To Perfect Body

Learn how to plan your diet and nutrition for your fitness goals. Nutrition for muscle building, fat loss and health.



Emphasize The Negative

  Muscle growth is the logical byproduct of muscle contraction. Much emphasis is placed on the concentric phase of a lift where the muscle shortens as it contracts. But the stretching of the muscle during the eccentric, or negative, phase where the muscle lengthens while maintaining tension can directly cause muscle hypertrophy, too. Emphasizing the negative is an easy technique to overload muscles and promote radical gains in mass.

Set Short Term Goals

  Short term goals are important for developing a solid muscle building program. By setting short term goals, you will have the framework to follow so you can make small changes in your daily routine which will develop into healthy habits to last a lifetime. Focus on a weekly goal of gaining 1-2 pounds lean mass. This is the healthiest amount of weight gain per week and is the correct level to make sure you're not packing on body fat. To reach this 1 pound weight gain per week, focus on creating a 500 calorie surplus in your overall calories every day.

Learn how to plan your diet and nutrition for your fitness goals. Nutrition for muscle building, fat loss and health.

Eat Plenty of Carbohydrates

  Carbohydrates are needed to fuel your body during exercise. The storage form of carbohydrates is glycogen. The idea here is to super saturate glycogen levels so that the body never has to dip into protein for energy production.
  The higher the level of carbs in the body, the more likely you are going to remain in an anabolic environment. Carbs also play a role in the release of insulin. Insulin is the body's most potent anabolic hormone. It promotes gluconeogenesis, protein synthesis, and the formation of adipocytes. In short, the release of insulin is required to promote an anabolic environment and carbs help by releasing insulin.

Learn how to plan your diet and nutrition for your fitness goals. Nutrition for muscle building, fat loss and health.


Rest for Muscle Growth

  One of the best pieces of exercise advice is to understand that your muscles grow when you’re resting not
training. That's right; you don't actually get bigger and stronger when you're in the gym. It's what you do after your
workout that's the real key to muscle growth. If you don't let your muscles recover correctly, you're body will
become over trained and it will be in a state of constant "catch up". This is far from the ideal state that you want
your body in. What you want is to truly prime your body for your next workout and give it enough rest and
recuperation to fully optimize your training. The worst thing you can do is not help your body recover. This will lead to muscle atrophy (breaking down muscle) and you may experience the flu because of this. Take care of business and start your recuperation. When you get back from your workout, you might also try sitting in an ice tub or sauna to really relax and let your muscles recover. Rest is extremely important when training hard, so make sure to take the time to recover and grow from your training sessions.

  If you have been trying to gain muscle for any length of time, you have probably figured out that training is only half of the equation. To gain quality muscular weight, you must take in more calories than you burn, with a significant portion of them coming from protein. This large food intake can be a huge drain on your wallet, especially when you already have monthly gym and other team related expenses. Here are 10, nutrient-dense, muscle-building foods that will help you get the protein and calories you need without breaking the bank.


1. Eggs
  With 5-6 grams of both protein and fat in each little egg, and with prices as low as a dollar per dozen in some grocery stores, this is a muscle building food that cannot be beat. If you're in serious need of calories to grow, you would do well to eat the whole egg. The yolk contains healthy mono- and polyunsaturated fats, half of the egg's protein, and several essential amino acids and vitamins that you will not find in the white.

Learn how to plan your diet and nutrition for your fitness goals. Nutrition for muscle building, fat loss and health.

Stimulate your appetite for breakfast

  In the morning drink a small glass of orange or grapefruit juice. Cold appetizers such as refrigerated hard boiled eggs, celery, fruit and vegetables can also increase appetite. Deficiencies in B-vitamins are also causes of low appetite. Take a multi-vitamin in capsule or liquid form, tablets tend to not get broken down as well and much of the vitamin is wasted. Herbs such as Gentian root, Fennel seeds, Cardammon, Muira Puama and Rhodiola rosea also stimulate hunger.

  There is no shortage of exercises out there. But that doesn’t mean they’re all effective for building mass.
You can’t expect to go into a gym, start lifting random weights, and get bigger. (I found this out the hard way.)

  There are certain exercises that are “the cream of the crop” when it comes to putting on slabs of muscle mass in the shortest time possible. And there are others that are a complete waste of time.