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Eat before, during, and after training

As we’ve seen, weight lifting fosters a hormonal response that favors muscle growth. Simply put, when you train, your body enters a muscle-building state. That state is called anabolism; it’s an anabolic state.

Researchers have shown, however, that the body doesn’t enter the muscle-building (anabolic) state until you eat. That’s right. If you lift weights and don’t eat, you’re not building muscle. You’re actually losing some, as the weightlifting session damaged your muscles. Muscles don’t grow when you train them. They grow and recover between training session, when you feed them with energy and protein. So, to maximize muscle growth, make sure your body has plenty of energy and protein available when you need it the most: during and right after the workout. Energy and protein from food fuel the muscle-building hormonal state: your muscles grow.

Since your body only digests food 30 after you’ve eaten it, it’s a good idea to have a pre-workout meal about half an hour before you begin to train. Digestion will slow when you are training and many lifters have some discomfort when eat food during the workout. I recommend you drink you protein and energy instead to prevent this.

Carbohydrate and Protein Guidelines

Pre-Workout: 0.2 g of carbohydrate and 0.2 g of protein per pound of body weight

During Workout: 30 g of carbohydrate and 15 g of protein

Post-Workout: 0.4 g of carbohydrate and 0.2 g of protein per pound of body weight

Lift Weights

Remember, if you don’t eat more calories than you spend in a day and don’t eat lots of protein, you won’t build muscle. Similarly, if you don’t lift weights, you won’t build muscle. Both nutrition and training must be balanced well to build muscle. So what kind of weight-lifting will help build muscle? Well, good weight-lifting to build muscle follows 3 basic principles:

1. It trains every major muscle group

2. It trains them twice per week at least.

3. Build strength

Good weightlifting trains every major muscle group, because the more groups you train, the more groups grow. Good weightlifting trains every major muscle group twice per week at least, because science has shown that this frequency of training builds muscle faster in lifters who don’t use steroids. A word of caution: don’t waste time with bodybuilding routines that train each muscle group once per week. They were designed by lifters using steroids, for lifters using steroids. They don’t work as well for “natural” lifters. Good weightlifting makes you stronger, because your muscles won’t grow in the long run if you don’t become stronger. If you bench press 200 lbs today, and bench pressed 200 lbs six months ago, why would your pectorals, shoulders, and arms be bigger today than they were six months ago? The only way to increase the size of your muscles is to force them to lift heavier weights. Keep in mind that the principle of weightlifting and gaining muscle, is to train to become stronger.

The Exercises

In keeping with the three principles explained above, here are the best exercises in my opinion and experience (with a link to ExRx.net Exercise & Muscle Directory description’s of each).

Upper body and arms

1. The Bench Press

2. The Pull-Up

3. The Press

4. The Row

5. The Barbell Arm Curl

6. The Cable Triceps Pushdown

Lower body and trunk

7. The Deadlift

8. The Leg Press

9. The Roman Chair Crunch

Schedule:

Monday: Upper Body and Arms Workout

Tuesday: Lower body and trunk workout

Wednesday: Day Off

Thursday: Upper Body and Arms Workout

Friday: Lower Body and trunk workout

Saturday: Day Off

Sunday: Day Off

Carl Juneau teaches men how to get defined abs using a unique mix of carefully sequenced abs exercises. Check out his web site to discover little-known abs exercises that help to get washboard abs.