1 Surprising muscle building trick for your YOUNG ATHLETE

There are many things that I have told you about on how to build muscle. First, you've got to eat enough. If you aren't eating enough, nothing else you do will matter. You'll just be a really STRONG skinny kid.

Dead lifts are a MUST for muscle building!

The second thing is you've got to lift heavy. Heavy lifting uses lots of muscle which increases growth hormones and testosterone, both of which are necessary for muscle gain. So skip the body part splits and start doing squats, bench press, deadlifts, cleans, pullups, rows.

And building on the second point, you've got to keep the reps under 8. Anything more and you're wasting energy with reps 1-4, because those first few aren't nearly as difficult as the last 4. So make it work. A great starting point is 5 reps for 5 sets. This keeps you lifting heavy and keeps the total workload low so that you're stimulating type II muscle fibers to grow (which by the way grow the biggest).

Then you've got to sleep and allow your body to recover. This includes drinking plenty of water and sleeping 8-10 hours a day.

But there is another little trick that has been discovered to indirectly increase muscle building: Fat.

A study done by Dorgan, et al. (1996) found that those who had a fat intake of between 20-40% of their total calories had elevated testosterone levels. They also found that higher cholesterol levels were associated with higher testosterone levels. Granted this study had a pretty small sample (10 people) the outcome can still be used, but with caution. 

So how do you increase fat intake? Start eating more tree nuts, avocados, and eggs. Heck that could make a pretty good omelet right there! Grate some cheese and throw it over the top and you've got a muscle building breakfast that is high in protein, moderate in fat and low in carbohydrates!

The take away from today's lesson??

Don't be afraid of fat. Instead embrace it. But not the kind on your hips or around your belly. But rather the kind you eat. Because by boosting fat intake, you boost testosterone, and testosterone builds muscle!!

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Dorgan J. F., Judd J. T, Longcope C.C,, Brown C.C., Schatzkin A.A., Clevidence B.A., Campbell W.S., Nair P.P., Franz C.C., Kahle L.L., Taylor P.R. (1996). Effects of dietary fat and fiber on plasma and urine androgens and estrogens in men: a controlled feeding study. The American journal of clinical nutrition. 64, 850-855.

The Forgotten Part 4: The WORST thing for gaining muscle

If there is one thing that skinny guys are almost instantaneously afraid of when they start trying to gain weight, its gaining fat. 

At the first sign of their skinny guy 6-pack disappearing, they make a mad dash for the treadmill. But this is THE WORST THING they could do.

Go back to the first part of this series and see how many calories you've got to eat in order to gain muscle. What do you think happens when you hit the treadmill after a workout? Or if you spend 2-3 hours a day playing basketball with friends?

Using even more calories is counterproductive to muscle gain.

You have to eat that many MORE calories! 3 hours of basketball can burn up to 2000 calories. So now not only do you have to eat 4500 calories just to gain weight, but now you have to eat an additional 2000 calories because of what you burned playing basketball!

So what should a skinny guy be doing when he's not working out?? 

Stretch, sleep, eat. That's right. Until you start gaining weight, you need to back off all that extra curricular activity that is chewing up calories you COULD be using to gain muscle.

So unless you enjoy going crazy because you aren't gaining weight despite the dump truck worth of food you're eating, then you need to BACK OFF the extra curricular activity.

But at that point, the question becomes which do you want more: muscle, or the extra activity?

The Forgotten Part 3: Build muscle WHILE YOU SLEEP!

During your gut busting, avalanche of testosterone causing, muscle building workout, your body is going through a lot. You are breaking down muscle so your body can rebuild it in a stronger form. This is called adaptation. 

However, there is something that all young athletes and even coaches think when they are working out. And it's completely backwards. The idea that more is better or that muscle is built DURING the workout is the greatest fallacy in the weightlifting world! Muscle is not built during the workout. Muscle is built while you rest. 

So to go to school, practice for sport and then lift weights only to stay up until 11pm is the golden road to frustration. You see after you workout, you need to recover. You need nutrients, minerals and vitamins to fuel and speed up recovery. Because the faster you recover, the sooner you can lift heavy again!!

So here is what needs to happen in order for skinny kids to recovery quickly so they can get back to their muscle building workouts.

Sleep. Preferably at home.

• Sleep. A lot. You need to get AT LEAST 8 hours a night, and more is better, if you want to build muscle. Which means if you wake up at 6am, the latest you need to be crawling into bed is 10. Your body can't rebuild if you are still breaking down.

• Vegetables. Your body needs more than just protein to rebuild. Vegetables provide a lot of the smaller nutrients that allow your body to recover faster! So every meal should have at LEAST 1 handful of vegetables AND 1 handful of fruit.

