Post Workout Nutrition

One of the most overlooked parts of nutrition is during and post workout nutrition. Along with breakfast, these meals are the most important meals of the day. In a nutshell, during strength, power and endurance training, our glycogen stores are low, our cortisol levels raise, and our muscle protein balance is negative. In order to prevent this downward spiral from occurring, our post workout meal must do 3 things.

-Raise glycogen stores
-Increase protein synthesis
-Decrease protein breakdown

After training, there is a “window of opportunity” that allows our bodies to achieve these 3 goals and put our bodies in an anabolic state. While conflicting data has shown that this window can last anywhere from 30-45 minutes, the best idea is to consume this meal as soon as possible. The sooner you have this meal, the faster your body can start the recovery process. Additionally, the best type of meal to have during this time is liquid. By consuming a liquid meal during this time, the nutrients will get into the bloodstream faster and optimize the process. Please not that I do not recommend many supplements, however post workout supplementation is critical to seeing results in the weight room.

What type of shake should you consume?
Before I get into specific supplement brands, let’s understand exactly what type of carbohydrates and protein is optimal during this time. During the “window of opportunity”, the best type of carbohydrates and proteins to consume are fast digesting ones. Simple sugars such as a dextrose and a maltodextrin combination, or waximaize are optimal for carb intake. Whey protein high in BCAAs are the post effective protein during this time. Supplementing with 3-5grams of creatine during this time will also aid in recovery and performance.

How much to take?
In order to determine how many carbs and protein you should take in during and post workout, you must determine what your goal is.

Strength athletes looking to increase muscle mass:

Carbs-0.8 KG of bodyweight

Protein-0.4 KG of bodyweight

Example: 200 lb male athlete looking to increase muscle mass should consume 73 grams of carbs and 36 grams of protein during the post workout window.

Strength Athletes looking to decrease body fat while maintaining muscle mass

Carbs-0.4 KG of bodyweight

Protein-0.2 KG of bodyweight

Example: 200 lb male athlete looking to decrease body fat should consume 36 grams of carbs and 18 grams of protein during the post workout window.

*These recommendations are cited from John Berardi’s article that can be found here. I can’t emphasis enough how important nutrition is during and post workout. In conclusion, you should consume two identical shakes. Sip on one during your training session and sip on the other one immediately after your training session. Those athletes looking to increase muscle mass, should consume a meal (whole foods) with the same macronutrient breakdown 1 hour later. Those looking to decrease body fat, should consume a meal with the same macronutrient breakdown 2-3 hours later.
Lastly, to make your life easier, I will recommend 2 different supplements that have will take care of your during and post workout nutrition. Keep in mind that I would never recommend anything that I have never used personally.

-Advocare Post Workout Recovery
-Biotest Workout Recovery

When it comes to supplements, there are only a few companies that are legit. Remember that the supplement business is a BILLION dollar industry and every company is in it to make money. Please consult someone like myself before you buy any supplements.

Lift strong,

Joe Meglio
Performance Enhancement Coach

Tell Me What YOU Want

So I arrived to Florida yesterday morning and things have been crazy. This is the first time I've touched a computer in almost 36 hours. My sleeping hours have been messed up and I missed my first meal in years (no joke here). Anyway, now that I have some time, I want to ask my readers what YOU want me to write about.

I will leave some options below but by no means are these the only topics available. Your feedback is critical so I encourage you all to leave some comments and tell me what you want.

Examples:
Supplements
Before, During and Post Workout Nutrition
Conditioning for pitchers (or any other position or sport you want)
Speed Training

Now drop some comments!

