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| Photo credit to ironmagazine.com |
Welcome to Blog #2!
This time I want to write a little bit about macronutrients. To explain, macronutrients are in general, the way we can explain the break up of our food. In this blog, I’ll discuss PROTEIN and CARBOHYDRATE, and how much of each you should eat for healthy MUSCLE GAIN.
Let me start by saying that I am NOT a dietician or nutritionist. All the information that I provide is either something that I have learnt from other strength coaches and personal trainers (through courses and reading their books and websites), or things that I have found has worked for my clients and I.
What you eat will play a huge role in how much muscle you’ll be able to build. By following these simple guidelines you’ll soon find that you’ll be eating a lot. The amount of times that I’ve spoken with people at the gym who tell me they “eat heaps”, but still struggle to put on any muscle would be endless. In most of these cases I’ll ask a few questions and find out that this guy “train’s like a bodybuilder, but eats like a ballerina”. For those of you reading this who think “but I can’t eat that much, my tummy is too small”, you should probably just close this window, go back to drinking your soy latte, and doing tricep kickbacks in the gym, as this might be a little out of your league (but thanks for clicking on the link).
Protein
Let’s start with everyone’s favorite macro. In my opinion, this is generally the one that people over-eat.
Current guidelines on this topic vary. I’ve seen and heard people recommend anywhere from 1.2-3.5 gram of protein, per kilogram of bodyweight per day.
In my experience, I’d go with 1.4-1.6g/kg per day (e.g. about 145g of protein per day for a 90kg male)
The human body can only utilize a certain amount of protein to form muscle (around 25g at a time). So if your running on 3g of protein/kg/day, think about how many meals you’d have to be breaking that up into, to stay at the 25-30g per meal mark! Anything that isn’t used to build muscle, or fuel the body, will then be transported to our fat stores.
I know a lot of guys will be reluctant to move away from Flex magazines recommend 3g per kg guidelines, but just give this a try. Remember that these magazines make a lot of money on advertising, and what do they advertise the most?? That’s right genius….. Protein supplements! Don’t you think it would be in their best interests to recommend more?
CarbohydrateThere has been a huge trend in the industry, with people moving away from carbohydrate consumption. Carbs are the optimal fuel for our bodies. This means that our bodies find it very easy to break down carbs into energy, and use them to power through everyday tasks, including your workouts! It’s generally the types of carbohydrate that people eat that cause them to gain unnecessary amounts of fat. Stick as close to nature as you can, and aim to keep your choices as minimally refined as possible. Eat lots of VEGETABLES, and when eating starchy carbohydrate, stick to the WHOLEGRAIN alternatives.
When eating for muscle hypertrophy I usually recommend the following:
4g of carbohydrate, per kilogram of bodyweight, per day (e.g. around 360g of carbs per day for a 90kg male)
Before all of you shout me down on this I will say one thing. Play around with it. If you’re scared of eating that much carbs, start small and slowly increase the amounts. You can even get into it further and time your carb intake around workouts, or reduce the amounts eaten later in the day. It’s totally up to you.
One last thing on carbs. I hate to be the barer of bad news, but if you want to gain muscle, you’re going to gain a little fat. Man up, and get over it! Just don’t over do it. If you find yourself adding a few notches to the belt, you’ve gone too far!!
Quick word on Fat
I’m not going to put together a total fat daily recommendation, but make sure you are still getting this in your diet.
Aim to eat lots of avocado, olives and olive oils, raw mixed nuts and things like that.
Limit your saturated fats, and stay right away from processed trans and hydrogenated fats.
Like I said, play around with these amounts. Put yourself together a few example days, and see how much you’ll need to be eating. Give it a try! I’d love to hear how things go for anyone who gives this a go!
On a side note, this will be my last post for a couple weeks. Heading off for a holiday and don't really plan on writing up any blogs while I'm there.
EVERYBODY CHEER FOR FITNESS!!
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