OFF SEASON WEIGHT GAIN

Here's what worked for us:

1) A hot, hearty breakfast every day. No cold cereal, no breakfast bars, no pop tarts. Real food: eggs, potatoes, meat, toast, and juice. Vary the routine with breakfast burritos, omelets, chicken/gravy/biscuits, and other recipes.

2) Pack extra sandwiches and fruit for him to eat between classes and after school before practice/workout.

3) Normal lunch during school lunch period.

4) Big dinner waiting on the table the minute he gets home.

5) Peanut butter sandwiches or cottage cheese at bedtime.

Don't let him sleep in on the weekends. If he really needs some make up zzzzz's, wake him up at the usual schoolday time, make him eat his usual breakfast, then let him go back to bed.

Most kids who say they can't gain weight actually eat a lot less than they think they do. A typical day for these kids starts with a skipped or junkfood breakfast, a school lunch suitable for a small non-athlete as early as 10:00 or 11:00 in the morning, then nothing until after practice ends. Then they binge on fast food and other junk because they've been starved for eight hours. They think they're eating a lot, when in fact they're just backloading useless calories.

Fill him up with good food when he gets up, give him a sensible snack every two or three hours all day long, and top him off again with something that has both fat and protein when he goes to bed. Do this every single day. It works, and it's much cheaper than fast food or supplements.

Another side benefit is breakfast becomes one of their special memories. I'd get up early, cook the breakfast and set their plates in the warm oven or on the stovetop under an overturned skillet. The boys loved stalking into the kitchen and peeking under the skillets or into the oven to find what feast has been prepared for them. When they grow up and move away, they treasure coming home and getting "Dad's breakfast" served to them again.

Best wishes.

Agree with the above but add in a good high quality protean shake pre and post workout with.

His workouts also need to be phased with a strength and weight gain sequence. We really did not get this figured out right until he got to college with a good trainer.

What a great dad you are, Swampboy!!

I wonder if I should try a chicken/gravy/biscuit breakfast on my Yank?? I wouldn't even know how to make it!!

His favorite is peanut butter and bacon on whole wheat engligh muffins. Packed with protein!

Good tips ---- thanks all

The biggest problem I've had with this is that I cook for my son and I seem to gain weight faster.

Seriously, this has been a struggle for my son, whose weight has been steady for a year, despite a consistent workout regime. I've recently started cooking him breakfast - I think I just need to add another couple of these suggestions to what we are doing. Goodness knows he has the genes to gain weight.

Thanks, good stuff.

Lol, I know what you mean about gaining 'his' weight!

Good luck at Head First, I look forward to hearing more about it. Son had a good Northern VA camp at George Mason this past weekend, in the snow

definitely the protein shake in the morning or before he works out. Breakfast really is the key for how my son packed on 20lbs the past 6 months. Everything everyone has posted are great points

Baseballmom, sounds like being from Ct was an advantage last weekend.

I'm off to the grocery store...

From the begining of school to now i have put on 15 pounds all muscle. I have always eaten like crazy but in a healthy way similar to what swampboy was saying. Protine shakes in the morning do nothing but make your urine more expensive. you are not using the protine so there is no use taking in that much. Maybe a bar or something but shakes seem almost wasteful. shakes after a workout is what is useful because your body actually needs the amino acids and protines to rebuild your body.

Lots of carbs too and i don't mean mcdonalds or twinkeys. I'm talking apples, oatmeal, bread and grains, healthy cereal thats high in carbs, and other things that are hearty and make sure to mix simple and complex carbs.

Also remember you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. If his body won't gain weight, then just let him be stronger. I know we all want a guy who is 6'0 200lbs but some guys aren't built like that. I didn't start gaining weight until i was a sophomore and now being a junior it isn't as hard as before. I burn everything and am skinny but i put on muscle pretty easily now. just do everything within your control and thats the most you can do.

hope this helps

We tried the Whey protein and didn't have any real gains. Maybe about 3-5 lbs over a 2 month period.

Had an exercise and fitness guru suggest we try casien protein. That stuff did the trick. It's a long lasting protein that works over night. My son probably put on a good 15-20 lbs in 2 months.

Directions say every day, we did a shake every other night before bed.

Thanks for all the great advice, so far he has actually gained about 3 lbs. in the last 2 weeks.

This morning I moved the scale from my bathroom to my son's. I said if the number doesn't go up, eat more.

Not very scientific, but what the heck.

He's starting to see the number creep up on the scale. He's eating a hot breakfast every morning, and has incorporated protein bars into his diet. He's in the gym 3x a week.

"This morning I moved the scale from my bathroom to my son's. I said if the number doesn't go up, eat more."

Thats a great idea! I will try it. My son has been working out 4 days a week. He has gained about 5-6 lbs. in last 5-6 weeks.

quote:

Originally posted by Tooster:
"This morning I moved the scale from my bathroom to my son's. I

Why did I not think of this some time ago ...I know it won't go up on me now.

SOME YOUNGMEN ARE SIMPLY NOT READY TO PHYSICALLY MATURE IN THEIR HS YEARS I know my guys did not

There is an older post that suggests 16 oz of low fat chocolate milk after each workout.

Cheaper than protein and their are scientific claims that say it is the best recovery drink.

My son put on 15 lbs. last winter as a freshman and hopefully he will put on another 10-15 this winter.

