POSITIVE NITROGEN BALANCE EQUALS CONSTANT MUSCLE GAINS

If you wish to build muscle on a consistent basis then your body needs to be in a state of positive nitrogen balance. Nitrogen is a chemical element only found in protein. A positive nitrogen balance means your body is retaining more protein than is excreted or used as fuel. The only way to test a nitrogen balance is in the lab so to ensure your body stays in this state for the majority of the time you’ll need to get your protein intake right.

First of all the protein you consume must be of high quality, this can be more important than sheer quantity of protein. However you still need to provide the body with sufficient amounts of good, quality protein for muscular growth. If the diet doesn’t provide enough protein there will be slow or no muscle gains even with effective training. If protein intake is around 15% of total calories and the source comes mainly from high quality protein foods then with the correct training you should be able to gain muscle on a consistent basis.

There is no point in consuming too much protein (high protein diet) in an attempt to make sure you have enough as any surplus will simply be used for energy, just make sure you consume enough to support repair and growth during rest. What’s more important than consuming a high protein diet is to consume sufficient energy along with the quality protein to support additional growth of muscle. Building muscle is an anabolic process and this means it needs energy on top of your normal energy requirements in order to complete the task. This means that after you have gained some muscle you will need to increase daily calorie consumption slightly to continue to build further muscle mass. Again as with most things you shouldn’t go too far too soon and consume tons more energy in the belief that you’ll gain more muscle, doing this will only cause excess energy to be converted into fat and stored. I believe a good estimate is to increase daily calorie intake by 100 calories every time you gain half pound of muscle. However, make sure the gain is muscle by checking fat percentage, if fat has increased slightly then there should be no increase in calories. In terms of protein intake, providing you stick to the estimated 15% of calorie intake then as your calorie consumption goes up after gaining muscle weight then this will automatically rise to the correct intake.

Working out daily protein requirements in grams

There are two ways to calculate protein needs; from your energy intake or from your body weight. For this example we will use energy intake. If you know what your calorie requirements are then you can work out how much protein you should be eating to help build muscle consistently. It has been estimated that an average man requires 2500 calories per day so we’ll use this value. It is also estimated that weight trainers should be consuming around 15% of their total calories as high quality protein.

Energy Intake = 2500
Calories from protein = 15%

2500 x 15% = 375 calories from protein each day

To convert the protein into grams we need to divide the value by 4. This is because there are 4 calories for each gram of protein:

375 / 4 = 93.75 grams

The protein requirement in this example is around 94 grams per day. Because it’s too difficult to consume the exact amount we can go either way by a few percent, so let’s say protein requirement in this example is 90 – 100 grams per day.

An adjustment for beginners

Beginning bodybuilders often require a higher protein intake as the training effect is initially greater. For a novice exercise may cause a larger breakdown of muscle protein for energy production so there may be a bigger loss of muscle. It means more dietary protein may be needed to help recover the potentially large loss of muscle, plus extra protein to help build additional muscle after the recovery phase. After about three weeks on a new program the muscles adapt to the type of exercise and become more efficient at recycling and conserving protein, now the breakdown of muscle protein diminishes. If in the example above the individual was new to weight training then it may be necessary to increase the protein intake by 30%, so in this case the intake would be around 120 grams per day.

The correct amounts and the source of your daily protein are crucial in maintaining a positive nitrogen balance, however, it doesn’t stop here, there is another factor to consider - how much protein does one consume at each meal and how should the day’s requirement be spread out?

There is a simple answer to this question, our body can only use a certain amount of protein to top up the amino acid pool within the blood every time we eat a meal, and any more than this amount means protein will be used for fuel rather than muscular growth. This means you don’t want to be wasting valuable protein by consuming large amounts at each meal. It would be far better to spread the daily requirement over a number of meals and snacks. So if your requirement is 100 grams per day then consume 20 grams at each meal over the course of 5 meals in a day. If you cannot manage 5 meals each then try 25 grams over 4 meals. The overall idea is to maintain the blood amino acid pool over the whole day so the muscles have a constant supply of amino acids to continue muscle growth. I personally would not go for 3 big meals with 35 grams of protein. The amino acid pool is constantly being used for many other processes in the body thus if it is left too long and runs low the body may be forced to slow growth or even break down some muscle so proteins can be made for another purpose. Protein turnover is happening all the time in the body and therefore it is important to keep the amino acid pool topped high if you want to stay in positive nitrogen balance!

All information on this site is not intended as medical or professional advice. We urge all our web site visitors to seek medical / professional advice before beginning any weight training program, exercise, or any diet. In no event shall bigmusclesfast.com be liable for any damages, whatsoever including direct, indirect, or consequential. Please read our disclaimer.

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