Bodybuilding Nutrition Principles – Stop Megadosing

The fifth of our bodybuilding nutrition principles encourages you to stop megadosing. It is a misconception amongst bodybuilders that nothing succeeds like excess.   Meaning that if something is good for you, then twice as much is even better, and that too much is never enough.  This is a motto which is prevalent in bodybuilding and strength training, and this is particularly the case when the subjects of protein and supplements are mentioned.

It is for this reason that bodybuilders and strength trainers tend to megadose on supplements and foods in the mistaken belief that the more they eat and take, the more muscle they will build.  However, nothing could be further removed form the truth.  You require a certain and specific amount of nutrients for muscle building based on your individual needs.  If you eat more than you need it will just turn into unsightly fat.  If you megadose on bodybuilding supplements, the extra will only be excreted or at worst, can be toxic to your body.

Later in this series we’ll look at this subject in more detail and provide guidelines to help you calculate exactly how much protein and other supplements you need to consume in order to build lean muscle.

Bodybuilding Nutrition Principles – Eat Frequent Meals

The fourth of our bodybuilding nutrition principles encourages you to eat frequent meals. If your aim is to achieve a superb shape and obtain maximum performance, then you should forgo the usual three square meals a day approach to your diet.  Athletes, including bodybuilders and strength trainers, need to fuel themselves throughout the day and that means frequent small meals and snacks every two or three hours.

There are numerous studies which have been carried out into the benefits of eating small, frequent meals and snacks.  It has been shown that thermogenesis, the production of  heat by the body as it digests and absorbs food, increases by eating multiple meals a day – four or more. During the process of thermogenesis, metabolism steps up and your body will process nutrients more efficiently.  Eating more frequent meals will also serve to improve fat burning, improve the body’s use of protein, preserve lean muscle and reduce the appetite.  A further advantage of eating multiple meals is in mental performance. By eating regular, timed meals they will help you to think and process information more effectively, and will aid in increasing your attention span and help to boost your mood.

The questions therefore to ask yourself are what should you eat and when is the best time to eat it? The best advice is to time your meals around your workout routine.  It has been proven that exercise and food intake work in concert to build lean muscle, and this is what you as an athlete and bodybuilder are aiming for.

Bodybuilding Nutrition Principles – Consume Enough Calories

The third of our bodybuilding nutrition principles encourages you to consume enough calories. To feel energized enough to complete your workout, you will be required to eat the right amount of calories.  A lack of calories will assuredly make you feel like a limp piece of lettuce by the end of your workout routine.

It is a proven fact that less than 1600 calories a day will not contain all the vitamins and minerals that you will require in order to maintain a healthy body, prevent disease and perform well in your chosen sport, or for that matter your daily living.  A very low calorie diet, continued for a period of two weeks, can have a very serious effect on your health.  They will not provide you with the Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI) of enough of the nutrients needed for good health.

The Recommended Daily Allowances (RDA) were the national standard for the correct amounts of carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and vitamins and minerals that we need in our diets in order to maintain health and growth and to avoid certain deficiency diseases.  In recent years the Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI), were set up to bring the RDAs up to date and are based of more functional criteria.  Under certain conditions, for example, stress, illness, malnutrition and exercise, we may require a higher intake of certain types of nutrients. Many studies have shown that athletes in particular need to increase their uptake of DRIs during these times.

Of course how much you need will depend on a number of factors including your age, sex, how hard you train and whether or not you train competitively or recreationally.  It is found that bodybuilders and strength trainers are required to eat more carbohydrates and may also need to take some form of supplements with antioxidants and certain minerals.  If your aim is to gain muscle and lose body fat, then you should ensure that you eat enough calories and take in enough nutrients, and you will find that by doing so it will make the difference between succeeding and failing.

Bodybuilding Nutrition Principles – Eat Enough Carbohydrates

The second of our bodybuilding nutrition principles encourages you to eat enough carbohydrates. Generally not enough of the primary food fuel – carbohydrates - is eaten by many athletes, including bodybuilders and strength trainers.  In the majority of athletes’ diets, only half of their daily total intake of calories come from carbohydrates, when in fact 7 to 9 grams per kilogram of body weight daily should be consumed as carbohydrates.

