Body Building & Mass Gain: Eating to Gain Mass

Body Building & Mass Gain: Eating to Gain Mass

Using Supplements To Gain Mass! (Part 2)

 Alongwith considerable amount of protein diet, I must emphasize the importance of other kind of essential supplements too:

Increased Strength and Decreased Recovery
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In addition to a whey protein supplement, I recommend that everyone should be taking a multi-vitamin, plenty of vitamin C, and glutamine. Creatine can also be added if you are over 18. 

Multi-Vitamin
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Weight training increases the body's need for many minerals like magnesium and selenium. The multi-vitamin ensures that I am not deficient in any major essential vitamin or mineral. Deficiency symptoms include muscle weakness and suppression of the immune system, muscle cramping and fatigue. 

I always take a multi-vitamin without iron, because grown men do not need additional iron. We get enough from our food. Men and postmenopausal women should never take iron supplements unless they have iron-deficiency anemia, which is only diagnosed by blood tests. The body has no way to eliminate excess iron except through blood loss. Women who menstruate are protected from iron overload, obviously. Iron is also an oxidizing agent that can cause damage to the heart and arteries, and is a major risk factor in arteriosclerosis. 

Vitamin C
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Vitamin C essential to prevent free radical damage, which is ccelerated after the heavy trauma of weight training. It is also essential is helping to repair connective tissue which helps decrease the amount of time you are sore. I train very heavy and extremely hard. When I train my legs, I am usually sore for about 5-6 days afterwards. If I do not supplement my diet with vitamin C, I would normally be sore for almost 10 days! So, it really helps me to recover and get back to training. I typically take around 3,000mg in divided doses. That would equal quite a few oranges! 

Glutamine
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Glutamine is an amino acid that is produced by our bodies, but most of the time our bodies demand so much, that it can't create enough. I supplement my diet with glutamine to increase my levels of glutathione.Glutathione is a powerful antioxidant, which helps to combat the stresses of exercise trauma, and prevent muscle protein breakdown.  I especially believe that it helps prevent my body from breaking down my new muscle while I am asleep, so I never go to bed without taking it. I take about 15g per day (in divided doses), which would be impossible to get naturally.

Creatine Monohydrate
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Creatine's purpose is to supply our muscle with energy. It is also found in red meat, but you would have to eat an enormous amount of meat to get the same benefits as taking pure creatine powder. Everyone knows about creatine so I will not go into it here, but I do want to say that the major benefit from taking creatine is that it will increase your strength. 

This will enable you to lift heavier weights, which will stimulate more muscle growth. Many people make a big fuss over the muscle volumizing effects of creatine, because if you stop taking it, you lose that extra fluid that creatine brings into your cells. So what! You certainly DO NOT lose the extra muscle creatine helped you to gain. 

I can honestly say that I could not have built the body I have today without the convenience and enhancements supplements provide. I simply don't have the time or desire to do it any other way. This is a choice that you must decide for yourself. You will be spending your money on these products, so make sure that you know their place in your program. 

PS: Don't get caught up in product hype. Supplements will help, but they will NOT do the work for you.

Using Supplements To Gain Mass! (Part 1)

If you think that buying a shake or taking a few pills willall of a sudden make you huge, then you are mistaken. 

No supplement will help you if you are not training anddieting correctly -- they will just give you very expensiveurine. All aspects of your program have to be in order foryou to get the maximum benefit from sports nutritionsupplements. From my experience, supplements enhance your program by:

1. Adding an element of convenience: Using food supplementslike Meal Replacement Powders and whey protein help toeliminate the common problem of 'not enough time', byproviding you with an quick efficient way to get yourrequired nutrients each day.

2. Increasing strength and decreasing recovery time: Usingvitamin and amino acid supplements help to minimize thenegative side effects of weight training and speed yourrecovery.

The Benefit of Convenience

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There are many 'old school' trainers and bodybuilders whoprofess the uselessness of supplements. They are constantlypreaching that they don't work, and that you don't needthem. Well, to tell you the truth they are correct,somewhat. Remember that not too long ago there were nosupplements. Bodybuilders built huge physiques without mealreplacement powders, creatine or prohormones. 

