Welcome back to the second instalment in my nutrition series
for Andrew’s blog! If you missed part one, we covered why nutrition is
important for the athlete and the problems associated with under and over
eating. I suggest you check it out before going any further by clicking the
link! (http://strengthtrainingforyou.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/why-nutrition-should-be-of-priority-to.html)
So, we know that we don’t want to massively under eat as we
won’t have energy for recovery and training and we don’t want to overeat as we
just get fat – which doesn’t really help our performance!
How do we control our bodyweight and ensure we are eating the
correct amount of food?
Simply track your bodyweight, what you are eating and then alter it to
suit your goals.
Tracking bodyweight and food
Our food contains calories which are used to fuel our
everyday activity such as walking or running. When we eat food these calories,
they add up throughout the day and at the end of the day we are left with the
total sum.
Therefore, we have our calories
that we have consumed through food and the calories we have expended through our daily activity and exercise.
In short this is calories
in vs. calories out and the basis for energy balance.
The energy balance equation or calories in vs. calories out
states;
·
If we eat enough calories to maintain our
bodyweight we are eating at maintenance as there is no change
·
If our bodyweight is falling then we are in a
caloric deficit as we are eating less calories than our body needs to maintain
it’s weight
·
If our bodyweight is rising then we are in a
caloric surplus as we are eating more calories than our body needs to maintain
it’s weight
The two act in a tandem – if you are eating less food than
you need your bodyweight will fall and vice versa for too much!
Therefore, we need to
find the amount of calories we need to maintain our bodyweight and then we can
either increase or decrease to suit our goals. In the case of the athlete this
would be primarily to either sit at maintenance calories or in a slight surplus
as this give the body the best environment for growth and repair.
The key to controlling your bodyweight is to find your maintenance
calorie intake.
Finding maintenance
To find our maintenance calories we need to track both our food intake and our bodyweight.
This will give us an idea of the amount of calories we are consuming and what
is happening to our bodyweight.
I advise people to do this over a period of 14 days – why?
Quite simply, this gives us a long period to collect data
and gives us a better overall view of what is happening.
Our bodyweight fluctuates too much on a daily basis due to
changes in our carbohydrate intake, fluid intake, salt intake and other factors
such as stress.
Therefore, over the 14 day period these factors should be averaged out and have a minimal impact
on the overall number.
Tracking bodyweight
Weigh yourself under the same conditions every morning. For example, don’t weigh yourself
clothed one morning and naked the next – the clothes will add more weight and
it won’t be a consistent or accurate method of tracking!
I advise my clients to weigh themselves in their underwear,
after they have went to the toilet and before they have eaten or drank
anything.
Tracking your food intake
To track our food intake we need a set of digital kitchen
scales and a calorie tracking app such as myfitnesspal.
Simply, weigh out the amount of food you are going to eat
and then search for that food in the calorie tracking app and log the amount of
food.
This will then give you the caloric value and the amount of
carbs, protein and fat which your food contains.
Make sure you keep the tracking as accurate and consistent
as possible. For example, weigh pasta or rice before you cook it as it will
absorb different amounts of water depending on how long you have cooked it for.
For a more detailed overview of how to track your food
intake using a calorie tracking app, check out an article where I covered a
step by step guide – (http://carletonperformanceandnutrition.co.uk/wp-admin/post.php?post=454&action=edit)
Complete the above steps of tracking your bodyweight and
caloric intake to determine how many calories you are consuming each day and
how your bodyweight responds.
Finding maintenance pt. 2
Once you have gathered your data from the above steps you
can then create an average of your bodyweight and caloric intake over each week
of the 14 day period. You can then note any increase or decrease in weight
between week one and two and determine if you were in a caloric surplus or
deficit.
We can then use this increase or decrease in weight to
determine a rough estimate of our maintenance.
For example, if you recorded an average increase of 0.5kg
between week 1 and 2 and each day you consumed 3000 calories per day, you could
use the average figure of 1lb of weight gain =~3500 calories. This would allow
you to determine that you were in a surplus of ~3500kcals for the 14 day
period. If we divide this by 14 we get a 250kcal surplus per day for the 14 day
period. This means our maintenance figure is approximately 2750kcals per day.
Deficit or surplus?
Once we have worked out our maintenance calories we can then
either increase or decrease them to
suit our goals.
Remember our goal is to perform at our best both in training
and competition so we will want to give our body the best chance at doing so –
this means taking a slow and steady approach with any nutritional changes as
this will not ‘shock’ the body and allow us to maintain our performance at
optimal levels for as long as possible.
If your goal is to increase your muscle mass you will have
to eat to facilitate this. If you think you would perform better by reducing
your bodyweight and bodyfat then again, you will have to eat to facilitate
this.
