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Have you noticed how professional bodybuilders no longer have to “starve” themselves to stay lean? Unlike the old days where a cutting cycle required a big muscle loss to also lose fat and get lean, today’s weight lifters can control fat gain during muscle building and reduce muscle loss during the cut cycle. This is how.
Back in the early days of bodybuilding as a competition neared, the lifters would put themselves on ever shrinking calorie diets in an attempt to reduce their body fat. As a result of such a low calorie intake, it was impossible to maintain an energy level required to train as intensely for as long as they did during their muscle building, big calorie cycle. So muscle loss was inevitable.
Of course during this muscle building period to ingest the necessary amount of protein required by their bodies to take advantage of their intense training sessions, the calorie content would have to be so high that fat gain was unavoidable. So in essence it was 3 steps forward, then 2 steps back, over and over. My how things have changed.
Today’s serious lifters are able to limit their fat gain during the muscle building times and can drastically cut muscle loss during the pre-competition cutting time. How do they do this?
The 2 biggest contributing factors are first, a much better understanding as to how the body processes the food it takes in. Today’s lifters actually need more protein than their predecessors because they are so much larger now. We now know that the body can only process and use a certain amount of protein in any given time interval. Therefore the gluttonous meals of the past have been replaced by smaller, more frequent meals. This spreads the protein consumption out better so less is wasted.
The second major factor is that the weight lifting supplements available today are more highly refined than yesteryear. The protein supplements that most of the big fella’s take now are virtually all protein. Which means they are able to eat carbs and fats like anybody else would at meal time, and at the end of the day have gotten their required protein, eaten well and stayed low in total calories. Plus these supplements are ideal for the ability to spread out the intake. Keeping your calorie intake below your threshold is what allows muscle to be gained and limiting fat stores.
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