skinnyfat ectomorph slow gains (despite high testosterone)

[ecto84]

Hi guys,

I am 29 years old (5'8", 165, 14% bodyfat) and have started lifting 2 years ago.
3 years ago I decided to change the way I look because I had around 180 pounds and 25-30% BF (bad ass skinny fat ectomorph)all of it around the waistline.... I looked like ****. I dieted hard, lost a lot of muscle... I was at 149 pounds.... I couldnteven do 10 pushups....

The first year of training I was training crappy, eating crappy, not sleeping enough and drinking quite often.
I made very little progress that year, but then I made changes to diet, training and sleeping, results started to show but still the progress is slow.

I did bloodwork this week, and the result kind of shocked me, my test level is in 792 ng/Dl which seems to be quite high for my age, I expected to be lower since I hardly make any gains.

I tried all sorts of high calorie diets and supplements, but every time I bulk, i get mostly abdominal fat an little strength and muscle.

I am training 4 days a week: chest+ biceps, legs + abs, shoulders + trapezius, back + triceps. I focus on compound exercises first, 8-10 rep range, then I go to 15-20 rep range with lower weights.

Currently my diet is detailed below.
On training days (focus on carbs):

• Breakfast: protein shake, whole cereals + milk, flax seed oil
• Snack: 1 banana, 1 apple + what other fruits available at work
• Lunch: lean chicken breast + rice + vegetables
• Lunch 2: same
• PreWorkout meal: whole cereals + milk, creatine + carbs (20 mins before training)
• PostWorkout: protein shake + creatine + carbs + flax seed oil
• Before bed: lean protein + vegetables + fruits

On non training days (focus on fats):

• protein shake + flax seed oil + 50 gr almonds
• snack: almonds + various nuts
• Lunch: Various fatty meats (chicken, lamb, pork, beef) + vegetables
• snack: almonds + various nuts
• Dinner: Salmon/shrimps + vegetables
• before bed: protein shake + flax seed oil

I seep on average 7-8 hours a night, in weekends that is 8-9 hours per night + 1-2 naps.

Sometimes I cant get all of the above and switch to some similar foods to keep the focus on carbs or fats depending on day.

With all above being said, I am asking you guys for any advice. What am I doing wrong ??? What can I do better ? What should I focus on more ?
I am getting tired of not seeing good results despite the fact that I invest a lot of money and time into this, and the bloodwork showing great hormonal output...

Thanks.

 

[mik14]

Are u counting you calories & macros.

Do u no your maintenance calories.

Do you do cardio.

Your test levels are definitely a lot better then mine.

 

[ecto84]

I do not do cardio, I tried it, and it seems to make me loose muscles ...
This diet I am doing now it seems to keep my weight and BF stable, If i add more calories I get more fat, if i lower calories I tend to lose strenght.
Till now it looks like this diet/training plan works best... But I am not seeing enough gains.

I forgot to mention, that I did some other investigations and discovered that I have helycobacter pylori infections that gives me some gastrointestinal distress from time to time. I started antibiotics treatment this week. I hope I see more gains after I get rid of the bacteria in my GI tract....

 

[PaulBlack]

With all above being said, I am asking you guys for any advice. What am I doing wrong ??? What can I do better ? What should I focus on more ?
I am getting tired of not seeing good results despite the fact that I invest a lot of money and time into this, and the bloodwork showing great hormonal output...

Thanks.

You seem to mention quite a bit about diet and sleep but not much about how hard you are training!?
What does a typical gym week look like ie; frequencies, volume, exercises?
Do you love or look forward to train?
Do you have a "specific" goal that you are focused on?
Do you have a lift or lifts you are good at?
Are your goals to make certain big lifts stronger?
Are you adding weight to the bar on a regular basis?
Do you train with a partner(s)?

 

[ecto84]

You seem to mention quite a bit about diet and sleep but not much about how hard you are training!?
What does a typical gym week look like ie; frequencies, volume, exercises?
Do you love or look forward to train?
Do you have a "specific" goal that you are focused on?
Do you have a lift or lifts you are good at?
Are your goals to make certain big lifts stronger?
Are you adding weight to the bar on a regular basis?
Do you train with a partner(s)?

