Advanced Ectomorph Muscle Building Nutrition

You're generally lean, with a smaller frame and thinner limbs.

You have a fast metabolism and tolerate carbs well.  

​You're battle is usually trying to gain muscle/weight.

(Note - If this DOESN'T sound like/represent you, you may need to go back and take a look at the questions again to get more appropriate recommendations for your true body-type)

The Ectomorph struggle is almost always trying to put on muscle - staying light and lean pretty much happens naturally.  You're focus will need to be on eating enough calories to sustain your training and daily activities without going into a deficit.  You should almost never allow yourself to feel "very hungry", you should try to eat a meal when you start to feel about a 3-4 ("kind of hungry" to "ready to eat") on a scale of 5 (1 being "full" and a 5 being "holy s*** I'm ready to kill a buffet").

You've indicated that you have a lot of experience with managing your nutrition, so we will be focusing on tailoring your intake to your body type and goals and tracking your total macronutrient intake consistently.  Utilize our Macronutrient Individualization Calculator to get your recommended total daily caloric intake as well as the breakdown of the suggested average starting intake for each Macronutrient.

These guidelines are tailored towards experienced individuals with very specific and/or aggressive goals such as competing in a physique contest, dropping body fat percentage into the mid-single digits or for optimizing training for a competition.  This type of planning is for those with lofty physique and performance goals and is meant ONLY for those who have the discipline to follow nutrition plans/guidelines exactly, rigorously track intake and count calories at least 95% of the time and have the experience/knowledge to know when their body is no longer responding to the current nutritional plan and the ability to adjust macronutrients accordingly.

The Key factors you need to focus on are:
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• Try to follow a consistent eating schedule, whatever it may be (once every two hours, or only 2-3 meals a day) so long as you are as consistent as possible with the meal times.
  • Since your goal is to gain lean muscle mass - while we like to offer you the freedom to eat when/how it works best for you, as an Ectomorph it will probably be too difficult to eat enough total calories to gain weight with only 2-3 meals a day.  For that reason, it will probably work best to eat a minimum of 4 meals each day, and even up to 6 depending on your activity level and metabolism in order to eat enough to add muscle.

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• The meal guidelines listed below (for how much to eat) are simply starting points.  Utilize our Macronutrient Individualization Calculator to determine what percentage of your diet should be coming from Protein, Carbs, and Fats and follow that as much as possible, with at least a 95% compliance rate.
  • Note - If you cannot/are unable/unwilling to follow/track your micro-nutrient intake consistently at least 95% of the time you may be trying to take on too much at once, or may not have enough reason/motivation to be successful with this degree of nutrition plan.  I recommend you either go to our Intermediate Muscle Building recommendations or read our mindset information to help you focus on your goals and intentions.​

• Include the majority of your food from the "superfoods" listed below (or other similar high quality/nutrient rich foods).​

• As explained earlier - don't allow yourself to pass a 3-4 on a hunger scale of 1-5​

• Though usually less of a concern for ectomorphs, it may still be important to track your LBM (Lean Body Mass) so you know if the weight gained is positive or negative - meaning, whether you are adding fat or muscle. Check out our tracking progress article for info on tracking your LBM.
  • At worst, you should be looking to gain weight at a 1:1 ratio - meaning for every pound of muscle you gain you should see NO MORE than an extra pound of body-fat... and this isn't necessarily ideal unless you plan on doing a cutting phase after this.  If you are seeing a 1:1, or worse (1.5:1, 2:1, fat to muscle, etc)  decrease your carb intake by .25/lb of body weight.  For example, .25 x 180lbs = 45, so you would reduce your carb intake by 45 grams and wait 2-4 weeks to see how the change is effecting your progress.  Repeat this process until you are seeing a more desirable ratio of weight gain.  If needed, supplement the caloric loss from cutting the carbs with an increase in protein and vegetable intake.
  • After that it is worth noting that - for those who may be worried - it is completely possible to build lean muscle without increasing your body fat percentage, or at least without seeing a significant increase.  It just comes down to tracking your progress and adjusting your nutrition accordingly.​​

For Men, at each meal try to eat/include:

• 2 Palms (measure with the size of the palms of your hand) of a Protein food
• 2 Fists of vegetables
• 2-3 cupped handfuls of a carb source
  • less is more when trying to drop weight
• 1 thumb of a fat source

For Women, at each meal try to eat/include:

• 1 Palm of a protein food
• 1 Fist of vegetables
• 1-2 cupped handfuls of a carb source
  • Again, Less is more when trying to drop weight
• .5 thumb of a fat source

If you are following an exercise/workout routine -  eat a meal 1-2 hours pre and post workout.

Superfoods:

Proteins:

• Lean Red Meat (Beef, Venison, Bison, Preferably Grass-Fed)
• Chicken (Ideally Free-Range and/or Grass-Fed)
• Salmon (Preferably Wild-Caught).
• Eggs (Ideally Omega-3 and/or Cage-Free)
• Plain Greek Yogurt
• Cottage Cheese
• Coconut Milk Yogurt
• Protein Supplements

Carbs:

• Mixed Beans
• Quinoa
• Whole Oats
• Sweet Potatoes
• Rice (depending on how/what you cook with it.  Preferably organic and/or brown rice.)

Drinks:

• Green Tea (or any Tea not sweetened artificially or with sugar)
• Sports Drinks (Such as a Pre/Post-Workout)
• Purified/Mineralized Water

Fruits/Vegetables:

• Spinach
• Tomatoes
• Broccoli
• Cabbage
• Cauliflower
• Kale
• Generally Any Coniferous Vegetables
• Carrots
• Mushrooms
• Mixed Berries
• Oranges
• Pineapple
• Grapefruit

Fats:

• Raw, Unsalted Mixed Nuts
• Avocados
• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Fish Oil
• Coconut Oil
• Flax Seeds
• Grapeseed Oil (Non-GMO, preferably Organic)

Herbs & Stuff:

• Garlic
• Ginger
• Turmeric
• Cumin
• Cinnamon

This list is by no means all-inclusive, but should give you an idea where to start and should serve as a guide for some of the best foods to include in your diet.

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