Joe Meglio
Performance Enhancement Coach
www.MeglioFitness.com
www.MeglioNutrition.com
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

4 Minutes to Fat Loss

4 minutes to Fat loss

When you step into a gym, what is the most common thing you see people do? Although I do not train at a commercial gym anymore, I do know that in most gyms people tend to shy away from the weight room and spend most of their time on ellipticals, treadmills, stairmasters and other cardio machines. A year later you will find these same people still performing slow steady cardio and still not getting any results. What they don’t know is that slow steady cardio is dead the and aside from being extremely boring, aerobic activity can increase your cortisol levels (this is a bad thing!). This explains why the gym trainee who opts for cardio over strength training can actually get fatter over time. Don’t believe me? Think of the difference in physique between Olympic sprinters and cross country runners. Sprinters are very muscular and are shredded to the bone, opposed to the Cross country runners who are usually scrawny .

So where does this leave us? What if I could tell you that you can burn more fat in 4 minutes, than during a session of aerobic exercise? This is made possible by implementing the tabata method. Tabata can be used by athletes, weekend warriors, housewives or anyone looking to strip body fat, increase work capacity and conditioning levels. I like to refer to this type of cardio as conditioning. Not only will it strip body fat off you, but it will get you into the best shape of your life. The great thing about tabata is that it can improve both your aerobic and anaerobic conditioning levels simultaneously. The tabata method is a form of high intensity interval training that requires the trainee to perform 20 seconds of intense exercise, followed by 10 seconds of rest. You repeat this for 7 more rounds. At the end of 4 minutes you will have completed 8 total rounds. Sounds simple right? I promise you it will be one of the more grueling training sessions you ever experience

Tabata protocol
-8 total sets
-Each set last 20 seconds followed by 10 seconds of rest
- Do as many reps as possible during the 20 seconds

Exercise Selection

One of the great things about tabata is its versatility. It can be performed with bodyweight, dumbbells, kettlebells, barbells, sandbags or any other odd equipment. For most people, bodyweight is a great option. Now that we know what equipment can be used, let’s go over what movements you can incorporate. The movements should be compound and use many muscles at one time- squats, lunges, dips, pushups, mountain climbers, burpees and any other exercise that requires your body to produce a lot of movement. I recommend you choose more than 1 exercise for the 4 minute span. By choosing 2 or more exercises, you will increase the metabolic demand needed to get through the workout. Here is a sample workout using 4 different exercises:

1. Body squats-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
2. Pushups-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
3. Mountain climbers-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
4. Lunges-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
5. Body Squats-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
6. Pushups-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
7. Mountain climbers-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
8. Lunges-YOUR DONE

At this point, you can rest a couple minutes and then either repeat the same workout or change up the exercises and go at it again. It’s totally up to you! As you progress, you will need to choose more challenging exercises and may even have to increase the number of 4 minute rounds you do. Generally, 2-3 rounds are more than enough to help you reach your goals.

In addition to performing tabata with bodyweight, those that are brave enough can try complexes tabata styke. Complexes can be performed with virtually any equipment- barbell, dumbbell, kettblebell, sandbag and so on. Incorporating the Tabata method into complexes can be absolutely brutal! Personally, I have done these quite a few times in the past and they absolutely suck the life out of me. When it comes to complexes you want to choose exercises that are compound (yes there is a trend with compound exercises).

Here is a sample barbell complex tabata style:
1. Conventional deadlift-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
2. Hang Clean-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
3. Front Squat-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
4. Military Press-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
5. Conventional deadlift-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
6. Hang Clean-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
7. Front Squat-20 seconds on, rest ten seconds than
8. Military Press-HOPE YOUR BREATHING STILL!!

Notes: You want to choose a weight that you can perform at least 10 times. Obviously you can deadlift more than you can press overhead so with this said, make sure you can perform at least 10 reps on your weakest exercise. Notice how the exercises flow. It is important to make sure that the exercises flow from one movement to the next. For those of you who are not familiar with complexes, let me know and I will be sure to write a post on it! Lastly, while resting, never put the bar down! Barbell complexes with a tabata style are no joke. You need to be one serious mofo to make it through these 4 minutes.

