Q&A for: 30-Oct-05
901. Q:
what kind of whole food will give me lots of healthy amino acids? also, are eggwhites similar to whey, or slower burning like casein
A:
Any lean meat, chicken, or fish, as well as eggs, cottage cheese, or whey powder will give you the complete set of essential amino acids. Beans, lentils, and soy also provide near-animal quality protein and if supplemented with rice, will equal animal-source protein. So getting amino acids in your diet is pretty easy.
Getting enough of them can be a little more difficult -- I recommend getting at least 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight as a rough general rule. That can be (and should be) accomplished by having several meals throughout the day, each with a good source of protein.
As far as you last question, eggwhites are relatively fast-digesting, closer to whey than to casein. But I wouldn't worry too much about the details such as digestion times. Just make sure you get enough protein from a variety of sources throughout the day.
902. Q:
Hi Mike, what would be the best foods to eat to get the daily fat intake i need, in a weight gaining diet
A:
Extra virgin olive oil (for use in salads, not in cooking!), fatty fish, ground flax seed (or flax oil, though I definitely prefer plain ground flax seed), as well as nuts and egg yolks. Most of your fat intake should be monounsaturated fats which are plentiful in extra virgin olive oil.
Besides monounsaturated fats, try to get at least some omega-3 polyunsaturated fats in your diet. These can be found in fatty fish such as salmon and flax seed. Do NOT go out of your way to get enough omega-6 polyunsaturated, however -- although it is an essential fatty acid like omega-3, it is present in many foods, especially things like commercial salad dressings (which you should avoid) and soy/nuts/peanut butter and most people get too much of it already.
If you eat meat or chicken you will get a lot of fats from them as well, mostly in saturated and monounsaturated form. That's fine, just try to get as lean meats and poultry as possible. That means skinless poultry and 90% lean or better beef.
904. Q:
How long should i rest between sets if i am doing heavy weight training, and how long should my entire workout be, excluding stretching
A:
The heavier the weight you lift to failure (in other words, the fewer reps you do before failure), the more time you should allow between sets. Go with something like 60-90 second rest if you use weights you can lift for more than 12 reps, 90-120 seconds for 10-12 rep weights, 120-150 seconds for 7-9 rep weights, and 3+ minutes for when you reach failure in 6 reps or less.
906. Q:
how many calories are burnt doing jumping jacks
A:
They'll burn you around 8 calories/minute when done at high intensity (which is what I would recommend). In addition, they will give you some of the same benefits as heavy resistance training (again, if you do them at high intensity, focusing on jumping as high as possible) which will burn fat as your muscles recover after the exercise itself.
907. Q:
I have read that in order to lose the last bit fat of belly(when u are already thin)is to bulk up then restart diet again.Only this way will go and not with cardio.This way use models and bodybuilders also.Is that correct?And if so how much bulk up u need to do in order to achieve that?
A:
That is exactly correct and it is the best way to tackle the last bits of fat if you're already pretty thin. There's no hard rule saying you need to bulk up so much. The goal is to bulk up putting on as much muscle and as little fat as possible -- this requires very slow weight gain, a good diet, and of course a good training program. After at least couple of months of a good bulk like that, you can start cutting back down again, but you could also keep bulking longer, especially if you're noticing quality muscle gains without much new fat. Judgements like that ('quality muscle gain', 'not much new fat') are subjective of course, but that's the whole point: only you can decide how you want to sculpt your body. Check out Q&A #216 and Q&A #696 for somebody else's experiences and my recommendations for tackling that same problem. Good luck!
909. Q:
Hi Mike :)
I am a 5'6 240 pound female, and I resistance train everyday for a week now. I am now hearing that I cannot resistance train everyday. Is it because I will get big man muscles? I am highly motivated about the resistance training and am disapointed about not getting to do them everyday. I know I need to add cardio, and will soon. But I refuse to go out anywhere looking this big, and I don't have machines or videos to follow for cardio. So, can I resistance train everyday and not build bulk? and what can I do for cardio behind my closed doors at home? Thank you!
A:
You have a great mindset about exercising, great job! The reason that everyday heavy resistance training is not recommended is because for most people it would be overtraining, meaning your body would not be able to fully recover in between sessions. Overtraining leads to lack of progress and injuries over long term. However this is likely to happen only when you use very heavy weights (meaning such weights that you can only do less than 12 reps of any one exercise before your muscles giving out) OR when you do a lot of weight training, an hour's worth or so daily.
So with that in mind, you could actually arrange your resistance training to be daily... Allow 3 days of the week to have intense 30-45 minute sessions when you would use those heavy weights that cause muscular failure in 12 reps in any set. Allow the other 4 days for significantly less intense 20-30 minute sessions when you would use light weights (20 reps or more before failure). An arrangement like that should not lead to overtraining.
When you weight train, remember to train all your muscle groups in the course of the week. If you're not very familiar with weight training programs, check out my Weight Training article -- it'll cover the basics and give you several sample programs to try, including two that require almost no equipment.
To address your concern about getting too muscular... It won't happen as long as you are losing weight. So as long as you are losing 1-2 pounds/week thanks to a good fat-burning diet, weight training and, hopefully, some cardio, you should be quite safe from building much new muscle. But do make sure that you have a good diet and are losing weight -- read my Nutrition article if you haven't already.
Finally, for cardio you can do at home all it really takes is some imagination: dance to your favorite tunes, jump rope, shadow box, do jumping jacks, etc. All of these are very simple and very effective forms of cardio. Good time to do cardio for you would be on the same days when you do light weight training. Best of luck to you on your quest to get in shape!
|
