Want to compete in MP in a year, how to get there?

[Timpsi]

Hey!

I'm 5'11 and currently at 175 lbs, been training seriously for a year with diet and so on. Besides that, for about a year with no goals and mostly for fun. I have no experience in MP what so ever but I have now made up my mind, I want to try!

My goal is to compete in MP (I live in Sweden) and we have a couple of competitions for 1st timers. So november and december 2015 is my goal. I have been "bulking" since mid August, until now I have been gaining approx 1lb/week, which is a good aim I think. I have gone from not so much mass at 154 lbs to about 175 lbs now. Sure, I have gained some good amount of mass during this time but nowhere near where I want to be or what I expected, but maybe my expectations are too high as it takes time to build lean mass.

I have been doing a 4-split until now (Chest/tri, back/bi, delts & legs). Doing mostly heavy compounds with lighter isolation exercises after. Right now I'm ignoring weight and trying to really focus on the tensions and the muscle working, resulting in around 20+ reps to failure every set with 50 secs rest between each set. Right now I'm trying to maintain a +300-500 kcal surplus every day and eating around 2,5g proteins/kg (around 1-1,5 lbs/LBW).

So my question becomes; what advice would you guys give me right now? Complete my bulking phase until I hit around 198 lbs (90kgs) and start cutting once in spring, before once again trying to gain lean mass and yet again cut down effectively down to competition day? How would you train to gain as much mass as possible? Anything particular during cutting phase when dieting? Carb cycling, re-feeding etc?

Any advice or tips are appreciated!

[Berget93]

It depends what is your bf% at now since you are saying you went from 154 to 175 lbs?

Advice is really dependent on your physique, your nutrition, what you are doing besides working out. (the rest of the 23 hours of the day), imo you shouldn't really go above 10-12 bf% when "bulking" there is no muscle building benefits from it.

I realize this is an old post.