Universal Nutrition Forum

BULK UP
BY CHRIS ACETO
Vegetables rule when it comes to adding muscle mass

To bulk up your body with muscle, learn o bulk up your diet with vegetables. Low in calories,
vegetables also provide a host of nutrients that are otherwise deficient in many bodybuilding diets, including fibre, vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals.
Most bodybuilders acknowledge the crucial role that vegetables play in a bodybuilding diet, yet, for a variety of reasons, many of those same bodybuilders chronically don?t eat enough of these nutritious foods. First, bodybuilders get so focused on protein consumption that everything else takes a back seat. Once a trainer has eaten the suggested one gram of protein per pound of bodyweight daily and taken in enough complex carbs for growth, he?s very likely to feel full. Second, vegetables can be a pain in the butt to prepare, so many bodybuilders overlook them meal after meal, fooling themselves into thinking that their diets are pretty good anyway.
Here?s a news flash: if you want to make the most of your health and your bodybuilding gains, then you had better include at least two cups of vegetables a day. They contribute to a stronger immune system, improved absorption and stable energy levels ? all factors that play a role in recovery and growth.

RULE #1
EAT VEGETABLES FOR FIBRE
Vegetables are high in fibre, one of the most widely neglected bodybuilding nutrients. Fibre is an indigestible carbohydrate that supplies no calories to your body, but it does provide bulk, which slows digestion. This has two essential benefits. First, carbohydrates enter your body more slowly. This helps hold your blood sugar levels in check, keeping energy levels up and ?crashes? at bay. When blood sugar levels crash, they cause a spike in cortisol, a catabolic hormone that breaks down muscle tissue and makes recovery more difficult. Second, fibre helps support the absorption of amino acids. It keeps the walls of your intestines clean, making them more efficient. This in turn allows you to get more bang for your buck from your protein consumption.

RULE #2
EAT VEGETABLES FOR VITAMINS AND MINERALS
Every hard-working bodybuilder needs a hefty amount of vitamins and minerals. Unfortunately, many believe that popping a daily multi- vitamin/multimineral will suffice. It will help, but it won?t cover your bases as completely as whole-food sources. You need vegetables. They contain compounds that enhance the absorption of the naturally occurring vitamins and minerals found within them. These compounds also increase the absorption of vitamins and minerals found in meats, grains and even in supplement tablets. Bodybuilding nutrition is more than numbers; it?s more than total amounts of calories, carbs, protein and fat. The best nutrition plans don?t simply focus on the major things. The smaller things play a big role in creating the perfect environment for recovery and growth.

RULE #3
EAT VEGETABLES FOR WHAT WE DON?T KNOW
One thing we do know about vegetables is that we don?t know everything that?s in them. Recent information has demonstrated this. Scientists have established that vegetables contain lycopene, phytochemicals, antioxidants, carotenoids and sulphur compounds that contribute to numerous metabolic functions including immune support. Effective post-training recovery calls for a strong immune system. When it?s weak, not only do you fail to recover, but also your muscles may fail to grow regardless of your high calorie and protein intake. So, eat your vegetables for their known benefits as well as the ones yet to be discovered.

RULE #4
EAT A VARIETY OF VEGETABLES
Many bodybuilders focus on one or two vegetables (often spinach or broccoli). That?s far better than eating little or none, but taking in a wide range of vegetables is better. Include all of those you like and even a few you?re not as wild about. Suggestions include asparagus, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, courgettes, green beans, mushrooms, onions, peppers (all colours), spinach and squash.

RULE #5
EAT AT LEAST THE MINIMUM
On a daily basis, eat a minimum of two cups of vegetables. Spread that intake over three meals or more, especially whole-food meals. (It?s a good idea to pair vegetables with meat, since that is one of the most difficult types of protein to digest.)
You can have broccoli at one meal, some cabbage at another and green beans at a third, for example. Keep a couple of pounds of them in your fridge. Other options are to mix several vegetables together or buy fresh or frozen bags of pre-mixed veggies. This will reduce your prep time and will also provide a broader range of nutrients at each meal, as every vegetable has a different nutrient profile.

RULE #6
EAT VEGETABLES TO GET LEAN
If you?re on a bodybuilding diet, your challenges include avoiding cheating, reducing your total calories and providing your body with enough bulk to feel satisfied. Increasing vegetable consumption can be the key to all of these. Bump up your daily intake to six cups while dieting. When calories are severely reduced, it?s often easy to miss out on some of the important vitamins and minerals, but eating a lot of low-cal vegetables will help ensure that you meet your needs. They?ll also keep you full so that you?re less likely to eat foods you shouldn?t.

RULE #7
EAT VEGETABLES FOR BODYBUILDING GAINS
Certain vegetables, such as broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage, exert anti-oestrogen properties due to a phytochemical that they contain. This effect is beneficial to bodybuilders because lower oestrogen levels may help fight bodyfat, minimise water retention and enhance testosterone levels. Include these veggies on a regular basis and focus on them when you?re feeling overtrained or stressed.

RULE #8
MAKE VEGETABLES TASTY
Many people don?t enjoy vegetables unless they?re prepared in a way that makes them tastier. Offseason, when trying to add mass, you can pan fry them in olive oil, add teriyaki sauce, grate some low-fat cheese on top or cover them in a low-fat salad dressing. When dieting, you can keep calories to a minimum by adding herbs and spices and garlic powder, by using a nonstick frying pan coated with cooking spray, or by concocting your own ultra-low-cal dressing (we suggest mixing vinegar, artificial sweetener, garlic powder and savoury seasoning).

EAT ?DEM GREENS
If your bodybuilding programme isn?t as successful as you think it should be, consider improving your diet. Eating more vegetables is one of the most basic ways to accomplish this. Bodybuilders usually eat plenty of protein and complex carbohydrates, but they often overlook vegetables. Compared to the bodybuilding benefits of protein, those from vegetables may be less tangible, but vegetables can indeed have a potent indirect effect on muscle gains. FLEX

To order Chris Aceto?s training and nutrition book, Championship Bodybuilding, visit his Web site at www.chrisaceto.com.

