Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

Hey guys!

So I just joined this site a few months ago and never got myself motivated to get back into the game until last month and I truly began my journey about 3 weeks ago as far as training is concerned. I've been doing 5 days a week M-F currently and have had success already. I've noticed quick initial improvement in my shoulders, tris, and traps. During this bulk I am really concerned with targeting every muscle group, I want to pack on some general size and work from there. I know my chest is a weak area for me, I can never quite feel a squeeze in my chest, I really have to concentrate and breathe correctly, negatives seem to do the trick for me often there. So without rambling more I am going to list my routine for you and my diet and post the few current pictures I have now

Monday: Chest and abs
Flat Bench 5x5
Incline DB bench 4x8
DB flys 3x8
Cable Flys 3x10
Pec Deck 3x8
Wide grip pushups 2 sets failure
Cable Crunches 4xfailure
-I know this is a lot of work on my chest but if I dont do this much i never feel a burn, and never get response out of my chest, I discovered this heavy load routine for my chest triggered some responses for my chest last year so I'm trying it again

Tuesday: Legs
Squats 4x4-6
Leg Extensions 4x8
Leg Curls 4x8
Lunges 4x6-8
Calf Raises 4x15-failure
-I plan on adding straight leg dead lifts or toe touches for more ham work, they are always the weak part of my legs, and I've considered adding light front squats for quads but I may wait until I switch my routine

Wednesday: Shoulders and Traps
Standing Military Press 4x8
Lateral Raises 3-4x8-10
Front Raises 3x8
Bent over Rear delt raise 3x10-12
Rear Delt/Trap Extension 3x8
Shrugs 4x12
Upright Rows 4x8
Farmers Walks

Thursday: Lower back and Lats
Dead Lifts 4x4-6
Good Mornings 4x8-10
T-Bar Rows 4x8
Low Row 4x8
One arm Lat Pull downs 3x10
-Its light on the amount of exercises but the dead lifts are heavy and I am pretty worked after these lifts

Friday: Arms and abs
Close grip bench press 4x8
Skull crushers 4x8
Cable pull downs 3x10
Reverse pull downs 3x10
BB curls 4x8
Hammer Curls 3x10
Preacher curls 3x8
Isolation curls 3x8
Wrist curls 4xfailure
Ab Machine 4xfailure
Roman Chair leg lifts 4x10-failure
-I usually do 2 tri exercises then 2 bi exercises and then repeat

Here's to fruits and veggies!

Hey, welcome!

Your routine look pretty well thought our, varying the rep ranges for power and hypertrophy as well as the muscle groups you paired together!

Best of luck, I look forward to seeing you in th future on here!

One way to increase chest "area" visually is to bulk up your lats. Wide grip lat pull downs are excellent for that. Forgive me if you already have them on your list. They go well with wide grip lat pull ups if you alternate each one each week. Damn, you got guns, son. Once you add the barrel chest, you'll terrify the crap out of the meat eaters.

Baby Herc

thanks for the advice, I can give up the one arm pull downs and substitute them in or add them, probably wouldnt hurt if I added them. I'm trying to not overwork the muscle group too. The last time I really started targeting my lats I pinched a nerve in my back due to overloading the workout, so I'm taking some baby steps with the lats a bit because it put me out of commission for about 6 months and I never got back into bodybuilding until now, I'll probably add the pullups though, I need some more body weight exercises to go with my workouts too

Alright today was leg day and boy as it a pain in the ass, literally. I worked on my form on squats today, its been going to crap as I've tried to move to my prior weights and numbers too quickly, I focused on driving through my heals and not leaning forward when I pushed the weight up, knees feel much better after doing that and I felt a great workout in the hamstrings and glutes. I've been allowing my quads to do too much work on this exercise. I did my first two sets at 285 ad finished my last 2 sets at 295, and i followed the rest of my regiment today here are some pics of where my legs stand now, I am too embarrassed to post my poor hamstrings so once those get to where I want them I will post some pics haha

heres a picture of my calf, I have mde some good progress over the last 4 weeks with them




And here are the quads, usually my best responding muscle group, theyre smaller than what they have been, but that happens after neglecting legs as much as I did for a year, so hopefully I can get them back to respectable soon



Now one question I do have, when I do lunges, should I take long strides or short strides? Is there a benefit to each or does one work better than the other or target the muscles differently? Thanks for the input in advance!

