[aeroektar]

I tried for about 3 months, got in a half gallon or more of whole milk a day, often in protein shakes, I started it the same time I started training. I was scrawny, 5'7 120ish lbs, didn't take long to hit 140, but it was the first time in my life I built noticible fat stores. Also got horrible acne, and yeah, its not nice to your asshole.

I now know that all I needed was to learn how to eat. I wouldn't do it again, I'd rather put on lean muscle slowly then bulk up fast and deal with the fat gain and side effects.

[civpro]

GOMAD is just terrible. A gallon of whole milk is 3500 calories, which, drunk on top of all of your other solid food, will turn you into a fatass in no time. The fact is that the body can naturally only put on 1-2 lbs of muscle in a month and no more, so the rest of the caloric surpluses will go towards flab. All you need is a 250-500 caloric surplus. It's not that difficult. If you're a hardgainer and whole milk is an easy fix to meet your high caloric needs then that's great, but otherwise there's nothing good or magical in terms of downing a whole gallon of milk for the sake of it.

[Tom_hegan]

I did half-gomad with starting strength routine about 4 years ago. i put quite a bit of weight and had good strength gains.
I was skinny fat but along with the ss routine it gave me a good strength base for moving on to a more intermediate program and a more rounded diet.
looking back its a bit crazy but i have no regrets.

[PHC19]

If you're relatively lean, young, and undertrained (RE: novice), GOMAD may work. Ultimately, you need to test it for yourself. Titrating the amount incrementally (i.e. 0.5GOMAD to start, then 0.75, etc.) might be a good option.

[Beyond Borders]

(10-12-2014 08:24 AM)EagleMan Wrote:  

I'm thinking of doing the gomad diet, which consists of drinking a gallon of milk a day for 1-2 months. I'm not a big eater, so it's hard for me to eat all the necessary food needed to gain weight. I'll probably be using almond milk instead of whole milk. Has anyone here tried the gomad diet and had success with it?

How long have you been lifting? What does your current workout program look like?

What other eating techniques have you implemented in order to gain mass? Have you tried any techniques for increasing your appetite (the glaringly obvious bottleneck)?

[Bushido]

I did it last year, although it was more like 2-3 litres of milk than a full gallon (3.75 litres). Started off skinny, but put on a lot of muscle and gained strength. People definitely noticed within a couple of months.

As is par for course, I also gained a good deal of fat that I burned off in a 4 month cut before the summer.

There are definitely more "sensible" ways to gain strength and muscle, but GOMAD is a no-brainer method that works for anyone whose goal is to get stronger.

Even if you don't go full GOMAD, milk can be useful when bulking up. If you have trouble reaching a higher calorie intake, then you may want to add milk into your diet. Start with 1 litre a day on top of your normal diet and lifting and then review things after a week.

[cmrocks]

I did half gomad a couple years ago when I first got back into lifting. I was drinking 2L of whole milk everyday. It definitely works in terms of gaining size and strength. I started lifting again after probably 4 years away from the gym (no excuses, I know) and it didn't take long to get my squat from 145 to 275 lbs. The downside was that I gained a lot more body fat than I would have liked to. I also did this when I was 26 years old so maybe a bit old for it.

If you have an active job, I would highly recommend it. I think about something like being a roughneck on an oil drill. That's a physical job and a lot of those guys will work a 12 hour day then go hit the gym for an hour after work. In a situation like that, I think you can use all the calories that you can possibly intake. In my case, I work on a computer all day so it just ended up being too many calories for me.

[EagleMan]

(11-05-2014 02:28 AM)Beyond Borders Wrote:  

(10-12-2014 08:24 AM)EagleMan Wrote:  

I'm thinking of doing the gomad diet, which consists of drinking a gallon of milk a day for 1-2 months. I'm not a big eater, so it's hard for me to eat all the necessary food needed to gain weight. I'll probably be using almond milk instead of whole milk. Has anyone here tried the gomad diet and had success with it?

How long have you been lifting? What does your current workout program look like?

What other eating techniques have you implemented in order to gain mass? Have you tried any techniques for increasing your appetite (the glaringly obvious bottleneck)?

I've been working out for more than 10 years.I used to do more weight training at the gym in the past but now I do calisthenics(pull ups, push ups, dips, muscle ups) And I like it more as it's more functional, gets me more ripped and doesn't leave me as stiff as working out with weights. I've also done some boxing/bjj in the past and I'm looking to get back into boxing.

I've always had a low appetite. I could go a whole day without eating and still not feel that hungry. My weight has been the same for about 10 years(around 140-145lbs). I have gone up in weight a couple of times. First time I got to 155lbs by drinking a lot of protein shakes and eating a bit more, 2nd time I went on a beginners cycle of test e and got up to 160lbs(20 lbs up from 140). But my weight always goes back to my baseline weight. Currently I'm eating a lot of small meals and drinking water through out the day to rev up my appetite and to expand my stomach.

[Beyond Borders]

Why is it so important for you to get bigger?

I'm not harping on you here, but I've never understood lean guys who stress themselves out and go to big extremes, making themselves uncomfortable and forcing food down their throats in an effort to fight against their own natural "baseline." I know being "big" is kind of the thing around here, but I'm just as impressed when I see a guy with wiry muscles that's cut as fuck. And I've been around the block enough to know a lot of these guys are a force to be reckoned with.

I say work your advantages. Get ripped and maximize what you've got. If you can make some simple diet habits to either increase your appetite or put on a bit of muscle mass, then yeah that's worth it, but going to great lengths that put a damper on your enjoyment of life, like swallowing gallon after gallon of milk to me seems like an uphill battle.

And for what? Vanity? And does the weight even stay on long-term - what happens if you stop drinking all that milk?

Learn to live with what you've got. Keep focusing on being strong and fit, and maybe take up meditation to ease that part of your mind that's always chattering at you, telling you you're not big enough. Just my two cents.

As an aside, I completely understand the benefits of bodyweight training, and I'm 100% on-board with it (I read somewhere that muscles-ups are better for testosterone production even than squats). But if putting on size is your main goal, I think most of us can agree your workout program needs some tweaking. If size is more important to you than the benefits of that style of training, you may want to rethink your program for some balance and throw in some heavy lifts. Maybe it'll even increase your appetite.