Standard Cup Measurement 1 cup = 250ml

EATING FOR MASS
BY CHRIS ACETO
This two-week quality nutrition plan will build quality muscle

To pig out or not to pig out. Often, bodybuilders go from the most stringent diets to the least restrictive ones between the contest season and off-season. For bodybuilders who want to continue to grow and then get lean, this has long been considered the best way to keep growing. But you don?t have to blow up to 300 pounds of blubber if you want to increase your muscle mass. Bodybuilders who?ve built quality physiques understand that off-season mass building isn?t about gorging the body and getting enormous. Witness 220-pound Dexter Jackson, who never gets sloppy. Neither does Jay Cutler, nor others like Troy Alves and Darrem Charles, who always stay in good off-season shape. Eating for sloppy-free mass is more than eating a multitude of crappy calories. You have to pay attention to consuming good food all year long.
Other important aspects of off-season dieting are consistency and variation. Consistency means eating six times a day, every day. But one of the most essential elements is to vary the number of calories and macro-nutrients (protein, carbohydrates and healthy fats) that you take in daily. When you load up the body on one day with high calories, you drive your body into a temporarily heightened state of anabolism.
Here I explain how you can create such an anabolic state by rotating medium-, low- and high-carbohydrate intakes while varying protein and dietary fat consumption. I?ve built it into a two-week cycle. Repeat this cycle for as long as your off-season lasts, and you may find that you?ll achieve your best-ever off-season gains ? without getting fat.

Days 1-5
Start with the 2:1 rule
For the first five days of your cycle, you should eat a base of two grams (g) of carbs and 1 g of protein for every pound of bodyweight. For a 200-pound bodybuilder, that?s 400 g of carbohydrates daily with 200 g of protein. With regard to dietary fat, you don?t really need to count it. You?ll get what you need from your protein foods. Beef, chicken, whole eggs and low-fat dairy products will give you plenty, along with added calories to help you grow. Eat these core foods prepared simply, and you?ll be providing your body with all the basic nutrients it needs to grow as much as it can without the concern of adding large quantities of bodyfat. Do this for five days as you prepare to take your calories up even more.
* Hardgainers can go directly to a 3:1 ratio, and eat that for days 1-10. If that?s too much of a calorie shift, though, hardgainers can eat 2:1 on their first two-week cycle, then go to 3:1 for days 1-10 of their second cycle after the body has accommodated the increased calorie intake.

Days 6-10
Shift up to 3:1
Next, bump up your calories by taking in 3 g of carbohydrates per pound of bodyweight. The same 200-pound bodybuilder will now consume 600 g of carbs (that?s 2,400 calories just from carbs). Continue to take in 1 g of protein per pound of bodyweight. This high level of calories from carbs will help you keep your muscles saturated with glycogen. Glycogen ? carbohydrates stored in the muscles ? is an indicator of growth, so the more the better. Glycogen helps fuel your training, so saturated glycogen stores are important for maximal energy output at the gym. Follow this plan for five days.
Bodybuilders who don?t pay much attention to off-season nutrient shifting often miss the boat here.

Days 11-12
Drop to 1:2
After you have loaded up your glycogen stores, you can continue to make great off-season gains by dropping your carbohydrate intake. Your glycogen stores will fall. At first, this may seem detrimental, but it ultimately has the opposite effect.
Take your protein consumption up to 2 g per pound of bodyweight (400 g daily for a 200-pound bodybuilder), and drop your carbohydrate consumption down to 1 g per pound of bodyweight. This will provide you with enough total calories that you won?t drop weight. At the same time, you?ll be providing your body with all the aminos it needs to prevent muscle catabolism (breakdown). A high-protein lower-carbohydrate intake improves insulin sensitivity in muscle tissue, priming muscles to uptake not only a greater amount of carbohydrates but also amino acids on days 13-14.
The final dietary manipulation here is to switch your protein intake to include fattier sources. That doesn?t mean grease and oil. It does mean eating more beef ? cuts with moderate amounts of fat, such as T-bone steak and minced beef. Include more whole eggs, regular cheese and yogurt to make up, calorifically, for the drop in carbohydrates.
This dietary adjustment will help improve your muscle-building hormone levels. Hardcore off-season training can cause an increase in cortisol, and elevated cortisol can crush testosterone levels. A temporary increase in dietary fat can help keep testosterone levels in athletes (not in sedentary people) from falling. Also, when carbohydrates go down, an increase in dietary fat positively affects insulin sensitivity, further priming muscles for a greater anabolic response. At the same time, your glycogen stores will drop. Keep reading to find out why this is important.

Days 13-14
Eat up
Here comes the fun part. When you overeat, you generally get fat. However, when you overeat coming out of a dietary approach as outlined for days 11 and 12, your body?s response is super-compensation and a burst in anabolic hormones. Now, you?ve set up your body to store more carbohydrates than ever before. Temporarily overeating also causes thyroid, growth hormone and insulin-like growth factor levels to rise. All are important anabolic hormones, messengers that stimulate growth. Calories are certainly vital for growth, but hormones play a huge role. This approach harnesses both.
Take your carbs back up on these days. Eat as much as 4 g of carbs per pound of bodyweight, and fix your protein consumption at around 1.5 g per pound. A 200-pound bodybuilder will take in 600-800 g of carbs and 300 g of protein. In terms of dietary fats, go with lean sources of protein, as you?re getting plenty of total calories on these days. Emphasise a mix of one or two whole eggs with egg whites, protein powders, chicken and turkey breast and lean cuts of red meat.
This phase will fully saturate your glycogen stores and encourage them to fill up even more than they have before. When you drop your carbohydrate intake, your glycogen stores diminish, but the pathways responsible for retaining and storing carbohydrates as muscle glycogen over react. You can take advantage of this over reaction to fill up your muscles and keep growing.
Follow this cycle as long as you want to keep adding quality mass. At the end of a two-week phase, start over. You?re eating enough every day to keep growing, but the variations in calories and macro-nutrients will encourage the addition of muscle mass rather than bodyfat. FLEX

To order Chris Aceto?s training and nutrition books, including Championship Bodybuilding and Everything You Need to Know about Fat Loss, visit www.nutramedia.com.*

APPETITE FOR CONSTRUCTION
BY CHRIS ACETO
Eight tried-and-true methods for increasing appetite to build more muscle

