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Can Protein Increase Your Muscle and Training Results?

By Mandy Gibbons

Getting Fed Up with Your Lack Of Muscle Tone? Frustrated with Your Muscle Growth?

Have you ever wondered why you weight train like crazy and yet your muscle tone decreases? You've increased your weights, cardio'd your head off to lose extra body fat, so you can see your muscle definition, but none of this seems to work. You are not sure what you are doing wrong but you are getting fed up not getting results.

So why Would Protein Help?

When exercising, particularly weight training, our bodies need plenty of protein to develop and maintain muscle. Protein is broken down into amino acids, then turned back into protein to produce and repair our muscles after our training session. Because amino acids can be burned by the body during exercise, especially aerobic exercise, it is important that we make the effort to supplement our muscles to help them repair faster and more efficiently.

What Happens to my Muscles if I don't Bother to Increase my Protein Intake?

At the beginning of this article I mentioned instances that you may be familiar with. If you are training hard and don't bother to supplement your muscles with extra protein your muscles can start to deplete - due to your body turning to muscle / protein as a source of energy.

So how Much Protein Should I be Taking?

This depends on your body size, training schedule and program. It is important that you increase your intake to cater for your training so your muscles can survive your training sessions.

Protein intake required for the average person - who performs a light amount of exercise.
Approximately 1 gram of protein per kilo of body weight

Protein intake required an Athlete who has a heavy training schedule that involves alot of resistance exercise, sports specific training or weight training
Approximately 2 grams of protein per kilo of body weight

Protein intake required for the person - who has a hard core heavy weight training schedule.
Approximately 2.5 grams of protein per kilo of body weight

The above are approximations and examples to give you some idea of what the bodies requirements are for protein. Notice the difference in the protein intake for the programs that involve more muscle damage?

Keeping Up with Consuming Larger Amounts of Protein

Such high intakes of protein can be difficult to keep up with on a daily basis. So as well as including the following protein sources in your low fat healthy eating program you can also use a protein powder. (see below)

Sources of protein:
Lean Red Meat, Lean White Meat: Fish, Chicken or turkey (no skin), Eggs (preferably egg whites) Beans and legumes (which are high in carbohydrates). Nuts (nuts are also high in fat)... just to name a few.

When performing regular resistance training try to include a source of protein in each meal. Say for instance: Breakfast: 2 x poached egg whites, morning snack: 1 x protein shake, lunch: lean chicken with salad sandwich, afternoon snack: 1 x protein shake, dinner: grilled lean read meat or fish with veggies. If you are still hungry late at night, and you've been training hard, you might want to also have a protein shake before going to bed, as this is your peak muscle recovery time. 2 x protein shakes per day should be sufficient for the average person wanting to increase lean muscle mass. If just after a light snack after dinner try a low fat, low GI style yogurt - small, single serve tub.

Protein Powders

Protein Powders help supplement your eating program with the necessary muscle nutrients that your body requires such as Amino Acids (mentioned above), Vitamins and Minerals. Protein powders are a convenient way of ensuring you receive an adequate protein intake. There are so many protein powders available to us now. You can choose from a variety of different flavors, different powders for different training needs and even easier to mix powders that can be mixed in shakers rather than blenders. One more thing too. Make sure that you drink lots of water when increasing your protein intake to prevent dehydration and to help the digestion of your protein. Some people prefer to cycle their protein intake here and there to give their body a rest from trying to digest large amounts of protein. Like a cleansing process.

Eating "real food" is important so don't go overboard gulping down protein shakes with every meal because you'll more than likely find that you'll end up consuming too much. Which is not only as waste of protein powder but you could cause yourself to raise your calorie intake too high.

Just a few last words!

It is important before starting any new eating program to check with your doctor regarding increases or decreases in certain food intakes and food sources. You should now have a better understanding of why protein is important for assisting with your training. Your eating program and training program work hand in hand to help you achieve the training goals you have worked so hard for.

For more information on Personalised Training and Low Fat Eating plans please feel free to visit my site: http://www.virtualfitnesstrainer.com

Click here to view more free articles on health and fitness: Health and Fitness Articles

Happy Training!

Are You worried about Gaining too much Size from Weight Training?

by Mandy Gibbons

A Common Concern

I have written about this specific topic several times in my Newsletters as it has always been a very common concern - especially amongst women. The most frequently asked questions regarding this issue are: "I would like to increase my lean muslce but I am afraid that if I use weights I will look like the body builders in the muscle magazines etc" or "I have recently begun a weight program and I am finding that I am putting on more weight plus bulking up. How do I achieve muscle tone without getting huge?"

