Need advice on gaining properly... & economically

Amburger93

Hope everyone is succeeding one step at a time with their fitness goals.

I'm 5'3" ~108 lbs and have always been a cardio bunny. About three weeks ago, I decided to start gaining with a strong focus on lower body.

I upped my calories, upped my protein, and am keeping track of all my macros on this site/app. My workout routine now consists of weight training (adding weight every week) and I usually finish off with 30 minutes of HIIT on the treadmill (to keep up with burning the higher amount of fats I'm eating now).

Anyways, I'm new to this, any advice? Thinking of joining a CrossFit gym.

Springfield1970

If you want to build muscle you need to be in a situation where you're in a surplus of calories.

Women tend to gain about a quarter of a pound a week in muscle, but alongside that is an inevitable gain of about the same amount of fat.

So to gain half a pound a week, no more (there is no point), about 1750 pw or 250 extra cals a day.

There's no point spinning your wheels by not eating enough to fuel your workouts, so either drop the cardio or eat more.

Exercise burns calories, it doesn't choose a certain macro.

Muscle is build with extra calories, and protein (.8g per lb of body weight per day is good), carbs and fat ALL play an important role.

Weigh youself everyday and average it out every 7 to see if you are gaining a half a pound a week.

There will be other gains too, more food and waste in system, more glycogen, water, blood volume, so give your weight a few weeks to smooth out. Go for a 10lb gain, then cut the fat part of your gain by going on a slow cut of about 1/200 cals under maintenance.