Like many of the readers of this site, I grew up with bodybuilding nutrition. I read Championship Bodybuilding by Chris Aceto like the Bible, truly devoured Arnold's Ecyclopedia, and studied my favorite bodybuilding magazines every month.

A bodybuilding style diet (six meals, specific macronutrient ratios and nutrient distribution scheme, etc.) is one of the most effective ways to change your body, there's no doubt about it. And anyone who tells you otherwise has never consistently followed this style of eating with dedication and discipline.

But as I've worked with more people in the real world, my theories have evolved as well. I have started to ask myself three main questions regarding this approach:

1. is a traditional maximal fat loss/competition prep plan sustainable over the longer term?

The answer for the majority of us is no - and this is true even for the truly hardcore athletes among us. Many competitive athletes can tell you this first hand: Post-competition binge eating, rapid rebuilding of lost weight, and the negative hormonal feedback loop associated with extreme training and nutritional approaches and/or doping programs.

Everyone can diet in some way when motivation is high - whether it's for a competition, a new photo on Facebook or even just a summer pool party where you know the bartender and have been wanting to attend for months.

But how will preparing for that one big day affect your long-term metabolic and hormonal health and your ability to get lean again the next time you try?

Is completely cutting out carbs, doing three hours of cardio a day and having the personality of a snail and the libido of a corpse the only way to get in shape? No six-pack in the world is worth that.

Someone will defend bulking and dieting as necessary, but for many it's a simple yo-yo scenario, even if it is an integral part of the athletic realm. It's neither sustainable nor good for your long-term goals or overall health. I've seen former competitive athletes become obese, develop type II diabetes and struggle with their health and body composition for the rest of their lives because of this yo-yo effect.

If this approach sounds appealing to you, then that's fine, go for it. To each their own. I'm more interested in finding a plan that I can stick with for the rest of my life and that allows me to stay in shape year round.

2. is it functional?

For years I had no problem making trips to the grocery store every other day, cooking a truckload of food twice a week, packing a bag of Tupperware containers every day, etc. Discipline and dedication are part of my personality.

When I started this sport, I mistakenly assumed that this was the case for everyone. You want to get in shape? Then do what you damn well have to do to achieve that goal.

But after working with more and more people in the real world, I realized this isn't functional or realistic for most outside of the fitness industry.

Have you ever worked with a Silicon Valley entrepreneur whose industry is moving forward at a thousand tweets per second? Have you ever counseled a doctor or lawyer who can be in the operating room or courtroom for half a day at a time? Or a college student who has a lot of classes and has to work half days to earn their degree and is trying to find enough time to score?

For these populations, taking a break every 2 hours for tuna and broccoli is simply unrealistic.

Is eating 6 to 8 small meals a day functional and doable for the next year, 5 years or the rest of your life as your priorities change and you chase other career goals and still want to stay in shape?

If you are leaning more towards "not really", then the next question is whether something like this is absolutely necessary to get results or if there is another way.

3. are there alternative approaches to meal frequency for overall fat loss and body improvement?

I'm not talking about bodybuilding competition diets at this point, which is why I don't need a bunch of angry bodybuilders throwing their sweaty posing briefs at me - unless they're women.

Getting ready for the competition stage is something else. If that's your goal, then I hope you're following a well thought out approach and not an exotic protocol for recreational bodybuilders. If in doubt, work with a good trainer.

I'm also not talking about mass building phases or people who are strictly dieting to improve their athletic performance. If your calorie requirements are 5000+ kcal, then you probably have no choice but to go down the 5 to 6 meals a day route.

However, this article - and my articles in general - are aimed more at the other 90% of the non-competitive strength athlete population who are simply looking for a sustainable approach to getting defined and who want to be able to say "I look good. I mean really good. Look at how good I look."

Anecdotal evidence

Just as I would advise you not to let an ADA or Paleo dictate your diet, I would advise you not to let a bodybuilding/fitness nutrition dogma dictate your life. If you are objective, the reality is that there are other methods and approaches to achieving great shape.

Legendary bodybuilder Serge Nubret ate only two meals a day consisting of huge amounts of horse meat with rice and beans. I know some will think of steroids now, but this type of diet didn't just work well for him. Many of his non-bodybuilding clients also reported excellent transformations in their body composition.

The "three meals a day" approach is belittled in the bodybuilding industry and often criticized as being counterproductive to fat loss or improving body development.

However, this is most likely the case because the typical American diet is used as a representative control group for this approach - mocha and coffee for breakfast, sandwiches and chips for lunch, pizza and cookies for dinner.

