How I went from 130lbs to 165lbs in 2 years.
In April 2017 I was around 135lbs and due to lack of calorie surplus and consistent training. I wasn't happy at the weight and felt a little too lean. My typical workout consisted of things like lightweight training and some ab work. I wanted to lift heavier but at the time in my home gym, I didn't have the proper full equipment needed so I did what was feasible with my current setup. Most days I would eat probably 1800-2000 calories a day PLUS the exercise of even more calories burned. Very easy to see how at 5"9 I got to 130-135lbs. I would exercise around 2-3x per week for 45mins each which wasn't enough either. Some weeks I did 4-5x a week but the weights were light and I wasn't eating enough calories to support muscle growth. So, in general, I was just going around in circles after a while. Sure I was lean and had some visible abs but my strength was low and I wanted to GAIN muscle and weight at that point.
So in June 2018, I was able to find a great deal on amazon for a power rack to ship to Hawaii. Now for those who don't know, it's almost impossible to get a power rack (110lbs of steel) shipped here. Let alone for the good price of $30 shipping on amazon prime I got! I spent at least 2-3 years looking at various places online to buy from (there is no option locally to buy). I didn't want to pay $30 a month for a local gym and have to share 1-2 racks with tons of people. Either way, I was very glad to buy it in the end for around $300 in total.
So how did I go from 130lbs to 165lbs?
Well once the power rack arrived, I had up to 210lbs Olympic weights to use in the safety of a rack that could support up to 500lbs on the safety pins. I quickly within 4 months needed to buy two 45lb plates to add to my weight set. So now I have up to 300lbs to work with. Soon I'll need to buy more weight plates for my deadlifts.
In general, once I got the power rack setup, I also bought a pair of adjustable dumbbells from amazon. 5-52lb weight plate dumbbells from Yes4All brand. I'm very pleased with those and it helps a good deal on isolation exercises.
I started gaining weight quickly with the help of lots of resistance training of heavyweights and eating in a calorie surplus. I felt a lot safer in the power rack and was able to push a bit further than I was able to previous. In doing so, my appetite also increased a lot. I eventually got up to 171lbs even earlier this year in June 2019. I stopped bulking as much because I was getting a little "chubby" and wanted to lean out a bit more, so I incorporated more cardio/jump rope/ and dialed back my calorie surplus. For now, I'm around 160-165lbs and am happy around that number if I can remain lean enough.
- Power Rack with 300lbs of Olympic weights
- Consistency in the home gym (lifting weights, heavy volume 4-5x a week for 1hr 15min each)
- AB /core work 1-2x a week
- Count calories on myfitnesspal (900+ day streak)
- Follow a solid workout program with overload progression
If I can do it, you can do it too! Keep going forward and do your best.
About Author
Lloyd L.
Thank you for visiting my website. My name is Lloyd and I live in Hawaii. I started working out in 2010. Read more on how I overcame adversity and transformed my life forever!