Mike Matarazzo and Jay Cutler are not hardgainers. Besides having both grown up in the Boston area, the two mass monsters have something else in common ? they know how to eat! Matarazzo was one of the first monster eaters of modern bodybuilding, consuming 6,000 calories a day in the offseason; his contemporaries thought 4,000 was a lot. Cutler has never been shy about eating, either. He frequently takes in 10 small meals a day, enabling him to flood his body with nutrition every two hours around the clock ? during the offseason and while dieting for a competition.
Those who can eat a lot have a natural advantage over those with smaller appetites ? it?s easier to grow when you naturally overfeed your body. That isn?t the case for many bodybuilders. Hardgainers are bodybuilders who tend to have a tough time eating more calories than they need for maintenance. That?s what we address here: eight ways to trick and coax your body into consuming more calories. Once you can increase your appetite and take in more calories, it?s much easier to add quality mass.
1. Dump fibre Fibre, the indigestible substance found in beans, veggies, fruits, whole grains, nuts, seeds and other foods, is beneficial for health. Fibre provides a ?full? feeling. That?s fine for dieters, but it can get in the way when you?re trying to add muscle mass. Fibrous foods not only tend to be harder to chew and swallow, but they may be eaten in place of more calorifically dense foods, such as starchy carbs. Fibrous foods also stay with you longer, slowing down digestion, so that your body doesn?t cue you to eat your next meal as soon. All in all, taking in fibre is excellent as a weight-loss strategy, but not as a mass-gaining tactic. Nutritionists recommend eating 25 grams (g) of fibre a day, but when growth is your goal, avoid foods that are high in fibre.
2. Eat starchy carbs One of the best strategies for building mass is to take in plenty of starchy carbs: white rice, pasta, potatoes, bread, bagels, and cold cereal. These foods help you put on size. First, it?s easy to eat a lot of calories from starchy carbs, helping you to increase your daily calorific intake. Second, carbs are stored as glycogen in your muscles. They help drive water and other nutrients into your muscle cells, encouraging muscle growth. For most bodybuilders, a diet of 50-60% calories from carbs is ideal for a growth phase. A ratio of at least 2:1 carbs to protein is also associated with higher testosterone levels. Just be careful to watch your waistline. Starchy carbs encourage bodyfat storage; it?s all about finding the balance of calories and carbs that?s right for you.
3. Drink fruit juice Fruit juice provides concentrated calories and simple carbs; drinking it is an easy way to quickly take in a large number of extra calories. Drinking a cup of juice 30 minutes before a large meal causes a quick rise in blood sugar followed by a rapid decline. This in turn triggers appetite. So, having a glass of apple or grape juice before a large meal could help you finish that meal. You?ll have the wherewithal to eat it all.
Fruit juice can also be a part of your preworkout and postworkout nutrition. Combine 60-80 g of simple carbs from fruit juice with 30-40 g of whey protein for an excellent energy booster and muscle builder.
4. Overeat at night If you overeat once a week or even once every five days or so, you may be surprised by how your body responds. Often, when you eat a huge meal right before bedtime, you will wake up starving in the morning. This is due to several factors. The meal dramatically increases the release of insulin, the appetite-stimulating hormone, and stretches your stomach. This in turn expands the gut. Meanwhile, elevated insulin levels not only drive most of the food into muscle stores (of course, some is stored as bodyfat, too), but they will also increase your metabolic rate. Occasionally spiking insulin, especially at night via a large whole-food meal that includes carbs, will help spike metabolism. You fall asleep with an expanded stomach and elevated metabolism, which will leave you surprisingly hungry the next day.
5. Add artificial sweeteners Most people think of no-calorie sweeteners such as Sucralose, aspartame and saccharin as diet aids to sweeten foods and control calories. However, studies indicate that such sweeteners might fall into the opposite category ? as tools for adding size. How? Researchers have speculated that these sweeteners spike insulin levels, one of the most potent influences on appetite. Just as you might salivate and ?lick your chops? at the idea of a steak dinner, the body may automatically increase its insulin output when you use sugar replacements. In other words, although the sweeteners provide few calories, the perception that they are sweet causes your body to release insulin.
A recent study at Purdue University, Indiana, USA, showed that rats fed artificial sweeteners
ate three times more calories than rats given sugar. The bottom line is that you should add a mix of both calorie-providing simple sugars, such as honey or jam, to your hot cereal, along with a couple of teaspoons of artificial sweetener.
6. Try glucose-clearing supplements Over the years, chromium, vanadyl sulfate, alpha-lipoic acid and fish oil have all been reported to help clear glucose from blood to increase the formation of glycogen. The elimination of glucose helps to boost appetite because the resulting decline in blood sugar typically triggers the appetite centre in the brain, increasing the desire and ability to eat more. To see if this works for you, take 200 micrograms of chromium, 10 milligrams of vanadyl, 200 milligrams of alpha-lipoic acid and 3-6 g of fish oil each morning with your breakfast.
7. Support appetite with probiotics Think of probiotics as a cousin to fibre. They contain indigestible ingredients that help digestion; they fight increases in ?bad? bacteria that may interfere with digestion and immunity; and they aid nutrient absorption. Found in artichokes, onions, chicory, garlic and some mushrooms, probiotics can be used in supplemental form and are part of an overall strategy to increase appetite and absorb and utilise food. Follow label directions when using supplemental probiotics.
8. Spice up your appetite Some herbs and spices, particularly bitter ones, can increase appetite. Bitter flavours cause the release of saliva and other digestive juices, which can speed digestion, triggering hunger. The herb gentian is thought to be particularly effective at stimulating appetite. It can be taken as a tincture (1-3 g per day), as fluid- extract (2-4 g per day) or as a whole root (2-4 g per day). Other herbal remedies that may increase appetite include bitter orange, cinnamon, coriander, dandelion, hops, horehound, rosemary,
wormwood and yarrow.
If you want to pack on muscle mass, then you have to teach your body to eat enough to grow. Use these eight techniques, and you?ll have the appetite for growth. FLEX

Cortisol CONTROL
BY CHRIS ACETO

Learning to control this muscle-eroding hormone will increase your muscle mass

Do you feel sore, tired, irritable or weak? Have you noticed that your gains have plateaued? These could be signs that your cortisol levels are out of whack.
Cortisol is a stress hormone that?s truly the antithesis of testosterone: whereas testosterone supports muscle building, excess cortisol kills it. Besides tearing down muscle tissue and preventing the body from storing carbs as muscle glycogen, cortisol actually lowers testosterone. It also interferes with testosterone?s ability to bind to its receptors within muscle cells and induce an anabolic effect. When testosterone levels drop, not only does it become harder to build muscle and recover, but oestrogen tends to have a stronger effect in the body. Oestrogen is correlated with water retention, and it also makes shedding bodyfat a lot more difficult.

