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Posted in: Workouts / Goal Setting

How to Gain Muscle Mass?

Hello!

I'm a male, 16, and I've been working out with FitnessBlender for about 2/3 years now, but on and off a lot. Last November (4 months ago), I start to actually focus on my workout and stick to it (currently march and have follow my workout plan without any long break or given up! Only some 1 or 2 day where I don't feel like it or super busy). I have started with FB30 round 3, then FB Strong, then FB Burn, and again with FB Strong as I like strength training way more.

To be honest, I haven't watch my diet much throughout these workout, so I still eat process food now and then along with cooked meal (mostly rice because I'm Asian lol), so I get that it could be a factor into this problem. As four months has pass, I have seen some small weight changes, but not much. I feel like my belly fat hasn't burn of much, only a bit. The most differences that I've seen about my body is how my leg now is so firm and if I flex my leg I could see the outline of the muscle and such. My arm, however, see little changes. I can see how my bicep and tricep has grown a bit, but not much different. However, this is the opposite of my strength. When I started out I do bicep curl with an 10 pound per hands per 8 rep, but now I could do 17.5 pound per hand per 8 rep. My squat at the beginning I do 10 pound (as that is what available for me), but when I purchase the PowerBlock Dumbbell I start lifting around 15 pounds and now it goes up to 30 pounds per hand per 10 reps. This of course shows how my strength have been improving, a lot in my opinion as I was surprise at my strength when lifting. These of course doesn't correlate to my appearance because I still look skinny on the arm and fat around the belly.

Also my lower back start to hurt when I lift heavy above my shoulders (like I could do 60 pounds total for squat, but only if I let the weight hang down, not on the shoulders as that would hurt my back), so I have begin to focus on my core. I feel like my form is good and appropriate, but I'm not sure now.

So now as April Approach I'm going to try and make my own workout program to focus on my upper and body mass building, as now that is my goal (with some HIIT sprinkle in).

Do you guys have any recommendations on gaining muscle mass and lose the fat? (Can recommend me workout method/plan, the weight I should lift, and the diet) I know I can change my diet, which i'm slowly are doing now. It just because my family cooked most of my meal (i'm 16) and they love greasy Asian food, but I'm trying to learn how to cook by myself and make a healthier meal. Should I add more calories first for my mass building, or cutting back the calories for the fat loss before the mass building?

Also do you guys have any tip about my lower back pain? (I'm still a student so I feel like my heavy backpack also involve, and when I wake up of sleeping my back is usually sore too. This and the heavy lifting during a workout as previously mentioned above)

Sorry for this long paragraph and my bad grammar lol, but thank you if you can help!

Edited