Q: Thanks for answering my previous question. You asked for foods and weight equipment available for fitness plan.

For equipment: I go to school, so we have two state of the art gyms with everything we need. So, equipment is not an issue.

For food: I would like eat few fruits, soy milk, whey powder, tofu, spinach, garbanzo beans, lentils, peanut butter, eggs, pancake,and pita bread . I hope this helps. I can squeez in the meals every 3 hrs. How about water?

I want to workout 3 days a week, while doing cardio for the other 3. The cardio workout will be 30mins/each of running and rowing I can put in 1.5hr for the workout in gym. I will prefer to workout first thing in the morning.

To your reccomendation, I should focus on the muscle part first. I am looking FWD for the response and getting started.

A: You are 5 foot 8, 150lbs, around 20 years old. In order to gain muscle, you'll need to eat a lot. We'll start at 2700 calories per day. Those 2700 calories will be split into 6 meals (which means each meal won't actually be that big). Nutritional split of those 2700 calories will be: 200 grams of protein, 270 grams carbs, and 90 grams fat. Of course you won't hit these numbers exactly, but keep them as the daily goal and do your best. And avoid junk food, of course!

Splitting those numbers into 6 roughly equal meals, we find that in each meal you'll want to get 30-35 grams of protein, 45 grams of carbs, and 15 grams of fats (for a total of 450 calories per meal). Most of the foods you listed are great choices, except for pancakes :) I would also recommend ditching pita bread for things like oatmeal or at least whole wheat bread. So lets try a sample daily diet...

Meal 1: 2 eggs, 1 cup soy milk, 1 scoop whey powder, 1 banana
Meal 2: 1 cup (cooked) garbanzo beans, 2 cups broccoli or spinach, 1 slice bread
Meal 3: 2 cups (cooked) lentils, 1 tbsp olive oil
Meal 4: 2 cups soy milk, 1 scoop whey, 1 tbsp peanut butter
Meal 5: 2 cups (cooked) lentils, 1 tbsp olive oil
Meal 6: 2 cups low-fat tofu, 2 cups spinach

Obviously you won't eat exactly that every day, but it should give you a good idea for meals you can eat with the foods you listed. You will also drink a LOT of plain water throughout the day. 1 gallon of water per day is a good goal. You don't have to jump to this diet right away, but gradually 'eat' your way up to it over a week or so. Then track your weight by weighing yourself on an empty stomach in the morning once every few days. It'll take a couple of weeks for your system to get used to the new diet, but after that you should gain about 1 pound every 2-3 weeks. If you go a whole month without your weight going up, bump the calories up by 200-300 cal per day (in other words: eat more) But be patient -- the slower you gain weight, the more likely it is to be muscle rather than fat.

Now for your workouts... While you are eating a lot to build muscle you will need to focus on basic weightlifting. I don't recommend a lot of cardio because it will only slow down your muscle gain. You'll have plenty of opportunity for cardio in the next stage, when you shed the extra fat. If you really enjoy cardio, limit it to 10-15 minutes per day, 2-3 days per week. As far as weight-training, 3 sessions per week is enough. Aim for 45-60 minutes per session which should allow you to fit 20-25 sets per session. I have some sample programs posted in the weighttraining article. Alternatively, if you want to have quick 30-minute workout sessions you may choose the following program for the week:

Tue: 2 sets of barbell squats (for legs), 2 sets of pullups (for back), 2 sets of bench press (for chest), 2 sets of upright rows (for shoulders), 1 set of cable pushdown (for triceps), 1 set of barbell curls (for biceps). Choose weight that you can lift roughly 13-14 times and then do sets of 12 reps (so not quite to failure, but close).
Thur: Same as Tuesday, but pick weight that you can lift 10-11 times and do sets of 9 reps (again, close to failure).
Sunday: Same as Tuesday, but pick weight that you can lift 7-8 times and do sets of 6 reps (again, close to failure).

As I say in the weighttraining article, there is no one perfect weightlifting program. Feel free to choose from any of the ones on this site or from any other recommended to you by somebody or something you trust. Make sure to not overdo it -- the most time you should spend lifting weights is 5 hours per week. But while you are in the gym make sure you work and work hard. The main thing is consistency in lifting and in diet. Good luck!