Cortisol levels can be elevated for a variety of reasons ? hardcore training itself can induce this rise. It?s important that bodybuilders learn how to control their cortisol levels to keep making the best gains. If you suffer from the symptoms mentioned earlier, institute the following suggestions to help get your cortisol levels under control.
1. Stay on top of your workout nutrition As mentioned, cortisol rises when you train ? it?s a natural reaction. One of the best ways to avoid excessively elevated cortisol levels is to be disciplined with your postworkout nutrition. By supplying your body with exactly what it needs as soon as the work-out is done, you?ll jump-start your recovery and help blunt cortisol spikes.
After your workout, take in 30-50 grams (g) of whey protein with 60 to 100 g of carbs. Maltodextrin is easy, but you can take in other fast-digesting carbs such as rice cakes, white bread or cold cereal. You can also add 5 g of branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) to the mix, or take them before you work out ? BCAAs before exercise help maintain testosterone levels and can be used to fuel muscles. Leucine, one of the BCAAs, also spikes insulin levels through a different mechanism than carbs, and insulin helps in the suppression of cortisol. Whey provides building blocks that help prevent catabolism ? muscle breakdown ? and preventing catabolism is directly related to lower cortisol levels. Finally, the carbs in this combo spike insulin to further offset protein breakdown.
2. Control your workouts Training volume can have a direct impact on cortisol levels. If you?re overtraining, you?re taking your body past the point where you can make the best gains. Follow these rules to make the most of your muscle-building regime.
? Limit weight training to four sessions per week. Training more frequently prevents the body from attaining a full recovery.
? Keep sessions to about an hour. When you perform too many sets and exercises in a given session, you can break down your muscle tissue too much. Limiting the length of your training sessions helps avoid this.
? Emphasise multijoint movements. Exercises such as squats, deadlifts and bench presses are the most effective at stimulating muscle growth while helping to limit total training volume. They also best stimulate growth hormone (GH) and testosterone, which can help blunt cortisol.
? Avoid excessive pumping and finishing movements. When you perform numerous sets and reps of these types of exercises, you can raise your cortisol levels too high without stimulating as much muscle growth. Try to keep pumping and finishing movements to no more than three sets per bodypart at the end of the workout.
3. Be careful with your cardio If cardio exercise burned only bodyfat, then you could hop on a bike and cycle your way into the record books as the most ripped human ever. The problem is, though, that prolonged and excessive cardio causes an increase in cortisol, and this situation can begin to prioritise muscle tissue as an energy source, tearing it down instead of helping to build it.
How much is too much cardio? I?d say anything more than five sessions a week ? and try to keep it to no more than four times per week when you?re not being strict with your diet. Thirty minutes per session is also enough, except when you?re trying to get really ripped.
4. Eat six meals a day The benefits of eating multiple meals per day are numerous. Besides allowing you to stay lean, a diet strategy of smaller and more frequent meals has been shown to keep cortisol levels lower than less-frequent feedings. Multiple meals ? at any calorie level ? will result in greater cortisol control than less-frequent meals, and we know keeping cortisol in check yields less fat, more muscle, better recovery and more energy. Strive to take in six meals per day throughout all phases of your training programme.
5. Take vitamin C This water-soluble vitamin cushions the negative effects of free radicals, compounds that are released with hardcore training. Free radicals target tissues such as muscles, weakening them and increasing inflammation and breakdown. When this happens, cortisol levels spike. By providing your body with antioxidants, such as vitamin C, you can help control cortisol. One study showed that a daily dose of 1,000 milligrams (mg) helped weightlifters keep cortisol under control. A good bet is to take 1,000 mg with your post-training meal, when free radicals are most likely to be present. Don?t go to the extreme and take a megadose, though, because new research shows that excessive vitamin C could actually be detrimental.
6. Supplement with vitamin E This fat-soluble vitamin offers many versatile benefits. Primarily, vitamin E helps combat the oxi-dative stress of training and dieting. Like vitamin C, vitamin E is also helpful at combating free radicals. Large amounts of vitamin E have been shown to decrease creatine kinase activity, a marker for muscle-fibre injury. That?s what happens when you train. It?s the irony of trying to get big: you tear down your muscles to rebuild them and make them grow bigger. Taking 800 international units of vitamin E daily may help to prevent severe breakdown, which, in theory, should allow you to recover more quickly from your training.
7. Try phosphatidylserine Phosphatidylserine (PS) is a phospholipid, a quasi fat that is derived from soya beans. PS has been shown to help control cortisol levels. When you take 800 mg immediately after training, it saves muscles by blunting the total amount of cortisol released by your body. In theory, you can train like a madman and rapidly recover if you follow up the hard training with this anticortisol supplement. Another benefit is that when you keep cortisol levels under control, it?s easier for your muscles to ?carb up?. With escalating cortisol levels, muscles experience a downgrade in their ability to take up carbs and deposit them as stored muscle glycogen.
8. Eat (or supplement with) garlic This bulbous flavourful herb common to Asian, Mediterranean and Middle Eastern cooking has a long-deserved reputation as a health food. Recent research has shown that garlic along with a high-casein diet altered the body?s hormonal status, yielding lower levels of stress hormones such as cortisol. Other studies have shown that garlic may help increase testosterone levels. In general, the higher your testosterone levels, the lower your cortisol levels. So supplement with garlic powder ? 450 mg twice daily with meals ? or with a garlic supplement that provides about 4 mg of allicin with casein protein shakes. This may help keep cortisol to a minimum.
9. Get your glutamine You knew it had to show up here, right? Recent studies have pooh-poohed glutamine?s beneficial effects on cortisol levels, but I disagree. There are many other studies that take a pro-glutamine view in muscle building. Glutamine works to spare BCAAs, and keeping BCAAs high helps keep cortisol levels from rising. In addition, glutamine pushes water into muscles, and hydrated muscles remain anabolic. Several studies show that supplemental glutamine can help keep cortisol levels in check.
Glutamine can help suppress the amount of cortisol circulating in blood. Glutamine also increases GH levels, combating cortisol?s catabolic effects. For a beneficial effect on cortisol levels, athletes may need a lot more glutamine than amounts that are often suggested. I recommend taking 5 to 10 g before and another 5 to 10 g after training to help reduce cortisol levels.
10. Add arginine to your supplement regime Arginine is now touted as a nitric oxide inducer; yet, it remains an effective GH releaser. Arginine may also have effects on cortisol levels. When GH levels rise, which naturally occurs with sleep, cortisol levels fall. As you get older, the sleep-induced GH boost just isn?t what it used to be, which allows cortisol levels to rise. Rising cortisol makes it harder for your body to grow, to hold mass and to get lean. Take 9 to 12 g of arginine before bed without carbs to increase GH levels and to blunt cortisol. FLEX