• Fat. Your body needs fat. Certain fats, such as those found in fish, seeds and nuts help prevent and minimize inflammation of muscle, which occurs after a hard workout. However, these fats should not be eaten immediately after the workout. Instead its best to have them right before bed so your body can put them to use. So eating fish oil capsules, up to 6 per day, as well as having almonds, walnuts and cashews over the course of the day will speed up recovery as well.

Muscle is 70% water. More water = more muscle.

• Water. Muscle is about 70% water. Plus water is necessary to flush waste products out of your system so repair can happen quicker. In addition, water is necessary for certain vitamins to be absorbed. These are called water soluble vitamins. So drinking up to a gallon of water over the course of a day, is certainly NECESSARY if you're looking to add muscle.

Recovery is often the MOST OVERLOOKED aspect of building muscle. But look around at the meatheads who are walking around with slabs of muscle. They're usually carrying a jug or bottle of water of some kind.

Stay tuned tomorrow as we wrap up "The Forgotten" series on building muscle for skinny athletes!!

The Forgotten Part 2: Turning your twiggy legs into tree trunks...

Yesterday I discussed the need to eat with the intention of gaining weight. Basically what that boiled down to is that if your kids aren't gaining muscle, but they want to, they need to eat more. Now granted eating enough is THE most important aspect of gaining muscle.

Lets get Anabolic!!

But all of that food won't do much if you're spending hours on end in the weight room. The reason for this is that after about 45 minutes of some heavy lifting, your body will begin to run out of carbohydrates for energy and instead will begin to break down muscle for energy. This is called catabolism. The buildup of muscle tissue is called anabolism.

So how long should you workout then? Well to prevent this muscle breakdown, workout should be kept to right around 45 minutes. Much longer and you run the risk of catabolism. Now a lot of you are thinking, "Dude, i'm just getting warmed up after 45 minutes!!"

Well start warming up quicker. Say in about 5 minutes. Do some body weight calisthenics such as pushups, body weight squats or lunges and about 20 arm circles in each direction.

No need for calf raises here!

And you don't need 4 different exercises for each body part. Instead stick with the biggest "Bang-4-your-Buck" exercises like squats, bench press, chin-ups, standing military press and deadlifts. Basically make sure your hands have to hold onto something or pick up weight on each lift. So skip the calf raises, the leg extension, the 3 different types of curls and the wrist curls.

The next point is to keep the weight heavy. None of this 3 sets of 10 reps junk. Keep it short and HEAVY! 4 sets of 6 or 5 sets of 5 is sufficient. Do 4 exercises, 4 sets of 4 reps with 1-2 minutes between sets should get the testosterone flowing and the growth hormone pumping!!

But why not those typical body builder schemes of 3 sets of 10-12 doing 3 different exercises for your arms? Well as I discussed above, was that workout will take WAY TOO LONG. In addition, it won't stimulate the proper muscle fibers!

See there are 3 types of fibers. Type 1 are slow twitch, and don't grow much. Type 2a are the middle fibers, and they grow some. But the type 2b are the ones that are begging to grow. And its only through heavy lifting that we'll hit those fibers without burning up the calories. So again, heavy weights, old fashioned tough guy weight lifting and only a handful of repetitions are your best bet.

Here are the exercises you should be doing to gain muscle:

• Squats
• Deadlift
• Bench press
• Chinups
• Push press
• Hang cleans
• Lunges
• Dips

These are the only exercises skinny guys need until they start actually gaining weight.

Now, stay tuned because next week, I'll tell you what you should be doing on the days between your lifting days to keep your physique from being confused with a 12-year old girl.

The Forgotten

In the age of childhood obesity their is a group of boys that are invisible. Invisible to football coaches, invisible to the eye of girls, invisible, not because they are gone. But because they are SKINNY and UNDERWEIGHT!

I’m not going to drag this out because it doesn’t need to be too incredibly complicated or over analyzed. But I’m just going to list the things you NEED to do if you want to gain muscle as a skinny kid. Because face it, nobody cares that you've got a 6-pack if you get blown around like a leaf in a light breeze.

1. Look at what overweight people are doing and do it. Except add in some weight lifting to it.
2. Speaking of weight lifting, don’t spend all day in the gym. 45 minutes…TOPS!!
3. Because you’re on a time crunch in the gym, you’d better be doing exercises that use most or all of your muscles. More muscle usage = more testosterone and growth hormone
4. If you play a high activity sport such as basketball, soccer or swimming, gaining weight will be even TOUGHER. So if you aren’t practicing or lifting weight, you need to be eating. 
5. SLEEP... a lot.
   

Today I will just discuss the first point and I will address the others in future blog posts.

Step 1: try to become overweight.