There was no such thing as exercise 'machines'. They usedmulti-jointed, compound free weight exercises that not onlyincreased their muscular size, but also make them incrediblystrong. So, if you look at that way it can be done and youdon't need any supplements. However, the decision whether ornot to use supplements should involve the consideration ofother factors that may come into play when speaking ofdieting today. The first of which is time.

Many people today just do not have the time to live, eat andbreathe food. Very few people like to cook, and even fewercook on a regular basis. When was the last time that youactually had six meals that you actually cooked yourself? Many of those who are against dietary supplements continueto preach that you should get all the nutrients that you need from your diet. 'Eat a balanced diet and you will get all the nutrition you need'.Well, 100 years ago that may have been true, but today this type of advice is

questionable. 

The fact is, most people's idea of a good meal is restaurant or (even worse) fast food. To ask someone to eat specific amounts of protein, fat and carbs seems like an impossible request considering that most people can't even get their minimum requirements of good fat or fiber. Experts will continue to spout 'eat a balanced diet,' while Americans feast on nutrition less fast food and sugar. Not only do our bodies have to deal with the ever-increasing external stresses of everyday life, they also have to combat nutrient-depleting, tissue damaging exercise.  

Examples of what 300g of protein is equal to: 

Tuna -- 50 oz of canned tuna (the average can is 6-8oz.),
which is 1,750 calories and 25g of fat 

Chicken -- 38oz of chx breast (equals about seven 6oz
breasts), which is 1,313 calories and 38g of saturated fat 

Beef -- 43oz of lean ground beef (about 2.7 pounds of meat),
which is 3,214 calories and 215g of saturated fat 

Eggs -- 50 large whole eggs, equals 3,750 calories and 250g
of saturated fat 

Egg whites -- 100 egg whites, equals 1,600 calories and
almost no fat 

Pure whey protein -- 15 scoops of EAS Precision Protein,
equals 1,500 calories 7.5g of saturated fat  

It is very possible to get this amount from eating whole foods only -- But it will take work. Also, as you can see from the above numbers, getting all of your protein from regular food will also bring a lot of unnecessary elements like extra saturated fat. Yes, our goal to gain mass is to eat a lot of calories (including fat), but your main fat intake should consist of unsaturated fats that are liquid at room temperature like olive oil, flaxseed oil, sunflower oil and safflower oil. Whey protein supplements will help to give you the extra protein without the fat. 

The MYTH of Gaining Muscle Without Fat!

Many of you have expressed concerns about gaining too muchbody fat while on a high calorie diet, and wonder ifyou should do some aerobic exercise to offset the weightgain.

Absolutely not.

That will be detrimental to gaining muscle. For best results, you either have to train and diet to gain muscle or

lose fat. One or the other. If you are a true hardgainer,you cannot do both. If you try, you will not make any

substantial progress either way. So, now is the time to gainweight. You will worry about losing fat later. 

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The fact is that there are no magic pills, powders, foods orexercises that will allow you to gain muscle and lose fat atthe same time. 
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It all is determined by your genetics and metabolism. Somepeople can do it, some can't. If you are naturally thin andhave a difficult time gaining weight of any kind, it wouldbe silly of you to think that you will be able to gainmuscle while trying to keep your body fat low. 

Most skinny guys want to gain more muscle, but are afraid ofgaining body fat. They see all the bodybuilder photos andread the stories about people gaining pounds of muscle whilelosing pounds of fat -- They want to do the same. Whenlooking at these photos, you have to remember that most ofthese people do not have your body type. The majority ofthem are overweight and want to lose fat, not gain muscle. 

'Well', you say, 'What about those people who transformedtheir bodies? They lost fat and gained muscle'. Yes, butalmost all of these people were overweight, or had highlevels of body fat. In other words, their metabolisms were,for the most part, slow. They simply dieted and trained forfat loss. 

Weight training helped them to tone up and slightly increasetheir muscle mass by replacing some of the fat with muscle.However, you will never increase your body mass far aboveyour original starting weight on that type of diet.

In other words, even though you gain some muscle, you will actually weight less!

