Importance of Rest and Recovery in Muscle Building

To allow the body to build muscle tissue, rest and recovery is essential. The two components of rest and recovery are adequate sleep each night, and adequate time in between weight training workouts.

Adequate sleep - it is important to sleep as many hours as possible each and every night. Many people don't realize just how important sleep is when it comes to building muscle and gaining weight. If you don't allow your body to get enough sleep each night, you are neglecting a very important part of your muscle building program that could completely erase all of your muscle building efforts in the gym.


Adequate rest between workouts - It is very important to incorporate "rest days" into your weight training program so that you allow time for your muscles to recovery in between workouts. Try to avoid weight training on consecutive days, even if you are targeting different muscle groups.
Don't forget that your body only builds muscle tissue when you are not weight training. Simply put, you build muscle while you are sleeping, not while you are at the gym! If you weight train and don't get an enough sleep, or train too often it can become nearly impossible to build muscle.
The Effects of Inadequate Rest and Recovery
Whether you do not sleep enough each night, or do not allow enough rest days between your weight training workouts, you will be compromising your muscle building efforts tremendously. Rest and recovery are extremely important, and should be a top priority if you are serious about your muscle building goals.

THE EFFECTS INADEQUATE REST

Getting inadequate sleep each night will play a number of negative roles that will make building muscle very difficult. Not only will lack of sleep not allow enough time for your muscle to grow, it may also:
Decrease energy levels
Decrease testosterone levels
Decrease growth hormone levels
Increase catabolic (muscle destroying) hormones
While we sleep, we go in and out of four phases of sleep. This is known as the "sleep cycle", and is very important to the bodybuilder, since this is the time at which the body releases the growth hormone. Sleep deprivation disrupts the sleep cycle, and can be responsible for the effects mentioned above.
The bottom line: inadequate sleep will essentially make building muscle nearly impossible. It encourages your body to lose muscle, and gain body fat! Not a good thing if you are trying to build muscle. Get as much sleep as you possibly can. If you are sleep deprived, catch up on your sleep.

THE EFFECTS OF INADEQUATE RECOVERY BETWEEN WORKOUTS

Not allowing enough recovery time in between your weight training workouts can result in overtraining. Overtraining will ultimately lead to an injury, slowing your muscle building progress even further.
Since you are placing tremendous amount of stress on the muscles and nervous system each and every training workout, allowing enough time in between workouts is critical. Make sure that your program allows one day rest between weight training workouts. If for some reason you have to train on consecutive days make sure you are targeting different muscle groups on each day.
The bottom line: Try to design a weight training program the allows one day of rest in between each weight training workout, and never train the same muscle group on two consecutive days.
How Much Rest and Recovery Do Bodybuilders Need?
The amount of rest and recovery a bodybuilder needs depends on many factors, but most experts agree that eight to nine hours of sleep each night, and three to four rest days per week is ideal to maximize your muscle building potential.

How Much Sleep Does a Bodybuilder Need?

The number of hours of sleep your body requires each night depends on different factors such as your daily activity level, the amount of stress in your life, the intensity of your workouts, and the quality of your diet. A bodybuilder requires more sleep then the average person because of the stress the body is put through after every weight training workout.
Recent studies have shown the getting less than 6 hours of sleep each night can seriously affect your coordination, reaction time, judgment, overall health, and ultimately your body’s ability to build muscle and repair muscle tissue. Most experts recommend that the average person should aim for a minimum of seven, hours of sleep each night.
Since bodybuilders would not be considered an average person due to the increased stresses that a muscle building program places on their body, they should aim for at least eight to nine hours of sleep each night. This will ensure that they allow adequate muscle recovery time.
Since your muscle building program will be very taxing on your body, it will need all of the rest it can get!
So, how do you determine if you are sleep deprived? The easiest way to find out if you are sleep deprived is to lie down in the middle of the day. If you can fall asleep within about 10 minutes, then you likely need more sleep every night.
The good news is, that if you are sleep deprived it is possible to "catch up" on sleep, and your body may reward you with some extra muscle growth if you do.
To catch up on sleep, Try to sleep for nine hours every night for three weeks. At the end of the three weeks, try the 10 minute sleep test again. If you do not fall asleep within the 10 minutes, then your body is likely caught up. If you do fall asleep, continue sleeping for nine hours each night for another few weeks until your body passes the test.