For beginners and even most intermediates, I recommend you start with bodyweight tabata workouts. You can perform them directly after your training session for extra conditioning or on a separate day. Remember that tabata workouts should take place of traditional cardio and can even be training sessions for most individuals. I highly recommend that all females cut out the cardio machines, triceps kickbacks, hip adduction, and abduction, and start doing some serious bodyweight tabata workouts. Meatheads should also incorporate tabata style complexes directly after their training or on lighter days. Please note that if your goal is get stronger, you should limit the amount of conditioning you do because if you do it too often, it can have a negative impact on your strength. In closing, tabata workouts will help bridge the gap between conditioning and fat loss. Ultimately, it will be a combination of your strength training and your diet that will help to strip fat off your body.

Joe Meglio
Performance Enhancement Coach
Tabata Method
Supplements
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

Interview With Sarah Cook

Hey everyone,

On Thursday, I was interviewed by Sarah Cook for her book featuring 100 Young Entrepreneurs. For more information on Sarah and her business please check out her website. She provides a great source for both parents and young adults looking to empower, become or raise young entrepreneurs. To listen to the audio interview please click on Interview With Sarah Cook at the top of the page. It is approximately 20 minutes long. I hate to ruin any surprises so please listen to the audio and drop some comments!


Joe Meglio
Performance Enhancement Coach
Young Entrepeneur
Meglio Nutrition
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

How to Apply the Max Effort Method

In my article, How to Get Strong, I described in detail the three methods used to develop strength. Max effort training is the absolute king when it comes to developing strength. Let’s review the protocol used to implement the Max Effort method.

-Use the Max Effort method 2x a week. 1 movement on upper body days and 1 movement on lower body days
-Start with the bar and make 10% jumps till you reach your working sets. Once you reach these sets, make smaller jumps until you perform 4-6 total reps above 90% of your 1RM
-Rotate the movements every 1-3 weeks.
-Do not perform your Max Effort lower body sessions the day before or after your Max effort upper body sessions.

So now that we know how to use the Max Effort method, we need to understand what movements to use. For the upper body we always will use a straight bar or a specialty bar. We never use any dumbbells for max effort training. The goal during Max Effort training is to recruit as many motor units as possible. Barbells do a much better job at doing this than dumbbells.

-flat bench
-incline bench
-close grip bench
-incline close grip bench
-Floor press

For even more variation, specialty bars can be used including: thick bar, Swiss bar, and cambered bar. These bars are great for many reasons. Thick bars and Swiss bars take a ton of pressure off the shoulders and offer great variety compared to the straight barbell. The cambered bar is great for increasing the range of motion on the bench but can also increase stress on the shoulder joint. Since most gyms do not have these specialty bars, a straight barbell is perfectly fine.

Many of my baseball players do not perform Max Effort bench pressing with a straight barbell. This is a debate for another time but when push comes to shove, there are better ways to improve their athletic performance. Since the thick bar and Swiss bar takes a lot of pressure off the shoulders, we will occasionally use them for Max Effort lifts. Instead, for our baseball athletes we usually perform Max Effort chin ups working up to 3-5 rep max). The same method can be used for anyone suffering from elbow or shoulder injuries.

Lower body lifts include variations of the squat and deadlift. Squats are the king of all lifts. And no movement will ever put slabs of muscle on you like the deadlift. Here are the best lifts to use:

-free squat
-box squat
-front squat
-box front squat
-zercher squat
-Straight bar deadlift
-Trap bar deadlift

Again for lower body lifts, you can use different barbells. The key to Max Effort training is to get really good at a couple of movements. Beginners should use 3 week waves followed by a deload. The more advanced you are the shorter the waves. Now go get under the bar and get strong as hell!

Liftstrong,

Joe Meglio
Performance Enhancement Coach
Nutrition and Supplements
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

Meglio's Kitchen

I hope everyone’s having a great week! Sorry I have not posted in a few days. I have been crazy busy training and practicing. Before I get into what is in my kitchen, I would like to thank all the Moore Catholic baseball players that came to the Underground Strength Gym tonight. They killed it!

