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Posts Tagged ‘diet’

Muscle Building Nutrition Q&A – Part 4

Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
Ok, so we’ve established answers to the following questions in the first three parts of this series so far:
1. Would I have to do a bulk?
2. How long would I bulk for?

Alright, how about some practical steps? We’re not going to get into the training aspect of this right now as it’s a rather varied topic, so we’ll just keep the focus on nutrition – which really is what will be the final determinant of gains. By that I mean, I don’t care how hard you’re training, if you’re not eating enough to support muscle growth, you’re not going to be gaining size. Period. (exception to the rule – newbies and those new to ‘effective training’)

To go back to another point made in one of the previous posts – expect to gain at least some bodyfat. If you expect to stay lean, expect to stay the same. I’ll give you a few case examples:

1. I was emailing back and forth with a client prospect who has been solely focused on muscle gain for many, many months. She works with another trainer. In our communications, she ended up sending me her pre- and current ‘bulking’ pictures for review. First thing I noticed? Nothing. Literally, I couldn’t tell a difference at all. I asked her what the difference in weight was. The answer? One pound. I believe this was over the course of about nine months. ONE POUND. Now, it’d be great if there was some massive recompositioning here but there wasn’t – no visible changes. I questioned her on this and she said her trainer wants to her stay lean while gaining size.

The results show how effective that strategy is.

2. A client of my own who I worked with for a little over a year. We did a few cut/bulk cycles and yes she gained some body fat during the bulks. But she had a great mindset for all of it (vital necessity in my opinion) and had the big picture in front of her the whole time. The numbers will make my point for me.

November 19/07

Weight – 110 lbs

Waist – 30 1/4

Hips – 33 3/4

Thighs – 17

Chest – 31 1/2

Arms – 9 1/2

Calf – 10 1/2

Contrast that to her final biweekly:

September 16/08

Weight – 109.4 lbs

Waist – 24 1/4

Hips – 33 1/4

Thighs – 17 3/4

Chest – 32 1/4

Arms – 10

Calf – 11

The most glaring point there is that she weighs basically the same as her starting weight – but her waist is 6 inches smaller. Now that’s a recomp.

A successful bulk is obviously determined by the results gained – hopefully you’ve added some muscle and not too much fat. It’s fine to gain, gain, gain, but if you end up the same bodyweight and the same bodyfat – basically you look the same as you did pre-bulk – it doesn’t seem like you did very well. Now if you end up the same bodyweight, but you’re even leaner (see Case #2 above) then you definitely had a successful run. Gaining 20lbs only to lose 20lbs and look no different – that’s not a good bulk.

How much do I need to eat?

Enough!

You need to definitely have more energy coming in than going out. Again, insufficient food intake = no gains. Look around the gym – most people there are trying to gain some muscle, get stronger, etc. Are they? They appear to be working pretty hard and yet, a year from now, chances are they’ll look no different. Something isn’t working. Could it be what they’re doing/eating outside of the gym? Could it be that they train hard for 45 minutes (trying to build muscle?) and then they hop on the elliptical for 30 minutes PWO (trying to get the cuts?). It doesn’t work.

So how much food? I generally recommend that you start at an assumed maintenance intake. I say assumed because all of the predictive equations are just estimates. They’re not going to necessarily be 100% accurate, but it’s a starting place for us. If you’re not coming off a hard diet, around 15x total bodyweight is a good ball part. Pay attention to results though – if you’re gaining (beyond water and glycogen) then clearly this is not maintenance. If you’re coming off a hard diet, start a bit lower as metabolism will be slightly depressed. Stay there for two weeks and reassess. Did the scale go up? Go down? Stay the same? Adjust accordingly. Assuming you were at maintenance, start adding calories. Again, we’re trying to avoid getting too sloppy so take it easy and just systematically raise them. Start at 10% above maintenance, stay there for a bit, and reassess. What’s happening? Nothing? Add another 10%. You basically continue to add calories until you start to see an upward trend on the scale, but not so quickly upward that it’s clear (in the context of expected rates of muscle gain) that you’re gaining too much fat per given pound of weight gain. If you are gaining too much fat, scale the calories back a bit. It’s all about a simple outcome based approach. Base your adjustments on your results.

