Weight Gain for College FB Players

[gtapp]

Weight Gain for College Football Players

Things to keep in mind:

1. No two people (with the possible exception of identical twins) respond in the same way to stimulus. We are all individuals and all our bodies work differently. When I was 21 I worked out 6 days per week at a competitor’s only gym in Iowa and tried to eat a minimum of 8000 calories a day. I gained 5 lbs. in four months. Metabolism was just too high like many college aged kids. MSU recruited a kid from MN in 2000 that lived next door to me. He had only played basketball and never football. He weighed 265 lbs., was 6’4” tall and had never lifted any weights. Once he got to MSU the strength coach told me they were going to put 20 lbs. on him the first year and he would start at OT for 4 years. In that first year he increased his strength by 2X to 3X on all lifts. He weighed 220 lbs. after that first year. His body reacted to the weight training and the change in diet by losing weight. Different bodies react differently especially at that age.

2. You can only gain so much muscle size/weight. Look at bodybuilders: Once they peak they weigh in at the same weight for the rest of their careers. All of the stars of this sport changed little from year to year once they reached their prime. Ronnie Coleman won all those titles because he was the biggest. His goal was always to be bigger than everyone else but he weighed in between 260-265 every time. One year I saw him and he was at least 315. His goal was to add 5 lbs. of muscle for the next show. It didn’t happen. After cutting he was still 265. That’s all his body could produce. If you could constantly get bigger you would have 400 lbs. bodybuilders but we don’t.

3. College football players don’t train just for strength/size. They train for agility, quickness, speed and injury prevention. So they are less likely to add a lot of mass unless it is also comprised of water and fat. They don’t train like Bodybuilders or Powerlifters. Each player makes tradeoffs depending on position. They want to be bigger and stronger but at what cost? Bigger usually means slower and less quickness.

4. Injury: College football players get injured a lot. Look how many offseason surgeries the Cats have and how many players are held out of Spring ball to recover. They can’t maximize the weight room benefits when injured. This is also true during the season. They experience all types of injuries that limit their weight room training capability. Plus keep in mind when your injured the body will fuel the injury (recovery) before it feeds the rest of the body thus making it even harder to add size.

5. Maximum gain per year: It is rare to find any lifter (in any sport) who can gain 10 lbs. of muscle in a year. This includes body builders whose only goal is size and symmetry. Higher gains are possible under “Optimal” conditions. Football players are not in Optimal conditions for gaining muscle mass. The optimum goal for gaining the most muscle is to add 1 lbs. of fat for every 1 lbs. of muscle. Any less fat and your muscle gain will go down. The strength coach at U of Wisconsin told me that is their goal for lineman, 1 for 1. This is why LB’s gain so little. Look at the last few years. Cole weighed the same for his last 3 years, Na weighed about the same for all 5 years, Singleton lost weight for his Sr. year. These are big men who train just as hard as anyone on the team and have the same strength coach but they are trying to add strength without adding fat (which slows them down). Doesn’t result in much of a year to year gain in weight. Maybe in strength but not weight.
Note: The U of W coach told me the most gain he ever got out of a lineman is 23 lbs. in one year and that player came to fall camp so slow they had to take most of it back off. He said he typically sees 0-10 lbs. per year for lineman depending on body type and years of lifting experience.

6. Body Adaptation: Take anyone who has never lifted and get them in a training program with a great coach and the most size/weight they will gain is usually that first year. The second most is the second year and so on. The body adapts (again see Bodybuilder comments). 20 years ago players did not lift as much in high school and even if they did they had no quality coaching. Now days they are lifting at least by their freshmen year and if they show promise mommy and daddy will get them in a program with a trained professional early to improve their chances of getting a scholarship. By the time we get them at MSU their body has adjusted to the lifting and gains are reduced.

7. School year impact: Once classes start it is even harder to gain because it takes food to grow. Size and strength come 70+% from eating and only 30% from lifting. When can they eat and what do they eat? You have classes, study time, practice, meetings, film work, weight room work, time with the trainers to deal with injuries and maybe time to socialize. When do they find the time to eat enough meals a day and consume the right kind of calories? And with a college kid budget what can they afford. Maybe the football program gives them food during the day but when do they have time to run over to the Fieldhouse and what about at night?

8. Season weight loss: Most players lose some weight over a season for the reasons already mentioned. So if you somehow gain 10 lbs. over the spring and summer you may lose some or even most of that during the season making it harder to gain each year.

9. Supplements: So many supplements are banded by the NCAA (I am talking over the counter) that the college players don’t get the same benefit as you and I. And even if they are not banned they are expensive. Even Protein powder is cost prohibitive for many college students. And steroids? Cost and NCAA testing take care of that.

10. Summary: Weight gain for football players is not a given. I asked the U of W coach about growing players vs. getting them big. He said the desire is to always get them already big and just add strength and technique. I asked how that was going. He said that they still have to grow some of them. I asked why? He said because we are not Alabama. Notice how much bigger the MSU lineman recruits have been the last few years. Why, because it is too hard and slow to grow them. The center for the Chargers retired at the end of last year. He lost 85 lbs. in 6 months. His approach was to exercise and eat less. I am going to guess that only 20 lbs. of that 85 was muscle. That shows you how much of the weight gain for these lineman is fat and water. You can gain as much weight as you want by being stationary and eating 10 meals a day at IHOP. But that’s not what anyone wants for a football player. We want him to get better, bigger, stronger, quicker and gain more endurance all at the same time. Doesn’t work that way!

