The Two Keys For Eating To Gain Muscle While Simultaneously Shedding Fat

I’ve found two specific eating habits that are essential if you want to gain muscle and shed fat at the same time.

This is the 3^rd and final installment on this mini-series of how to eat to maximize muscle gain.  Click here for part 1 and here for part 2.  Plus, today I’m including some sample menus!

Before I share them, and conclude this series, let’s get some assumptions on the table:

• You are not fat now, but still want to get leaner
• You want to gain muscle AND lose fat at the same time
• You are willing to have each of those goals progress more slowly in combination than if you focused on only one at a time; but you still want good progress on both
• I assume you are using a decent lifting routine
• I assume you are eating healthy food, in a good mix of proteins, carbs, and fats; if you don’t know the basics, then refer to Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle or 3 Months To A New You.

Ok , so rather than tease you, I’ll state the two keys upfront:

a)       Gradually increase your overall calories to a point far above what you think you should be eating

b)       Use the zig-zag calorie method

Last week I shared a 5-step strategy about how to gradually increase your caloric intake.

Now let’s talk about that “zig-zag method”…

pic: Skinny guys can get muscular by eating right and training

Why Skinny Guys Stay Skinny

This is Part 2 of a series on how to eat right to gain muscle.  Click here for part 1. This article (part 2) has three sections

- one about why skinny guys stay skinny,

- another about how to get yourself to eat more, and

- the real secret to gaining muscle fastest from your diet.

Then next week I’ll share the advanced eating technique to actually gain muscle and lose fat at the same time, plus I’ll include a few sample menus!

The biggest mistake skinny guys make, when starting to lift, is not eating enough.  Oh, they think they are eating enough.  But they aren’t.  They think they are in Case 5 above but really they are in Case 4 (see last post).

Look at a skinny guy who isn’t lifting. He’s currently skinny, right, so that means he’s not eating excess calories.

Now start him lifting on a decent muscle building program.  Lifting heavy weights burns calories during the activity and also burns more after the activity.  If he’s still eating the same amount as he was before, then he’ll actually lose mass!

This is compounded by the fact that the skinny guy isn’t happy about his muscle size, but he likes being able to see his abs.  (Yeah, but you can see his ribs too!)  So he absolutely doesn’t want to get fat.  He just wants more muscle.  As we’ll see, this constraint comes back to haunt him.

Of course he’ll have heard from his buddies that he needs to eat more.  Plus, he’ll naturally be more hungry.   So chances are he would increase how much he eats, right?

But most skinny guys only end up eating a little bit more.  They eat enough to prevent muscle loss, but not enough to really grow muscles.

An Example Might Help

Let’s take an example of a skinny guy:  6 feet tall, 150 pounds, 10% bodyfat. So he’s not too skinny, he’s got a thin layer of muscle because he’s an active guy, but he’s now going to start lifting.  His target is to get to 180 pounds and stay 10% bodyfat.  (6 feet tall, 180 pounds, and 10% bodyfat looks really good at the beach.)

And let’s say he wants to get there within 1 year.  That’s 30 pounds (27 pounds of muscle and 3 pounds of fat) in 12 months.  Breaking this down, we get to an average of 0.5 pounds of muscle a week.  That’s tough to do but not impossible for the skinny guy who’s never really lifted before.  [And it won’t be linear – in the beginning, if he does things right, he’ll gain faster than he will towards the end.]

It’s pretty universally accepted that

I’m starting a series today on how you should eat in order to gain more muscle mass.  This will be a 3-parter that I’ll finish throughout the month.  Here’s the outline:

1. Why your eating habits are more important than your lifting habits if you want to get bigger (naturally)
2. Why skinny guys stay skinny – plus, the fastest way to gain muscle from your diet
3. How to eat more to gain more muscle and actually lose fat at the same time – plus, I’ll also include some sample menus ( keep in mind that entire books are written on menus so I’m only offering some examples!)

Today let’s tackle the importance of eating habits compared to lifting habits.  Next week we’ll dive into #2 and the week after that we’ll conclude with the third topic.

Why Eating Is More Important Than Lifting

You want to get bigger, huh?  Join the crowd.

You might just be thinking “a little” bigger.  Or maybe you are thinking “a lot bigger”.  And maybe you just want bigger shoulders, or pecs, or glutes, or whatever.

