Building muscle requires two things: a growth stimulus and enough nutrients and rest for recovery. Intense weight training stimulates muscle growth in the gym. Proper nutrition allows muscles to recover outside of the gym. Staying lean while building muscle requires careful attention to your diet and the timing of your nutrition. For example, carbohydrates have a different effect on our bodies following intense exercise than at any other time. Follow a few simple guidelines to target your training and nutrition to build muscle and stay lean at the same time.
Step 1
Time your nutrients to optimize muscle growth while minimizing fat storage. Post-workout and pre-bedtime are two opportunities to provide your body with nutrients for muscle building. Take a post-workout shake containing 35 to 50g of whey protein, 60g of high-glycemic carbohydrates (fruit juice or dextrose) and 30g of healthy fats (flaxseed oil or medium-chain triglycerides). According to the "Muscle Nerd" Jeff Anderson, this post-workout anabolic window is a time when almost all of the nutrients you ingest will be used for muscle recovery. Take another protein shake pre-bedtime containing 30 to 50g of whey and casein protein (slow-digesting, such as cottage cheese) and 1 or 2 tbsp. of flaxseed oil or natural peanut butter. Avoid large amounts of carbohydrates pre-bedtime to prevent unwanted fat storage.
Step 2
Take in 1g protein per pound of your body weight every day. Take 25 percent of this total immediately after your workout, due to the body's need for more protein to stop muscle breakdown and begin protein synthesis. For most people, this will amount to 35 to 50g of protein. Subtract that from your daily total, then divide the remaining protein between five or six smaller meals throughout the day. This eating strategy keeps insulin levels low, which means less body fat storage, while also keeping your muscles in an anabolic or muscle-building mode.
Step 3
Do one negative-accentuated (NA) set at the end of each compound exercise. Compound movements are multi-joint mass-building exercises, such as squats or bench presses. You perform negative-accentuated sets by slowly lowering the weight with a six-second cadence. According to fitness authors Jonathan Lawson and Steve Holman, these slow-negative reps cause more micro-tears in muscle tissue, which take a lot of calories to repair over the next 48 to 72 hours following your training session. Besides burning extra calories, NA sets also release the potent fat-burning growth hormone.
Step 4
Do "super cardio" immediately following your weight-training workout. The amount and duration of post-workout cardiovascular exercise depends entirely upon your individual metabolism. Hard-gainers, or those who struggle to gain weight, may find that they do not need any cardio to stay lean. Those with slower metabolism may choose to do 15, 20, 30 minutes or more. The "Muscle Nerd" Jeff Anderson calls this "super cardio" because our bodies use up most of our glycogen fuel (muscle-stored carbohydrates) during anaerobic weight training. Thus, this low-intensity cardio burns body fat almost exclusively, while sparing muscle tissue. More intense cardio can burn away hard-earned muscle tissue.
Step 5
Add a few helpful natural supplements to your program. The combination of creatine monohydrate, whey protein and conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) has been shown to lead to great lean muscle mass gains, according to "The Power of Three" by Carey Rossi. Take 5 to 10g of creatine monohydrate with your whey protein immediately following your workout. Split 6g of CLA equally between your five or six daily meals.
References
- "Optimum Anabolics"; Jeff Anderson; CQC LLC, 2004
- "Xtreme Lean"; Jonathan Lawson and Steve Holman; Ironman Publishing, 2008
- "Muscle & Performance"; "The Power of Three"; Carey Rossi
Member Comments