Muscle Building – Building The Physique Of a Bodybuilding Professional
Bodybuilding is a process of staying fit and building a body with an excellent shape for aesthetic purposes. It demands muscle gain and building the same. The addition of muscle mass makes the body leaner and adds some bulkiness. The process of muscle building during bodybuilding is tedious and requires an extensive stretch of patience and commitment for a long time. In addition, it requires the correct training and accurate consumption of nutrients and food.
Muscle mass is dependent on the levels of amino acids in the body. If the body lacks amino acids, one would observe a drop in muscle mass, while the more amino acids in the body, the more muscle mass. Amino acids are the end products of protein breakdown. Thus, one requires a high-protein diet to have a good amount of muscle mass. Muscle hypertrophy is the term that bodybuilders associate with the muscle-gaining process.
Through this blog, we will try to shed some light on the fundamentals of muscle building, the diet that one has to follow, and supplements that naturally keep one’s muscles healthy and strong. So let’s dive into the topic.
The Perfect Age For Muscle Building
Muscle building knows no age. Even if one is in their late 40s, one can easily do so if one sticks to the correct diet and workout plans. However, there are a few factors that people should keep in mind regarding the perfect age for muscle building.
The perfect age for muscle building is the late teenager, around 17 years of age. 17 to 25 is the best time to start building muscles because of the testosterone-driven growth one will achieve. With increasing age, the pace of muscle building slows down, but it doesn’t mean one can’t build muscles after their 30s. Irrespective of one’s age, one should remain consistent in one’s efforts, always concentrate on every muscle group of the body, drink enough water, and supply the body with ample protein to see the changes taking shape faster.
Diet That You Should Follow For The Best Results
To achieve the best possible body shape and to stay fit, one has to follow a strict and healthy balanced diet plan. The primary requirement for building muscle and becoming a bodybuilder is to bifurcate one’s diet into two phases. One is the bulking phase, and the other is the shredding phase or the cutting phase. Let’s discuss what professionals eat during both these phases.
As the name suggests, the bulking phase requires food ingestion to bulk up the body. During this phase, one needs a good amount of calories in the body. Trainers generally recommend increasing calorie intake by 15%, but they also need to lose the calorie by 15% during the second shredding phase. The fundamental rule to remember is to increase calorie intake with increasing weight (during the first phase) and decrease the same with decreasing weight (during the second phase). Do not increase or decrease more than 1% of the body weight weekly.
The following requirement is the macronutrients, which include protein, carbohydrates, and fats. Trainers recommend consuming calories by taking these macronutrients. The macronutrient ratio should be kept balanced. Any professional trainer would recommend a macronutrient ratio to the trainee, which doesn’t change during both phases. Practically speaking, 30 to 35% of calorie requirement should come from protein, the other 55 to 60% from carbohydrates, and 15 to 20% from fat sources. These guidelines should be practical for any beginner getting into muscle and bodybuilding.
Natural Products That Act As An Excellent Supplement For Muscle Building
Natural supplements help people achieve their nutrient consumption targets in the dietary routine. It is a great way to naturally include various much-needed nutrients, fibres, etc., into the body. Let us discuss some of the best supplements for the muscle-building process.
Creatine is the most natural substance one can include in their diet plan as a supplement. It helps increase muscle mass by 40% and positively affects the muscle cells and exercise performance. Studies also reveal that creatine increases muscle strength, allowing one to do heavy-weight exercises during training. Besides increasing water content in the muscle cells, the supplement also helps increase the hormonal levels for distinct growth of muscles like IGF-1. Thus, creatine is an excellent supplement.
Beta-alanine is a beta amino acid present in our bodies. People generally use beta-alanine to reduce tiredness and increase performance during exercise sessions. However, studies also show that the supplement can help increase muscle mass. For example, a study showed taking 4 grams of beta-alanine every day for around eight weeks increased body mass. Although people need more scientific data to conclude if beta-alanine can increase muscle mass, one can now use it because it is a safe compound for the human body.
Branched Chain Amino Acids, known as BCAAs, are a group of three crucial amino acids: leucine, isoleucine, and valine. Meat sources and eggs are the primary sources of these amino acids. It is an essential requirement for the growth of one’s muscles. Many say that BCAA proves to be crucial for those who are vegetarians or do not consume enough protein in their diets. These are facts because meat contains the most proteins, and if a person is a vegetarian, he doesn’t consume meat. Thus, he can’t consume the large chunk of protein and amino acids that BCAA provides them with.
Final Words
A person indulged in muscle building should also have an eye for bodybuilding. Thus, this article covered not only the muscle-building part but also the bodybuilding aspect of staying fit. Muscle-building, if done correctly, can not only make one powerful but also look robust. We wouldn’t recommend anyone to get dependent on supplements because some processing also takes place in them, and the only all-natural supplements are the food we cook and eat. Make exercising and proper eating a part of your daily life, and watch the magic unfold. Hop on the journey of muscle-building and bodybuilding today.