This is problematic for comparison because these are not the typical meals eaten by someone seeking to change their body composition.

It is more the sub-optimal dietary choices that are the problem and not the meal frequency pattern itself. Three meals a day can work well for fat loss - provided you make good food choices.

In contrast, the traditional Japanese diet (fish, lean meat, eggs, vegetables, rice, sweet potatoes, less processed foods, etc.) results in one of the lowest diabetes and obesity rates in the world. And don't get me started on genetics. There are studies that show that when native Japanese people switch to a more Western dietary pattern, their health biomarkers drop dramatically and their body fat percentage skyrockets.

I'm not trying to make everyone feel like they're turning into a Japanese person, but you can certainly learn a few things from this approach to eating - just as you can from any effective approach including Paleo or Mediterranean diets.

While I think a Paleo diet is a good starting template for an overweight, sedentary office worker, I think the traditional Japanese diet is a good template for a strength athlete looking for a healthy carbohydrate-based nutritional approach to improving their body development.

Here is a typical day. I have adjusted the values to better suit an 85 kilo man rather than a 45 kilo geisha:

• Breakfast: 2 to 3 whole eggs, 120 grams of fish, 1 cup of rice, sea vegetables*, green tea.
• Lunch: 250 grams of teriyaki chicken, 1 cup of rice, mixed vegetables
• Dinner: 350 grams salmon or mackerel, miso soup, 1 cup rice, spinach salad
• Dessert: 1 piece of fruit or ½ cup of mashed sweet potato

This provides an 85 kilo bodybuilder with about 180 grams of protein, 180 grams of carbohydrates and 40 to 50 grams of fat as a by-product of protein foods.

* Sea vegetables are basically nothing more than seaweed, which may not sound particularly tasty, but have been a staple in the Japanese diet for centuries. Sea vegetables also provide one of the widest ranges of minerals of all foods, including iron, magnesium, zinc and especially iodine. The name sea vegetables is a collective term for a number of different vegetables such as nori, hijiki, wakame, arame, kombu and dulse.

The next step is to add an appropriate training nutrition protocol on training days. For lean people trying to build as much mass as possible, a high quality weight gainer is the most effective natural method I've come across.

Heavier guys or athletes subject to weight class restrictions will probably be better off with a high quality protein powder and fewer carbs to achieve significant, but less dramatic, gains in strength and mass.

Cliffs Notes on meal frequency

When I was still in school, I tried to make up for what I missed during chemistry class because I was daydreaming about the couple hot girls in my class by reading through "Cliffs Notes" - a series of textbooks with condensed information on various topics - on the relevant subject. Here's my Cliffs Notes version on the science of meal frequency:

A study conducted by Bellisle and colleagues examined the purported benefits of frequent meals on the thermic effect of food (TEF for short). While the researchers found evidence that the thermic effect of food was higher with more frequent meals, the differences measured were neither clear nor significant, leading them to conclude that total food intake is still most important in the energy balance equation (1).

Another study conducted by Burke and colleagues looked at an identical carbohydrate intake over a 24-hour period, split into either meals every four hours or hourly meals. No significant difference in muscle glycogen storage was observed between the two groups (2).

Lastly, a study conducted by Norton concluded that although frequent intake of amino acids is a common practice, it is unlikely that eating another meal 2-3 hours after the first meal is sufficient to cause a further increase in protein synthesis, as amino acid/leucine levels are already elevated.

Norton concluded that it may therefore be more beneficial to consume larger amounts of protein during a meal and wait longer than the 2 to 3 hours between protein doses typically recommended in the bodybuilding community (3).

Leaving personal bias or tradition aside and looking at the scientific data objectively, there is clearly not much difference between smaller, more frequent meals and larger, more spaced meals when it comes to fat loss and metabolic factors associated with fat loss (food-induced thermogenesis, energy expenditure over 24 hours, etc.).

Some will use these scientific studies to "hear what they want to hear" and rail against a bodybuilding diet. "I knew it. Three meals a day is superior to a six meal a day approach. Bodybuilders are obsessive, compulsive idiots."

But that's not what the science says. It says that both approaches are more or less equally good. Translation? Both can be effective in the real world.

Remember the hierarchy of fat loss: optimal food choices, total calories, and targeted macronutrient ratios based on individual factors are the most important steps in designing an effective fat loss diet. When these variables are controlled, meal frequency is not as important.