How Much Recovery between Workouts is Necessary?

Most experts agree that you should aim for at least one rest day between each of your weight training workouts, preferably two. So for example, if you weight train three days a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday), then your rest days would be the other four days (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday).
During your rest days, it is important to take it easy. No matter how tempted you may be to workout on a rest day, you should restrain yourself. remind yourself that your body will use your rest days to repair and rebuild your muscle tissue. Just relax and enjoy them -- if you are training as hard as you should be, they are well deserved!
Rest and Recovery Tips
Be sure to follow these rest and recovery tips to allow your body the time it needs to build muscle, and to maximize your bodies muscle building potential:
Aim for a minimum of eight hours of sleep each night - Any less and you may be robbing your body of the time it needs to help repair your muscle tissue.
Avoid anything that will increase adrenaline levels - Watching TV, surfing the net, or performing any activity that involves deep concentration can cause an increase in adrenaline, which will make falling a sleep difficult. Try to relax a few hours before bed time and avoid any activities that you think might affect your sleep.


Try to avoid physical activity close to your bed time - Late night workouts are generally not a good idea, nor are any activities that will increase your heart rate. Elevating your heart rate before your bedtime can make it difficult to fall asleep. Try to limit your activity level within three hours of your bedtime.
Do not eat large amounts of food before you sleep, and try to avoid consuming carbohydrates - Eating too much food before you sleep means that the digestive system will be working hard while you try to sleep. This can make it difficult for your body to get in to the state of deep sleep that it needs to repair muscle tissue. If you need a snack before bedtime, try to eat something small that is high in protein that is easy to digest.


Get on a consistent sleep schedule - Try to get to bed and wake up at the same time every day. A consistent sleep schedule will help improve the quality of your sleep.
Do not weight train on consecutive days - Try to allow at least one day in between weight training workouts, even if targeting different muscle groups. Your muscles and nervous system need this time to repair themselves.


Rest and recovery is extremely important part of your muscle building program. A bodybuilder needs at least eight to nine hours of sleep each night to maximize the body’s ability to build muscle. Lack of sleep is responsible for a number of factors that will hinder muscle growth including a decrease in anabolic hormones, an increase catabolic hormones, and a decrease in energy levels. Ultimately it will become very difficult to build muscle with inadequate sleep.
Incorporating rest days in to you weight training program is also very important, since your body uses these days to repair and rebuild muscle and connective tissue. Not allowing enough rest days, or weight training on consecutive days can result in overtraining and injury.
When designing your muscle building program, make sure that rest and recovery is not overlooked. Rest assured (no pun intended) that your body will reward you for your efforts.

The Myth Of Cardio Before Breakfast—Debunked!

We’ve all heard it before, the theory that doing cardio on an empty stomach after an overnight fast sends fat burning into overdrive. If only it were true …

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by Brad Schoenfeld Apr 11, 2011

In 1999, Bill Phillips published his bestselling fitness book, Body-for-LIFE, which promised a body transformation in 12 weeks.

In his cardio chapter, Phillips put forth the theory that performing aerobic exercise first thing in the morning on an empty stomach maximizes fat loss.

The rest, as they say, is history. Ever since, every Tom, Dick, and Harriett has been shuffling off to the treadmill each morning before raising so much as a spoonful of oatmeal to his or her lips.

His rationale was as follows: A prolonged absence of food brings about a reduction in circulating blood sugar, causing glycogen (stored carbohydrate) levels to fall. That leaves your body no choice but to rely more on fat, rather than glucose, to fuel workouts.

Moreover, the low insulin levels associated with fasting are conducive to fat breakdown, increasing the availability of fatty acids to be used as energy during the exercise session.