            Granted we don’t want you to be obese and slothful, but we do want you to gain weight. And there is no better person to look at for gaining weight, than somebody who has…gained a lot of weight. What is it they do? Well, they eat a lot. They eat frequently. And they eat a lot of carbohydrates; which is what you need. But you also need to make sure you’re building muscle instead of adding fat to your belly.

            And the thing with most skinny kids is when they think they are eating a lot of food, they usually AREN'T eating enough. Put it this way, if you aren’t gaining weight, you need to eat more. 

Here is what a skinny guy’s day should look like if he works out in the morning

Wake up (0 hours) – eat 1 measured cup of oatmeal (300 calories), 2 cups of milk (244 calories) Total = 544 cal

Workout – have a protein shake (130 calories)

After workout ( + 1.5 hours after wakeup) – 2 pancakes (350 calories), 1 cup cottage cheese (204 calories), ½ cup orange juice (56 calories) Total= 600

Snack ( + 2.5 hours) – 1 bagel (270 calories), 3 tbsp peanut butter (300 calories) Total = 570

Lunch ( + 4.5 hours) – 1 can tuna (150 cal), 2 tbsp mayonnaise (200 cal), ¼” slice of cheese from block (200 cal), 2 slices of bread (140 cal), a salad the size of a boat (60 cal), balsamic dressing (enough, but less than you think)(150 cal) Total = 900 cal

Is this what you see in the mirror??

Snack ( + 7.5 hours) – 2 cups yogurt (200 calories), ¼ cup peanuts (300 cal), ½ cup granola (180 cal) Total = 680 cal

Dinner (+ 10.5 hours) – Meat the size of your hand (300 cal), [broccoli + raisins] the size of your hand (150 cal), glass of milk (200 cal) Total = 650 cal

Before bed meal ( + 12.5 hrs) – 2 Scrambled eggs or protein powder (150 cal) + spoonful of peanut butter (200 cal), apple (75 cal) Total = 425 cal

Total calories = 4500 calories*

For most kids this is going to seem insurmountable. But it can be done. And with a quality lifting program, it can add a significant amount of muscle to ANY kids frame.

The 3-hour window for MUSCLE gain...

Willis is talkin' bout eating... A LOT!

Hormones are what dictate what our body does. Hormones regulate our body temperature, our metabolism, our balding patterns, and our sleep/wake cycles. Hormones do everything in our body. They are basically the central control system. Whenever we do something, hormones are released. 

From a fitness standpoint, this has HUGE implications! When we workout and lift heavy, our body releases growth hormone (GH), testosterone, insulin-like growth factors (IGF's), cortisol and catecholamines. These are all necessary for increasing muscle mass, especially in high school aged athletes. These hormones serve to prime the muscle for growth and repair to allow the muscle to perform beyond what it was previously capable of.

But in order for the body to build muscle, there has to be material to build it with. Also because this is a prime time to build we really want to cram the muscle cells with plenty of fuel. 

The "gate keeper" that regulates fuel delivery to the cells is insulin. Without insulin, there won't be much fuel deliver to the muscles. So after each workout, all athletes need to eat food that A)stimulates insulin release and B) gives us material to build with.

The foods that satisfy requirement A are simple carbohydrates. Now normally I recommend that athletes stay away from simple carbohydrates outside of a post-workout period. But since we are talking post-workout, i'll allow some simple carbs. Foods that are simple carbs are breads, cereals, bagels, fruit juices, jelly. 

So the carbs give us an insulin release and some fuel to get into the muscle. But we also need protein. The best protein post workout is whey (pronounced WAY) protein. Whey is a fast digesting protein that also has a substantial insulin release with it. But if whey protein just isn't practical, then milk is a good back up plan.

But here is where things get really important for muscle building. During exercise, muscle breakdown occurs. The longer you wait after exercise to get some carbs/protein into the body, the more breakdown occurs. Also, the longer you wait the lower the level of muscle building, or anabolic, hormones decreases. The body needs to be fed when these hormones are at high tide!

So there is 3-hour window that carbs/protein must be eaten. After this 3 hour window, the levels of anabolic hormones have decreased to a point that eating a large meal of simple carbs will be stored as fat rather than used to rebuild muscle. 

Good post-workout meals are:

• 1 cup of non-fat yogurt + 1 cup of granola
• 1 cup of chocolate milk
• banana/strawberry/ yogurt smoothie
• 1 cup of cereal + 1 cup of milk
• peanut butter + jelly sandwich
• peanut butter + banana sandwich

These are just a few meals that would help to build muscle post-workout. 

In summary, workout with high effort, eat well following workouts and outside of that 3 hour window stick to protein and fruit/veggie combinations. This way your athletes will build muscle without burning fat .