Nutrition
I have many aquaintances who spend a lot of their time in gyms. Constantly pumping heavy weights, constantly running on the treadmill, or rowing for hours at a time. I admire them for their dedication and I've seen results first hand. However, I also know that many of the gains they have had are in spite of a good nutritious diet rather than as a result of one.
People so often overlook the importance of nutrition as part of an exercise regime and healthy lifestyle. For many exercise goals such as weight loss, or muscle building, nutrition is as important as the exercise itself! So why do people fall down on such an important part of exercise?
Eat Small - Eating to Lose Weight
There are 2 schools of thought for your average Joe looking to loose weight. First is that the less you eat the more weight you lose and second is the more exercise you do, the less you have to worry about what you eat. Very few people give nutrition it’s due credit and the truth is that the human body is far more intricate than that but nutrition really isn’t.
Let’s look at both of the myths from above and try to clarify them somewhat.
MYTH 1: The less you eat the more weight you lose.
Crash diets do not work. As a woman you need about 2000 calories a day and a man will need 2500 approximately. If you starve your body of the calories it need to survive with all guns blazing then you’re forcing your body to react to the situation. It’s a negative situation so you can expect and equally negative reaction. When you body realises you are starving it of the nutrients it craves, it will start to store fat as a survival mechanism. Therefore instead of losing weight you will be storing fat. You won’t be able to sustain the crash diet and when you start eating normally again, your body will be afraid you will enter back into starvation mode so it will store even more fat. And of course your metabolism will slow down if it’s not being forced to work every few hours so when you start eating normally again, it will be even more difficult to lose weight by exercising and dieting healthily.
The truth is the more often you eat, the more easily you will find it to lose weight. Click here for more.
MYTH 2: The more exercise you do, the less you have to worry about what you eat.
Exercising does not give you free reign to eat what you like. Ever. Some sports people are very lucky to be able to eat what they like because of the sheer amount of energy they burn daily but very few serious sports people would choose to live this way. 1 pound of fat is the equivalent of 3500 calories. If you manage to burn this amount of calories in the gym then eating junk food or sustaining a diet that is high in saturated fat is just undoing the good work you’ve done in the gym and you will find it difficult to shift the weight. If you are exercising in an attempt to lose weight you need to stick to 2000-2500 calories per day for women and men respectively in order to lose weight. You may want to drop 300-500 calories from you’re regular diet as this will also help and finally, you’re cardio work should see you training in a heart rate zone between 50% - 60% of your maximum heart rate.
The easiest way to find you target heart rate training zone is:
220 – your age = HR
HR x 0.60 = Target Heart Rate (THR)
Let’s look at both of the myths from above and try to clarify them somewhat.
MYTH 1: The less you eat the more weight you lose.
Crash diets do not work. As a woman you need about 2000 calories a day and a man will need 2500 approximately. If you starve your body of the calories it need to survive with all guns blazing then you’re forcing your body to react to the situation. It’s a negative situation so you can expect and equally negative reaction. When you body realises you are starving it of the nutrients it craves, it will start to store fat as a survival mechanism. Therefore instead of losing weight you will be storing fat. You won’t be able to sustain the crash diet and when you start eating normally again, your body will be afraid you will enter back into starvation mode so it will store even more fat. And of course your metabolism will slow down if it’s not being forced to work every few hours so when you start eating normally again, it will be even more difficult to lose weight by exercising and dieting healthily.
The truth is the more often you eat, the more easily you will find it to lose weight. Click here for more.
MYTH 2: The more exercise you do, the less you have to worry about what you eat.
Exercising does not give you free reign to eat what you like. Ever. Some sports people are very lucky to be able to eat what they like because of the sheer amount of energy they burn daily but very few serious sports people would choose to live this way. 1 pound of fat is the equivalent of 3500 calories. If you manage to burn this amount of calories in the gym then eating junk food or sustaining a diet that is high in saturated fat is just undoing the good work you’ve done in the gym and you will find it difficult to shift the weight. If you are exercising in an attempt to lose weight you need to stick to 2000-2500 calories per day for women and men respectively in order to lose weight. You may want to drop 300-500 calories from you’re regular diet as this will also help and finally, you’re cardio work should see you training in a heart rate zone between 50% - 60% of your maximum heart rate.
The easiest way to find you target heart rate training zone is:
220 – your age = HR
HR x 0.60 = Target Heart Rate (THR)
Eat Big - Eating to Gain Muscle
Eating to gain muscle is difficult especially if you are what is referred to as a hard gainer in bodybuilding. First things first, unless you are instructed by your personal trainer to take a mass gainer supplement, then stay away from these. Most people do not enough cardio work when they are weight training and as a result, the weight will just pile on if they use a mass gainer.
Muscle needs protein and rest to develop. As long as you stick to this simple rule then you are well on your way to growing your proportions.
Protein is important for muscle growth as muscle is essentially made up of proteins and need to absorb protein after a hard workout to promote recovery and growth. You should get the bulk of your protein requirements from food and any excess requirements should be made up using high quality whey protein.
Sources of protein include fish, chicken, lean red meet, milk, cheese, nuts. As such your diet on a muscle building program should draw from this list heavily. To keep your metabolism burning all day long and to provide a constant flow of protein, you need to eat 6 small meals a day and are allowed to up your regular intake of 2500 calories per day as long as it not made up of mostly fat.
Rest is essential in muscle building as muscle is NOT built at the gym. Muscle growth occurs when the muscle tissue damage caused during weight training is repaired and comes back stronger. Therefore muscle is built while we are resting. This is why you may have heard of split routines. Split routines are when different muscle groups are trained on different days so that each muscle group has appropriate recovery. You may operate a 3 day split where Back and Shoulders and Biceps are on Monday, Chest and triceps on a Wednesday and Legs and Abs on a Friday. Some people will break it down to a 5 day split working fewer muscles each day and there are many other ways to sequence your program to avoid overstressing individual muscle groups. This is known as the principle of Placement and is one of the major principles of training. It must be referred to when planning a muscle building (hypertrophy) program.
Muscle needs protein and rest to develop. As long as you stick to this simple rule then you are well on your way to growing your proportions.
Protein is important for muscle growth as muscle is essentially made up of proteins and need to absorb protein after a hard workout to promote recovery and growth. You should get the bulk of your protein requirements from food and any excess requirements should be made up using high quality whey protein.
Sources of protein include fish, chicken, lean red meet, milk, cheese, nuts. As such your diet on a muscle building program should draw from this list heavily. To keep your metabolism burning all day long and to provide a constant flow of protein, you need to eat 6 small meals a day and are allowed to up your regular intake of 2500 calories per day as long as it not made up of mostly fat.
Rest is essential in muscle building as muscle is NOT built at the gym. Muscle growth occurs when the muscle tissue damage caused during weight training is repaired and comes back stronger. Therefore muscle is built while we are resting. This is why you may have heard of split routines. Split routines are when different muscle groups are trained on different days so that each muscle group has appropriate recovery. You may operate a 3 day split where Back and Shoulders and Biceps are on Monday, Chest and triceps on a Wednesday and Legs and Abs on a Friday. Some people will break it down to a 5 day split working fewer muscles each day and there are many other ways to sequence your program to avoid overstressing individual muscle groups. This is known as the principle of Placement and is one of the major principles of training. It must be referred to when planning a muscle building (hypertrophy) program.