The point is, we’re talking physique here and we all have different ideal images of what our target physique should be.  If you are reading this, then chances are high that part of your desired physique means bigger muscles.

So weightlifting is the most important part of getting bigger muscles, right?

Wrong.

Now before you start writing me hate mail, I’m saying “most important”.  That’s a relative term.  Meaning, that of course lifting matters!  If you want to get bigger muscles, instead of just a bigger gut, then you’ve gotta lift.

But I’m saying that a great eating plan with a mediocre lifting routine will do more for your physique than a great lifting routine and a mediocre eating plan.

(I’d like to write that previous sentence in all caps, but that would just annoy you, right?)

A Simple Example

Let’s walk through a very simplified analysis of 5 cases…

Muscles need stimulation, nutrients, and rest.  That combination triggers growth.  How much growth depends on the quality and quantity of the stimulation, nutrients, and rest.

No stimulation, no growth.  Ditto for rest.  And of course, no nutrients (food), no growth.

Since this article series is about how eating impacts muscle growth, let’s assume for now that you are on a pretty good lifting routine.  It’s not the best, but it’s not the worst.  (So, you can extrapolate from this and assume that results will be better/worse in relation to your lifting routine.)

Case 1: Let’s say you are doing your “adequate” lifting routine, but not eating at all.  What would happen?  Your body would go into starvation mode, burning muscle first, then fat, and then you’d die.  Obviously, no muscle growth in this scenario.

Case 2: Now, instead of eating nothing, imagine you eat a small quantity of junk food.  Let’s assume total calories are just enough to prevent starvation.  But your muscles need protein (in the form of amino acids) to heal after you’ve stimulated them with your adequate workout.  And so just junk food doesn’t give the muscles what they need to grow.  Result:  no muscle growth.

Case 3:

Check it out here:

Healthy Chocolate Pudding

Enjoy!

p.s. post comments as to how you like it/dislike it

Subcutaneous Fat vs. Visceral Fat

It’s almost too cliche to have fitness sites talking about abs and stomach fat as summer approaches, but then again, that’s important to most readers this time of year.

Have you heard of the difference between visceral fat and subcutaneous fat?  Mike Geary has a

“Well, for one thing,

Skip is smart, funny, motivated, hard-working – things “bodybuilders” aren’t often credited for.  But to compete in that arena without steroids pretty much assures that only the most elite – both physically and mentally – survive.

I was talking to Skip for advice, and I’ll tell you about that in another post.  But for now I want to tell you how I was able to get an hour of his time…  This is really important for those of you looking to add mass.

Having conquered the natural bodybuilding world, Skip has turned his attention to business.   One of those businesses is MassMachineNutrition.  [This is NOT an affiliate link or anything.  I do not make any money at all from this link.]

I saw that he was offering a free hour of consultation for everyone who orders his Maximum Mass Pack – protein powder, creatine, glutamine, multivitamin.

I did a double-take.  Was he really going to give me an hour of one-on-one advice just for buying stuff I would have bought anyway?  The price he was charging was a good price for the supplements so this was a no brainer.

Now, I’ve followed Skip for the past couple years and I know I’ve mentioned him before in earlier articles.

I’ve never endorsed a supplement company before.  But after talking to Skip about his ethics, I know he is delivering good stuff.

But even if you like where you get your protein and creatine now, or frankly even if you don’t use any supplements at all, you really should go to http://www.massmachinenutrition.com/mmp right now and get the free hour of advice.  Skip totally OVERDELIVERS in that hour and no matter where you are in your muscle journey you will not regret it.  (Really, if you don’t use protein powder, etc. buy it, get the advice, and give the protein powder to your buddy.)

Plus, you get a 13-hour audio seminar for free.

It’s really unbelievable.  The way I look at it is I just paid Skip a little more than I’d pay a know-nothing personal trainer at 24Hour Fitness and I got a ton of supplements free and a 13-hr course for free.

Seriously, right now you need to go to http://www.massmachinenutrition.com/mmp and get his Maximum Mass Pack and the free hour of advice.

And again, I make absolutely no money from this.  I’m referring you to Skip because I know it is worth it for you.  You will not be disappointed. 

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