Proper nutrition plays a crucial role in building a stronger and more aesthetic body. Eating healthy food is not the only factor in proper nutrition, but also what, how much, and in what ratio. To a certain degree, this depends upon which category your body belongs to:
- skinny
- rounded
- muscular body-form
To increase muscle mass and lower excess body fat, six nutrition factors are in play:
- Calories
- Proteins
- Carbohydrates
- Fats
- Water
- Supplements
Calories
The word calorie comes from the Latin calor which means heat.
A calorie is a unit measure of energy, i.e heat.
How much energy is 1 food calorie (kcal)? To understand this, we’ll consider it from the aspect of heat. 1 calorie is the amount of energy needed to increase the temperature of 1 kilogram of water by 1 °C.
Body heat is a result of calorie combustion and the raw material for this energy is provided by food (plus water and oxygen).
- 1 gram of protein has an energy value of 4 calories.
- 1 gram of carbohydrates has an energy value of 4 calories.
- 1 gram of fat has an energy value of 9 calories.
There is a rough equation that says if you ingest more calories than what you expend, then your body weight will increase. If you ingest fewer calories than what you expend, then your body weight will decrease.
When it comes to selective increase or decrease of weight (muscle mass or fat), this equation does not make a difference in what kind of calories are ingested and what kind of mass is to be gained or lost. All calories are not the same.
And despite their same caloric value, proteins, and carbs have different effects on the body. They activate dissimilar hormones with opposite effects to each other in gaining muscle/losing fat.
Proteins
Proteins are the material your body uses to increase muscle mass. This mainly occurs after exercising through the activation of hormones which execute the building of additional muscle mass.
The most important thing in nutrition for muscle growth and burning extra fat is to lower the intake of carbohydrates and increase the intake of proteins and fats. You don’t need to significantly lower your intake of healthy fats.
Large quantities of protein especially without fats will increase insulin more than needed. In that case, the process of burning excess body fat halts. What’s a large quantity for someone can be too little for someone else depending on multiple individual factors.