I hit the gym 4 times a week: chest+ biceps, legs + abs, shoulders + trapezius, back + triceps. I have problems with overtraing from time to time, but for now I seem to do it less often. I divided a workout into 2 parts:

1. I do warmup 1-2 sets. Then work up to my maximum weight on each exercies. Once every 2 weeks I try to do 2-3 reps with a higher weight than my max weight that I can do 8-10 reps. After I hit the max weight on first exercise, I move on to the next one, I do a set with 75% max weight, than another one with 100% wieght. I do this for 3-4 exercises total, that would mean 2 warmump sets + 6 or 8 sets in total.
2. I go for high rep training on isolation exercises mostly: 15-20 reps 4-5 sets total, 2-3 exercises.

Overall I am trying to train optimally in terms of volume. I train to failure each muscle group.
I love working out, i love the "high" I get after finishing the workout.
My primary goal is to get to 176 pounds 10% BF. After that I will either go maintainance or even try to get bigger...
I can bench my own weight for 10 reps, but I'm at my best when I hit the shoulders and triceps.
I try to addy more weight to the bar, but I am trying to keep the form and execution optimally.
I have a partner which helps me with last reps and some negatives that I do from time to time.

 

[kdeome]

Wow. I'm 25 and my test levels were low 400s... been training a little longer than you (less than 1 year more) and I've had good gains (not great).

Flat bench is 275
Incline bench is 235
Squat is 300
Leg press is 600

My lifts are kinda low, but my body weight is low also. What are your lifts like? How many reps/sets? Skip days? Supplements?

With your test that high I would expect much better #s and results than me.

 

[kdeome]

Oops just missed your post. How would you rate your daily workouts intensity? 1-10 10 being insane.

 

[ecto84]

Wow. I'm 25 and my test levels were low 400s... been training a little longer than you (less than 1 year more) and I've had good gains (not great).

Flat bench is 275
Incline bench is 235
Squat is 300
Leg press is 600

My lifts are kinda low, but my body weight is low also. What are your lifts like? How many reps/sets? Skip days? Supplements?

With your test that high I would expect much better #s and results than me.

Your stats look way better than mine, you are probably much gifted in terms of genetics. I have been very skinny throughout my teens and early 20, but because of junk food i morphed into a skinny fat person ...

I tried Animal Pak, Stack, tribulus (before I knew I had this test level), different types creatine w/wo carbs, whey/cannabis protein isolate, fish/flax oil.
Now I only do optimum nutrition whey isolate, creatine + carbs.

regardint the reps/sets, i already said that i do 2-3 reps once every 2 weeks with respect to the maximal weight I can to these reps correctly. Also I do 8-10 sets and 15-20 sets or drop sets at end of each training session.

 

[ecto84]

Oops just missed your post. How would you rate your daily workouts intensity? 1-10 10 being insane.

I would say that this tends to vary from 5-10 depending on how I feel. Sometimes I just dont have enough fuel despite I eat the right amount of food and preworkout meals ... I think this has to do with my GI tract infection, which I hope will get fixed ...

 

[ecto84]

Pic:

 

[kdeome]

I guess my only advice is to eat a lot more, what's your calorie intake look like? For me, I can gain clean at 2400 calories a day, ~300p 150c 80f and then a high carb day ever 5 days ~300+c

You don't look bad brah. I'm an ecto too, graduated HS at 125-130lbs, skinny fat. Ate and lifted to 165 the last few years, dieted down to 148, now its just a game of 2 steps forward bulk and 1 step back in cut. Good luck!

 

[PaulBlack]

Honestly you look good for your height and "natural" BW.
When I started 30 some years ago, I was quite skinny. If you are trying to stay fairly ripped, you might most likely be on the thinner side.
What specific exercises do you use for say legs and back (the absolute biggest muscles groups?)
Because when I "focused" way more on beefing those big groups with heavy weight, instead of my chest. shoulders and arms, I gained more mass all over from the systemic changes of standing with weight bearing on my core, spine, hips, legs etc. (Say, do you do most of your exercises standing perhaps?
That said, I tend to agree, that if you want more mass, (and that is something you have to decide as far as being ripped and being bigger) you may have to bump up the total cals, slowly, but you will still add overall BW to the frame.
Lastly, maybe you are pushing the intensity sets reps too hard all the time and not feeding your body enough to get bigger from the work?
It's like the old 20 rep squat and milk W/O's. They worked much much better for the ones who drank enough milk to add BW than just doing the squatting!?