For example, Big Joe weighs 189lbs with 18% body fat. Thisworks out to be 34lbs of fat and 155lbs of muscle. He thengoes on a fat loss diet and slowly diets down to a ripped 5%body fat at 168lbs, which is 8.4lbs of fat and 160lbs ofmuscle. He lost 26lbs of fat, and his weight only went downby 21lbs. So, looking that this we realize that he managed to also gain 5lbs of muscle. You can see that he has more musclemass than when he started, and he looks totally ripped, but hisweight decreased because his main goal was fat loss. He looksmuch better, and his measurements changed, but he onlyincreased his total weight by five pounds. 

If you are very thin, you cannot do this. Yes, your body fatwill decrease, and this will also give you more muscle mass,but it will not increase your weight. You will just get muchthinner. Big Joe was 'big' to begin with; we are not. To getthe same results as Big Joe, you must first gain the weight,and then concentrate on losing the body fat later. Joe hadthe size; he just needed to trim down. We do not have thesize to work with, so we have to force our bodies to growbeyond our body's comfort range. This is the hard part.

This is why if you want to grow beyond your current size,you have to diet for it specifically. 

Remember, most of you have extremely fast metabolisms.Gaining weight will be extremely difficult. 

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The only way you will get bigger is to shock your body.
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You must shock your body by:

1. Training with heavy weights, and
2. Eating a lot of calories.

The first shock is with weight training. You must focus oncompound free- weight exercises, and lift heavy weights,which will stimulate the largest amount of muscle fibers.Your body responds to this stimulus by increasing yourmuscle mass. 

The second way we must shock our body is by eating morecalories than your body is used to. This is the most important factor in gaining mass. When you overload yoursystem with plenty of protein and fats, your body has noother choice but to gain weight.

Weight Train for Maximum Muscle Gain

Exercise machines are a lot like the training side wheels on your first bike. While you're learning, they serve an invaluable purpose. They provide support, and prevent injury.  But once you've learnt the right posture and balance, the same wheels can be a drag.

Unlike training wheels, however, it's tough to know when you've outgrown an exercise machine.  And that can really hamper your progress down the line!


Free Weights vs. Machines vs. Body weight Exercises
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Weight training involves the use of equipment that enables variable resistance. This resistance can come in the form of 'free weights' like barbells and dumbbells, machines that use cables or pulleys to help you lift the weight and bodyweight exercises like pull-ups or dips.

For maximum muscle gain, the focus of your workouts should consist of free weight exercises. Not machines or body weight exercises.

To get an effective, muscle-blasting workout, you must stimulate the most muscle fibers as possible, and machines do not do this. The main reason for this is a lack of stabilizer and synergist muscle development. Stabilizer and synergist muscles are supporting muscles that assist the main muscle in performing a complex lift. 

The more stabilizers and synergists worked, the more muscle fibers stimulated. Multi-jointed free weight exercises like the bench press, require many stabilizer and synergistic muscle assistance to complete the lift. 

On the other hand doing a bench press using a machine will need almost no stabilizer assistance. Since machines are locked into a specific range of motion and help to support the weight along that path, they fail to stimulate the muscles that surround the area you are working (stabilizers). This is a mistake. If your stabilizer muscles are weak, then the major muscle group will never grow! 

Free weight exercises like the dumbbell press or squat, for example, put a very large amount of stress on supporting muscle groups. That's why you will get fatigued faster and not be able to lift as much weight as you did on the machine. But you will gain more muscle, become stronger very quickly and have a true gauge of your strength.

If you use machines in your program, they should be used to work isolated areas and only after all multi-jointed exercises have been completed. Beginners should begin with a limited combination of machine exercises, bodyweight exercises and mult-jointed free weight exercises. Before increasing the weight levels, they should work on becoming familiar with the proper form and execution of each. Soon, bodyweight exercises will become insufficient to stimulate growth and they will need to focus on more free weight

exercises.

Multi-Jointed Exercises
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The exercises that work the large muscle groups are called compound (or multi-joint) movements that involve the simultaneous stimulation of many muscle groups. These compound exercises should be the foundation of any weight training program because they stimulate the most amount of muscle in the least amount of time.