KICK-START MASS
BY CHRIS ACETO

Whether you?re a beginner or more experienced, these are the seven nutrition fundamentals for growth

Although this article is a blueprint for beginners, more experienced bodybuilders should read it as a refresher. Beginners may not know all these basic rules of bodybuilding nutrition; more advanced bodybuilders often forget their roots and the standard nutritional elements that really work. When advanced bodybuilders substitute ?high tech? techniques for basics, they commonly plateau, unable to push their physiques any further. Keep following these basic rules ? no matter how far you?ve progressed ? and you will keep progressing. It?s as basic as that.
RULE 1. Eat seven meals a day. Eat every two or three hours during the day and you?ll keep growing, even if some of the foods you?re eating are less than ideal. Frequent meals keep the body flooded with nutrients and calories, preventing muscles from falling into a catabolic state. This eating strategy also helps control cortisol levels ? cortisol being the hormone responsible for accelerating a catabolic state, or protein breakdown. When you avoid catabolism, then anabolism ? or growth ? is the only alternative. Keep eating and keep growing.
RULE 2. Stress carbs throughout the day for growth. If I hear the adage ?there is no such thing as an essential carb? once more, I?m gonna throw up. Let?s get this clear, carbs are essential for growth, full stop. They support a hormonal environment for massive gains ? greater insulin drive for repair, greater insulinlike growth factor (IGF) levels for building muscle and improved testosterone uptake by muscle tissue. Every meal in a mass-building phase ought to include carbs. Carbs also make it much easier to take in sufficient total calories for growth. If you?re a young hardgainer on a low-carb diet wondering why you can?t put on size, the answer is clear. You need more calories from carbs to grow.
RULE 3. Eat the right amount of protein. You need a certain amount of protein for growth. You may have the mistaken idea that the more protein you eat, the more your muscles will grow. That?s false. Once you?ve eaten one to 1.5 grams (g) of protein per pound of bodyweight each day, the rest of your protein consumption is going to waste. If you eat more than that, you?ll be trading off by consuming too few carbs. Protein and carbs go hand in hand. When you eat too few carbs, you waste protein. On the other hand, when carbs are eaten at every meal ? and in larger quantities ? the body will rarely burn its protein for energy. Depending on your bodyweight, aim for 25-40 g of protein at each of your seven daily meals and I guarantee you?ll have enough to grow.
RULE 4. Skip the low-fat diet. Don?t splurge on butter and fried food; those things are out. Do include red meat on a daily basis, and stick with whole eggs (forget about just eating egg whites). Why? Red meat has a greater concentration of growth-supporting nutrients ? B vitamins, creatine, iron and zinc ? than any other protein food. You need some fat to grow (both the healthy and saturated versions). Fats spare glycogen stores (essentially, carbs stored for energy in your muscles) and help maintain a positive nitrogen balance ? the benchmark measurement for growth. A reasonable amount of saturated fat (like that found in beef) helps boost testosterone levels, fostering a better hormonal environment for muscle growth. Set aside the low-fat fare for dieting and getting cut. Eat fats on a daily basis.
RULE 5. Stress dairy for calories and growth. Check out Arnold Schwarzenegger?s diets from the olden days. Red meat and cheese made up a substantial part of his regime. Dairy foods ? low-fat cheese, semi-skimmed milk, reduced-fat cottage cheese and yogurt ? are exceptional sources of protein. Besides containing class-A amino acids, they yield special fats called short-chain fatty acids that support growth. These foods are also dense in calcium, which exerts an effect where calories are more likely to be burned or deposited as muscle mass rather than stored as bodyfat.
RULE 6. Go easy on the vegetables. This one might get me in trouble with the nutrition police because everybody knows how important and healthy a variety of veggies can be. In the real world of getting big, though, you shouldn?t go too heavy on them because they?re very filling, yet low in calories. It?s often hard for a hardgainer or beginner to consume all the food needed for serious gains. Two servings of vegetables a day will do. Of course, if your stomach has room for more veggies, eat them.
Rule 7. Make your preworkout meal massive. We hear a lot about the postworkout meal ? what to eat after training ? but the pretraining meal sets the stage for growth. A very large portion of easy-to-absorb carbs, such as ground rice mixed with sugar or honey or a couple of low-fat blueberry muffins combined with 30 g of whey protein, eaten 30 minutes or so before training virtually ensures that you won?t slip into a muscle-wasting state around your training time. The preworkout meal triggers growth by increasing hormones that drive nutrients into muscles while shutting off enzymes and hormones that might cause a loss of muscle during hard training sessions. Eat up before you train. Afterwards, take in approximately 40 g of whey protein with 80-100 g of simple carbs (sugar).
WRAP UP
These are the nutritional basics. They?re simple, but they?re also easy to overlook. Everyone is searching for a magic pill, but, unfortunately, the only magic out there in terms of nutrition comes in the form of discipline and consistency. Often, beginners don?t fully grasp that and more advanced bodybuilders forget it. Keep up your nutritional discipline and consistency, and you will continue to make progress, no matter what your level. FLEX

Use this 12-step carb-loading programme to add the appearance of 15 pounds of muscle in just one week

When I lived in California and trained at Gold?s Gym in Venice, I often saw top competitors who appeared to be in sub-par condition a week before a major show. Then, a week later, the same bodybuilders would often show up onstage in sensational condition. Flex Wheeler was known for achieving drastic changes in his physique in less then 10 days. One reason for this was the implementation of successful carbohydrate depleting and loading. The system, which requires large but temporary changes in carbohydrate, sodium and water consumption, can lead to near-miracle changes in the appearance of muscle conditioning.

The process creates a temporary illusion. It?s a ?quick fix? that allows a bodybuilder to appear a lot harder by virtue of fuller-looking muscles combined with less water retention.
Whether you?re a bodybuilder who wants a quick fix to sharpen your physique for a contest or just for a trip to the beach, these are the steps to deplete and then supercharge your body with carb loading. You may be shocked by how much better ? and bigger ? you?ll look in just one week.

Step No. 1
Pre-programme: increase sodium intake
In the week prior to starting your carb-cutting programme, boost your intake of sodium ? plain table salt. The simplest way to do this is to sprinkle salt on all of your meals. Elevating sodium increases water retention in the body and decreases the water-retention hormone aldosterone. Remain with a higher-than-usual sodium intake until one day before carbing up during the programme (in step 7). When you suddenly reduce your sodium intake at that time, and while aldosterone levels readjust, your body will excrete even more water ? most of it coming directly from beneath the skin. This will lead to greater definition.

