Posts Tagged ‘muscle building nutrition’

Preparing Your Pre Workout Meal

As we are all aware a good muscle building diet is critical to build muscle mass. What is also important is the timing of your meals. Around two hours prior to your workout is when I recommend you eat your meal.This should provide plenty of time for digestion so that you don’t start your session when you are feeling bloated or full and lethargic.

Ideally this preworkout meal should be something that you are used to and that you know won’t make you feel heavy and bloated as you want to be at your best to give your all in the gym. Make sure it contains slow burning energy such as that found in rice and oatmeal and that you consume the protein part first. You risk becoming tired if you eat your carbohydrate before your protein. This occurs as both the protein and carbohydrate cause the body to release specific chemicals that have differing affects. Protein releases tyrosine which signals your brain to be alert and energetic whereas the carbohydrate triggers the release of tryptophan that tells the brain to become sleepy. Therefore always eat the carbohydrate second.

If you really want to know how to build muscle fast then great advice is to drink a protein and carbohydrate shake about half an hour before you workout. This will significantly boost your energy for your workout. Ingredients should include whey protein, maltodextrin, wxymaize or dextrose. Try to take on board 25 grams of protein and 40-50 grams of carbohydrate. Doing this will raise your insulin levels which is one of the bodies strongest and most effective muscle building hormones. What’s more it will also reduce the production of cortisol which has a negative affect on building muscle.

Remember working out when you are already hungry and tired is not a good thing, you certainly won’t be breaking any personal bests. Always try to keep fruit or meal replacement powders or bars to hand should you ever not have time for a proper solid pre-workout meal.

If you are a regular coffee drinker then try and switch your coffee for a green tea which contains less caffeine but has lots more health benefits. Lastly, remember to keep taking on water, this is critical too. Ok bear those things in mind and you’ll be hitting the gym in peak mode for an awesome muscle stimulating workout which you will be able to grow from because you will have had the correct muscle building nutrition.

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Why Am I Not Getting Bigger?

‘Why am I not getting bigger?’ is one of the most often questions asked globally from bodybuilders. After all you are training hard, with good muscle building nutrition in your diet, yet your gains are still minimal. The sense of frustration after all of the months of effort is tremendous and can be really demotivating. So, what precisely is the answer? Well, there are a few likely causes, see if any of these ring a bell with you, together they show you how to build muscle:

1) Are you eating enough? Some hardgainers are really just undereaters. As this is a major reason for poor muscle growth. In bodybuilding the key to weight gain is eating, lots and often! Consuming food every two hours is a very useful guideline that will help you intake the required amount of calories. Make sure you snack lots on food such as: dried fruit and nuts, yoghurt, cottage cheese,  cereal and milk, protein bars, fresh fruit, and protein shakes, etc

2) Are you getting enough protein? To build muscle mass fast you should aim for 1.5 grams of protein for each pound of bodyweight per day. Great sources of protein include: chicken, fish, turkey as well as dairy products. You need the excess calories in order to grow so don’t be overly worried about purchasing the low fat type. Sure you need quality calories but make your life easier and eat everything, remember you can go through a cutting up stage in a few months time. making use of whey protein shakes is an excellent way to increase your protein intake, the larger tubs of course are normally better value of money.

3) Has your workout become unstimulating? If you can reel off your routine from the top of your head then that probably means you have been doing the same for thing for quite a while now. If you are not provoking your body to grow in new and different ways then it simply is not going to grow. How about varying things around using, super sets, drop sets, partials, negatives and so on. You may just try doing the same routine only backwards and se how that change works, how about doing 10 sets consisting of 10 reps for just one exercise like the benchpress (get ready to be sore!) or just give yourself a week off from training to allow your body to fully recover. There are endless variations that are possible make sure you use them.

4) Are you getting enough down time? Did you ever see anyone walk into a fitness centre workout and then come out having put on half a stone of muscle? Never. So, clearly your muscles don’t grow when your pumping iron, they grow when you are resting. You are limiting your muscle growth if you do not allow enough time for the muscle to recuperate. If anything you ought to be giving yourself too much time to grow rather than too little. Try dropping to working a muscle group just once a week. Also decreasing the amount of sets done for each body part, try just 3-5 intense sets per bodypart per workout. Think that is not enough, try it and watch the results!

5) Is your water intake high enough? If you don’t drink plenty of water then your progress won’t be as fast it should be. In order to grow, your muscles need copious amounts of water. Take a bottle of water with you, leave it in the car and always sip on it.

So the initial question: ‘Why am I not getting bigger?’as you now know has potentially many answers. Answer the list of question in this article and if you need to adjust something then start doing it today. The problem for your limited growth may well be the one point above that you do not meet. Change is required if more than one of these points is not being addressed by your bodybuilding lifestyle. Certainly there are a huge variety of reasons why you aren’t building muscle mass fast but they are the typical probelms. Now go pump some iron and start growing!

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Best Muscle Building Foods-Protein

The question on the minds of a lot of beginning weight lifters is are there foods that build muscle? There are certainty muscle building foods that will help you to gain lean muscle mass, get bigger and stronger. When you eat the right foods and train properly you will increase your overall muscle mass and strength. Remember you need more than food and supplements to get bigger. By not eating the right foods you can actually retard your muscle growth. By all means find out as much as you can about taking supplements, they can make or break a good workout and recovery period after wards.

Our body is a complex bio-organism and it must have the correct nutrients to work properly and at the correct times. By eating a diet primarily of processed foods and sweetened treats we are denying our bodies the good nutrition it needs to execute at it’s best. When your diet is comprised mainly of processed foods you’ll notice an increase in lethargy and obesity. To put it bluntly, garbage in garbage out. Stock your home with the muscle building foods that will make you look and feel like a winner.

Is Protein The Best Muscle Building Food?

Most of our muscular growth is due in part to our intake of protein. If you’re concerned with eating foods that build muscle then you need to be concerned with protein. Protein can be found in a number of various food groups including vegetables in the form of amino acids and should not be restricted to one or the other. It’s important to eat a big variety of protein sources because of the different degrees with which we absorb protein.

Protein Types

Meat is a good example of a muscle building food that is high in protein and has been the essential part of a body builders diet for a long time. Although a primary source of high quality muscle building protein consuming too much meat can have adverse effects on your body over the long term. This is why you need to deviate your source of protein. One ounce of meat contains roughly eight grams of protein.

Another example of a high quality protein source are eggs. Eat the eggs without the yolk to avoid the harmful long term effects of cholesterol. The egg has between six and eight grams of protein per egg

For more great ideas on muscle building foods and nutrition you will also want to visit Rocko’s site, you can see it here:Rocko’s Muscle Building Foods

Protein Supplements And Meals

Protein shakes should contain about 25 – 30 grams per serving and should be used to supplement a meal if necessary. It is best if you eat five to six small meals throughout the day rather than the accustomed three large meals. Eating these 6 smaller meals will actually burn more calories and provide your body with the necessary protein it needs during the day.

How Much Protein

It is generally felt that one gram of protein per one pound of body weight will be enough for the day. I believe it would be more accurate to calculate this at one gram of protein per one pound of lean muscle mass. Also be aware that our bodies can only assimilate roughly 25 to 35 grams of protein at any one time, the rest will just be wasted.

These are just a couple of the best muscle building foods and there are a lot more to choose from. The easiest way for you to know that you are getting the right muscle building foods in your diet and doing the right workout routines is to find a program that provides both of these and will help to take the guess work out of your weight lifting program.

I hope you liked this article on muscle building foods, I also have a review of a high quality product you might want to take a look at here:No Nonsense Muscle Building Review

 

 

 

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