The optimal meal frequency pattern for you is the pattern that best helps you stick to your diet. The most maintainable and functional approach in your world is the best approach for you.

In other words, the physiology of meal frequency doesn't matter that much. Both science and anecdotal experience prove this. It is the psychological and social factors that are the most important variables in your decisions.

Of course, this requires some experimentation on your part. How does a meal frequency fit into your daily routine, how does it fit with the demands of your career, lifestyle and social life?

Some have found for themselves that eating smaller, more frequent meals gives them better blood sugar control, gives them more energy and makes them less prone to bingeing and dieting slips. Even though they eat smaller, calorie-controlled meals, on a psychological level they like the idea that another meal will follow shortly. They like to stay one step ahead of hunger, or that feeling of never feeling hungry and never feeling too full.

If they have to go through a long period without food and are hungry, they find it very difficult to make good food choices. They end up overeating on junk food. A traditional fitness/bodybuilding approach might work better for this group.

Many fitness athletes suffer from the fear that if they ever go longer than three hours without eating, their body will start to "cannibalize" itself and they will lose all their hard-earned muscle mass. These people have a "feed the machine" mentality. Regardless of the physiological truths, psychology is the key component of nutritional success. Smaller, more frequent meals may be the best approach for this demographic as well.

With busy professional lives and an aversion to packing food and carrying it around in Tupperware containers every day, some find that eating 6 to 8 meals a day is very impractical and unrealistic for their lifestyle. They can't manage to fit six balanced and complete meals into their daily routine. They therefore end up eating a few solid meals and then simply resorting to snack foods - usually the highly processed, carbohydrate-rich unhealthy snacks.

In addition, when they do eat, they prefer to eat a full, filling meal. The small, fitness-style meals don't satisfy their appetite, leaving them constantly hungry and craving. From a psychological point of view, such a dietary approach makes them feel like they are constantly depriving themselves or constantly dieting.

Lastly, there are those whose career or lifestyle fits very well with the traditional "3 meals a day" approach. Ultimately, this is the pattern that society and civilization has defined as the normal structure in most forms of society. We have our breakfast meetings, our lunch breaks and our evening dinner dates.

Three balanced meals might be the easiest approach to follow for the working population who are not professional athletes. Slaving away to try to fit in a fitness approach of eight small meals a day might be unrealistic and counterproductive.

Just remember that food choices are crucial. Three balanced meals a day with good food choices will produce different results than three meals consisting of junk food and the typical foods of the Western diet.

References

1. Bellisle et al. 1997. Meal frequency and energy balance. Br J Nutr Apr;77 Suppl 1:S57-70.
2. Burke, et al. 1996. Muscle glycogen storage after prolonged exercise: effect of the frequency of carbohydrate feedings. Am J Clin Nutr 64(1): 115-119.
3. Norton, L. 2008. Optimal protein intake and meal frequency to support maximal protein synthesis and muscle mass. SlideShare.

By Nate Miyaki

Source: https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/deep-meal-frequency-thoughts

A cyclical carbohydrate intake for fat loss

There comes a time for almost every exerciser when they want to get defined.

If you already train regularly with weights, then changing your training program probably won't result in a dramatic reduction in body fat. How you train will have the biggest impact on your performance, but how you eat is what will really determine who you look like in the mirror.

In other words, you need to focus on nutrition if you want to get lean and a cyclical carbohydrate intake is one of the most effective approaches you will find.

Cycling your carbohydrate intake means that you vary the amount of carbohydrates and/or calories you consume in a given day.

Bodybuilders have long known that carbohydrates appear to have the most significant impact on body composition of the three macronutrients. As a result, there are hundreds of different approaches to cyclical carbohydrate intake, each of which varies this popular fat loss strategy slightly.

Even though I'm more of a "sets & reps" oriented writer, I have my own variation of cyclical carbohydrate intake. It's a strategy I've used successfully with many athletes including myself. Last year, I reduced my weight from 105 to 85 kilos for a competition using the plan I will present here.

Like my training programs, this plan is not easy but it is simple and straightforward and it works - if you have the discipline to follow it.

The plan consists of the following four phases:

1 - Super Strict

As the name suggests, this is a very strict diet phase. It should be used at the beginning of a diet as a kick start or at the end of the diet as an effective way to lose that last bit of fat. This is a tough, brutal diet and, as I will explain, should only be followed for a short period of time.

During this phase, carbohydrates are the most restricted: You are allowed 50 grams of carbs per day and the significant majority of those carbs must be consumed in the form of vegetables. No traditional starches or sugars are allowed during this phase.