Step No. 2
Pre-programme: increase water intake
When you increase sodium, it?s important to take in roughly 50% more water than usual. That is, every time you would normally have a glass of water, make it a glass and a half, so that by the end of the day, you?ve boosted your fluid intake by 50%. Greater water intake sets up the body for greater definition at the end of the process. Maintain this intake until you reach step 10.

Step No. 3
Days 1-2: drop carbs 50%
Here?s when the carb-cutting programme really begins. Drop your carb consumption by 50%. This first drop will help prevent the shock of taking your carb count too low too quickly. If you were previously eating approximately 1,500 calories from carbs per day (about normal for a 200-pound bodybuilder who consumes 3,000 calories a day for bodyweight maintenance), then cut your total carb intake to 200 grams (g) per day, focusing mostly on complex carbs, early in the day. Still, for these two days, maintain your pre- and post-workout nutrition simple carbs at approximately 50 g, divided between those two meals.

Step No. 4
Days 1-5: mildly increase protein
Some people go wrong at this step. When carbs drop, you must increase protein consumption to prevent muscle breakdown. However, if you increase your protein intake too much, a lot of that extra protein is burned as fuel, sparing the body from emptying its glycogen stores. Therefore, to experience the muscle-saving effect of extra protein without inhibiting the depletion of glycogen stores, elevate your protein intake only by about 50 g daily on each lower-carb day. A 200-pound bodybuilder who normally eats a gram of protein per pound of bodyweight each day should consume about 250 g of protein during this phase.

Step No. 5
Days 1-5: train with high reps
When depleting carbs for five days, you should train with higher reps ? 12-18 per set ? and perform 50% more sets than normal. For example, if you normally perform 10 sets for biceps, go to 15 total sets (50% more volume work) and aim for 12-18 reps per set. Of course, you?ll have to decrease the weight in order to hit that volume. However, the goal here is to lower carb reserves, and volume work is tremendously effective in doing so. It all goes back to super-compensation. The more carbs you can deplete, the greater amount you can store during the carb-up process, leading to bigger- and tighter-looking muscles.

Step No. 6
Days 3-5: further deplete carbs
On these days, drop your carbohydrate intake to 100-150 g per day, emphasising complex- carbohydrate sources, such as yams, oatmeal and brown rice. Take these in early in the day and target about .7 g of carbs per pound of bodyweight (a 200-pound bodybuilder should take in about 140 g of carbs daily).
When carbohydrates drop, reserves of glycogen stored in muscles begin to decline. As glycogen levels decrease, the body begins to pump up its production of glycogen-storing enzymes. When you later pack in greater quantities of carbs, those carb-storing enzymes will help pack away these additional carbs as new glycogen, yielding fuller-looking muscles.

Step No. 7
Days 5-7: reduce sodium
The day before adding carbs back, drop the additional salt you?ve been putting on your food. When sodium levels decline, you?ll experience changes in aldosterone that favour water excretion and a tighter look. You needn?t zero out your sodium intake. Cutting all the extra sodium should be enough of a drop.

Step No. 8
Days 6-7: carb up
Now the fun begins. After five days of depleting carbs, along with performing volume work, your muscles will be tremendously low in fuel, screaming to be replenished. When you switch to a high-carb intake, much of what you consume will be directly stored in your muscles. I suggest eating 3 g of carbs per pound of bodyweight daily, minimum, and up to 5 g per pound for those with a faster metabolism or those who weigh more than 220 pounds. Avoid using fruit and sucrose (table sugar) or high-fructose corn syrup. Starchy complex-carb sources are ideal, and good choices include potatoes, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, pasta, white rice and brown rice.

Step No. 9
Days 6-7: reduce protein consumption
When you?re carbing up, you can drop the added protein of step 4. This follows the simple edict that carbs and protein work like a seesaw. When carbs drop, you have to eat more protein; when carbs dramatically increase, you don?t need the added protein. Take in just a gram of protein per pound of bodyweight on each of these days.

Step No. 10
Days 6-7: reduce water intake
In step 2, you increased water intake. Now, reduce it to 50% of what you would normally have on any given day prior to step 2. If, for example, you would usually drink 4 litres of water, reduce that to 2 litres. Since carbohydrates require water to make new muscle glycogen, many people assume that they have to drink like a thirsty camel to make glycogen. Not so, because in the face of restricted water and increased carbs, muscles make up for the water shortfall by dragging some from under the skin into the muscles. The result is less subcutaneous water retention and a harder-looking physique.

Step No. 11
Days 6-7: take it easy and don?t train
As a rule of thumb, when carbing up, it?s best not to train, as that siphons off some of the incoming carbohydrates, preventing an optimal carb-up and fuller muscles. This might be why many bodybuilders appear fuller a few days after a competition. The days off allow for optimal compensation of carbohydrates. In fact, avoid energy expenditure as much as possible to allow your muscles to fill up.

Step No. 12
Day 7: pump up and take pictures
Pump up your muscles a bit right before you step onstage, do a photo shoot or strip off your shirt to impress people. Use light weights (or isometric movements) and go through a full range of motion, feeling the stretch, contraction and pump. Keep reps low ? you don?t want to burn up carbs.
On this day, you may be in the best condition of your life. Have someone take pictures of you to capture the moment and to use as a record of comparison for the next time you carb deplete and carb load. Photographically documenting your condition and muscle mass is a great way to determine that you are continuing to progress as a bodybuilder. FLEX

BEST FOODS
BY CHRIS ACETO

These are the best of the best in their category ? for offseason and contest prep

