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Do you avoid bedtime snacks with an objective of preserving your hard-earned muscle gains? If your answer is yes, you are making a mistake, because you are losing on an opportunity to build muscles. Explore more about the potential of foods in your muscle-building journey:

1. The need for bedtime foods
2. How bedtime foods help you grow
3. What foods to eat before bedtime

Your muscle-building effort should not end with dinner, particularly for those who are struggling to pack on mass. Know about the best foods to eat before bed and you will be inching closer to your muscle-building goals.

Refreshing your muscle-building lesson, workouts injure your muscle tissues. Whey protein, the perfect post-workout snack rushes muscle-building amino acids to the muscle tissues and triggers the process of building bigger and stronger muscles.

So far so good, but by avoiding slow-digesting protein-rich bedtime snacks you are missing out on a crucial muscle-building opportunity.

High-protein foods are ideal foods before bedtime because they keep you full for a longer duration and increase the calorie spend, according to a study published in the December 2009 issue of “The Journal of Nutrition.”

If the fear of fat looms on your mind, you need to know that these foods are not dense meals, rather protein-rich snacks to ward off catabolism.

HOW BEDTIME SNACKS HELP YOU GROW

You must have heard that maximum muscle gains happen not inside the gym but outside of it. Let’s explain how.

1.   7 to 8 hours of quality sleep is essential to allow your body to recover from workout strains. Coincidentally, this is the time when the maximum surge of growth hormones take place.

2.   Depriving your body of muscle-building essential amino acids is a sure shot way to set your body on catabolism route, as your body will steal amino acids from your hard-earned muscles, to convert to glucose to fuel your brain and gut.

3.   Additionally, research studies have found that even after a single bout of resistance training in healthy males, muscle protein synthesis in biceps remained elevated for up to 24 hours post-exercise.

4.   Noshing on slow-digesting protein-rich snacks, like cottage cheese and a casein shake, right before bedtime along with healthy fats enables the muscles to tap into nutrients to get bigger and stronger. With the trickling of proteins in your muscle fibers throughout the night, your muscles will not get in a catabolic mode when you wake up.

 Ideally, your bedtime snack should consist of slow-digesting proteins with a liberal helping of good fats to slow digestion of protein for longer nourishment of muscles.

WHAT TO EAT BEFORE BED TO BUILD MUSCLE

Eating protein-rich foods right before you go to sleep helps repair and build muscle tissues after exercise, according to a study published in August 2012 in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise.

1.        Low fat cottage cheese

Cottage cheese is a high casein food, rich in slow-digesting proteins that spare breakdown of your muscle proteins during the night and boosts new muscle synthesis. A cup of cottage cheese will give you 11 to 12 g of protein to build more muscle mass.

Add almonds to the cottage cheese to get important nutrients, like (proteins, monounsaturated fats and omega-3 fatty acids) but also provide satiety and slow the digestion of proteins, thereby, supplying proteins to your body over a longer period of time.

1 cup of low-fat cottage cheese with 1 ounce (28.3 g) of almonds provides 327 calories, 34 g of proteins, 11 g of carbohydrates and 16 g of fat.

2.       Casein shake

Derived from cow’s milk just like whey, casein, the curdled residue of cheese making process forms 80 percent of the milk. Casein is a slow-digesting protein. It creates a gel in the stomach that leads to a release of amino acids into the bloodstream over up to 7 hours, just right to nourish your muscle fibers, when you sleep. The slow-digesting nature of casein doesn’t make it a good choice in muscle protein synthesis, but it prevents muscle breakdown. To grow bigger and stronger, you need to prevent muscle breakdown and a casein shake prior to bed serves the purpose. Get MuscleBlaze Micellar Casein Shake to preserve your hard-earned muscles.

3.         Yoghurt

Homemade yoghurt is a probiotic, calcium and protein-rich snack. The protein found in yoghurt acts as the building block for building lean muscles. Consuming a cup of yoghurt before bed offers 11g of protein for nighttime muscle preservation.

4.      Grilled fish

Fish is a perfect pre-bed food source because it’s high in protein content and contains healthy omega fats. Have it an hour before going to bed and your muscles will thank you.