If you have not read my post on How to Get Ripped, make sure you do so before you read this one. Even if you are trying pack on serious muscle, I still recommend you follow the 8 rules of nutrition I included in that article. Now without any further ado, here is a snapshot into my kitchen, my dorm room.

Fruits- I eat 2-3 servings a day. Favorite times to eat fruit is first thing in the morning, 1 hour post workout and whenever I am on the go or miss a meal with veggies
-Bananas
-Apples
-Pineapples

Vegetables- I try to eat 2-3 cups with every meal. One of my favorite things to do is throw 2-3 cups in the wok and mix it with hot sauce or throw it all in a salad with chicken.
-Broccoli
-Baby Carrots
-Lettuce
-Sweet Potato
-Peppers
-Cucumbers
-Cauliflower
-Mushrooms
-Tomatoes

Meat- I can’t help but eat meat, probably more than I should.
-Thin sliced chicken breast
-90% or 96% ground beef
-Turkey Sausage
-Turkey Bacon
- Lean steak

Condiments and Sauces
-Hot Sauce-I am addicted to hot sauce. I will mix it with veggies, chicken, meat, eggs, rice or about anything you can name
-Cinnamon-I throw cinnamon in my tea, oatmeal, protein shakes and on top of sweet potatoes. Cinnamon is great for jacking up your insulin sensitivity.
- Organic Extra virgin olive oil- I use this on may salad and on my low carb days
-Apple cider vinager- See above
-Red wine vinager- See above
-Mrs. Dash seasonings-Great for seasoning meat, chicken and veggies.

Nuts- I use nuts on my low carb days. P+F meals.(protein + fat meals)
-Raw Almonds
-Sliced Almonds
-Pistachios
-Organic peanut butter (chunky and smooth)

Carbs-P+C meals (protein + carb meals)
-Oatmeal
-Organic rice cakes
- Brown rice
-organic whole wheat pasta

Beverages
-Water
-Occasion tea, coffee and crystallite
-Almond milk

Foods to avoid
-All soda
-Packaged and processed foods
-junk foods

While this is not an all inclusive list, these foods make up the majority of my diet. A lot of the food is influenced by my college cafeteria. Whatever they don’t supply, I make sure I have it in my dorm room at all times. Also, for those wondering how many times a day I eat, I usually eat 6-8 times a day. If I am not eating in the cafeteria, I bring food back to my room or cook on the George Forman. You have to make do with what you have. No excuses! I hate when other college students use the excuse that their cafeteria has no “healthy food”. I will also share with you a few tips when it comes to food shopping and eating “healthy”.

Additional Notes

- Never have any foods in your kitchen that will temp you.
-Eat less at restaurants, business meetings and other social gatherings. These arrangements usually have horrible food choices and thus you should try to prepare as many meals at home as possible.
-Remember you want to eat like a CAVEMAN. Keep packaged foods to a minimum. If these foods are healthy, why do you need to be convinced that they are healthy? Do what your mamma told you and eat your fruits and veggies!
-Always keep your kitchen stocked up. If you start to run low, you will be tempted to change your good habits. Don’t let this be an issue. Shop in bulk if necessary. Wholesale stores like Costco or Sam’s Club are great options.
-Cook P+C meals or P+F but never F+C. Fat +carb meals are a recipe for disaster.
-Don’t say “I can’t do this”. Don’t make excuses! Take action and take control of your nutrition.
-Consistency, dedication, and motivation will lead to good eating habits and a lifestyle change.

