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Assuming a strict diet and training schedule, there should be a limit to how much muscle growth the average person can expect within a given time frame.

To be more specific, lets assume the person has 70kg and just started to go to the gym 3 times a week. How much muscle (in kg) can be gained on average within a month? I am looking for a rough benchmark here because it obviously depends a lot on many other variables. I am also interested in the differences between men and women concerning muscle growth expectations.

Demento
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    When you say "strict diet", do you mean "eating a lot so one gains muscle and fat" or "not eating very much so one maintains low body fat", or something else? – Dave Liepmann May 16 '13 at 12:53
  • I am talking about a diet where the goal is to gain muscles while keeping the body fat low. – Demento May 16 '13 at 18:03
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    This very much depends on diet, training/programing, and experience (novice lifters can gain a lot quickly). I don't think you've adequately answered @DaveLiepmann's question. Of course you want to gain muscle & not fat - that's a universal desire - but it doesn't really tell us much about what your diet actually is! – G__ May 19 '13 at 02:34
  • To be more specific, it is a low-carb diet where carbs are only allowed in the morning and before/after training sessions. The rest of the day mostly protein and fat. The average calorie intake is about 2500 calories per day. – Demento May 20 '13 at 10:59
  • Voted to close, as this is basically going to be a list of "Well, I got X kilos in Y days" kind of answers. Each person is individual, and it heavily relies on factors intrinsic to the person. – JohnP May 22 '13 at 14:25
  • How would the answer to this affect your fitness? This is more a biology question, I think. –  May 22 '13 at 17:39
  • Think that it was more of a general question. If you have never trained before how are you supposed to know that you can't put on 20kg in a week if you do everything perfectly? – Darcys22 May 23 '13 at 05:59
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    In my opinion this could be a fair acedemic question. Also, it could be a fast "red alert measurement" if something goes wrong with ones bodybuilding efforts. If we were able to provide a rough equation for maximal weekly/monthly muscle gain, someone gaining twice as much mass would know that he's doing something wrong and gaining fat, before he gets noticeably fatter (waist measurements etc). @JohnP such answers would just be bad kind of answers, and that does not indicate the question itself is bad. We had questions on how much fat can one lose weekly and those were valid, why this one isnt? – K.L. Jun 03 '13 at 10:53
  • @K.L. - Because with some allowances for personal body characteristics and reactions, fat loss is basically a calorie equation applicable across a wide population base. Something like this is very individual specific, and affected by many more factors (training history, time off, reaction to diet, past injuries, body morphology, etc etc.) – JohnP Jun 03 '13 at 16:14
  • @JohnP If youre pointing out that introducing such a formula or equation for muscle mass is impossible (and you may be right on that!) then that is, in my opinion, a perfectly valid answer to this question. Write it down, put it into some nice words and here we go! We helped someone and all the others to come. You can explain why introducing such a formula is impossible and have there been any studies made on the topic.That would be a high-quality answer unlike those "ive gained 5kg/month" you mentioned. I think this kinda proves the question is valid and should not be closed – K.L. Jun 03 '13 at 16:25

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If its the first time you have ever got into fitness/working out you can sometimes expect "noob gains". I myself got about 5 kilograms without nutrition at all.

If you are really strict with your diet (Bulking) you can expect to get like half a kilo of muscle per week after that. Its a really rough number, it will be more or less depending on your body and usually you will overestimate how "well" you are exercising and dieting.

This will plateau out eventually, you cant keep putting on muscle on indefinitely

Darcys22
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  • Thx, that's exactly the estimate I was looking for. Do you know if there is a major difference between men and women concerning those numbers? – Demento May 22 '13 at 19:23
  • I assume there will be a general trend for males to gain more but there is going plenty of difference between individuals anyway. Plenty of females make better progress than males with similar routines/diet – Darcys22 May 23 '13 at 06:01