The strategy became popular with bodybuilders and other physique athletes striving to get as lean as possible. After all, who wouldn't want to burn more fat while expending the same amount of effort?

After all, who wouldn't want to burn more fat while expending the same amount of effort?!

I'm sorry to say it, but the whole zombie-before-dawn-at-the-gym thing was a big mistake.

Here's why:

Measuring Your Morning Cardio And Metabolism

First and foremost, it's shortsighted to simply look at the number of fat calories burned during an exercise session. Your metabolism doesn't operate in a vacuum.

Rather, the body continually adjusts its use of fat and carbohydrate for fuel depending on a variety of factors.

As a general rule, if you burn more carbohydrate while exercising, you'll ultimately burn more fat in the post-workout period and vice versa (1).

In the end, it doesn't make a bit of difference. You need to evaluate fat burning over the course of days -- not hour to hour basis -- to gain a meaningful perspective on its impact on body comp.

Let's say you're a skeptic, though, and figure it's better to burn more fat now rather than later. A bird in the hand is better than two in the bush, right? Well, not in this case.

True, the research does show that fasted cardio can increase fat utilization during exercise compared to performing cardio in the fed state. Except this only occurs at very low levels of training intensity.

During moderate-to-high intensity levels, the body continues to break down significantly more fat when fasted compared to after you've eaten.

So far, so good. Unfortunately, the rate of breakdown exceeds your body's ability to use the extra fatty acids for fuel. In other words, you have a lot of extra fatty acids floating around in the blood that can't be used by working muscles.

Ultimately, these fatty acids are repackaged into triglycerides post-workout, and then shuttled back into fat cells. So you've gone to excessive lengths…only to wind up at the same place.

During moderate-to-high intensity levels, the body continues to break down significantly more fat when fasted compared to after you've eaten.

Fasted Cardio Doesn't Mean Fast Results

Okay, so perhaps you're thinking that you'll just perform fasted low-intensity cardio to burn those few extra fat calories. Nice try, hot shot. You see, training status also has an effect on the fasted cardio strategy.

Namely, if you exercise on a regular basis -- and if you're reading this article, that likely includes you -- the benefits of fasted cardio on fat utilization are negligible even at low levels of intensity.

Horowitz and colleagues (2) found that when trained subjects exercised at 50 percent of theirmax heart rate, an intensity that equates to a slow walk, there was no difference in the amount of fat burned--regardless of whether the subjects had eaten.

These results held true for the first 90 minutes of exercise; only after this period did fasted cardio begin producing a favorable shift in the amount of fat burned.

So unless you're willing and able to slave away on the treadmill for a couple of hours or more, fasted cardio provides no additional fat-burning benefits, irrespective of training intensity.

Fasted cardio makes even less sense when you take into account the impact of excess post-exercise oxygen consumption. EPOC, commonly referred to as the "afterburn," represents the number of calories expended after training. Guess what? Eating before exercise promotes substantial increases in EPOC (3).

And guess where the vast majority of calories expended in the post-exercise period come from? You got it, fat!

There's also the intensity factor to consider. Research indicates that high-intensity interval training is more effective than steady-state cardio for fat loss (Bill Phillips actually recommendedHIIT as the preferred type of cardio in his book).

Ever try to engage in HIIT session on an empty stomach? Bet you hit the wall pretty quick. In order to perform at a high level, your body needs a ready source of glycogen; deplete those stores and say goodbye to elevated training intensity.

The net result is that fewer calories are burned both during and after exercise, thereby diminishing total fat loss.

On top of everything, fasted cardio can have a catabolic effect on muscle. Studies show that training in a glycogen-depleted state substantially increases the amount of tissue proteins burned for energy during exercise (4).

Protein losses can exceed 10 percent of the total calories burned over the course of a one-hour cardio session -- more than double that of training in the fed state (5).

Any way you slice it, sacrificing hard-earned muscle in a futile attempt to burn a few extra calories from fat doesn't make a lick lot of sense--especially if you're a bodybuilder!

Ever try to engage in HIIT session on an empty stomach? Bet you hit the wall pretty quick.