Basic Movements
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Bench Presses (works the chest, shoulders, triceps)
Overhead Presses (shoulders, triceps)
Pull-ups/Barbell Rows (back, bicep)
Squats (legs, lower back)
Deadlifts (legs, back, shoulders)
Bar Dips (shoulders, chest, arms)

I cannot overemphasize the importance of these exercises. Do not start an advanced weight-training program

without them! They will overload your entire skeletal and muscular system like no machine could ever do, giving you and effective workout in a very short period of time. If you can only do a few exercises, then do these. They have been proven (and not just by me) to encourage muscle and strength gain unlike any other exercises.

Training with Heavy Weights
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To build mass, you must weight train with heavy weights. By heavy, I mean a weight that is challenging for you -- not me, or anyone else. To consider a weight heavy, you should only be able to do a maximum of 8-12 reps before your muscles temporarily fail. A weight is considered 'light' if you can do more than 15 reps before muscle fatigue sets in. Heavy weights stimulate more muscle fibers than lighter weights. It's that simple. More muscle stimulation means more muscle growth.

Don't Over-train
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Heavy weight training puts a huge strain on your body, so adequate rest and recuperation after your workouts is essential. If you are prone to train too often, several things happen:

* You don't give your muscles enough time to recuperate between workouts. If your muscles have not repaired themselves, you will not be at maximum strength for your next workout. Rest is essential. Other than eating, this should be your main focus.

* You are setting yourself up for burnout or an injury.

I know you are motivated and excited about working out, but don't be careless. You must pace yourself, you want to be able to keep this up for a long time, not burnout before you reach your goals. I only weight train 3 times per week, that's all. Anymore than that and I would not give my body enough time to repair and build new muscle.

Contrary to popular belief, you do not grow while working out. You only grow when you are resting. 


Below is an example mass workout:
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Wednesday (legs, abs)
4 heavy sets for 4-8 reps each.
Heavy Squats, leg extension superset
Seated Calve Raises, 4 strips sets
Crunches (4 sets of 20)

(Thursday: Rest)

Friday (chest, shoulder, triceps, abs)
Flat bench press, incline dumbbell flyes superset
Shoulder press, side raises superset
Triceps pushdowns
Reverse incline leg raises (3 sets of 20)

(Saturday: Rest)

Sunday (back, biceps, abs)
Wide grip pull-ups, latbar pulldown superset
EZ bar bicep curl, incline dumbbell curls superset
Crunches (4 sets of 20)

Proteins,Carbohydrates and some useful fats

High Protein Foods
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Whey protein
Eggs
Egg whites
Chicken breasts
Turkey Breasts
Lean Beef
Fish (tuna, salmon)
Protein bar
Soy protein Isolate



High Carbohydrate Food
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Potatoes (baked, fries, hash browns)
Sweet Potatoes, yams
Oatmeal, cream of wheat, cream of rice
Rice
Beans
Any green leafy vegetable
Bread
Pasta
All cereals (hot or cold)



Healthy Fats
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Olive oil
Sunflower oil
Safflower oil
Flax seed oil
Walnuts
Avocados

Here's A Sample Mass Diet
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It provides 2,440 calories, 234g of protein, 182g of carbs
and 81g of fat:

8am -- Meal 1
Myoplex, 1 tsp flaxseed oil
432 calories, 42g of protein, 25g of carbs, 14g of fat

11am -- Meal 2
4 Whole Eggs w/ 1 cup of hash browns
440 calories, 28g of protein, 36g of carbs, 20g of fat

2pm -- Meal 3
6 oz. chicken breast with 1/2 cup of rice
319 calories, 50g of protein, 23g of carbs, 7g of fat

5pm -- Meal 4
4 whole eggs in a flour tortilla w/salsa
367 calories, 24g of protein, 17g of carbs, 20g of fat

8pm -- Meal 5
Myoplex, 1tsp flaxseed oil
432 calories, 42g of protein, 25g of carbs, 14g of fat

11pm -- Meal 6
6 oz grilled tuna with large baked potato, 1 cup of veggies
450 calories, 48g 
of protein, 56g of carbs, 6g of fat


Eating the right amount of foods consistently will force your body to grow beyond what you may think possible.

Eating to Gain Mass

For so many people, the only real 'weight problem' is about losing it. If you have trouble gaining weight, you're shrugged off as another fussy eater. 'You're so lucky!' They'll tell you patronizingly. 'All you have to do is eat!'

The truth is, no one will ever gain muscle without food.
Dieting for muscle gain is simply a matter of eating.