Update: My son has gained at least 5 pounds in a month with consistent work outs, protein bars, hot breakfasts, better attention to what he is eating. I believe his trainer changed his workouts, but my son believes it is his diet which is making the difference.

He's going to need some new clothes.

twotex..We thought the same thing when our son gained weight/muscle. He needed new pants but he wanted to keep his shirts to show off his muscles. He felt it impressed the ladies to wear tight, cutting off blood circulation shirts..lol

Swampboy's post is golden. Nothing much more a parent can do for a growing HS athlete IMO.

The weight gain doesn't happen overnight, but it does happen. It is difficult to be persistent with a workout and diet routine without seeing instant results, especially for a teenager. But results will occur if the routine stays consistent. At my college we had a kid come in with me as a freshman who was 6 feet tall and weighed in at 143 lbs. He couldn't even bench press 30 pound dumbbells (which we certainly let him have it for) and had trouble consistently hitting the ball out of the infield. He was very fast, had great hands, was a switch-hitter and was extremely athletic. He was just incredibly weak.

Fast-forward to the present...he is our starting shortstop and #3 hitter and won Conference Player of the Year last year. He had some pro scouts coming by in the fall after having a pretty good summer in a formidable league and with a good spring, has a shot at getting drafted. He's now still 6 feet tall but weighs in at 188 pounds of solid muscle and wins just about every strength competition we have as a team.

As it was noted previously, some people just develop differently. But over time, it will happen.

Thanks, JH.

This approach does work. My baseball player wrestled in the 140-pound class as a freshman, 160 as a soph, 189 as a junior, and 215 as a senior (though he was light in that weight class).

He steadily gained about a pound and a half every month for his entire four years of high school. No big jumps, just slow and steady progress.

SwampBoy, I think of your earlier post on this topic every morning, as I do the breakfast-under-skillet routine...slowly adding extra eggs, more meat, carnation choc milk, etc. Lunch has included extra sandwiches, extra fruit, and protein bars!

I call it Mary's Diner. I still would love the chicken/bisquit/gravy recipe!


He has gone from 160 to 169 in about 2 months so I would call this a good plan!

Twotex, glad to hear the plan is working in your house, too.

Dip a chicken breast in beaten eggs, roll in seasoned crumbs, and pan fry (or use the George Foreman grill).
Place chicken breast on an open face biscuit.
Cover chicken breast and biscuit with giblet gravy.
Scramble the eggs and place on plate next to biscuit.

Wb13, funny you should mention it. My son mentioned needing new pants but now word on the shirts.

Mary, sounds like G is making good progress. I haven't been this interested in my son's weight since his first birthday. It is almost fun - he's not stressed out about it, and enjoying the progress he's seeing.

His trainer told him that improvement was 90% nuitrition, but until recently my son didn't do anything about it. As my son likes to joke (now), who knew someone with 30 years of experience knew what he was talking about?

Sometimes I feel like I'm living the cheese commercial, where the guy goes in and asks the hunk of cheese a question to see how mature it is. My son the "cheese" is starting to ripen a little!

You all are doing great with your nutriton plans and helping your young players gain some weight and get stronger.Good nutrition and a solid weight lifting program are the two things that helped my now senior in college.

A few tips if you dont mind me adding to the conversation.

We always found the season to be tough and son always dropped weight after working so hard in the fall.

A few things that we did.

1.I made snack bags in a brown paper bag each bag had 500 calories in it and it was addition to his meals.He just had to finish it by end of the day.

We used the snack bag idea through sophmore year in college when he was on his own.

One thing we did was add a scoop of whey protein to 8 oz of gatorade and he would take those to baseball practice and games.The protein is approx.120 caloires per scoop.

My son was a huge calorie burner so we added a optimal nutrition weight gainer shake.He still uses that today as a senior in college.It is NCAA approved and doesnt contain creatine or any other substances HS should not take.

My son adds a Casein drink before bedtime as it stays in the body longer than other proteins.

Carnations are awesome.There are many different combinations to get everything in.

Season is the toughest as they are at school all day and then at a game or practice and thats when snack bags were great.

Ideas for snack bags: Pistachios, other nuts and now they have flavored nuts(nuts are great as they are dense and dont fill them up so they will eat their three meals).Granola bars,Bananas, ritz crackers with peanut butter,or cheese, My son hated nuts except for pistachios so I got him chocholate covered peanuts,15 of them were 300 calories if I remember right.( not the best but nuts have protein and fat). Those chex mix snack bags,they are healthy or make your own mixes, pretzels,yogurt covered pretzels.The plan was to have a snack bag finished by end of day,so there would be 4-5 snacks of about 100 calories each.He could grab during the day or between classes and before practice or games.That insured his blood sugar to be steady with a good health supply of protein.

My son to this day does many of these same things.In college it gets so busy that they have to keep calories coming in.Especially if they are calorie burners to the extreme as many growing boys are.

Good luck,your def. oving in the right direction.Just as I am sure you know not to much fat,or quick calories.better to out it on slow and more muscle.My own son lost 4% body fat from last fall to this fall when tested at school.he just changed a few things and got great results.

Wow, the snack bag is a great idea. The best ideas are usually simple.

Just sawthat Gatorade now makes a gatorade protein recovery drink.11oz of gatorade with 20 mg of protein.They didnt have that drink 5 years ago.We made our own.