To Cardio or Not to Cardio Before Breakfast

Summing up, the strategy to perform cardio on an empty stomach is misguided, particularly for physique athletes.

At best, the effects on body composition won't be any better than if you trained in a fed state; at worst, you'll lose muscle and reduce total fat loss. So if you should eat…what should you eat prior to cardio?

The answer depends on several factors, including the duration and intensity of training, the timing of previous meals before the cardio session, and individual genetics.

A good rule of thumb is to consume approximately 1/4 gram of carbohydrate and 1/8 gram of protein per pound of your ideal bodyweight (which may differ from your actual weight).

For example, if your ideal bodyweight is 200 pounds, then your pre-workout meal should consist of approximately 50 grams of carbs and 25 grams of protein. A shake made of natural fruit juice and whey protein is a good option, particularly if cardio is done early in the morning before breakfast.

WHEY PROTEIN

Whey protein is a fast-absorbing source of protein to support lean muscle! Great for anytime of the day - especially post-workout!

Get your whey protein today!

Of course, individual response to macronutrient intake will vary, so use this recommendation as a starting point, and adjust accordingly.

Can a high carbohydrate diet cause you to retain water ?

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If you've ever polished off a large plate of pasta in one sitting, you may have noticed a sluggish, bloated feeling later that day. What you felt is water retention, the biological aftereffect of a meal high in simple carbohydrates. While simple carbohydrates do spur water retention, complex carbohydrates can actually help you shed unwanted water weight.

CARBOHYDRATES

Carbohydrates are found in foods such as fruits, veggies, sweets, dairy products, cereal and pasta. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, your body breaks down carbohydrates and turns them into glucose for energy. The CDC notes that in a healthy eating plan, between 45 and 65 percent of your daily caloric intake should come from carbohydrates.

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SIMPLE VS. COMPLEX CARBS

There are two types of carbohydrates: simple and complex. While your body needs both, the CDC notes that complex carbs --- fiber and starch --- take longer to convert to glucose and are found in foods that offer more nutrition than simple carbohydrates. Simple carbohydrates are found in sugars, both the natural sugar in dairy products or fruit and the added sugars found in processed foods like baked goods.

HIGH-CARB DIETS

High-carb diets emphasize foods such as potatoes and whole-grain pasta, bread and rice. According to former "New York Times" health columnist and PBS television host Jane Brody, you could follow a diet in which up to 80 percent of your daily calories come from carbohydrates --- provided those are largely complex carbohydrates --- and suffer no ill health effects. Complex carbohydrates such as whole grains contain fiber, which helps slow down digestion and makes you feel full. Fiber also increases how much fat your body excretes; Brody notes that this is helpful in weight loss and preventing heart disease.

CARBS AND WATER RETENTION

Unfortunately, there is a relationship between a high-carb diet and water retention. In "Good Calories, Bad Calories," author Gary Taubes writes that carbohydrates cause your kidneys to hoard salt instead of excrete it. Once your body's salt content rises, your water content must also rise to keep the ratio of salt to bodily fluid steady. When you cut carbs, your body can let go of both the salt and the water it was retaining. This is why low-carb diets often produce a quick initial weight loss --- the dieter isn't losing any body fat, but he is losing several pounds of retained salt and water.

PREVENTION/SOLUTION

According to the University of Maryland Medical Center, complex carbs such as whole-grain foods can actually help you reduce water retention, while the simple carbs found in refined flour products such as white breads and some pastas can actually cause bloating. To cut down on water retention, eat leafy green veggies, green beans, asparagus, grapes and pineapple, which all have a diuretic effect. The UMMC also suggests you reduce your sodium intake, eat less red meat, avoid alcohol and consume antioxidant-rich fruits such as cherries and blueberries.

Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/309135-can-a-high-carb-diet-cause-you-to-retain-water/#ixzz2UdVQj9GD

How To Be Happy by Being More Selfish & Caring Less

• April 23rd, 2012
 
• Posted in Personal Development . Self Awareness . self Help
 
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Most of us are not selfish enough in the right area’s of our lives and we care too much about the wrong things. This combo makes it almost impossible to be truly happy.