Supporting Article: http://www.t-nation.com/article/bodybui ... ut_bulking

My Background/Experience:
• 41.5 years of Serious lifting experience
• 15 years in and around competitive lifting
• Trained with:
o Mr. Iowa, Mr. California, Mr. Minnesota
o Trained with Louie Simmons (Westside Barbell)
o Trained With a member of the USA Powerlifting (PL) Team
o Trained with NASA’s (powerlifting governing body) powerlifter (PL) of the year in the US
o My Mentor was ranked 8th in the US for 2 years in the 242 lbs. class for PL
o Was part of small PL group that trained together; this group included 2 US record holders in the bench press
o Had lunch this summer with the number 2 ranked female body builder in the world in 2009 (threw that in because it sounded cool)

[AlphaGriz1]

I approve this message

[Rich K]

Weight gain pointers for sedentary couch slobs is not as long a read. Thanks Gary.

[Joe Bobcat]

Interesting info Gary, but what I want to know is did you stay at a Holiday inn last night and how often do you stay at a holiday inn? I know you get a load of crap for your input on matters relating to weight gain... but thanks for sharing what you know.

[gtapp]

Not one comment about the female body builder???? I guess I should have included a picture!!! She was AMAZING!

[allcat]

Not one comment about the female body builder???? I guess I should have included a picture!!! She was AMAZING!

Sorry, don't usually like that look. I like women curvy and soft.

[AlphaGriz1]

Not one comment about the female body builder???? I guess I should have included a picture!!! She was AMAZING!

Didnt see him...........

[94VegasCat]

That's all good, but how often and heavy of a weight can you squat?

[JDoub]

Sound about right. Good stuff Gary.

There must some exceptions (as you stated every body reacts differently) -- I certainly remember guys I played with who added all kinds of weight and strength, especially our first two years in college.

I never lifted in high school, came to MSU out of high school at 6'1" and 175 lbs as a safety. Rock Gullickson was our strength coach, and put me on a 6000 calorie a day diet -- 60% carbs, 30% protein, 10% veggies. Rock was ADAMANT that the perception that football players will become slower and less flexible was horsespit if you lift correctly and work on flexibility. He taught us FR / skinny guys to eat 5x per day and how to stuff those 6000 cal. down (eat until you're full, wait 20 minutes, and eat more). We spent about 20 hours per week in the weight room, 4 to 6 times per week. That in addition to practice 6 days per week, along with separate cardio workouts.

Now this was a time before steroids were banned. Half our team was on them, I was not.

I weighed in spring football at 6'2" and 191 lbs. My body fat (before BMI measurements) went from 14% to 8% in that same time frame. And my 40 time improved. The next fall, following the same routine, I came in at 6'2" and 198 lbs. So in one year I put on over 20 pounds of muscle as a skill player, then kinda stayed there.

Other guys I remember:
Mark Rhinehart -- CB then RB, didn't put on any weight, 5'11" 185 lbs, but he was a lifter since HS, freakish strength and speed, absolute stud, stayed same size, benched over 300 in HS
Shawn Stump - OT came in about 6'4" 225 ended up playing at 6'4" + 285
Mark D'Agostino - LB came in 6'2" 175 played around 6'4" 230 was a weight room gym rat
Jay Fagan (griz) - OL 6'3" 220 out of HS, all Big Sky at 6'3" 285, Redskins 290lbs

[RickRund]

Now that we are here and JDoub brought it up, my Grandson says ALL college FB players are on the foods and I totally disagree... Am I naive?????

[gtapp]

That's all good, but how often and heavy of a weight can you squat?

Not sure if that question is directed at me or college players in general: If me, the answer is ZERO! I have to have my right quad muscle re-attached to the bone using cadaver tendons (2 weeks out), the left quad is torn down the middle, the left hip has a ruptured tendon and the right hip has a hip pointer. Once that heels I have to have the 3 torn tendons in my right shoulder re-attached. I was a horrible squatter. I was taught to only box squat. I used to do my sets at 545 to 585 until I broke my foot twice and then went down to 405 and 455. From now on I will only use body weight to work my legs. I wave the white flag.

[RickRund]

Just curious gtapp, did you ever know a California Body builder named Steve McCarl? He was in the Natural division...He is a kid I played football with. He was a school teacher in the Vacaville area. His Dad was also a Body builder eons ago, was our town doctor and I believe was a training partner with Jack Lalanne...

[gtapp]

Just curious gtapp, did you ever know a California Body builder named Steve McCarl? He was in the Natural division...He is a kid I played football with. He was a school teacher in the Vacaville area. His Dad was also a Body builder eons ago, was our town doctor and I believe was a training partner with Jack Lalanne...

No, but I give a lot of credit to the natural guys. It is difficult to lift hard without the juice. Recovery from workouts and injury takes much longer. Those guys are tough and dedicated!