandwich (peanut butter is a great muscle building food IMO)

9:00pm- Dinner, Quality protein, Complex Carbs, Veggies

11:00pm- Casein Protein, Eggs, Bed

Needless to say, the second diet plan worked very well. I noticed I was not feeling "tired" anymore, I was motivated and ready to attack the weights in the gym. 

Best of luck!