We put excessive energy into the wrong area’s, and as a result, we don’t have enough energy left over for what’s really important… our health and happiness. We watch the news and are fed a bunch of garbage, then get upset about all the negativity that is taking place around us. Is getting upset really going to make a difference in what’s going on in the world? Some would argue, that yes, one person can make a difference. While this is true, it’s also a rarity. Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Mother Theresa for example, have made a huge impact. However, they did it peacefully, not shouting at the TV screen and without obsessively thinking and talking about all the injustices going on. They were laser focused on the solution, not the problem.

When you are focused on anything negative, that gives your energy away to what you are upset over and therefore, you empower it even more. What you focus on and the energy that you give to it, draws more of that to you. If that isn’t discouraging enough, it also deplete’s the energy stores you have. That wasted energy could have been used on something more positive. For example, practicing gratitude for all you do have, which would have attracted more things, people or situations into your life to be grateful for.

We hold the power to create the lives we desire and we do that by what we put out into the world. If you aren’t satisfied with the life that you are living or certain things in it, then change your focus and you will be able to attract something better. It really is that simple, not easy, but simple… Focus on what’s positive and forget all the rest.

A great place to change focus is on your health, which is pretty much the foundation for happiness because without being healthy, it’s kind of hard to be happy about anything else, if almost impossible. This is an area most of us would benefit from if we became more selfish, because we have a tendency to take better care of our cars, houses, pets and others, rather than we do our own body and mind.

When you are really sick, you don’t think about other people or doing something that will make you happy. You think mostly about yourselves and getting better. This is not the kind of selfishness that I’m talking about. That is an instance where being selfish is because you have to be. The selfishness that I’m referring to, that we’ve forgotten about, is the kind that prevents you from getting sick. It focuses on wellness, not on fixing symptoms and on being fit and not fat. It focuses on having a healthy mind with positive thoughts, not on being negative, worrying, being angry, and fearful. It’s time to be selfish with our self-care and focus on eating healthy and exercising both our body and mind.

Stop caring so much about what is happening around you. Most of that stuff you cannot change. Care about what you can change and what you can change, is yourself. Care about what you eat. Be selfish about what you put into your body. It’s the only one you’ve got.

Eat real food. Pass on the fast and fried foods, candies, cakes, cookies, snacks, sodas, sports drinks, and fruit juices. These are basically loaded with sugar and bad fats. They are okay to indulge in once in a while, but when these so-called foods are making up a majority of your diet, they will make you fat, which effects more than just your appearance. It affects your health and mind as well as the quality of life you live. Even if you don’t have or aren’t aware of having any health problems, if you are overweight and not truly happy with the way you look, it affects your overall happiness and that influences all areas of your life.

The way to happiness starts with a healthy body and a healthy body starts with a healthy mind. You must first believe that you have the power to create the body and life you want. It’s the truth. We all have that power. Believe it and then make the decision to do what it takes to achieve it, which is taking small steps until you have it. Start with cutting out all the un-healthy food and replace it with real nutritious food. There is no need to starve your body or diet. If that worked, then we would all be thin.

Add exercise to your daily routine. Do whatever gets you sweating. Start somewhere, even if it’s only a 10 minute walk. Just be sure to do it consistently and soon you will be walking for hours and your weight loss, energy, and endurance will spur you on to try other types of physical activity. It’s really important, especially in the beginning, to have a consistent and strict regime.

You need to develop the habit of eating right and working out and that takes at least three weeks of doing it everyday, every meal. There is nothing wrong with having a cheat day. Cheat days actually can be very good for your metabolism. However, in the beginning, cheat days can turn into cheat weeks, even months and eventually lead to giving up on yourself completely. Healthy habits help create a healthy mind, which creates a healthy body and a healthy happy life.

For your own well being, please be more selfish about how treat your body and care less about the things you can’t change. Focus on what you can change which is your thoughts, your food choice’s and exercise. The only thing standing in your way is your decsion to do it. When you do, stick to it and watch just how happy you can be..