5.        Peanut butter

A tablespoon of peanut butter, with yoghurt and flaxseeds is just right to provide you continued nourishment during night time. When you team peanut butter with yoghurt, you get a generous dose of protein along with good quality fats. Flaxseeds on the side provide polyunsaturated fat.  

Now that you know what to eat before bedtime to build your muscles, you should quit your fears and choose the right bedtime foods. The result will show in bigger and stronger muscles.

Collagen is a popular supplement and for all good reasons. It is considered to be a wonder element for skin and hair and is used in various beauty products and regimes. But, what if we told you that collagen works wonder for your muscles? Get back the jaw you dropped just now and read the post to know more about this wonder supplement.

What is collagen?

It is a primary structural protein that is found in the tendons, ligaments, muscles, bones, vasculature, cartilage, skin and the GI system of the human body. This is the heaviest protein found in your body, which makes up 35% of the total protein content in your body.

The term ‘collagen’ is derived from a Greek word which means ‘glue’. Collagen, in fact, acts as an adhesive that binds your body together. Collagen is made up of conditionally essential amino acids which are proline, glycine, and arginine. Conditionally essential amino acids are those which your body produces, what you need to intake is the essential amino acids, as your body cannot produce the on its own. This is one of the reasons why collagen supplements are enjoying exploding popularity.

A total of 29 types of collagen are discovered to date. Out of these, type I, II and III are majorly found in the human body.

There are enough researches that state that collagen positively affects the quality of the skin and helps reduce wrinkles. It also improves the health of hair and nails. Collagen has also known to be helpful in reducing joint pain.

Nowadays you can find widespread use of collagen in various functional foods like protein bars, baked goods, etc. The fitness industry has been marketing collagen on the claim that it helps in muscle building. Is this claim true? Let’s understand.

The functioning of collagen supplements

Be it collagen, whey protein or any other form of protein, upon ingestion, they are digested and broken into individual amino acids by the enzymes of the GI tract. When these reach the small intestine, they are transferred to the bloodstream and move further to the liver.

Those amino acids that the liver is unable to use, are discharged again into the bloodstream where they are used by the body to perform a variety of functions such as:

• Muscle growth and recovery
• Repairing of cells
• Improving appearance and health of skin, hair, and nails
• Production of hormones
• Enhance joint integrity
• Neurotransmitter synthesis

The reason behind the stark popularity of collagen supplements is that when we age, our natural collagen production rate declines. Consuming collagen supplements can help in providing our body with the required amino acids to enhance collagen production.

Amino acids in collagen

Collagen is made up of various amino acids. Out of these various amino acids, 3 are main:

• Glycine
• Proline
• Hydroxyproline

Hydroxyproline is not found in good quantity in a majority of foods that people normally consume. Collagen offers the human body this vital amino acid. Collagen’s unique composition of amino acids helps in muscle building.

To lose weight or form big muscles, weight training is very important. It gives your muscles strength and helps in burning body fat. Collagen is said to be helpful in building muscles and thus helping those who are undergoing weight training.

Let’s dig deeper to find out the actual deal.

Collagen for muscle building and weight training individuals

Collagen is the main component providing structural support to your body. It is present in 90% of the connective tissues. The high bioavailability and high amino acid profile of collagen labels it as great post-workout nutrition which is absorbed quickly and repairs and replenishes the proteins that break down while working out.

• Collagen helps in muscle repairing and restoration: When you work out for longer durations, your muscles lose protein because of oxidation, muscle microlesions, and inflammatory reactions. There are various researches that show that while exercising, protein synthesis reduces and increases quickly post-workout for an extended time period. Consuming a high-protein diet after a workout helps to restore the lost proteins in muscles by increasing muscle anabolism. Collagen has a great amino acid content and thus it qualifies for muscle repairing and recovery.

• Collagen might help in speeding up recovery time: Regeneration of muscle fibers along with the generation of connective scar tissue are the two main factors that lead to the healing of torn and ruptured muscles. For these two factors to happen, collagen formation is very important. A study was conducted to measure the rates of collagen production for 3 weeks after a muscle tear. The researchers found that collagen synthesis rates were raised in muscle cells during that time. During the first week of the healing of muscle tear, Type III collagen synthesis was at its highest. It is in connection with the development of flexibility of the connective tissue. As and when the healing process went further, Type I collagen started forming and was linked to enhanced strength of the newly formed muscle fibers and connective tissues.