Reducing our bodyfat
If our goal is to reduce our bodyfat we will need to take a slow and steady approach not to
negatively affect our performance.
You can starve yourself by drastically reducing your food
intake but is this going to allow you to train or compete at your best? Don’t
think so!
If we try to reduce
our bodyweight too quickly this can increase the risk of losing muscle and harm
our performance during training and competition as we don’t have the necessary
fuel and energy reserves to perform our required skills. I suggest losing no
more than 1% of your bodyweight per
week and only losing weight for a maximum
of around 12 weeks before taking a break.
Furthermore, I advise all my athlete’s to only reduce
bodyweight or bodyfat in the offseason when they are not required to perform at
their peak and the body is not placed under as high a recovery demand as during
the competitive season where performance could be affected if we are not eating
enough fuel!
Aim to reduce your maintenance calories by around 10% to begin with and then monitor your
bodyweight. If you stall or did not lose weight, reduce your calories by a
further 5%.
If you are losing more
than 1% of your bodyweight a week then increase
your calories a little – approximately 100-200 per day with larger folk
leaning towards the higher end.
Increasing muscle mass
Likewise, if our goal is to increase our bodyweight we will
want to take a slow and steady approach
in order to limit the amount of bodyfat we accumulate. In most cases, excess
bodyfat will not help performance!
Aim to gain bodyweight in relation to the rates of weight
gain suggested from the first article, seen below;
The above is an excerpt from Eric Helms
most recent book (1) and gives a good idea of the amount of muscle we can
expect to gain in a month
Again, these are extremely low numbers but they will ensure
you are mostly adding muscle which is the aim!
To do this, aim for a small increase of calories beyond your
maintenance – 100-200 per day – and continue to track your bodyweight.
Gaining too fast? Decrease your calories a little – 50-100
per day and monitor the change.
Gaining too slow? Increase your calories a little – 100-150
per day and monitor the change.
The above calorie goals will go hand in hand with proper
macronutrient ratios to aid in your performance, recovery and ensure you are
getting the maximum benefit from your nutritional approach. This key topic will
be covered in part 3!
Summary
To control our bodyweight we need to determine our
maintenance calories. The most accurate way of doing this is to track both our
food intake and bodyweight over a period of 14 days, allowing us to create an
average for both to determine our maintenance.
Once we have our maintenance we can then either increase or
decrease our calories in line with our goal of weight gain or loss.
We should aim to take a slow and steady approach in both
cases to avoid any body composition changes impacting our performance, unwanted
muscle mass loss and unwanted bodyfat gain – which will not help us perform
better as an athlete!
In part 3 we will cover the macronutrients, how much of each
we should be eating and how they can influence our performance.
About the Author
Dave Carleton is a powerlifter who competes in the 66kg class and has represented Great Britain at European and World Championship level. He is currently studying Sports and Exercise Science in Edinburgh and runs a nutrition and training coaching service, helping people get stronger and achieve their body composition goals. He creates regular articles and tips through his blog and facebook page which are linked below;
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/Davy-Carleton-Performance-Nutrition-1650952501824022/?ref=aymt_homepage_panel
Blog - carletonperformanceandnutrition.co.uk/blog-3
References
1 - Helms, E.,
Valdez, A. and Morgan, A. (2015).The Muscle And Strength Pyramid – Nutrition
Andrew Richardson, Founder of Strength is Never a Weakness Blog
I have a BSc (Hons) in Applied Sport Science and a Merit in my MSc in Sport and Exercise Science and I passed my PGCE at Teesside University.
Now I will be commencing my PhD into "Investigating Sedentary Lifestyles of the Tees Valley" this October 2019.
I am employed by Teesside University Sport and WellBeing Department as a PT/Fitness Instructor.
My long term goal is to become a Sport Science and/or Sport and Exercise Lecturer. I am also keen to contribute to academia via continued research in a quest for new knowledge.
My most recent publications:
My passion is for Sport Science which has led to additional interests incorporating Sports Psychology, Body Dysmorphia, AAS, Doping and Strength and Conditioning.
Within these respective fields, I have a passion for Strength Training, Fitness Testing, Periodisation and Tapering.
I write for numerous websites across the UK and Ireland including my own blog Strength is Never a Weakness.
I had my own business for providing training plans for teams and athletes.
I was one of the Irish National Coaches for Powerlifting, and have attained two 3rd places at the first World University Championships,
in Belarus in July 2016.Feel free to email me or call me as I am always looking for the next challenge.
Contact details below;
Facebook: Andrew Richardson (search for)
Facebook Page: @StrengthisNeveraWeakness
Twitter: @arichie17
Instagram: @arichiepowerlifting
Snapchat: @andypowerlifter
Email: a.s.richardson@tees.ac.uk
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-richardson-b0039278
Research Gate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Andrew_Richardson7