2 - Normal

This is the main phase of this plan. It is low in carbohydrates and high in natural protein and fat. You are allowed to eat 100 grams of carbohydrates per day, most of which are consumed in the form of vegetables, with a small amount of fruit and starch allowed, but no junk food.

One of the reasons I call this phase "Normal" is because I want to change people's mindset. Many people believe that high-carb days are normal and that we should eat 500 to 600 grams of carbohydrates a day. Carbohydrates are not evil, but you still have to earn them through activity. Most people are quite physically inactive and so their carbohydrate intake should be limited.

In the new nutritional mindset, a low-carb diet should be "normal" and higher carbohydrate intake should be seen as a wasteful binge.

3 - High carbohydrate

Low carbohydrate intake is good for fat loss but often not ideal for performance. Most readers will be training hard and heavy, so an occasional carbohydrate boost is necessary and this is where the high-carb day comes in.

On the high carbohydrate days you should consume a large amount of carbohydrates in the range of 400 to 800 grams per day. The purpose of this is to replenish the body's glycogen stores, stimulate an anabolic response through an insulin release and give your mind a break from the moderately restrictive phase of the diet.

The basic idea is to eat a lot of vegetables and add to this an unlimited amount of fruit and natural unprocessed carbohydrates, as well as a small amount of processed carbohydrates if necessary. Carbohydrates from dairy products are also allowed.

4 - Holidays

You can let your imagination run wild on these days. I generally believe in moderation for most things - including moderation of the moderation itself - which is why you can feel free to feast during your vacation. The shock to your system from the intake of nutrients can actually be a good thing if it happens on an occasional basis. You decide on your own vacations (I've listed mine below), but in general it should be less than 21 days per year.

The diet plan phase by phase

(The numbers indicate the number of servings per day for the given food).

Foods are listed in order of preference by category:

• Natural Protein: fish (any, but wild caught fish should be preferred), chicken, beef, turkey, lamb. Pork, seafood
• Natural fats: olive oil, organic butter, poultry skin
• Natural starches: sweet potatoes, potatoes, rice, oatmeal
• Processed carbohydrates: wraps, pita chips, all types of bread (the more fiber, the better), pasta, popcorn, crackers, granola bars, fruit bars
• Desserts: ice cream, cake, brownies, cookies, candy bars
• Processed meats: breakfast meats, homemade hamburgers, pepperoni sausage, hot dogs, bacon, sausage

Weight loss system

• For rapid weight loss: Follow the super strict phase for 3 to 14 days to promote significant weight loss and then move to the normal weight loss or maintenance phase.
• For normal weight loss: Combine 5 to 6 days of the normal phase with 1 to 2 days of the high-carb phase. If you are losing weight too quickly, add half a day to one more high-carb day. If you are not losing weight fast enough, reduce the high-carb phase by half a day.
• To maintain weight: Combine 4 to 5 days of the normal phase with 2 to 3 days of the high-carb phase.
• To gain weight: Combine 3 to 4 days of the normal phase with 3 to 4 days of the high-carb phase.

I categorize vacations as the following:

• Meals after a competition
• All vacations (up to one week in length)
• The following holidays: Christmas, New Year, Easter, your birthday
• Optional: Your partner's birthday, anniversaries

A concrete example

Below is an example of the food intake for one day of each of the three main phases (I assume you don't need help planning your food intake during vacations / public holidays)

* As for the skin of the grilled chicken, you should pay attention to what it is coated with. I prefer a homemade version, which consists only of spices. You shouldn't use a spice mix with sugar.

On the high-carb days, you can use pre-workout, intra-workout and post-workout supplements that contain fast-digesting carbohydrates to boost your training performance and speed up your post-workout recovery.

On super strict and normal days, you should only use carbohydrate-free pre-workout, intra-workout and post-workout supplements such as BCAAs, leucine and fast-digesting protein such as whey protein or whey protein hydrolysate.

I assume that only organic eggs from free-range chickens are used and that all dairy products are organic, preferably from grass-fed cows. Most of the rest of the meals can be prepared at home in advance.

On the high-carb days, I try to include foods in my diet that are widely and readily available, although this may come at the expense of choosing the absolute ideal foods.

The good, the bad and the butt-ugly

All diet plans have their pros and cons. I'm not saying this is the only way to achieve fat loss, but I do believe it is a sensible and workable way.