• Collagen can help in preventing injuries by providing strength to joints, bones, and ligaments: When you perform weighted movements, like lifting heavy weights, the pressure is generated on your joints. This might sometimes invite injuries. You need strong bones and joints to avoid injuries. A study conducted on three distinct category athletes showed that supplements when combined with collagen peptides, arginine, and BCAA over a course of 2 years, minimized tendon-ligament and joint injury rates. One more study to measure the effect of regular collagen peptides intake on the Achilles tendon structure was conducted. It was discovered that there was an evident rise in collagen fiber diameter, indicating enhanced tendon strength due to supplementing collagen. So, people doing weight training can experience a certain level of ease while lifting heavyweights.

• Collagen can be helpful in reducing joint pains that are connected to sports-related injuries: Getting involved in weightlifting, doing heavy-duty weight exercises, etc. or being involved in various sports or intense workouts can lead to joint pain. Various studies have proven that collagen might be helpful in reducing joint pain arising due to exercises or other intense physical activities. Collagen supplements help in enhancing joint functions and improve flexibility while working out. 

• Collagen is helpful in enhancing natural creatine production: When you are doing heavy lifting in the gym, your muscles lookup to a fast and instantly available source of energy, which is available in the form of ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate). It is a chemical substance that requires creatine to be present in order to exist. To generate creatine you require glycine, methionine, and arginine. These three are amino acids out of which collagen contains arginine and glycine in a huge amount. That is why collagen can have a positive impact on creatine and eventually ATP production. Higher the ATP levels, more will be your muscle energy and you will see a difference in your workout capacity at the gym.

• Collagen helps in enriching muscles with nutrients: Arginine present in collagen helps in enhancing blood flow in the body. It is known as a vasodilator, i.e., it aids in relaxing and broadening the blood vessels. When the blood vessels increase in size, your muscles get more amount of oxygen and other essential nutrients. This helps in muscle recovery. For weight training individuals, it is extremely helpful as it helps muscle recovery after an injury or overexertion. It also relaxes the tired muscles you get after heavy workouts.

Collagen has various benefits to offer to bodybuilders and people undergoing weight training. But if you are looking to entirely shift to collagen for all your protein needs, hold back. Collagen has a unique amino acid profile but misses out on one of the 9 essential amino acids. It can be taken in combination with protein supplements such as whey protein and a healthy and nutrient-rich diet.

Huge muscles are always a result of diet, exercise, and supplements combined. MuscleBlaze recommends that you should keep working out and don’t forget to eat healthy and workout along with consuming supplements like collagen.

The journey to acquiring your dream body is not as simple as training and eating right. A lot many factors, known as bodybuilding secrets compete for your attention to get a sculpted physique.  However, a new bodybuilder faces multiple myths and rumours. These myths can confuse beginners and also intermediate lifters. The first step to an informed decision is knowledge. Therefore you need to know what are biggest bodybuilding myths? Once you know the myths, the second step is to separate the  bodybuilding facts from fiction, which will help in supersizing your muscle growth and build the body you have been aspiring for so long. 

Myth # 1

LONG DURATION WORKOUTS LEAD TO MUSCLE GAIN

No pain no gain, at least muscle gain is one of the biggest bodybuilding myths.  This myth has goaded many fitness and bodybuilding enthusiasts to go through one more rep, until their muscles were on fire, almost every day.  Will this lead to muscle gain? No.

European sports researchers closely observed the Bulgarian Olympic weightlifting team and used ‘round-the-clock’ blood chemistry tracking. The study found that heavy lifting for more than 45 minutes caused testosterone, the hormone responsible for muscle growth and recovery to decrease by as much as 80 percent and cortisol takes charge. Other than making you sore all over, this training regimen is going to trap you in the growth plateau.

