Bob Foster really hated food (explanation below)

I'll make note of myself every time I see the conversation on this forum, lol. Funny to think how often this comes up, but yeah.

Before I started working, I'd eat a damn good share of food during the day, but end up waking up being able to see parts of my ribs- Now it's even worse, since I'm actually expending energy the whole day on top of that.

I'll gladly trade genetics with anybody who can't lose weight.

 

Yeah, he went from 6'5.5" to something like 4'2" but in 1978 he reached 15th in the heavyweight rankings and was being discussed as an easy defense for Larry Holmes. However, future Holmes challenger Lucien Rodrigues (who would gain attention for nearly decking Dokes a year later) ruined that prospect by decking Hazelton 3X for a third round TKO in Wichita. (Casablanca native Rodriguez was an easy 12 round shutout for the Assassin, but the French transplant was never in any trouble. At the halfway point, Lucien's corner told him to just go the distance, something fellow Europeans Evangelista and Zanon didn't come close to doing.)

 

I guess that’s why he ate so few of Joe Frazier’s left hooks before leaving the table.

 

You said it. People see there skinny friend twice a week eat like a madman after a night out but they don't know that the other days he has a coffee and a cigarette for breakfast, some nuggets and fries for lunch and a slice of pizza in the evening. If you overeat one day but your weekly calorie intake averages to 1800 per day you're just not going to gain weight.
Then there's activity level, actual innate metabolism and N.E.A.T (Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis) which is how many calories you burn fidgeting subconsciously throughout the day. Some people can sit on the sofa immobile with almost no movements, others keep twitching the feet sideways, tapping their fingers swaying their waists back and forth etc. etc. These little movements add up to build a notable caloric expenditure by the end of the day.
So what about the people who really do have high metabolism, levels of activity and NEAT?
The same that goes for everybody. If they eat more calories than they burn during the day, they gain weight, simple as.
Now where complications may seem to arise is that when caloric intake increases, NEAT activity goes up, and when the body is in a caloric deficit, NEAT levels go down, your body controls how much you will move subconsciously based on the energy available to it.
If you feel lethargic and drowsy from a strict diet, you are not going to move your limbs much when at rest.
However, that does not mean that people are incapable of gaining weight because their NEAT levels increase, they just need to eat enough to compensate for that increase in caloric expenditure, same as how you need to make up for the calories you burned out on a run if you want to gain weight.
The best way for the skinny friend who seems incapable of putting on mass to actually succeed is to spend a week logging what they eat, calculate the calories and then start adding each week and monitoring their weight fluctuations. If they increase the calories and their weight stays the same, eat more. If the weight increases for a period but then plateaus, again increase the calories, to break through the new baseline of "maintenance calories" (the amount of calories you need to eat to maintain your current weight).
This of course works inversely too. If one can't lose weight, then they should track their caloric intake and start methodically reducing.

 

That’s interesting.

I had a mate in HS and for several years after and he also complained about not being able to put on weight - and I know for a fact that he ate like a horse but he was also quite active and hyper otherwise. His dad was thin exactly like him.

I assume your functionality at the weight you are is fine - so is it just a perceived aesthetics thing as to why you want to put on weight?

Unless you’re severely underweight for your height and frame, believe me, there are many who would kill to be in your “predicament”.

 

Excellent post.