Читать реферат по английскому: "Nutrition Essay Research Paper Nutrition 101 Back" Страница 1

(Назад) (Cкачать работу)

Nutrition Essay, Research Paper

?Nutrition 101: Back to Basics

If you go into any gym in the world and randomly ask 100 people to pinpoint the most important thing for achieving success in bodybuilding and fitness, you’d probably get just as many different answers. Most replies, however, would involve various training programs or styles.

As important as training is, nutrition plays an equally large role — your diet is almost always responsible for either success or failure in bodybuilding and virtually any fitness program. Here I’ll present a basic nutrition program that includes some key tips on nutritional timing, metabolic enhancement and preferred food and supplement choices. This program can teach you how to determine your daily protein, carbohydrate, fat and caloric needs. So get your calculators and notebooks ready; back-to-basics Nutrition 101 is about to begin.

DAILY CALORIC INTAKE

Before we examine the various macronutrients, let’s look at the common denominator that links all types of foods: calories. This is a topic that has been used and abused a lot over the past several years. At one point, high-calorie diets were in, then low-calorie diets came back in fashion. The same holds true for protein, carbohydrate and fat. Opinions seem to change all the time.

The following formula, on the other hand, is tried and true. If you follow it and make adjustments as needed, you can’t help but achieve nutritional nirvana. Unlike many of the complex formulas for figuring daily caloric needs that have been introduced, my formula is a simple, effective method.

If your goal is to add muscle while not adding bodyfat, or even slowly eliminating bodyfat, multiply your weight (in pounds) by 13, 14 or 15 — 13 if you have a slow metabolism, 14 for a moderate metabolism and 15 for a fast metabolism. For hardgainers or those who simply want to gain weight, multiply your weight by 16, 17 or 18 according to the same metabolic progression. If your aim is to lose fat, multiply your current bodyweight by 10, 11 or 12 — again, 10 if you have a slow metabolism, 11 for a moderate metabolism and 12 for a fast metabolism

Use this as a starting point; you may need to adjust your caloric intake by 50–100 calories per day if you plateau and have trouble achieving your desired goals. This formula also works nicely as a starting point for bodybuilders who want to calculate their varying caloric needs over the course of a year. Precontest bodybuilders would multiply their desired bodyweight by 10, 11 or 12, according to their metabolism. Off-season bodybuilders would multiply their current or desired weight by any number from 13 to 18, depending on how fast their metabolism is and how lean they want to stay in the off-season. This formula works equally well for both men and women.

THE MACRONUTRIENT MIX

After figuring your daily caloric needs, you’ll want to figure out how many grams of protein, carbohydrate and fat you should take in per day. Roughly 30%–35% of your calories should come from protein, 50%–60% from carbohydrate and 10%–15% from fat. Each gram of protein or carbohydrate is equal to 4 calories, while each gram of fat has 9 calories. Ration your calories somewhat equally throughout 5–6 meals or more per day. Higher-calorie postworkout meals are a good idea.

Although I won’t discuss vitamins and minerals in detail, I do recommend that everyone take some type of multivitamin or mineral pack every day. This supplementation provides daily insurance and eliminates the worry of meeting required needs for general health and recovery.

PROTEIN

Protein is essential for the repair and growth of muscle tissue. The amino acids derived from proteins form the building blocks of all cells in the human body. Without protein, your organs, hair, nails, immune system and every other bodily system wouldn’t survive.

Bodybuilders need to take in enough protein to carry out the body’s day-to-day functions and fuel muscle recovery. Daily requirements for active people have been disputed for years between sports-medicine professionals and those who set the U.S. Recommended Dietary Allowances. My personal opinion, supported and accepted by many sports nutritionists and bodybuilding experts, is 1–1 1/2 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight per day. Any less and your recovery and growth will suffer; higher amounts don’t seem to offer any additional benefits.

Remember, your protein intake should be approximately 30%–35% of your total caloric intake. A 200-pound man who eats 2,600 calories per day, then, should consume about 215 grams of protein each day. This equals roughly 33% of his total calories. A 105-pound woman who eats 1,575 calories per day should consume roughly 130 grams of protein daily, or about 33% of her total calories.

Divide your protein intake fairly equally throughout all your meals. If our 200-pound man consumes six meals a day, he’d want to consume 30–40 grams of protein per meal. If our 105-pound female eats six meals daily, she’d want to consume 20–25 grams of protein per meal. Good sources of protein include lean turkey and chicken, white fish, lean red meat, egg whites and protein powders.

CARBOHYDRATES

Carbohydrates are the body’s preferred energy source. For the purpose of this article, we can break them down into two categories: simple and complex carbs. Complex carbs should represent the majority of your dietary carbohydrates, except in postworkout meals. Complex carbs break down slowly and elicit a mild blood-sugar response; they don’t result in a rapid release of insulin by the pancreas.

Eating simple carbs elicits a rapid rise in blood sugar, which can result in increased insulin secretion and a commensurate fall in your blood-sugar levels. This can make you feel sluggish and

Похожие работы