If you continue training harder and longer till the point your testosterone level drop up to four-fifths your muscle recovery will suffer, as well as your attempt to gain muscle mass. Your workout should last 45-60 minutes at the max, any longer and catabolism sets in.

Myth # 2

LIFTING SUPER SLOW BUILDS BIGGER MUSCLES

The latest muscle building myth, making rounds in training circles is super slow resistance training. In this form of weight training, concentric muscle movements, the exercises leading to shortening of muscle fibers take 10 seconds to complete and the eccentric portion  in which muscles are forced to elongate is completed in 4-5 seconds. The focus of super-slow lifting is more on coordination and control, rather than speed.

Researchers at the University of Alabama studied two groups of lifters performing a 29-minute workout. One group followed the super-slow technique and performed exercises using a 5-second up phase and 10-second down phase, the other group followed the conventional 1 second up and 1 second down approach.  University of Alabama researchers recently studied two groups of lifters doing a 29-minute workout. One group performed. The faster group burned 71 percent more calories and lifted 250 percent more weight than the super slow lifters. The author of the study, Gary Hunter, Ph.D., C.S.C.S.,deducted that the best increases in strength are achieved by doing the up phase as rapidly as possible.

Myth # 3

EAT A SUPER HIGH-CALORIE DIET TO GROW BIG

Without a doubt, if you wish to grow your muscles, your calorie intake should be more than your calorie expense. However, in no way, this gives you a license to eat a super-high-calorie diet, until you are blessed with a super-efficient metabolism. Most studies go on to show that about 65 percent of new tissue gains are brought about by high-calorie diets consists of fats. You must eat to grow but not to gain extra fat weight!

Putting it simply anyone who wishes to grow in size needs to eat 500 more calories, above his maintenance intake to pack on muscles from cleaner fuel sources, like high-quality proteins, complex carbohydrates, and good fats. The amount of muscle you can build relies on your body’s ability to synthesize muscles from the protein you ate, and there is a limit to it. Your body can build between 0.25 to 0.5 pounds of dry muscle tissue in a week’s time, under ideal circumstances (perfect diet, training, recovery, and supplementation). On average, your body will process one or two pounds of muscle in a month.

Myth # 4

LEG EXTENSIONS ARE SAFER THAN SQUATS

For centuries squats have been maligned because these compound exercises were believed to wreck knees and leg extensions were considered safer and injury free. A recent study in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise found that “open-chain” exercises—those in which a single joint is activated, such as the leg extension—are potentially more dangerous than closed-chain moves—those that engage multiple joints, such as the squat and the leg press.

When you perform a leg extension, the major lower-leg bone, called the tibia slides forward. This stretches an important ligament in the knee and eventually, people recognized the need for an anti-shear device to reduce the stress on the ligament. A leg extension also stresses the cartilage on the back of the patella, a.k.a. kneecap, at its thinnest area.

While doing a squat the tibia slides backwards and reduces stress on the knee ligament. Moreover, squat engages the thickest area of your knee cap and not the thinnest area(back of kneecap) the way leg extension does.

Myth # 5

TRAIN HARD LIKE A BODYBUILDER

And finally the mother of all myths to which most people subscribe to  that to build body, you need to train really hard like a bodybuilder, you are committing the most often committed training error. Sangram Chougule, MuscleBlaze athlete clarifies that beginner bodybuilder should not follow the advanced level of workout of pros. Initially, they need to engage both bigger and smaller muscles under a good trainer. Be clear about your muscle-building goals and customize your training session accordingly. Research shows it if you are looking to build up your strength then you should look at reps in the range of one to seven – but this won’t be as effective if you are looking to work out for muscle growth.  For muscle growth, your reps should be in the range of 8-12 to stimulate adequate metabolic changes for muscle growth.

TRAINING SCHEDULE FOR NEW BODYBUILDERS

You need to know what will work for you and this depends on how badly you want to grow. Moreover, you need to know what works for you. Tune out top bodybuilding myths to grow in size and strength.

Do you laboriously trudge on a treadmill for 45 minutes every day hoping to burn fat? If your answer is yes and weight loss still manages to elude you, you need to learn the tricks for faster fat loss. According to research published in the journal Obesity, men and women who did 300 hours of cardio lost only 5 pounds in a year. Safely, you can deduct that when it comes to weight loss slow and steady cardio does not work.  Decode the secrets to a super quick fat burn workout and turn in a lean, mean, fat-burning machine. 

