Gain weight and hit calorie target

[ShaunyB]

Hi all

I need a bit of advice. My BMI is 19 and I'd like to gain a bit of weight.

Two questions really. Do I need to worry about calorie target Fitbit dashboard has given me? Is that just to lose weight or is it also an indicator of the amount, quality of the exercise I've done? I've had my Fitbit three days, walked 40 km and 6.6k on a treadmill in a hour, with a 15% incline... I've not hit the calorie target of 2116 once. Any advice on the best exercises to do this?

Also, any advise on the best food to eat in order to gain weight?

Any help greatly appreciated

   Shaun

[A_Lurker · Accepted solution]

@ShaunyB- if you're trying to gain weight you definitely shouldn't be undereating.  Are you looking to simply gain weight or gain muscle?  If you're looking to gain weight then look for low bulk/high calorie foods.  A handful of nuts is a good way to add calories.  Also, depending on the type of foods that you already eat we could give you other suggestions.

If you're trying to gain muscle then I'd suggest backing off on the cardio and consider lifting weights.

[ShaunyB]

@A_Lurker thanks for the advise. In the short term, I'm looking to increase my weight and general fitness at the same time. In the long term, I'm thinking of trying for a marathon, my local one is in September, so I've got plenty of time to prepare. My thinking is to get my weight to be the midpoint of the normal BMI range and while I'm getting there, gradually improve my cardio and start some light running.

I do exercise a lot already and go to the gym three or four times a week, I use the treadmill but get travel sick if I don't hold on and find it hard to actually get into a proper running action, so I use the treadmill at 15% incline and my personal recent best is 6.7k in an hour. My resting heart rate is 62 today.

I've started eating nuts after your advise and my weight is now slowly increasing. I've put on 0.7kg in the last three days. I've also started Farlek "walking" ;-)... walking at a 5 kph pace and then breaking into a light run for a minute or so. I'm obviously aiming to increase the length of those runs each day.

So, thanks for the advise, it was very helpful. One extra question, my resting heart rate was 59 four days ago, it's increase by one each day since then. Could this be related to the slight weight gain?

Thanks!

[Dominique]

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@ShaunyB wrote:

One extra question, my resting heart rate was 59 four days ago, it's increase by one each day since then. Could this be related to the slight weight gain?

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Most likely not. First of all, small fluctuations (a few bpm) up and down from day to day are normal. You should probably wait until you have a long enough set of data before making any conclusions, especially since 62 is definitely within the normal range for a healthy person.

[A_Lurker]

I would have said the same thing that @Dominique said.  It's not unusual for mine to go from just under 60 to even mid-60s and such, then back.  Here's what I've noticed.  Your resting rate is obviously based on a certain period of time when you're not moving, but not sleeping.  I've had extremely busy days where I barely sit down from getting up in the morning until getting off work.  My resting rate will spike that day and I'm thinking it's because I'm truly not 'resting' enough for it to get a good number. Without tracking it too much - over training and illness can cause it to continue going up, but I'm using an example where mine was probably mid-60s and when it was taken in the hospital is was closer to mid-90s.  I wouldn't sweat some bouncing up and down, just look for longer sustained upward trends.

[Dominique]

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@ShaunyB wrote:

Also, any advise on the best food to eat in order to gain weight?

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The "science" of gaining weight is very simple: you need to overeat for some period of time (just like the science of losing weight is simple: you need to undereat). Any food will do, but it’s a good idea to favour healthy calorie-dense items: calorie-dense so you won’t feel full too fast (which could prevent overeating) and healthy so you not only get the calories you need to gain, but also valuable nutrients like vitamins, minerals etc. However, just because you eat "healthy" doesn’t mean it won’t get stored as fat, and you probably don’t want to morph from skinny into "skinny fat". So it would be a good idea to include resistance training in your activity (as suggested by @A_Lurker), so that a significant part of the extra energy you supply to your body by overeating is used to put some meat on your bones rather than stored as fat.

I understand you’re preparing for a marathon, which is fine. Your body type is probably very well-suited for long-distance running (no need to carry too much extra mass). However, you need to understand training for long-distance running will increase your energy expenditure (which means you will need to eat even more) and is not ideal for gaining muscle (you will mostly work the muscles needed for running). Which is why you should consider doing resistance training as well.