I?m sure you?ve heard this cliché of nutritional wisdom: ?Eat a wide variety of foods to get the best array of vitamins, minerals and nutrients.? That?s great advice because there is no such thing as a single perfect food. In the realm of bodybuilding nutrition, you need a mix of proteins for growth and different complex carbohydrates for energy. You should also include plenty of vegetables and fruits to obtain phytochemicals, which are small nutritional compounds that provide antioxidant properties, support immunity, fight muscle inflammation and supply numerous other health benefits.
That said, I?m often asked which are the ?best foods? for bodybuilders. The answer depends on what you are trying to accomplish and what you are looking for. Check out my list of the best bodybuilding foods. I?ve given you my choice for the best food in each category for getting cut and for adding quality mass. Of course, you should include other foods in each of these categories, too, but relying on these ?best foods? as the cornerstone of your nutrition programme will take you a long way toward your bodybuilding goals.
BEST MEAT
For Getting Cut | Turkey Breast
Drastically lower in fat than even the leanest cuts of red meat, turkey breast lets a bodybuilder pack in the protein with as few calories as possible. 225 grams provide roughly 45 grams (g) of protein and only 2 g of fat, while the same amount of lean beef would provide 15 g of fat, yielding at least another 117 calories.
For Adding Mass | Flank Steak
Muscle building requires two major components ? calories and protein ? and you?ll find both in flank steak. Although low-fat sources of protein are best for dropping fat, there?s room for dietary fat in mass-gaining plans. Moderate amounts of dietary fat can be beneficial. Fat helps spare glycogen stores, exerting an anticatabolic effect, and it can upgrade the ability of the body to manufacture additional muscle glycogen. The saturated fat in red meat is also important for testosterone production. Red meat is dense in creatine, iron and vitamin B12 ? important muscle-building nutrients.
BEST FISH
For Getting Cut | Pollack
Fat-free or near fat-free precontest diets are extremely effective in removing bodyfat, because dietary fat, more so than carbs, is extremely efficient at making its way to bodyfat stores. Pollack, like turkey breast, is very low in fat and high in protein, plus it?s low in calories, making it ideal for getting cut.
For Adding Mass | Salmon
Many bodybuilders think of salmon as a contest fish because it contains omega-3 fatty acids. Reports indicate that omega-3s can support fat burning, and they can. These fatty acids are primarily effective, however, when a bodybuilder has significantly leaned down already, meaning salmon is best consumed when a bodybuilder is near the end of a diet. For mass building, you can?t beat salmon. Omega-3 fatty acids fight muscle inflammation, help spare the loss of glutamine and increase the storage of glycogen ? all of which indirectly support protein synthesis, the fancy name for muscle growth. These fats also protect against muscle breakdown, which can have a significant impact on growth.
BEST VEGETABLES
For Getting Cut | Broccoli and Cauliflower
These low-calorie veggies provide compounds called indoles, which can lower oestrogen levels in the body.Oestrogen helps facilitate the storage of bodyfat. Honourable mention for best vegetable goes to asparagus, which exerts a diuretic effect to temporarily enhance muscle definition.
For Adding Mass | Peas and Corn
OK, peas and corn technically fall into the complex-carb category more than the ?vegetable? category. They share many of the attributes of veggies, such as fibre and phytonutrients, but they yield many more calories than other veggies, so they are a natural for mass gainers. Still, keep in mind that mass-seeking bodybuilders often neglect vegetables, believing themto be ?diet food?. Actually, the body needs vegetables to enhance digestion and as a source of fibre, vitamins and minerals to keep the immune system healthy and to help the body properly use the amino acids and complex carbs it is getting. With the advent of shakes and the desire for more protein, a complete lack of vegetables may be one of the biggest shortfalls of many would-be mass-gaining diet plans.
BEST FRUIT
For Getting Cut | Strawberries
Yielding only 50 calories per 150 grams, strawberries head the list. Their fibre content will help you feel full, allowing you to eat less and keep calories under control. Strawberries are also high in vitamin C and other nutrients. Cantaloupe comes in a close second. An entire small-size melon yields approximately 150 calories ? about as many found in four rice cakes.
For Adding Mass | Raisins and Figs
I?ve yet to write up a hardgainer?s nutrition plan that didn?t include raisins ? usually in the first meal of the day, mixed into porridge. I include them for the carbs. 75 grams of raisins yields 60 g of carbohydrates, the top source of energy for muscles during training. Raisins are not only dense in carbs, they also don?t bloat the stomach. They are also rich in powerful antioxidants. Mixed with hot cereal, they make an ideal pre- or posttraining snack.
Figs are also concentrated in carbs and provide the body with benzaldehyde, a cancer-fighting compound, as well as ficin, a digestive enzyme that aids protein digestion. Frequently, cancer-fighting compounds are also anti-inflammatory in nature and support immunity, which assists in muscle recovery.
BEST GRAIN
For Getting Cut | Slow-Cooking Oats
250 grams (cooked) yields only 25 g of carbohydrates ? and, compared to 25 g of carbs from a fast-digesting source, oats are less likely to make you fat. Oatmeal is high in fibre, which slows down digestion. This helps you feel full, warding off hunger, and it also helps control hormones and enzymes, such as insulin and lipoprotein lipase, which might affect the storage of bodyfat.
For Adding Mass | Pasta
Hard-training bodybuilders will want to start with a daily carb intake of at least 2 g per pound of bodyweight and move up to 3 to 4 g. To get in all those carbs, you need to eat foods that are dense in carbs, and pasta fits that description. Even though many people think of pasta as a ?refined? carb composed of white flour, it?s not. Most pasta is made with semolina flour, which is better than white flour due to its mineral content and digestibility. Semolina breaks down slowly, providing steady fuel for better recovery. 140 grams of cooked spaghetti or macaroni provide 120 g of carbs.
BEST CHEAT FOODS
For Getting Cut | White Bread and Bagels (with Jam)
This category is tough, as the best answer may be any refined carbohydrate ? fat-free biscuits or fat-free cake. When you are trying to get ripped, cheating ? eating a high carbohydrate snack on occasion ? can trick the body into believing the diet is over, which helps give a kick to a slowing metabolism. The caveat: these cheat snacks are effective when the body has already dropped a serious amount of bodyfat. That?s the period when metabolism tends to slow. If you are cheating straight out of the gate ? the initial few weeks of a diet ? then you will only slow the fat-burning process.
For Adding Mass | Various
Keep it simple: there?s nothing wrong with a burger and chips every once in a while. There?s definitely no special cheat food for gaining mass. If you are a hardgainer, you can eat five clean meals a day and one meal that is much higher in fat. The daily net fat intake will remain fairly reasonable. On the other hand, if you struggle with bodyfat, I don?t recommend eating high-fat foods. Include them only on rare occasions.
There you have it: the best of the best. Base your bodybuilding diet on these foods and other quality bodybuilding foods, and you?ll make even better progress toward your goal, whether you?re trying to get cut or striving to gain muscle. FLEX