1.      LIFT WEIGHTS TO LOSE FAT

Start with lifting weights that you’ve conveniently avoided so far thinking that weight lifting is for men who wish to grow stronger and muscular. An average man loses around half of his muscle mass between 18 to 65 years. Muscle is a metabolically active tissue and requires more calories to maintain, as compared to fat. As you get better at strength training, you will be able to lift more weight.  Around 60 percent of calories consumed are spent in maintaining bodily functions, termed as Basal Metabolic Rate. When you pack more of lean muscle mass, your calorie expenditure goes up. Sterling-Pasmore equation specifies that to support 1 pound of lean muscle mass your body spends 13.8 calories.

 Moreover, when you lift weights metabolic change take place. The primary fuel for intense workouts is carbohydrates or glycogen stored in the muscle tissues. Studies go on to establish that lifting weights raises your metabolism for up to 39 hours of your workout. The fuel for intense weight training sessions is glycogen or longer chain version of glucose stored in the muscle cells. An awesome workout will deplete the reserve of carbs and you will burn fat during the recovery phase.

One of the huge problems with cardio for fat loss is that the more you do, the better you get at it and more fuel efficient you become. With resistance training the opposite is true. The better you get at strength training, the more weight you can lift and the more it takes out of you. Begin to lift weights to lose fat because when you spend some of your training time getting stronger, you are better prepared to do other forms of training at a higher/faster level that ends up burning more calories. 

2.      HIGH-INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING BOOSTS FAT BURN

High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT), the highly circulated word in weight loss alternates high-intensity bouts of exercise with steady cardio.  In HIIT you sprint for 30 seconds and walk for 60 seconds. Any exercise session will tap into fuel source from carbohydrates and fats and the source of fuel depends on the intensity of the exercise. A low-intensity activity taps into the fat store for energy and a high-intensity activity like sprint relies on glycogen as a source of fuel. When you alternate a high-intensity workout with a low-intensity activity, you utilize both the sources of fuel. Research studies go on to prove that a shorter, high-intensity workout burns more calories than a steady state cardio and when you alternate it with a less intensity activity, like a sprint with a walk, you eventually burn more calories, because every bit counts.

An intense session of cardio quickly depletes glycogen reserve of your muscles forcing your body to tap into other sources of fuel like fatty acids and muscle protein. With continued exercise, your body is not able to keep up with the demand of oxygen and fuel and lactic acid begins to flood your muscles. You may have noted that burning sensation when you train hard. Research suggests that as your oxygen levels deplete your body has to work hard to build its oxygen stores back for a period of 16 to 24 hours post-workout. The bonus: more calories get burned than exercising at a moderate speed. Do High-Intensity Interval Training to boost fat burn. 

3.      INEFFICIENT EXERCISE

Yes, you heard it right. Think about it, on the first day of jogging, your legs ached and felt heavy after jogging for two km. In two months, you grew efficient and were able to jog easily for 5 km without getting breathless. Though you’re jogging more now, your rate of fat burn has decreased. To peel off fat, you need to waste energy and this can happen only when you are not efficient enough in the form of exercise you choose. Therefore, if you are a lousy dancer go ahead and dance, row, swing kettle ball but doing the same exercise day in and day out is going to make you chubby.

Lastly, your moves in the gym are as good as what you eat. If you are chasing weight loss, you need to unleash the strength of insulin. Your pancreas secretes insulin when your blood sugar levels go up in response to high glycemic, fast-digesting carbohydrates. A lot of the food you eat will not be delivered muscle cells but get stored as fat if you do not have insulin-sensitive muscle cells. When you sit down to eat, eat proteins and fat first. Include an apple-cider-vinegar infused drink before a carb-heavy meal for enhanced insulin sensitivity. Have psyllium husk twice a day to lower blood sugar levels. Take a high-quality fish oil supplement along with those intense training sessions. The combined effect of these will lower your blood sugar and result in weight loss.