Sport Nutition Tips: Eating the Right Foods for Exercise Posted in: Sport Nutrition – Tags: calories, diet, mg, zn

Nothing strengthens your workout progress like eating the right food. Since you reading this, you already understand that exercise requires a certain regimen. With proper nutrition, adherence to the regime is equally important, which we already wrote about. Today we will talk about what foods should be included in the diet and why.

Nutrition for sport

If we simplify the nutrition scheme to the limit, it will turn out that the athlete’s body needs carbohydrates before training, and proteins after it. First one is responsible for the source of energy for the muscles, while another – for gaining mass and proper recovery.

In addition, workout increases the body’s needs for vitamins and minerals – in particular, magnesium and zinc. Zinc is especially important for men, as it is necessary for the production of testosterone. All this leads to the rational question – which food is best for a healthy diet?

Diet for Exercise – Sport Nutition

Eating the right foods for strength training isn’t just a serving of a protein shake or a BCAA capsule. To be honest, there are no special food that make an athlete’s muscles grow faster. Practice shows that it is quite possible to gain muscle mass on ordinary buckwheat, oatmeal and chicken breast.

This is because the diet must have a high calorie content – in order to gain weight, body needs the energy. And the only way to control the correct diet and composition of the diet while exercising is to keep a food diary and prepare meals at home, weighing the ingredients.

Otherwise, it is nearly impossible to determine how many calories, protein, fat, and carbohydrates are in a portion of food you eat. In addition, most ready-to-eat meals in canteens contain too many carbohydrates – while the amount of the right fat is minimal.

How to eat properly when exercising?

First of all, you really need to eat a lot to gain muscle mass. Unfortunately, the calorie intake of most naturally thin men who have problems with weight gain is often less than 2000 kcal per day – with 2700-2900 kcal required for muscle growth.

This leads to the conclusion that the daily calorie intake should be at least 15-20% higher than the norm, otherwise the body simply will not have enough calories to recover from training and the energy necessary for muscle growth.

In addition, control of the percentage of protein, fat and carbohydrates promotes muscle growth, not fat. Fats should account for about a third of all calories consumed, for each kg of body weight, about 2 g of protein is needed, the rest of calories – for carbohydrates. Moreover, carbohydrates should fall on classes 2-3 hours before training.

So what sport food is right at a time?

The example of the diet, which will be given below, represents the most optimal in terms of cost-benefit. You can combine the food as you wish. The main thing you need is to remember three basic rules on which the nutritional menu for workouts is built:

• in the morning you take fast carbohydrates to increase performance;
• the main meal takes place at lunchtime (the largest amount of carbohydrates);
• dinner consists of vegetables and dietary meat.

Diet example:

1. Breakfast. Compiled taking into account the lack of morning training.
1. A cup of oatmeal (1-2 oz.) with milk.
2. Half of banana.
3. 1 oz. dried fruits.
2. Lunch. This type of food intake takes place 1-1.5 hours before training.
1. A large portion of pilaf. For cooking, use either brown rice or a mixture of cereals (quinoa, lentils, bulgur). About 4,9-5 oz. of cereals.
2. Chicken breast. 3,5 oz. boiled chicken.
3. Add an olive oil at the end, 0,5 oz.
4. Take several BCAA capsules nearly before training.
3. Nutrition after exercise. After good physical activity, it is recommended to eat for the next 2 hours.
1. Shake with a large portion of protein (one and a half scoops) and 0,175 oz. of creatine.
2. Fast carbohydrates (0,5 oz.) to close the carbohydrate window.
4. Second lunch.
1. Omelet from three chicken eggs.
5. Dinner. Here, focus on the amount of protein.
1. Vegetable stew. Use 7-8,7 oz. of various vegetables (zucchini, bell peppers, corn), 3,5 oz. of pumpkin or potatoes (it is better to use sweet potatoes – sweet potatoes), 1,75-2 oz. of cereals or durum wheat pasta
2. Beef, 3,5-5,2 oz.
3. Dressing with olive oil. Added at the end, 0,3-0,525 g.

It’s important to remember that eating well for muscle growth isn’t just about taking expensive sports protein powder right after your workout. If you want to gain muscle mass quickly, you need complete control over your diet, its calories and protein, fat and carbohydrate content. Only this will allow your muscles to grow. We hope our menu will help you in this difficult, but worthy business.