To gain muscle, we’re told to eat everything in sight. We’re told to drink a gallon of milk a day, or to pour olive oil over a pizza before eating the entire thing in one sitting, or even to eat fast food for every meal – all in the indiscriminate pursuit of mass. Okay, eating that way will get you bigger. And it will make you stronger, so at least some of that mass is muscle. But at what cost? You’ll just have to go on a “cut” to eliminate the bulk you don’t want to keep while taking care not to dip into the bulk you do want. It can certainly work, but what if there were a better way?
Photo of author Mark Sisson at age 58.
I say, get it right the first time. Eat a sensible, biologically-appropriate diet that provides the macro and micronutrients your body needs to build muscle without accumulating excessive body fat. I won’t comment on the type of lifting you should be doing. Anyone reading this blog likely already knows the importance of multi-joint, compound lifts like squats, deadlifts, dips, and presses. So keep doing that.
You guys know about protein. Eat lots of it. You’re probably already doing that, so just keep it up. But don’t stick to plain chicken breasts and lean steak. Those are fine sources of essential amino acids, but when you focus solely on lean meat you avoid lesser known nutrients that also promote anabolic signaling, assist recovery, and support the health of your joints.
Don’t avoid fatty cuts. Our bodies require saturated animal fat to produce sex hormones like testosterone, while low-fat diets lower circulating androgen levels. And the cholesterol in foods like egg yolks and animal fat can directly increase muscle strength and size by upregulating testosterone levels – as long as you’re actually exercising and giving your body the stimulus it requires to utilize the cholesterol. Eat whole eggs and fatty steaks. Cook with butter and coconut oil.
Eat gelatinous cuts and save your bones for broth. Often dismissed as a “useless” protein for its lack of essential amino acids, gelatin is actually vital for anyone looking to lift heavy and put on lean mass. For one, gelatin is protein sparing, meaning it provides amino acids that would otherwise be drawn from your regular protein intake. With gelatin in your diet, the other protein you eat “goes longer.” And two, lifting places a lot of stress on the joints while gelatin has been shown to alleviate joint pain. This isn’t surprising, since gelatin comprises the connective tissue – cartilage, tendons, fascia – in and around our joints. One particular amino acid found abundantly in gelatin – glycine – also promotes better sleep, which is probably the most anabolic non-food nutrient a lifter needs. Sleep is where we recover and where we grow. Eat oxtail stew, beef/lamb shanks, ribs, and make bone broth on a regular basis. Don’t throw out your chicken carcasses or rib bones.
Eat liver. Classic bodybuilding diets almost always included liver (or dessicated liver tabs), also known as nature’s multivitamin, because they were the most abundant source of preformed vitamin A/retinol. Retinol is a vastly underrated anabolic nutrient that’s necessary for testosterone production and muscle protein synthesis. Plus, protein metabolism exhausts retinol stores, so the more protein you eat, the more vitamin A you’ll need to keep your stores topped up. Liver once or twice a week will do the trick and keep you from overdosing on retinol. You can eat poultry liver more often than beef, lamb, or pork liver, since the former is lower in vitamin A (but higher in iron).
0 comments:
Post a Comment