For me, this system has the following pros and cons:

The advantages of the program:

• It's relatively easy to follow. You wake up, you know what day it is and you do your best to stick to the guidelines for that day.
• It works well in real life. If you're out with friends or attending a social event, you make that day a high-carb day. The system also allows you to feast during your vacation. If you're working your butt off day after day in the gym and in the kitchen, then you simply need to let go of the reins occasionally.
• Once you've internalized this system, you can modify it for a number of different goals by increasing or decreasing the number of high-carb days. If you want to gain weight but stay relatively lean, try this plan with 3 to 4 high-carb days. If you are not losing fat at the desired rate, then gradually reduce the number of high-carb days by half a day per week until you reach the desired fat loss rate.
• This program focuses on natural, unprocessed, whole foods, which should be the foundation of any successful diet plan. You can, of course, substitute foods with other foods of equal value - if you don't like poultry, replace it with salmon, etc.
• This program allows cravings and doesn't continually ban them, which can be a test of willpower and won't necessarily make you the most popular person.
• This program works. Enough said.

Cons of the program:

• It can be easy to turn your high-carb day into a full-blown cheat day. You see chips and think "oh, it's a high-carb day" and you eat them, followed by a candy bar, two plates of spaghetti, etc. You can eat a lot of carbs, but they need to be at least reasonably natural and healthy. If you want two baked potatoes with your steak, that's fine, but two portions of chips are not the same.
• Consuming carbs after a few low-carb days can sometimes increase carb cravings instead of reducing them. For me, I've found that the first breakfast after a high-carb day can be tough as I get used to a higher carb intake. The second and third days are easier because I'm not comparing the smaller meal to the big meals of the high-carb day.
• It can be hard to do an intense training session on the low-carb days. The solution to this is to plan your high-carb days so that they fall on the days of your hardest workouts - or at least the day before - so that you have enough glycogen for your workouts. I usually schedule my high-carb days on Mondays and Fridays, but you can plan yours to best fit your training program.
• Your body weight will fluctuate a little more than normal with this plan. It should drop relatively sharply from one low-carb day to the next, but may increase significantly after a high-carb day due to replenished glycogen stores and the accompanying water and salt. However, if you monitor your weight you will see a steady decrease in weight combined with a similar decrease in body fat.

Final words

For me, all the disadvantages are manageable and controllable and are more than outweighed by the benefits of this program. You train hard in the gym and now it's time to show the results of that hard work! If you're frustrated with the results of regular calorie restriction and want to try something new, then you should give this program a chance. You have nothing to lose - except body fat.

By Tim Henriques

Source: https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/carb-cycling-for-fat-loss

The first part of this article series included a description of the three macronutrients in combination with some very useful information about fatty acids, cortisol and basal metabolic rate. This article also talked about which foods you should eat and which you should avoid.

The second part of this series of articles covers 13 nutritional gems and gives you some concrete advice on how to achieve just about any body development goal you're after.

Why didn't I have something like this when I started training?

Nutritional gold nuggets

Here are some additional nutritional guidelines that are applicable in most circumstances. These simple things will allow you to better understand this whole nutrition thing and achieve optimal results in your body transformation.

1 - Measure everything and write everything down - at least in the beginning

A good nutrition program is all about quality and quantity. You should eat a certain amount of food to meet your needs and build a great body. If you eat drastically too little, you risk losing muscle and strength. If you eat too much, you will gain more fat than muscle. If your goal is to build muscle, then you need to eat enough to stimulate maximum growth, but not so much that you get fat. If you prefer to get hard and defined, then you need a large enough calorie deficit so that your body has to draw on its fat reserves to meet its energy needs, but you also shouldn't eat so little that you end up losing muscle.

In both cases, there is one constant: you need to eat a certain amount of calories within a certain range to get the results you want. How can you do this if you don't even know how many calories and how many grams of protein, carbohydrates and fat you're eating? You may think you're eating 3000 kcal a day when in reality you're only eating 2000 kcal or less (or you could be doing the opposite and drastically underestimating your calorie intake).

If you don't have a good idea of where you are, how can you tell where you need to be? This is the reason you need to keep a record of the food you eat each day and calculate your calorie intake. In an ideal world, you would always calculate your food intake to know exactly what you are getting. If you do this, then it's quite easy to make quick adjustments. I can understand if you don't want to do this all year round as it gets boring after a while and there are only so many hours in the day. However, you should at least do it during the first month of your "body composition nutrition phase". This will at least give you a pretty good idea of how many calories and nutrients your favorite foods contain.

