build muscle Building Muscle Diet healthy nutrition lifting weights muscles Nutrition nutrition for lifting weights nutrition tips weight lifting diet

By D. Champigny

Lifting weights is great for building muscles, but it's really only 1/3 of the task - and you won't build much muscle from lifting weights if you don't cover the other two areas too. Just as important are your nutrition and getting sufficient rest between workouts.

Nutrition For Lifting Weights

Ask even the newest weightlifter and they can probably tell you all about lifting weights, what reps & sets mix to use and what every piece of equipment in the gym is for - but very few can give you informed information about nutrition and what they should be eating to grow those big muscles they're so fervently working towards.

In the 1960's and 1970's bodybuilders would eat a healthy, nutritious diet in preparation for, and during, their contest season and then 'bulk up' during the off-season. The idea was to ensure you ate as much as you could, regardless of the quality of food, in the hope that their body would have all the nutrients it needed at any given time to build maximum muscle. So they would put on 30 - 50 pounds of bodyweight, only to then diet off the extra 20 - 40 pounds of fat included in their extra mass.

Nowadays, though, it's understood that one can build maximum muscle mass while staying fairly lean, with little extra bodyfat to burn off at competition time. No longer do they consume massive amounts of pasta and white potatoes, but instead they've reduced their carbohydrate intake, upped their protein intake and replaced the simple carbohydrates they were eating with complex carbs like steel-cut oats, sweet potatoes (yams), brown rice, etc.

So what should your nutrition look like for lifting weights? First you need to know the total number of calories you'll need, and that varies from person to person, even if you're lifting weights together. The calories you need are based on your metabolism more than your gym sessions, so start with what you're currently eating - after all, your current caloric intake got you to your current weight and is maintaining it, right?

Start by dropping soda and alcohol from your routine and replace those calories with protein sources. Carbs and protein each contain 4 calories per gram, so it's a straight swap. Replace your remaining simple carbs with complex carbs - most of your carbohydrates should come from sources like the steel-cut oats, brown rice and yams mentioned above plus vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes and apples.

Do not try to lower your intake of fats, just make sure they come from healthy choices like fish oil, krill oil, eggs and nuts. It's especially important to make sure you're getting enough Omega-3 and Omega-6 from your fats, on a ratio of 2:1 or 3:1 - getting your fats from the sources mentioned will go a long way towards meeting those goals, but you might want to consider an Omega-3 supplement as well.

At this point you're getting your carbs and fats from healthy sources, and that just leaves your protein. The are a great number of protein sources readily available. Some of the best are milk, eggs (especially egg whites), salmon, tuna & other fish, chicken, lean red meat, etc. Fortunately there is enough variety that you can easily vary your diet to keep it interesting while staying compliant with good nutrition practices.

You won't need to count calories and be very vigilant for long - repetition week after week will make eating this way a habit before long and you'll be able to maintain your eating habits automatically then. But make sure you DO stick to your new eating patterns long enough for it to become habit before you ease up at all.

From that point on, your nutrition for lifting weights depends on your personal goals. If you want to maintain lean muscle mass while burning off bodyfat, lower your daily carb intake by 10%. If you want to build more lean muscle, up your daily protein intake by 10%. In either case, note the effect it has and adjust your levels accordingly. Continue adjusting your nutrition as you go along, keeping the changes small and noting the effects. Healthy nutrition for lifting weights really is that simple, so there's no reason to let poor nutritional habits sabotage your efforts in the gym!

back bodybuilding fitness athletes lats lifting weights muscles obliques shoulders v-taper back weight lifting exercises weight lifting for weight loss

By D. Champigny

When lifting weights for bodybuilding or fitness athletes, male or female, one of the main goals is building that perfect body image. And while men and women usually differ in their desired final look, both want that sexy v-taper to their back...

Achieving that look isn't just the result of building a bigger back though. Three different sets of muscles play a role in building a v-taper appearance - your obliques, your latissimus dorsi (lats) and your medial deltoid muscles. In other words you want a narrow waist, wider shoulders and a nice sweep to your back to join the two.

weight lifting for weight loss

Keeping Your Obliques Narrow 
Your obliques are the muscles that run down the outside of your waist just above the hips. Working the obliques is done with twists, either seated with a bar across your shoulders or with kettlebells. The problem here is that they respond just like any other muscle - the heavier the weight you use the bigger the muscle grows. Normally that's what you want from your workouts, but with obliques the bigger they get the wider your waist is and the blockier your appearance.

Widening your waist will detract heavily from the appearance of a v-taper and lessen the impact of your overall figure. That doesn't mean you can't work your obliques though - just stick to either indirect training for them from the other exercises you do or do your seated twists using a broom handle instead of a weighted bar.

Building Your Lat Sweep 
Your lats provide that nice sweep from your waist to your shoulders, and the more you work them the better and wider your v-taper will look. To build their width, pick exercises that stretch them fully and force you to pull your arms back down towards your side. Using an overhead pulley to do seated lat pulldowns is the most obvious - after all, that's why it's called LAT pulldowns.

You can also add to the width of your lats with one-arm rows done on a weight bench. Instead of using a straight up-and-down movement for your reps, start at the bottom with the weight further forward, in line with your head. As you pull the weight up use a sweep to bring it up beside your hip then lower it back down as low and as far forward as you can safely stretch. As always, keep your torso parallel to the bench throughout the exercise and avoid the tendency to let the back roll side to side.

Wider Shoulders To Complete The Look 

weight lifting back exercises

OK, obviously you can't actually widen your shoulder joint or safely move the shoulder joints further apart, but you sure can pack a lot more muscle onto your shoulders to give them a wider appearance. Anyone serious about lifting weights will want to build all 3 shoulder muscles - front, medial and rear deltoids - evenly, but for building a v-taper it's the medial or outside head that makes the most difference.

Compound exercises like upright rows and overhead presses will build the medial head, and be sure to use side dumbbell raises as the isolation exercise to build your shoulder width. Often referred to as lateral raises, these are the only exercise that focus almost entirely on the medial delts - just be careful not to raise your arms above parallel at the top of each rep as this can damage your shoulders' rotator cuffs. Don't overdo the weight, either - be sure you can finish each rep in strict form and opt for more reps, at least 12 - 15 reps per set.

Beyond training those 3 areas, be sure you're not carrying extra bodyfat around your middle as that will also detract from your v-taper. While that should go without saying, it's not unusual to see novice bodybuilders and fitness athletes still sporting those tell-tale 'muffin tops', so be sure you're not letting a few extra pounds of fat diminish your hard-won physique.

Hit the weights hard every time you're in the gym and enjoy the impact of your great v-taper back on the beach next summer!