The images aren't working for me!

O weird they load on the phone but not computer. Nicely done

thank you, that is weird they wont load on your computer haha. About to eat my last meal and go to bed, been a long day and gonna be another long one tomorrow, got the shoulders and traps to work

Hit the traps and shoulders pretty hard today, definitely going to feel it tomorrow! Pushed up 135 on standing military press for my last 3 sets, switched it up to dumbell shrugs and liked the decision, up to 105 on upright rows and my dumbell exercises for the delts all increased in weight this week as well.

Going to be my first thanksgiving as a vegan and I'm 100% sure the family will give me crap for it but doesnt matter to me, getting bigger and staying healthier is my number 1 goal, have a great holiday to my fellow Americans!

Hey guys around 6:50 AM for me here, just finished breakfast: 2 packs of Kashi oatmeal, cup and a half of Kashi fiber twig cereal with a cup of soy milk and half cup of almond milk, somewhere around 45 g of protein. Going to hit the gym in about an hour and do my arm workout today, have really been noticing some nice progression in their development, especially the biceps. Used to not see the muscle separation unless I flexed but now just standing I can see some definition and size. Hope everyone has a great weekend and to any vegan Ohioans Go Bucks and beat that state up north today!

Ok guys need some advice please

I have been doing a nice job of controlling cheats and taking in plenty of veggies and protein sources, I just want to make sure my meals are sufficient and what can i do to make them better if not, I am brand new to vegan/vegetarian bulking here are what my meals have looked like. I wold like to note real quick to that I m not strict as a vegan but I am as a vegetarian, I don't touch any meat products and I rarely eat dairy products and my budget for food each month is very low so I am pretty repetitive in meals for monetary reasons

Meal 1: 2 packs of kashi oatmeal and 1 and 1/2 cups of kashi fiber twig cereal with 1 cup of soy meal, over 40 grams of protein

Meal 2: Shake (still whey unfortunately) with soy milk after my workout 50+ grams of protein

Meal 3: 1 and 1/2 cups of brown rice, 1 serving of lentils and 1 serving of kidney beans, 1 cup of broccoli/peas about 40 grams of protein

Meal 4: Same as meal 3

Meal 5: Same as Meal 3 and 4

Meal 6: Shake with soy milk 52 grams of protein and I eat grapes or an apple with it

I know I need to add fruit to the diet somewhere else as well. My big question is am I getting complete sources of protein in my meals, and will this diet work for me? I've noticed some gains already but I want to maximize my gains as much as possible while keeping my bank account above the red haha. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated, I do plan on switching the protein supp to a vegan source just cant spend 60 bucks on it right now and after doing the math my whey is cheaper right now, work is picking back up for me so hopefully money wont be such an issue soon but it is for now, thanks again for your input guys!

I am not sure how much i believe this but here you go:

http://www.savvyvegetarian.com/articles/get-enough-protein-veg-diet.ph


If you want to know how to combine incomplete proteins then here you go:

http://www.livestrong.com/article/259689-what-foods-combine-to-make-complete-protein/



Overall, your diet looks pretty good!

Why the whey, I don't care pesonally (each for their own), but is is because you have some left over to finish off or something?

I get it pretty cheap right now and its just much cheaper than the vegan [rotein powder right now, im paying off some huge bills right now and once I am caught up in about a month I do plan on getting rid of it, not my favorite but it is a complete protein from what Ive researched since it is animal based. This is the only animal source product I use minus some salad dressings and occasional cheat meals that may have cheese on them or have some sort of dairy in them. Thanks for the links! My leg are starting to get nice shape and size to them so I feel like its working just wanted to make sure

You had been making some serious progress. How have things been going for you recently?

-Dylan