So, what would you suggest for a diet and training plan? How to I begin to get properly educated?
I might have been a little harsh in my last post, I made it right before hitting the sack. Instead of ragging on you I'll go over some of the basics to get you started.
Training
As far as training goes, what works best for everyone is different. My advice is choose a training program that is known to work for many people and go from there. Over time you'll learn what works best for you individually. Everyone has their own favorite method of training, research some of the popular ones and experiment.
I started with a 3 day split, hitting each muscle-group once per week. Soon after I realized it wasn't enough and moved to a 4 day split. A 5 day split might be even better for me but it's hard for me to get to the gym that often consistently. The less muscles you have to hit each session the harder you can hit them. Since you only hit each group once per week, make it your goal to hit them so hard they're sore until you hit them again.
It's always changing, but right now my split is Biceps/Upper Back, Chest/Triceps, Lower Back/Upper Legs/Shoulders, Abs/Calves. As you can see a 5th day would be helpful to move shoulders into as well as give me an opportunity to focus more on forearms and traps. I'm always changing it up and it's different for each body-part, but starting out I really liked the 5x5.
This is very subjective, but I personally I like to do about 3-4 workouts per muscle group. So if you were doing 5x5 on Chest/Tris day, that would mean about 15-20 sets for each, 30-40 total for that day. I can do this in 45-75 minutes. The key is not to BS when you're at the gym, stay focused on why you are there.
Oh, and SLEEP! You have to give your body a chance to recover and minimize the risk of over-training.
Diet
With diet, again, what works for everyone is different. The key really is counting your calories and keeping track of your macro-nutrients, basically your daily carb/fat/protien ratios. This goes for whether you're bulking or cutting, don't use a bulk as an excuse to get sloppy with your diet. Do a little research and you will find some "standard" ratios. Start with those and tweak to find what works for you.
Get yourself a food scale they are absolutely mandatory and cheap. After a while weighing your food will become an automatic habit. Before you put anything in your mouth your first thought should be how it will fit into your diet as far as calories and macros are concerned. This is a big change to make and at first will be rather difficult and time consuming, but after a while it will pretty much become automatic. In fact, I wouldn't recommend making such a big jump all at once. Ease yourself into it. Maybe start by keeping a rough count of your calories and focus on eating 6 "clean" meals a day (unprocessed foods, whole grains, lean meats and fish, lots of veggies, etc.), and taking in a lot of protien. Doing just this will probably give you results. Then start keeping track of and dialing in your macros.
Soon, if you're like me, not only will you be planning your meals ahead of time for the sake of convenience but you'll be packing yourself lunches and constantly thinking ahead every time you walk out the door to make sure you have some food to shove down your throat every two hours.
Eating clean isn't as expensive as some people make it out to be. Frozen chicken breast and veggies can be purchased in bulk pretty cheap. I've been eating a lot of Talapia as well since it is a cheap fish. Then carb sources like oats and brown rice are also very cheap. I spend a fraction on food that my friends who constantly eat out spend. It does take time preparing all your own food but overtime you learn to streamline your tasks and and save time.
Basically the weight you gain or lose mostly depends on your caloric intake. For losing weight, a pound of fat will cost you about a 3,500 calorie deficit. This means if you wanted to shoot for 2 pounds a week (which is the maximum unless you are very obese) that means you would want a 7,000 calorie deficit per week. No, I don't recommend dropping into a 1,000 calorie deficit per day right off the bat. I'd say start at 500-600 and then adjust every couple weeks depending on your results. Oh, and make sure you are still lifting heavy even if you are cutting. This will help you retain muscle mass. Think of it as a way of telling your body that you still need that muscle mass.
To gain weight, you need a surplus of calories - you want to take in more calories than you burn. I'll let you do some research to find a good starting point as far as how much of a surplus. Start with something moderate and increase/decrease based on your results.
As far as what your "maintenance" caloric intake is (the amount of calories that you burn per day), it is different for everyone. It depends on your body mass and daily activity. There are numerous calculators online that will help you establish a rough estimate to begin with.
Tracking Progress
To keep track of your progress, don't worry so much about what the scale says. Get yourself some body fat calipers, they're very cheap. It's not the most accurate measurement but in my experience it is consistent which is most important. Obviously the most accurate measures are not accessible to most of us on a regular basis. Measure your body fat about every 2 weeks or so, and do it at the same time of the day. Obvious choice would be right when you wake up. Using your body fat percentage and your weight you can estimate your progress as far as how much fat you are losing and how much muscle you are gaining. Using just your weight measurement alone will not tell you that. I also recommend taking "progress pics" every two weeks. You see yourself in the mirror everyday so you won't notice the changes too much. But when you go back and compare your progress shots you surely will and it can be very motivating.
Wow, that's a lot of stuff I just typed. Maybe I've had enough coffee.... Anyway, I went back and divided up my post into sections for you. It might seem like a LOT all at once, but again, there is nothing wrong with making changes little by little, in fact, I recommend it.