2. use the 10-20 rule

If you are on a fat loss phase, you should eat between 10 and 20% fewer calories than you consume (a higher deficit will lead to muscle loss). If you are on a mass-building phase, you should eat between 10 and 20% more calories than you consume (you don't need more than that to build muscle and more will lead to more fat gain than muscle gain). So if your calorie consumption is 3000 kcal, then you should eat between 2400 and 2700 kcal per day if you are trying to lose fat and 3300 to 3600 kcal if you are trying to build muscle.

3. the less body fat you carry around, the more carbohydrates you can eat without gaining fat

Leaner people have better insulin sensitivity, which is why they don't tend to store carbohydrates as easily as fatter people in the form of fat. Carbohydrate intake should remain at the lower end of the spectrum as long as your body fat percentage is not below 10%. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't eat carbohydrates at all (although this is a very effective way to eat for fat loss purposes), but you should at least minimize your carbohydrate intake.

If you decide to keep carbohydrates in your diet, then you should make sure that you only eat "good carbohydrates" (vegetables and some fruit, especially berries. Carbohydrates after training in the form of a shake are also acceptable). Make sure you eat these carbohydrates at the appropriate times. As mentioned earlier, the 'safest' times to eat carbohydrates are breakfast and immediately after training. At these times, your muscles are naturally more sensitive to insulin, which means that these carbohydrates are more likely to be stored as muscle glycogen instead of fat.

4. favor whole foods

The closer a food is to its natural state, the better it is for you. This is true for both health and body composition purposes. In most circumstances, if it comes out of a box, you shouldn't eat it.

5. cheat meals

When you start a "muscle friendly" diet, you should wait 14 to 21 days until your first cheat meal. It will take at least that long for you to get used to a new eating pattern. If you cheat too often, you will stick to your old habits. Maintaining a good diet will always seem like a chore that requires discipline and brings a sense of deprivation, rather than a way of life that is enjoyable.

6. loading/cheating

Once you have established good eating habits, depending on your body fat percentage, you should plan a "loading/cheat phase" that can last from one meal to a full day every 5 to 14 days. If you are fat (by body composition standards) and have a body fat percentage of 15% or more, then you should limit yourself to 1 to 3 cheat meals (half a day) every 10 to 14 days. If your body fat percentage is between 10 and 15% then you can plan a half cheat day every 7 days and if your body fat percentage is below 10% then you can plan a full cheat day every 7 days or a half cheat day every 5 days.

7. try not to compensate for an unplanned gluttony by skipping meals

A lot of people will eat an unplanned meal, feel guilty and then either not eat for the rest of the day or be extra restrictive the next day. Even worse is when they feel like eating junk food later in the day and therefore don't eat anything at all beforehand (and basically fast for most of the day), thinking that this will prevent fat gain. This is stupid. In fact, these two mistakes are worse than the unplanned feasting itself. Not eating for an extended period of time before a big junk food meal (and starving yourself for 10 hours) will put your body into fat storage mode and you will be more likely to put on that junk food as body fat than if you hadn't fasted beforehand. In addition, if you were starving before, you are likely to eat even more junk because you are hungrier than if you had eaten your normal meals.

Skipping meals after an unplanned binge is no better, which is especially true if you choose to fast the day after the binge to make up for the binge. This can easily lead to a vicious cycle: by starving yourself you increase the feeling of hunger and you will develop huge cravings for junk food. You may then give in to these cravings by bingeing again, after which you will feel guilty again, causing you to starve again, and so on. After an unplanned cheat meal, you should immediately go back to your regular diet. Accept your mistake, live with it and do your best to prevent it from happening again. Don't make a mistake worse by trying to make up for it with another mistake.

8 - Poliquin's axiom

Some time ago, I had the opportunity to attend a presentation by trainer Charles Poliquin, where he spoke about nutrition. He explained his basic nutritional principle: "If it doesn't fly, swim or run, or isn't a green vegetable, don't eat it." One silly listener asked "And what about bagels?" Even though I thought the coach was about to burst a blood vessel in his head, he simply replied, "Do bagels fly? Do they run or swim? Are they green? No? Well, then don't eat them!".

9 It's important to eat a wide variety of foods

If you eat a specific food too often - e.g. chicken four times a day, every day - then you will eventually develop an allergy or intolerance to that food. A few years ago, I coached a weightlifting team at the Quebec Games. This event was held in a remote part of the province and we were stuck at the competition site for a week. They gave us 5 food tickets for each cafeteria meal (3 per day). For each ticket we got one of the available food items. For most people, this would have been a drink, a main dish (usually pasta), a side dish (vegetable, sauce), a dessert, and a piece of fruit.