This may be because a lot of bodybuilders are under the impression that a low carbohydrate diet promotes faster weight loss.  The main problem with these diets is that they cause a depletion of glycogen, the body’s way of storing carbohydrates.  Once the glycogen supply is depleted the body starts to use up protein from tissues, including muscle tissues, to meet its demand for energy.  The result is that you will lose hard earned muscle.

Many fitness minded people and athletes steer clear of carbohydrates, particularly bread and pastas, as they believe that these foods will make them fat.  This belief is the main reason why there is an unbalanced proportion of carbohydrate, fat and whey protein in bodybuilding training diets, which in general are much too high in protein.  The truth is that carbohydrates are probably the most important nutrient for losing fat and helping to build muscle.

We’ll look at the role of carbohydrates in building muscle later in our series looking at bodybuilding nutrition principles.

Bodybuilding Nutrition Principles – Vary Your Diet

The first of our bodybuilding nutrition principles encourages you to vary your diet. Many people who are concerned about their physical appearance and are interested in improving their physique and strength training performance, are quite prepared to do anything which might help them to achieve success in this field.  However, the advice given to strength trainers and bodybuilders is often misleading if not completely wrong.

There are several bodybuilding nutrition principles which those athletes interested in looking after their bodies, and which will enable them to reach the pinnacle of their chosen sport, should follow.  These include: varying your diet, following a high energy diet, consuming enough calories, timing your food and nutrients and stopping megadosing.   If you follow these basic principles then it is quite possible that you will achieve the physique that you have always wanted and even help you to attain the top of your chosen field.

It is very likely that you have looked in a magazine and have admired the picture of the strapping young person staring back at you.  They are very muscular, well defined and, in as far as you can see, near to perfection proportion wise.

However, in truth what you are looking at may not be the picture of health that you think.  A lot of bodybuilders and strength trainers consume a lot of calories which contain a lot of fat.  If this type of diet is maintained habitually for a period of time, such an enormous amount of fat intake will lead to health problems in the future, specifically heart problems.  The majority of diets which bodybuilders adhere to are boring, with them eating the same types of food day after day.  The result of this is that the diet lacks variety  and if this is missing it therefore follows that a lot of nutrients essential for peak health are missing also.

In general bodybuilders and strength trainers do not eat a lot of fruit, dairy products or red meat.  If they don’t eat fruit they are missing out on disease fighting, health building antioxidants.  If they leave out diary products they are missing out on calcium which helps to build strong bones.  Red meat is a vital source of mineral such as zinc and iron.  When such foods are left out of a diet, then the result is a potentially serious deficiency.

This is most prevalent in pre-competition season diets where bodybuilders believe that they must restrict their diets in order to achieve the best muscle definition.  Many studies have shown that the worst deficiencies are in the amounts of calcium and zinc in the body, and this is more so in female bodybuilders. A serious deficiency of calcium could lead to the development of osteoporosis in later life for many of these women. The good news however is that foods containing these nutrients should be added back into the diet in the form of skimmed milk and dark poultry meat.  This should help to alleviate some of the problems.

A further nutritional problem for strength trainers and bodybuilders is that of fluid restriction.  In general, many bodybuilders compete in a state of near dehydration.  They restrict the level of water in their bodies in the belief that it will inflate their physiques to the point of blurring any muscular definition.  Some even take laxatives and diuretics to assist in this process.  This only helps to flush more water out of the system, but it then takes with it an important mineral called electrolytes.  In competitions it has been known for bodybuilders to pass out because they are in such a dehydrated state.

It is often the case that many bodybuilders and strength trainers go mad at the end of a competition season when it comes to their food intake.  They gorge on all the foods that they have restricted from their diet.  If this is done habitually, it too can have serious consequences and can lead to extra fat pounds being added on.  It should be noted however, that the majority of bodybuilders do get some things right when it comes to their diet, specifically during the training season,  They will eat several meals throughout the day, rather than a lot at one given time,  This is a practice that many nutritionists would like to see replicated in the general public.

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