Do you think a person who posseses many of the “hardgainer” characteristics how would be able to maximize hypertrophy ?
I have all the characteristics (short muscle bellies, slow recovery, small-ass wrists, etc) and have a devils time making any noticable gains even after 10 years of training.
Have you ever trained the “hardgainer” type before? If so, what did you differently (if anything)? My main goal is hypertrophy …
Listen, as a 152 pound guy in HS to a 185 guy now, gaining mass is simply intensity and sound diet. Unless you your mom was Olive Oil and your dad Ghandi, mass is possible.
Former 145-150 guy in high school. Now 185-190 [solid].
wrestled/100m/200m @ 136 in peaked at 240 while powerlifting recently "slimmed down " to 205 to find the speedster within. the question i would ask you is when does size become athletically useless for what you want to achieve?
If they are young it might just be that they mature later than thier peers - so don’t worry too much.
If they are already 23 or older and skinny and really a “hardgainer” then I have found that typically they can’t recover too well. Therefore, I would stick to the lifts that will allow you to train the most muscles with minimum number of exercises (squat, dead, bench, pull ups or variations).
Then play around with the rep and set schemes until you find what works. They may need as little as one set of maybe four - six exercises. Don’t be afraid of doing less if things arn’t working. Having said that one person I trained 3 years ago adapted to being able to tollerate 20 sets after the first year and a half.
172 in high school.
Worked up to 240 after 5 years while playing 2 seasons of rugby each year.
Run 260-270 now.