is aNyone building lots of muscle living as a carnivore??

bigsea · is aNyone building lots of muscle living as a carnivore??

i aplogize if this has been answered as i've asked this before, in many different topics. i cannot help but ask again, it is constantly on my mind and i cannot remember if someone answered it for me.

i am a teenage guy, and im trying to maintain my muscle tone i already have, i am pretty thin though, mainly im trying to BuilD lots & lots of muscle mass. I am eating as a carnivore and am making it thru the first "2 weeks" the bad 2 weeks, ha. i cannot wait for getting thru this period and coming out with tons of energy and all the other benefits. i have not been keeping up with my workouts and exercising since i started because of the low energy/fatigue issue, and im losing the little fat i have, my body fat is like 5.5%, and what im afraid of is if im losing my muscle mass.
truly i don't mind if i am losing my muscle as long as i can Build It Back after this "2 week" period..
so basically my question, is for all the athletes out there, the bodybuilders, or just the guys who are going to the gym building muscle mass, pretty much anyone, since you have passed the "2 week" period, are you gaining back your muscle?? The pure, 0 carbohydrate muscle tone? i pretty much know the answer to my question, as all the tribes Weston price studied ate zero carbs (some of them) and they had beautiful physiques, so i get that is possible to build muscle, but im talking building LOTS of muscle mass.
guys, lemme know if possible thanks a bunch

BlackLabelSimian

If you want to build a lot of muscle mass and stay completely carnivore, my thought is you're going to have to eat a ton of protein, lift heavy with lower reps and rest a lot.
I try to stay away from starches, etc as much as possible and I've found the only way I can hold onto any substantial amount of size if I do that is to make sure my protein intake is a lot higher. If I'm not eating enough and it's only protein and fat, I lose both bodyfat and muscle quite rapidly.

bigsea

edit.. just my usual ranting haaaa forget it

BlackLabelSimian

I just re-read my initial post and I didn't really convey what I wanted to at all, so my apologies for that. I worded it very poorly.

But yeah...If you have to up your steak intake up to 5 a day, so be it. The calories have to come from somewhere, ya know?

It might seem like you're taking in enough calories, but in order to build muscle, you need a caloric surplus. If you're not gaining weight then you aren't eating enough, plain and simple. Even if your diet consists only of protein and fats, you still need to take in more than your maintenence level to put on any kind of substantial size.
If your body needs 2,000 calories per day to maintain your current bodyweight, then you need to bump it up and take in more than 2,000 every day to start gaining weight...And you have to be consistent about it.

All I know is that for myself if I am not taking in mass quantities of food while I am sticking to a carnivorous diet, then I drop both muscle and bodyfat very, very fast.
If I start taking in some kind of carbs, then it seems I don't have to work half as hard at eating to maintain size. So my options are either take in some carbs or make damn sure I am taking in a ton more protein and fat in their absence.

I've read of bodybuilders that eschewed carbs and by most accounts they were eating hardboiled eggs, taking dessicated liver tablets and sipping heavy cream all day long in between meals to either preserve the muscle mass they had already built or gain more weight. Bottom line, whatever the source of your calories, you need to eat an excess of them to start putting on more muscle.

bigsea

thanks blacklabel. well i hate to "give up" on the carnivore thing, but im going to add in carbs in the form of white rice, because white rice has basically no fiber, minimal, and i feel its best for me right now.
eventually in the future, after i've adjusted to the meat, eggs, and white rice, i'll probably try out the carnivore thing again, but its SO much easier for me to just eat some white rice everyday then to throw in an extra 4 pounds of meat or whatever it takes..

thanks for the tips!!

ReddyMcMeaty

I'm sure you won't, but don't forget that "lots of muscle mass" means working hard with compound lifts. Squats, deadlifts etc. It's easy to be in a weight program and to look in the mirror and think oh my biceps would look good if they were bigger and start isolation exercises, oh I have scrawny forearms how about some curls... and end up with 20 isolation exercises and no bodymass. Stick to the big compound exercises!!! You're at an age where it will never ever ever be as easy to gain muscle as fast again so take advantage of it.

My husband who is 32 just realized that he can no longer just work out for 2 weeks anymore after a period of being sedentary and feel like he can rip out trees again and see muscle popping out Laugh

Poor thing ;) take advantage of your youth and build up a good foundation NOW because later in life "life" catches up with you and you find yourself with periods of time where you can't dedicate any to yourself. Oh man I am sounding like an old mom. Outta Here

BlackLabelSimian

ReddyMcMeaty

I loved my arms that were built from chinups. My boss before that called them "huge" and when I was in massage school people used to ask what I did to work them out, oh I must be able to curl a lot! I think huge was a bit of an overstatement though.

BlackLabelSimian

I'm not adverse to doing some curls from time to time, but one of my favorite routines inculdes supersets of chins and dips. I always had really good results using that method. Built up my arms, shoulders, chest and back to a pretty good degree.

And remember that "huge" is a relative term. To your average person who doesn't train or trains very little a well developed arm, even if not overly massive, can indeed look pretty darn big.