You Need to Train for Big Muscles to Get Big Muscles

Body Building for very large muscles is only achieved by training in a specific manner to reach those goals - which can take years to reach this stage of muscle development. I personally love the physique of a body builder but it doesn't necessarily mean that I want my muscles as big as that. However I can appreciate the sheer hard work that goes into that type of training. I have often used the techniques of body building myself to gain muscle size when wanting to create a more muscular look without gaining too much size or looking masculine.

What You Eat will Encourage You to Bulk Up

One thing you need to watch out for when beginning your weight training program is what you eat. Why? Because what you eat effects the way your body reacts to your training program. Certain foods and the amount of those foods eaten can cause you to bulk up - when your actual plan or goal was to become leaner.

How Eating Affects Your Size and Shape when Partaking in a Weight Training Program

Ok. Reviewing your eating program is one of the most important things for you to do when starting your exercise program. When most people start training they find that they become very hungry, because they are expending more energy, which then leads them to eat more. The most common foods people reach out for when they are super hungry is really fatty foods or high sugar foods, because they're convenient and "fulfil the craving" that's being experienced. These foods, as much as they may taste great, won't help your progress if you're training to build muscle while also keeping your body fat at bay.

Overeating to Compensate for Exercise

If you begin to "carb up" or fill the hunger gap with junk food, as mentioned above, you need to be training to burn off that type of food intake, which would often be more in the line of an athlete's or a body builder's etc training program. This means that any excess food you eat, and are not burning off, will most likely "store", making it harder for your body to burn off stored fat or support lean muscle growth. Besides, you and I both know that your body probably isn't clapping it's hands at the thought of you topping it up with bags of chips as a source of fuel for energy.

Putting On Weight when Your Starting Your New Exercise Program

Most people when they start exercising will put on a kilo or so. This is normally due to muscle growth. Even just a small amount of resistance training can cause this, especially if you haven't trained in a while. But don't worry because this is only weight not your measurements. Muscle is denser than fat so you may have already started losing some body fat, but because you've stimulated muscle growth there's been a small gain in weight.

Don't forget about water weight! The more muscle you have and the fitter you are the more water you'll store. This is GREAT NEWS and means your body is reacting to your new training program. If you are doing the right thing by your program you will soon be seeing some fantastic changes in your bodyshape. So be persistant and try not get frusrated. It's very common for people who are very lean or very fit to look like they actually weigh less than what they really do. My advice is to monitor your progress via taking your measurements, using goal clothing and fat calipers - and give the scales the flick for a while only weighing yourself once in blue moon.

It is Easy to Get Confused when Trying to Choose What Food Types will Help Your Training Goals

Choosing what we should eat can be baffling. Often we tend to place it in the too hard basket and decide to start "tomorrow" on our new eating program. Honestly, once you get started you will be so impressed with yourself for making the effort to learn and educate your self further on this matter. Learning what is right for you and your body type will offer you the freedom to start experimenting with new recipes and to start seeing new results from your eating program.

Steps to Prevent You from Bulking Up

- Eat Low Fat Foods

- Reduce your bad fat intake. Make sure you include healthy fats in your eating plan. For example: EFA's.. flaxseed oil, salmon etc

- Cut back on the "white" Carbs - breads, cereals, potato, pasta and rice etc opting for the brown ones instead eg.. multi-grain bread, sweet potato etc.

- Make sure you are performing 3-4 cardio sessions per week.

- Don't forget about your weight program. If you want to start training for larger muscles then user heavier weights with lower reptitions. And at the opposite end of the scale use lighter weights with more repetitions.

- Use Variety in your cardio sessions and your weight training.

- Reduce your alcohol consumption.

- Make sure you take one day off per week from training and allow yourself a "cheat" meal once a week,

- Increase your Lean Protein intake eg... fish, chicken breasts (skin removed / fat cut off), cottage cheese, egg whites, lean red meats, protein shakes.

- Eat more veggies and salads, rather than filling up on "heavy" carbohydrates.

- Get your workout (weight/ resistance program and cardio workout) upgraded every 8-12 weeks , no longer.

Final words...
So unless you're actually training to pack on heaps of size you won't turn into the incredible hulk. Weight / resistance training and exercise in general not only gives us the opportunity to change our body shapes but can also increase our fitness level, assist in rehabilitation, improve our self esteem and boost our overall wellbeing. Please don't be scared to include it in your health and fitness regime. Choosing the right program for you is important so you can benefit and enjoy your workouts plus feel confident that you are on the right track to your health and fitness goals. Always remember to check with your doctor before starting any new eating or exercise program.

Happy training folks,

Yours in fun, health and fitness

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