Hardly any of these foods contained protein, so for a week I subsisted on 5 packs of milk three times a day to get my protein. By the end of the week, I had developed a serious lactose intolerance.

You may not develop a full-blown food allergy, but even a mild one (that you may not even feel) can have negative effects on your body. If you have even a mild intolerance to a food, then eating that food is stressful for your body. So if you eat that food, your cortisol levels will rise. And as you may remember, cortisol can lead to catabolism (muscle breakdown and loss) and also promote the storage of fat in the abdominal area. This is doubly bad.

For this reason, you should rotate your food choices. This is especially true for protein sources, as different foods have different amino acid profiles. Don't limit yourself to cooked chicken breast: eat beef, pork, salmon, buffalo, ostrich, kangaroo, etc.... I think you know what I'm getting at.

10. small regular meals are better than big irregular meals

I really thought most people knew this today, but when I talk to new clients, I'm always amazed that they don't know it. It's quite simple, really. Your body can absorb nutrients better if you eat them in small, regular portions. This also promotes positive nutrient partitioning (more nutrients are stored in muscle and fewer nutrients are stored in fat tissue).

Eating smaller, more regular meals prevents fluctuations and dips in blood sugar and ensures more even blood sugar levels, prevents feeling bloated after large meals and prevents cravings that occur when you haven't eaten for a while. The bottom line is that for body composition purposes and health, smaller, more frequent meals (5 to 8 meals per day) are the way to go.

11. eat protein at every meal

Protein is the building block that makes up your muscles. The more protein you consume and use, the more muscle you will build. A regular protein intake will allow for optimal protein absorption. It will also optimize your muscle building by ensuring a constant supply of amino acids. If protein is not available, the muscle building process comes to a standstill. To maximize muscle growth, make sure you eat at least some protein every time you eat.

12. eat your breakfast

When it comes to body composition, breakfast is the most important meal of the day (yes, I know you've heard that before). First of all, it's important to break your overnight fast: Depending on when you ate your last meal, when you wake up in the morning, you haven't eaten for 8 to 12 hours or more. This leads to a catabolic (muscle wasting) state or at least stops muscle building. To maximize your muscle building, you need to break this fast as soon as possible. This requires a good breakfast. If you don't eat breakfast, your muscle building process will stagnate and you may even experience muscle loss due to elevated levels of the stress hormone cortisol (starvation is another form of stress on the body). Chronically elevated cortisol levels will make it virtually impossible to build muscle and will also cause fat to build up in the abdominal area. This is bad news.

When it comes to fat loss, skipping breakfast has another downside: it has been shown that those who skip breakfast tend to consume a greater amount of calories throughout the day. In other words, skipping breakfast stimulates hunger during the rest of the day, which can lead to overeating. On the other hand, eating a good breakfast drastically reduces hunger and food intake during the rest of the day.

The bottom line is: if you want to be lean and muscular, don't skip breakfast!

13 Don't neglect the anabolic window after training

The second most important meal of your muscle building day is the meal immediately after your workout. Simply put, no muscle growth can take place before the recovery process begins. To speed up the onset of this process, you need to supply your muscles with nutrients as quickly as possible. The faster the required nutrients are transported to the muscle, the faster you will recover and the more muscle you will build. Immediately after training you should therefore send protein and carbohydrates (more or less carbohydrates depending on your current nutritional phase) to your muscles with an express delivery so that they can grow immediately.

Even though solid food after training is better than nothing, it is not what your muscles need. Solid food needs to be digested, which is why it can take 2 or more hours before the nutrients it contains are transported to your muscles. Fast-absorbing nutrients in the form of a post-workout shake can be available for muscle building within 15 to 30 minutes. After training, we have a 45 to 60 minute anabolic window for increased muscle growth. Don't miss it. Always remember that real food is better than powder most of the time - apart from straight after training. So treat yourself to a post-workout shake.

The best diets for fat loss

There are three primary diet strategies for fat loss:

• Carbohydrate-dominant diets, where fat intake is minimized
• Fat-dominant diets that minimize carbohydrate intake

As a rule of thumb, fatter people and naturally endomorphic body types ("strong" people) will respond better to a low-carb approach, while leaner individuals and naturally ectomorphic body types ("skinny" people) will do better with a high-carb intake. Mesomorphic body types - people who are naturally lean and muscular - do well on all types of diets, but seem to respond best to a balanced approach.

