Gaining Muscle Mass Successfully

 

General Nutrition 101

Diet Analysis 101

Weight Management 101

Exercise Facts

Helpful Links

• Read these real life stories from the fitness center if you want to get big and strong

John and Ryan are trying to put on some weight in the form of muscle.  Their trainer at the fitness center designed a weight-training program to fit their goals.  Now they want to know how nutrition can help them gain muscle mass.  Here’s what we told them:

John and Ryan then told us they wanted to follow a high protein diet in order to gain weight.

Here’s what we told them:

     Set realistic goals:

• A muscle mass gain of 1-2 pounds per week is a reasonable goal   

• Calculate your energy needs using the energy needs calculator. 

• After you have calculated your needs, add on 500 calories per day for a reasonable weight gain of 1-2 pounds per week.

• Check out the meal patterns and Food Guide Pyramid to find an eating plan that fits your daily calorie needs.     

• Individuals who weight train need slightly more protein than the average person. 

• For example: a healthy male who weighs 175 pounds decides he wants to start weight lifting 3 days per week.  He generally only needs to eat one extra serving of protein per day (think a tape cassette- size piece of chicken) to meet his higher protein needs.

• Exercise and high protein diets don’t mix: your body needs carbohydrates for energy during exercise.  Your muscles may feel tired because they aren’t getting the type of energy they need (carbohydrates).

• High protein diets can cause health problems.  High protein diets make your kidneys work overtime to break down the excess protein. 

• Your body uses protein and fat for energy when you don’t feed it carbohydrates.  When fat is broken down, ketones (smaller pieces of fat) increase in your blood.  You can experience fatigue, headaches, dizziness, insomnia and irritability if ketones get too high. 

• High protein intake increases the risk of heart disease, because foods high in protein (like meats and cheeses) are also high in saturated fat.  

• Eating lots of these proteins will raise your cholesterol levels, which can clog your arteries and cause a heart attack.

• AND MOST OF ALL…High Protein diets are BORING!  You can’t eat your favorite foods like pizza, so you’ll get bored easily.