How Can You Gain 20 Pounds At Least, In 7 Days

By Nick Nilsson

Read about how I managed to accomplish this astounding weight gain – going from 192 pounds to 217 pounds in only 7 days

Having done a lot of research, I wondered how many pounds I could gain if I put all that knowledge to work.  It was a bit of a personal challenge, really, I wanted to see if I’d learned anything at all – plus I had some vacation coming up and nothing better to do with myself…

I was very aware that it would be impossible to gain a tremendous amount of muscle weight in one week, but I also knew that rapid weight gain would drive loads of extra nourishment into my muscles, so there would be some advantage in terms of muscle gain.  Nevertheless, it was important for me to remember that the total weight gain would comprise of fat, water, and muscle.

I knew that, first, I would have to set myself up for this rapid weight gain by dieting down.  Sounds a contradiction, right?  But I knew that, if I deprived my body of nutrients, it would react by absorbing all the nutrients it could when I reversed that trend, allowing me to gain pounds.

So, I went on an Atkins type diet for a couple of weeks, eating less than 30 grams of carbs a day and sticking to a diet of meat, eggs, cheese, and vegetables.  The effect of this regime was to clear the glycogen stores and excess water from my body.  A little known fact is that water attaches itself to carbohydrates, so that if you clear out the carbs, excess water follows. 

Its important that I tell you that I didn’t restrict water intake at all, which would simply have caused my body to hang onto every drop of water it could get and give totally the opposite result to the one I wanted.

As far as training was concerned, I did three high-intensity cardio sessions per week, each of them lasting for about twenty minutes.  This was really tough because cardio workouts burn calories very quickly and this could have an effect on my aim to gain at least 20 pounds in a week.  On top of the cardio sessions, I also did six sessions per week of high rep weight training – I did 12 to 15 reps per set – with very short rest periods.  This was designed to further deplete my body, making it more hungry for the nutrients I would be giving it during the weight-gain week.

Two weeks of this regime and I was ready to start the weight gaining part of the experiment.  I weighed in at 192 pounds.

My weight-gain week started on the Sunday, when I took my first serving of creatine and glutamine as soon as I woke up.  During that day, I ate as much as I could and drunk as much water as I could as well.  I also loaded up on the creatine and glutamine because these supplements are exceptional at forcing nutrients into muscle fibers.  In fact, creatine alone can result in a gain of 5 to 10 pounds over a five day loading phase.  I had maximized this effect by coming off creatine for the previous three months.

So, during that Sunday, I took four servings of creatine and glutamine, ate as much as I could (eggs, oatmeal, meats, potatoes, fruits, rice, etc), and drank gallons of water.

For the next four days, I continued loading with the creatine, but only took the glutamine after working out.  On the Monday I was planning to start my weight-training program, which was going to be extremely challenging, with twelve total-body training sessions over a period of six days.

I had worked out that by doing lots of total-body training sessions, every single part of my body was going to get as much break down and stimulation as I could provide for it, which would result in the maximum take-up of nutrients – because every muscle in my body would be hungry.

To add to this effect, I planned to do more sets for the big muscles, like the chest, back and thighs than I did for the smaller muscles.  Every part of my body was going to be worked twice a day over a six-day period.

I should warn you now – this type of training should not be carried out over long periods of time.  It’s a quick, one week shot only, and was purely done as an experiment.

So, on Monday:

On waking I took my creatine, then I made breakfast using ten eggs and an enormous bowl of oatmeal (enough for four people normally).  To add a bit of flavor, I missed in a fruit yogurt.  Yeah, it was a lot but, to effectively gain weight, you need to think big!

When I went to the gym for my first session, the scales said that I’d gained 10lbs in just one day – obviously, I was doing something right.

I then did a 45 minute session, during which I worked every single part of my body.  When I’d finished, I immediately took a mixture of 40 grams whey protein, 5 grams creatine, 10 grams glutamine, and Tang, which is a sugary powdered drink mix.  On top of that, I also took some vitamins and minerals (calcium, magnesium, vit C, plus an anti-oxidant).  It is so important that you give your body the materials it needs to rebuild itself as soon as possible.  If  you don’t, all that happens is that your body just breaks itself down.

I went home and got my lunch together, which was two large chicken breasts and a huge bucket-load of spaghetti with meat sauce, man am I going to gain some pounds.  Then, a few hours later, I had a couple of cans of tuna, a sandwich, plus ice cream.  I’m only telling you what I ate, this is not a prescription for what you should eat, and you should never do anything like this unless you have spoke with a nutritionist or doctor before hand.

I made sure that, throughout the day and evening, I made sure that I drank a full glass of water every ten to fifteen minutes.  Good hydration is vital for weight gain – muscles, like plants, won’t grow without water.

In the evening, I did another total-body workout.  By this time, there was so much water and carbohydrate in my body, after coming off the low-carb diet, that every action I made pumped my muscles incredibly.  I used heavy weights for sets of six to ten reps, and I stretched each muscle set thoroughly after I’d done them.

After the workout, I once again had a supplement-vitamin mix before I went home. Once home, I had four eggs and a bowl of cereal for my post-workout meal. Then, right before bed I had another protein shake.  I also mixed up a protein shake and put it on the bedside cabinet so that, if I woke up in the night, I could take in more protein.  This meant that I would be reducing the time my body went without food.  And, considering the amount of water I had been drinking during the day, I just knew that I would be waking up!

For the following few days, I repeated this schedule – continuing with the food loading, creatine loading, and water loading.  By the end of the second day, I had gained fifteen pounds and, by the end of the third day, I was up eighteen pounds on my starting weight.

When I’d finished loading with creatine, after the fifth day, I began having a protein shake first thing in the morning instead.  This is the best way to start the day because it reverses in an instant the catabolic state that your body is in after a night’s fasting and gives you the best chance to gain pounds of muscle.

There was no doubt that things were going well, my muscles were taking in everything I threw at them, I gained strength rapidly and, to be honest, my fat gain wasn’t as bad as I’d feared.  It was good to be on the home stretch though.

On the Saturday afternoon I had an enormous shepherd’s pie at a friends house.  Shepherd’s pie is wonderful food to gain pounds because it’s really just a giant pile of ground beef, potatoes, and corn.

When I weighed in before my final training session at the gym, I tipped the scales at 217 pounds.  In only seven days, my strength and weight gains had been astounding – I was able to increase the amount of weight I could bench press for eight reps by THIRTY POUNDS!  I had added a full inch to my arms.

And on top of all of this, rapid weight gain is superb for stretching muscle fascia, giving muscles more room to grow and increasing their potential to grow further.

So, I really had learned something with all my research.  I managed to gain twenty-five pounds of body weight in just a week!

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