My Current Bulking Routine
I spent the best part of the last six months of 2024 travelling whilst coaching internationally. During this time I have to confess although my training was fairly consistent my nutrition was not! Mainly because it was not possible to keep things on track whilst doing all the travelling and coaching that I did.
However now that things have settled down into 2025, I'm able to move myself into a consistent eating pattern. And that means I'm able to go into calorie surplus, and capitalise upon that to get the most out of my training, and boy has it been fun to hit some new numbers on the bar.
Calorie surplus can sometimes be misunderstood or even feared, so I wanted to map out what I'm doing every day in this article and also speak a little bit more about my thoughts around bulking.
From December 2024 to the end of February 2025 I’ve gained around 6kg. This is well paced weight gain around a couple of kilos/month, bringing me performance increases with minimal unwanted fat storage during the process.
First of all here is my daily intake of protein and meals.
Morning Pre-Workout 6:30am
200ml Rice milk with 1.5 scoops protein powder.
1 x banana.
Morning Post-Workout 8:30am
2-3 x toast w marmite / jam
1.5 - 2 scoops protein powder mixed with water.
Lunch 12-12:30pm
200g cooked chicken breast
served in Greek flatbreads, with olives, tomatoes/peppers, coriander.
Afternoon Snack 3:30pm
100g No added sugar Muesli w full fat milk.
1.5 scoops of clear whey isolate mixed with water.
Dinner 6:30-7:30pm
200g protein (cooked weight) - (chicken, beef, fish etc) served with salad or vegetables as you like)
Pre-Bed Snack 9:30pm
1 x High protein yoghurt 20-25g protein
This intake of protein brings me around 200–220g/day of protein.
Main Parameters of Calorie Surplus
My main thoughts on bulking and how to run it efficiently are as follows:
Time limit bulking for a few months, 3 – 5, or enough to clear a sticking point in lifting if needed. After an excessive period of calorie surplus you may find you gain more fat than muscle and this will then become disadvantageous beyond a certain point.
Focus 80 to 90% on clean eating. Try to not pursue calorie surplus through "dirty bulking " and the use of junk food or too much to processed low nutritional content food.
Track weight gain weekly, and aim for around 1 lb or around half a kilo.
Make sure you are driving progress on the barbell during this phase, that should absolutely mean adding weight to the barbell to make it more challenging and hit new records for singles, sets of three and fives.
You'll notice I start early, and eat at periodic intervals. In doing so in this fashion, I never really feel like I have to gorge myself and feel overly full. This means that over-satiety does not become a problem, and I don't feel so full that I start to want to avoid meals.
You'll notice that I am not tracking calories. I stopped tracking calorie some years ago, I am now in favour of making sure I audit my protein intake. And then I measure my weekly weigh in on the scales, and also make sure that my gym workouts are progressing.
If all those things are in alignment, I don't really need to know the calorie number. I just need to enjoy my meals, enjoy my training and stay consistent within the week as much as possible.