Erik Ledin
www.leanbodiesconsulting.com
 

 

 

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Low Carb Diets vs. Low Fat Diets

Monday, April 20th, 2009

Let the debate between low carb and low fat diets end – science has determined the winner! In a four-month study conducted at the University of Cincinnati, 50 obese test subjects were divided into two calorie-restricted groups: 1) low carb and 2) low fat. The low-carb dieters followed an average protein/carb/fat ratio of 28/15/57 for the first two months and a ratio of 24/24/52 for the last two months. While subjects following the low fat diet had a macronutrient ratio of 18/53/29 for the first two months and 20/48/32 for last two.

What’s important note is that there was no significant difference in total calorie intake between each group. In spite of this, the difference in macronutrient breakdown showed a significant difference in overall weight loss and body fat reduction. By the end of testing, results showed that the low-carb subjects lost more body weight (21.6 vs. 13.5 pounds) and fat (13.7 vs. 7.1 pounds) than those following a low-fat diet!

J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2005 Mar; 90(3):1475-82.

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Muscle Building Nutrition Q&A – Part 1

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

I get asked a variety of muscle-building/bulking-type questions a lot, so I thought I’d just cut and paste a common question and answer it here. My opinions here would not be gender specific and apply both to males and females.

Q: Would I have to do a bulk and how long would I bulk for?

A: Ok, just to put some context to the term “bulk” here, it simply means eating at a caloric intake that is above your assumed maintenance calorie requirements for an extended period of time – with the obvious goals of adding some size and strength to your physique. It is not an excuse to get fat or sloppy.

To address the first question – would you have to do a “bulk?” This is entirely dependent on three primary things:

  • What do you look like now relative to what your goal physique generally looks like? For some, it will be obvious that yes, you definitely need more muscle if you’re going to hope to be competitive. Developing a great physique isn’t just about fat loss. Males or females with great physiques are well-developed with strategically emphasized muscle groups, in addition to carrying low levels of body fat… and yes, the developmental aspect takes time.
  • Do you want more muscle? What are your own goals and preferences for your physique? Some people like the idea of being more muscular than they are now; some people don’t. It comes down to your goals first and foremost. Only you can determine if you want more muscle.
  • Are you willing to gain a least some body fat? Or, are you presently lean enough right now that you can stand to gain a little body fat and not lose your mind?

To the issue of how long, the short answer is it depends. But that’s about as helpful as well, not answering the questions at all. I’ll be back to answer that question next.

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Whey & Casein Combo Increases Lean Body Mass

Thursday, February 12th, 2009

Whey and casein are proteins both derived from milk. While each type of protein offers a different amino acid profile, they’re also digested at different rates in the body. Whey is digested fast, while casein takes a lot longer, and therefore, considered a slow-digesting protein. Research has shown that whey can spike protein synthesis (muscle building), but only for a short time. On the other hand, casein has been shown to inhibit protein degradation (muscle breakdown) over a long period of time. This has led many bodybuilders to combine the two for better results in muscle growth – a practice that recent research also supports.

In a 10-week study conducted at Baylor University, researchers split 36 males randomly into 3 groups, who were given a different supplement prior to weight training. Group 1 received a placebo; Group 2 consumed 40 g of whey and 8 g of casein; while Group 3 ingested 40 g of whey, 3 g of branch chain amino acids and 5 g of glutamine. The results showed that Group 2 had the greatest increase in fat-free mass.

J Strength Cond Res. 2006 Aug; 20(3):643-53

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Nutritional Discipline

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

As odd as it sounds – you shouldn’t trust your gut when sticking to a meal plan. No matter how strict you may think you’re being, nothing keeps you as honest as sticking to a nutrition journal. A daily account of not only what you plan to take in, but what you actually did take in is one of the best ways to stay on track. Not only will you have the ability to plan your meals ahead of time, it is an easier way for you to track calories, proteins and carbs in advance. Just like keeping a journal of training, with a solid record of your diet you can retrace your steps to see where you went right and where you went wrong. Then from there you can make the necessary tweaks to take your progress even further.