Lift Strong,

How to Get Big and Stay Lean

A Real World Approach to Carb Cycling

As I promised in a previous article, I will now talk about the method I recommend for increasing lean muscle mass while maintaining body fat. Please note that this method is highly effective and should be used by lifters that are already pretty lean. If you need to loose a lot of weight, you should diet down first. If you need to gain a lot of weight (greater than 15 lbs), you should focus on taking in more calories. This approach is perfect for the trainee who is looking to critique their physique while making steady progression. So how is it possible to add muscle mass and not put on any fat? The answer is carb cycling.

Carb Cycling is an approach to eating that manipulates the amount of carbohydrates consumed on a given day. “By fluctuating macronutrients on a daily basis, we can ensure that performance and muscle building can be optimized on the days when it’s most important, while burning fat on the other days”(Starnes). The three possible days that we will utilize include “high carb” days, “medium carb” days and “low carb” days.

“High carb “days are utilized during the hardest training days. On these days, you want to feed your body a ton of carbs in order to put it in a highly anabolic state.

“Medium carb” days are utilized on training days that are less taxing on the body. On these days, the goal is to give your body just enough carbs to fuel your workout but not enough to put your body in a highly anabolic state. These days are maintenance days.

“Lower carb” days are utilized on your off days or days you are performing cardio or light conditioning. On these days, your primary goal is to burn fat. Since you are performing minimal activity, your body will not need carbohydrates. These days are fat burning days.

Now that we understand what carb cycling is and what variables must be manipulated, we need to know how many carbs we should put in our bodies on given days. Since we are varying our carbohydrates on certain days, our fat and protein intake will also vary. Here is an easy chart to follow. Please note that these numbers are based on grams per pound of body weight.

High day

Fat: minimal fat

Carbs: 2-3 grams

Protein: 1-1.25

Medium and low days

Fat: 0.15-0.35

Carbs: 0.5-1.5

Protein: 1.25-1.5

While I recommend you evenly spread out your carbohydrates, proteins and fats over the course of 5-8 meals, in the “real world” most people don’t have the time to count calories. NO WORRIES! If you follow these rules, you will not have to worry about counting calories.

-Have a complete breakfast everyday.

-Always eat veggies/fruit and lean protein with each meal.

-With the exception of breakfast, only eat starches (oatmeal, brown rice, baked potato, whole grain pasta, etc…) on medium and high carb days. Starches are your main source of carbohydrates and thus if you manipulate your starch intake you will manipulate your carbohydrate intake. To understand this fully please see the chart below:

Low Days- No starches! Only exception would be post workout shake after cardio or conditioning.

Medium Days- You will eat starches during your meal before your training session, during and post training, and than your first two meals following your training.

High Days- Eat starches with every meal. While this may seem like a lot of carbs, remember that these are your highly anabolic days. Check this out. If you weigh 200 lbs and you are suppose to take in 2-3 grams of carbs per pound of bodyweight; that equals 400-600 carbs that day! The only feasible way to get in the necessary amount of carbohydrates is to constantly feed your body starches throughout the day.

In addition to bulking up, please note that carb cycling is a great approach for shedding body fat. While the principles remain the same, you will need to vary how many high days you have vs. low days. Obviously, bulking up will require more high days than if you were cutting. For newbie’s to carb cycling, I recommend you start with 3 high days a week, 2-3 moderate and 1-2 low days. After a couple weeks, you can critique these numbers depending on your goals and what works best for you. The benefit of using carb cycling during a cutting phase is that it allows you to decrease body fat without loosing any size.

Now that you know the secret to putting on lean muscle while maintaining body fat, it is time to take action! For those of you that are still confused, don’t worry about the macronutrient breakdown on high, low and medium days. Instead, focus on your starch intake. Lastly, remember to follow my 8 rules for getting the body you want. Stay tuned for my next article, as I will discuss optimal food selection.

Joe Meglio

Performance Enhancement Coach
www.MeglioFitness.com
www.MeglioNutrition.com
Joe@MeglioFitness.com

Sources:

http://www.tmuscle.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance_nutrition/a_beginners_guide_to_carb_cycling