Starting Out with Training and Diets

When you’re just starting out with training and bodybuilding, there are many different criteria that will determine how well you do and at what pace you can achieve the kind of body that you dream about having. Naturally the exercise and workout routines that will build and shape your body are highly important to you, but of equal importance is the way you feed your body and its muscles to get the best from them.

In other words, your diet is equally important as a part of your overall fitness program. Here we’ll take a general look at some of the nutrition and diet that are needed for body mass gainand body building plus cutting to reveal lean muscle and improving endurance. We’ll also look at how diet affects the training programs of men and women.

Body Mass Gain and Bodybuilding

You need to approach the process of gaining body mass and body building from two sides. First, you must train with weights and second, you must eat a diet that will feed your muscles while you train. Doing both these things is essential if you want your muscle mass to increase, which is the only kind of weight gain that you should be aiming for.
It is recommended that you choose what you would consider heavy weights to train with, where you can only manage four to eight reps with. If you can do more, then the weights are too light and you must increase them. Using heavy weights for low reps puts more stress on the muscles you are working on, which in turn causes faster muscle growth.
To feed your muscles while you continue your workout program and gain muscle bulk, your diet must contain more calories than your muscles can burn off. If it does not, then you will not gain the mass you need. To do this entails eating more often, preferably six meals per day and each meal must include lots of protein rich foods. That means no processed or junk food at all. Only good quality fresh foods are acceptable. Protein is essential for your muscles to repair and grow after your workouts.
The top protein rich foods for bodybuilders who want to build muscle mass specifically include eggs, lean chicken breast, lean beef, tuna steaks, whey and soy protein isolate These foods in particular contain all the amino acidsthat your body needs top repair and build muscle.

Building Lean Muscle

To cut lean muscle, you need to stick with a high protein, low carbohydrates diet and workout often and with heavy weights. This is similar to the process you would go through in order to build muscle bulk or mass. You are essentially working out to burn off all excess fat and build lean muscle at the same time. It is the display of lean, cut muscle that bodybuilders in exhibitions and competitions are able to show off and they do it by this method.

The diet involved in producing the leanest muscle is again one high in protein. This is because not only does protein rich food help to build and repair muscle fibres, it also boosts the metabolism, which in turn allows your body to make more efficient use of the foods it digests. Protein also slows your digestion rate as the protein in your food is assimilated more completely, which has the knock on effect of decreasing hunger. This means you will feel less like eating, although you must if you want to keep building muscle mass.

Endurance

Endurance is a move away from pure muscle mass building and general bodybuilding and requires a slightly different set of rules when it comes to training. While it is still important to have a high protein intake, the diet of someone entering into an endurance fitness program also needs to contain low levels of carbohydrates that the body is able to use as instant energy and is expended during the intended event. The workout is also slightly different in that you would combine many different exercises and weight training routines to both build muscle mass as well as promote stamina.

A diet that contains very low levels of carbohydrates may include small amounts of whole grains, cereals, nuts and pulses as these are the best, low fat sources.

Another important factor to any training, bodybuilding or muscle building program is getting plenty of sleep. This may at first seem to be contradictory, but during sleep you body is allowed the time it needs to repair the muscle fibres damaged during training and build new muscle cells and fibres.

Men and Women

Choosing the right diet to complement the exercise routine in order to build the lean, muscle bound, perfectly chiselled features of the competition bodybuilder is no different for men or women.

A woman’s body weight is generally lighter and naturally contains a higher fluid level than a man’s. This however, does not mean that a woman needs to include anything different in her diet than a man would in order to achieve a similar proportion of muscle bulk to body size. Indeed, the workout regime is every bit as gruelling as for a man, although the weights used are lighter, due only to the general physical body size difference. The calorie intake for a woman is slightly less than for a man, although this will be balanced in the weight to weight ratio between and man’s and a woman’s body.

Therefore to obtain the correct nutrition to promote an overall healthy training and exercise regime, a diet rich in protein is necessary.

When getting started on a program of bodybuilding to gain muscle mass and promote that lean muscle look that is so prevalent in competitions and exhibitions as well as boost endurance, both men and women will benefit equally from eating several high protein meals throughout the day. In addition, working out hard with heavy weights and getting plenty of regenerative sleep at night all combine to give you the best possible chance to achieve your own goals.