The different diet types can look something like this:

Low carbohydrate

• Calorie intake is set at 10 to 20% below calorie consumption
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fat accounts for 90 to 100% of energy nutrients
• Carbohydrates represent 10% of energy nutrients

If someone weighs 90 kilograms and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A calorie intake of 2400 to 2700 kcal
• Approx. 250 to 300g protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• He now has 1200 to 1500 left for energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• The fat intake would be set at 1100 to 1400 kcal (122 to 155 grams)
• Carbohydrate intake would be less than 30 grams

Low fat

• Calorie intake would be set at 10 to 20% below calorie expenditure
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fat accounts for around 10 to 20% of energy nutrients
• Carbohydrates make up 80 to 90% of energy nutrients

If someone weighs 90 kilograms and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A calorie intake of 2400 to 2700 kcal
• 250 to 300 grams of protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• He now has 1200 to 1500 left for energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• Carbohydrate intake would be set at 1000 to 1350 kcal (250 to 335 grams)
• Fat intake would be set at 200 to 400 kcal (about 40 to 50 grams)

Balanced

• Calorie intake is set at 10 to 20% below calorie consumption
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fats and carbohydrates both provide about 50% of energy nutrients
• Fats and carbohydrates should never be combined in one meal (eat only protein + carbohydrate or protein + fat meals, usually three of each)

If someone weighs 90 kilos and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A calorie intake of 2400 to 2700 kcal
• 250 to 300 grams of protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• He now has 1200 to 1500 left for energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• Carbohydrate intake would be set at 600 to 750 kcal or 150 to 185 grams
• Fat intake would be set at around 600 to 750 kcal or 65 to 85 grams

Advice for building muscle

In my opinion, you will make the best gains if you eat a clean diet all year round. I find it idiotic when people stuff themselves with junk food during the bulking phase just to gain weight. When trying to build muscle, you should eat the same as if you were trying to lose fat, but increase your calorie intake to 10 to 20% above your calorie needs.

Let's take the same example as above (approx. 90 kilos weight and a daily calorie consumption of 3000 kcal).

Low carbohydrate

• The calorie intake is set at 10 to 20% above the calorie consumption
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fat accounts for 90 to 100% of energy nutrients
• Carbohydrates represent 10% of energy nutrients

If someone weighs 90 kilograms and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A calorie intake of 3300 to 3600 kcal
• 250 to 300 grams of protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• 2000 to 2600 kcal in the form of energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• The fat intake would be set at 1800 to 2600 kcal (200 to 290 grams)
• Carbohydrate intake would be less than 30 grams

Low fat

• Calorie intake would be set at 10 to 20% above calorie consumption
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fat accounts for around 10 to 20% of energy nutrients
• Carbohydrates make up 80 to 90% of energy nutrients

If someone weighs 90 kilograms and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A daily calorie intake of 3300 to 3600 kcal
• 250 to 300 grams of protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• 2000 to 2600 kcal in the form of energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• Carbohydrate intake would be set at 1600 to 2300 kcal (400 to 575 grams)
• Fat intake would be set at 500 to 600 kcal (about 60 to 70 grams)

Balanced

• Calorie intake is set at 10 to 20% above calorie consumption
• Protein intake is set at 2.7 to 3.3 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
• Fats and carbohydrates both provide about 50% of energy nutrients
• Fats and carbohydrates should never be combined in one meal (eat only protein + carbohydrate or protein + fat meals, usually three of each)

If someone weighs 90 kilos and has an energy requirement of 3000 kcal, this results in the following:

• A calorie intake of 3300 to 3600 kcal
• 250 to 300 grams of protein (90 kilos x 2.7 to 3.3) = 1000 to 1200 kcal
• 2000 to 2600 kcal in the form of energy nutrients (calorie intake minus protein calories)
• Carbohydrate intake would be set at 1000 to 1300 kcal (250 to 325 grams)
• Fat intake would be set at around 1000 to 1300 kcal (110 to 145 grams)

Conclusion

Exercising is easy for us as it is our passion, but what separates those who are serious about their attempt to change their body from those who are not so serious is the quality of the nutrition program. Working out takes 3 to 5 hours of effort per week, while eating right turns the whole process into a full-time job. However, it is this amount of dedication that really shows us who the successful people will be. Will you be one of them?

By Christian Thibaudeau | 11/06/07
Source: https://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/nutrition-for-newbies-2