Proper sports nutrition to increase muscle mass

In fit­ness, a bal­anced diet is just as impor­tant as a train­ing pro­gram. For this rea­son, you should not expect pos­i­tive results from train­ing with­out chang­ing your eat­ing habits. This rule applies not only to train­ing con­duct­ed to reduce excess weight, but also to fit­ness class­es to gain mus­cle mass.

Factors affecting the growth of muscle mass during fitness

The process of increas­ing mus­cle vol­ume depends on the fol­low­ing fac­tors:

• inten­si­ty of fit­ness activ­i­ties and train­ing pro­grams.

For active mus­cle growth, it is nec­es­sary to work with max­i­mum weight, per­form­ing a small num­ber of rep­e­ti­tions. Under such con­di­tions, myofib­rils — spe­cial mus­cle fibers — receive micro­trau­ma. It is the regen­er­a­tion of these micro­trau­mas in the fol­low­ing days that leads to an increase in the num­ber of mus­cle cells;

• body type.

It depends on the innate con­sti­tu­tion of the body how much a per­son is ini­tial­ly pre­dis­posed to gain­ing mus­cle mass. The hard­est thing to increase mus­cle vol­ume, despite fol­low­ing the prin­ci­ples of prop­er sports nutri­tion, is ecto­morph peo­ple, whose body type is char­ac­ter­ized by thin bones and a fast metab­o­lism. Dif­fi­cul­ties with gain­ing mus­cle mass also arise in endo­morphs, which are genet­i­cal­ly pre­dis­posed to full­ness. With an increase in the caloric con­tent of the diet nec­es­sary for gain­ing mus­cle mass, along with the num­ber of mus­cle cells, the vol­ume of adi­pose tis­sue also increas­es. The eas­i­est way to build mus­cle is for peo­ple with a meso­mor­phic body type;

• calo­rie con­tent of food.

To increase mus­cle vol­ume, the diet, depend­ing on indi­vid­ual char­ac­ter­is­tics, should cor­re­spond to or slight­ly exceed the dai­ly calo­rie intake, cal­cu­lat­ed tak­ing into account anthro­po­met­ric para­me­ters and lifestyle. For mus­cle growth in the body, con­di­tions for an ener­gy sur­plus must be cre­at­ed;

• nutri­tion­al bal­ance.

The diet should con­tain all the nutri­ents nec­es­sary for the nor­mal func­tion­ing of the body, the growth of mus­cle tis­sue, as well as the replen­ish­ment of ener­gy con­sumed dur­ing strength fit­ness.

The role of proteins, carbohydrates and fats in nutrition for increasing muscle mass

Prop­er sports nutri­tion involves keep­ing a strict record of not only the calo­rie con­tent of the diet, but also its nutri­tion­al val­ue. A bal­anced ratio of pro­teins, car­bo­hy­drates and fats is extreme­ly impor­tant to cre­ate con­di­tions con­ducive to the for­ma­tion of new mus­cle tis­sue cells. For the nor­mal course of ana­bol­ic process­es that pro­mote mus­cle growth, nutri­tion must meet the fol­low­ing para­me­ters:

• The dai­ly amount of pro­tein should be 2–2.5 g per kilo­gram of weight.

When pro­tein is syn­the­sized in the body, new mus­cle cells are formed, there­fore, with a lack of it, an increase in mus­cle vol­ume will not occur, even if fit­ness activ­i­ties are extreme­ly intense. When con­sum­ing pro­tein in an amount exceed­ing the dai­ly dose, one should not expect a sharp increase in mus­cles either, since excess pro­tein is not absorbed by the body. For active mus­cle growth, ani­mal pro­tein is more use­ful, for exam­ple, dietary poul­try, fish and seafood, eggs, milk and hard cheese. In addi­tion, these foods are full of use­ful amino acids nec­es­sary for diges­tion and sub­se­quent pro­tein syn­the­sis;

• Car­bo­hy­drates are just as impor­tant in build­ing mus­cle as pro­tein.

They give ener­gy that allows a per­son to per­form com­plex phys­i­cal exer­cis­es with the max­i­mum work­ing weight. Car­bo­hy­drates are stored in the mus­cles in the form of glyco­gen, which is sub­se­quent­ly used by the body as an ener­gy resource. Prop­er sports nutri­tion involves the pres­ence of slow car­bo­hy­drates in the diet. They are found in large quan­ti­ties in cere­als and legumes, fruits and pota­toes. Slow car­bo­hy­drates sat­u­rate for a longer peri­od of time than fast ones, and in addi­tion, eat­ing foods with slow car­bo­hy­drates does not cause sharp spikes in blood glu­cose lev­els, which are accom­pa­nied by an acute feel­ing of hunger;

• fats are involved in many process­es in the body, for exam­ple, in the for­ma­tion of cell mem­branes, the syn­the­sis of tis­sue hor­mones.

In addi­tion, fats, name­ly essen­tial fat­ty acids, ensure the nor­mal func­tion­ing of the car­dio­vas­cu­lar sys­tem and the artic­u­lar-lig­a­men­tous appa­ra­tus. Healthy fats are rich in such foods: fat­ty fish, avo­ca­dos, nuts and seeds, as well as veg­etable oils derived from them.

Recommendations for proper sports nutrition

In order to achieve con­sis­tent­ly pro­gres­sive pos­i­tive results of increas­ing mus­cle mass, in par­al­lel with fit­ness class­es, the pur­pose of which is to stim­u­late active mus­cle growth, it is nec­es­sary to adhere to a spe­cial reg­i­men and diet, fol­low­ing the fol­low­ing rec­om­men­da­tions of spe­cial­ists:

• the num­ber of meals should be at least 5, 3 of which are main and 2–3 snacks. By eat­ing food often and frac­tion­al­ly, but in small por­tions, you can pre­vent the onset of an acute feel­ing of hunger, as well as pro­vide the body with all the nec­es­sary con­di­tions for the sta­ble course of ana­bol­ic process­es;
• accord­ing to the prin­ci­ples of prop­er sports nutri­tion for mus­cle build­ing, the ratio of pro­teins, fats and car­bo­hy­drates should cor­re­spond to the fol­low­ing pro­por­tion: pro­tein — from 50 to 60%, car­bo­hy­drates — from 30 to 40% and fats — the remain­ing 10–20%;
• the amount of pro­tein that enters the body with food should be at least 2–2.5 g per kilo­gram of weight. The lack of pro­tein in food can be com­pen­sat­ed by pro­tein sup­ple­ments and shakes;
• 1–1.5 hours before train­ing, you need to eat a por­tion of food rich in slow car­bo­hy­drates in order to pro­vide the body with enough ener­gy for sub­se­quent inten­sive work. In accor­dance with the prin­ci­ples of prop­er sports nutri­tion, after exer­cise, you should replen­ish your body’s pro­tein stores by drink­ing a pro­tein shake or eat­ing a serv­ing of pro­tein food.