Don’t want to carry a big fat notebook around with you? No problem, now there are no excuses when your cell phone or your PDA both have calendar functions that can be synched to your online schedule. Plan out your six meals a day in advance and you’ll have access to them at any time. You can even set alarms to keep you on track during busy times at work. The key to success is to be honest with yourself; if you know that you need a snack after every workout, write it down. It’s tougher to cheat if everything is accounted. It will make it easier for you to be disciplined and it will make your shopping list that much more accurate.

Got a few tips about sticking to the meal plan? I’d like to hear them. Just post them up in the comments section.

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Your Nutrition Must Support Your Goals – Part 2

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

If you’re seriously after optimal progress in either direction – fat loss or muscle gains – you’ll do far, far better if your nutrition supports those goals. If you’re chasing fat loss, again, you need to be eating in a deficit (we’ll go into more specifics on how to set up a fat-loss diet shortly). If you want to pack on some beef, you really need to be eating a lot.

There’s an old saying that says if you’re not growing, you’re not eating enough and honestly, for the most part, it’s true. The biggest reason more people don’t get bigger and stronger is that they simply do not have enough calories/energy coming in to 1) sustain them, and 2) support the growth and maintenance of new muscle tissue.

So let’s say you want to get in shape for the NxLabs Hardcore Bodybuilding Challenge and need the full six months to transform your physique and reach your goals. I suggest you take a look at yourself, do a hard assessment and determine what you need to do first. With 24 weeks, you have the time to split up those weeks into different sub-goals to reach your overall goal. Maybe you start out trying to add some size, while minimizing fat gains and then you transition into trying to get ripped while maintaining some of the newly earned muscle. Or maybe you have a lot of fat to lose in which case you want to jump right into a fat-loss program. Maybe you’re in desperate need of more muscle. Regardless, the bottom line is that your training, your cardio, what you do in the gym, while important, is going to end up being secondary to ensuring that your nutrition supports your physique goals.

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How To Keep Diet Discipline During The Holidays

Tuesday, December 23rd, 2008

You know those cheesy Public Service announcements about peer pressure you had to sit through in school? The same drills designed to keep you from being cool can now pay off during parties. Face it, our culture today makes food a reason to celebrate, not a source of fuel. But if you’re serious about making physical gains, then a long weekend should be a welcome time off work – not your diet. The harder you diet, the more it seems those around you will want to kill you with kindness. I don’t know how many times I’ve had someone try to cajole me into “just one little piece of Pizza” while I’ve been contest dieting. They don’t get it and they won’t get it, so it’s up to you to stay strong.

One crucial detail to remember is that one day of indulgence could very well derail the train of progress you’ve been working so hard to keep rolling . Oftentimes a welcome and sometimes needed cheat-day doesn’t come during a long, holiday weekend. You control your destiny and should schedule that day as a reward for weeks of strict diet. If you can schedule for a holiday then even better. You cannot, in fact, ruin months of training and diet with one day of bad behavior. Sometimes it can help to rev up your metabolism and restart the fat-burning machine.

Holiday Survival Tips:

  1. When in doubt, abstain. If you think you just can’t stay disciplined on that July long weekend or Thanksgiving at Grandma’s – stay home. Don’t put yourself in the path of temptation. All that food will be there when you finish the competition. Last time I checked there wasn’t a shortage of the lips and buttholes that go into a foot long.
  2. Focus on what you can eat, not what you can’t. Most friends and relatives, no matter how much they might joke, will respect your restraint. You’re not rubbing their faces in it, you’re making a choice for your body.
  3. Find alternatives. Lean turkey is still a great source of protein, but do not trust your family’s cooking when it comes to side dishes. The potatoes are loaded with butter, the cranberries are pure sugar and the desserts are still desserts. Fill up on what you can eat and deflect the conversation back to others. No-Sugar Jello, pickles and salads have gotten me through many a diet pitfall.
  4. If you’re going to drink – DON’T. Alcohol is the silent diet killer. Talk about empty calories. While even Vodka is a lower calorie alternative than beer– one little shot is still over 80 calories. Hardly worth sabotaging the chance at a title.

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