The REBOUND EFFECT
BY CHRIS ACETO
Gain up to 10 pounds in six weeks with this step-by-step approach to maximising muscle growth immediately after a diet
If you?ve ever dieted for a bodybuilding contest ? or for an extended period just to reduce bodyfat ? then you know what you want to do right after that: nothing but eat all the decadent foods that you?ve been avoiding for the past couple of months.
Sure, that?s one way to follow up a restricted diet, but it can turn into a disaster, resulting in startling bodyfat gains. A better strategy is to use this time to gain impressive heaps of muscle by taking advantage of the body?s rebound effect.
The best gains of an entire year often come in the first few weeks after a cutting phase, making that period of time ideal for growth. In fact, you can easily add five, six or even 10 pounds of real muscle mass in just six short weeks. Here are seven steps you can use to transition from a diet straight into six weeks of pure anabolism.
1 | Understand your body?s overcompensation mechanisms. The lucky bodybuilder has a fantastic metabolism that allows him to get ripped to the bone yet retain valuable muscle mass during a precontest diet. For many, getting ready for a contest is an exercise in modified starving. Some bodybuilders have to cut back on nearly everything ? fat, carbohydrates and total calories ? while pumping up the time spent on cardio to facilitate bodyfat burn. The truth is that the entire dieting process is hard on the body and often throws it into a chronic catabolic state where it loses some muscle or, at best, struggles to maintain muscle mass. The upside is that when the potentially catabolic process is alleviated, the body overcompensates, reverses gears and rebounds into a very strong anabolic state.
2 | Ramp up your intake of carbs and quality fats. When dieting, you are always restricting something. Consuming fewer carbs and less fat results in less energy. That can trigger muscle loss, but it also sets in motion anabolic signals that can prime the body for major growth when you end the diet ? as long as there are sufficient amounts of carbs and fats in your revamped nutrition programme. After dieting, the body can?t wait to get growing, as long as you reintroduce the right amounts of these nutrients.
In addition, hormones and enzymes help get the growth ball rolling. When you diet, testosterone levels can fall. When you start to eat again, they quickly bounce back. Rising testosterone levels, coupled with an increase in food intake, result in quick and substantial gains in muscle mass.
Furthermore, while muscle reserves of stored carbs (glycogen) decline during a dieting phase, glycogen-storing enzymes that potentially pack away a lot of carbs are working overtime. When you finish your diet and start to eat more quality foods, your body swells with massive glycogen stores, which directly affects growth.
3 | Follow the ?150 rule? of carbohydrate intake. No two bodybuilders have the same metabolism. That?s one reason competitors diet on different amounts of carbohydrates. Some eat a very low-carb diet to get cut up, while others eat a modified low-carb diet. Neither case warrants pounding down carbs after a competition and expecting to grow without getting fat. Be choosy and take a smart approach.
For the bodybuilders I work with, I have found that adding 150 grams (g) of carbs a day seems to work best. If you dieted on 170 g of carbs a day, you can expect to grow without gaining bodyfat by taking in a total of 320 g of carbs daily for the first three weeks after your diet phase. If you ate 300 g daily while dieting, go to 450 g a day.
The best sources are slow-burning carbs such as oatmeal, granary bread, brown rice and yams with meals, and simple carbs or sugars before and after your workouts.
4 | Adjust your carbs in the fourth week after a dieting phase. The body is an interesting machine. As you feed it after a dieting phase, your metabolism actually rises. As it does, you should continue to add more carbohydrates to compensate for the increase. If you do not add more carbs by the fourth week, your body may stall and fail to continue to achieve additional muscle gains due to a lack of energy coming in to support your rising metabolism. Therefore, from weeks four to six, add another 100-125 g of carbs a day to your diet.
If you were eating 320 g at the completion of the third week, you could go to 420-445 a day; if you were eating 450 g a day, go to 550-575.
5 | Don?t cut yourself short on fats. I?ll be the first to say that an extremely low-fat diet remains an excellent and proven way to rip up for competition or for the beach. Extreme low-fat dieting gets rid of the main macronutrient that is most likely to interfere with the shedding of bodyfat ? dietary fat ? and it allows you to keep your carbs somewhat higher during a cutting phase. The big downside of very low-fat diets is that they can also cause a drop in testosterone, growth hormone (GH) and insulinlike growth factor-I (IGF-I).
But, guess what? When you go back to eating the right kinds of fat in the first weeks after dieting, it helps support testosterone, GH and IGF-I levels, and, as mentioned in step 2, rising testosterone levels have a strong effect on adding quality mass. Increase your dietary fat in the first three weeks by 40-50 g a day, and add another 10-15 g daily in weeks four to six. Ideal sources of fat include a mix of the following: saturated fats, found in lean beef and full-fat dairy products; omega fats, from salmon and fish-oil supplements; and monounsaturated fats, found in avocados, olives, nuts and olive oil.
6 | Know your protein quotient. You have to pound protein to grow, right? That is not necessarily the case in the first few weeks after a diet. Getting your body to overcompensate and grow is really a matter of increasing energy. Do this by consuming more carbs and dietary fat, and, of course, by cutting out cardio during this period of time. That said, how much protein do you need?
In the first six weeks after a diet or contest, a gram of protein per pound of bodyweight each day is more than enough and a little less is fine. Why? Efficiency. When you increase calories by adding carbs and fat, you lessen the need for higher protein intake. The added fuel from carbs and fat makes the body extremely efficient at packing protein away in muscles. A higher carb and fat intake also lessens the need for the additional protein commonly consumed during a dieting phase. Rising testosterone and GH levels further support the body?s ability to take up and use protein without waste, another reason protein needs are not as great as many think during a postdiet period.
7 | Change your training. Of course, how you train can also affect growth. Generally, during a diet, in addition to performing cardio, bodybuilders tend to train with high volume and high intensity. When you come off your calorie restriction, you should also change your workouts. For best results, take a week or two off from working out to let your body recover. Then, get back into it with low reps and heavy weights. This will help you boost your gains in strength and muscle mass.
Bodybuilders often squander the period after a contest or diet in their eagerness to stop worrying about their food intake, instead taking the respite as a chance to binge on whatever they feel like eating. A far better strategy is to view these six weeks as an ideal time for growth: by increasing calories from quality carbs and fats, you can take advantage of this narrow but potent anabolic window of opportunity to make solid gains. FLEX

Great info cheers Venom!
Cycling of the macro's for carb loading and the rebound effect are very interesting.

He doesn't seem to be very pro- dietary fat especially for cutting. He sure knows his stuff anyway

He would want to being jay cutlers diet guru for the past 10 years

Thanks for that Venom. Theres a lot of good info there.

EATING FOR MASS
BY CHRIS ACETO
This two-week quality nutrition plan will build quality muscle

To pig out or not to pig out. Often, bodybuilders go from the most stringent diets to the least restrictive ones between the contest season and off-season. For bodybuilders who want to continue to grow and then get lean, this has long been considered the best way to keep growing. But you don?t have to blow up to 300 pounds of blubber if you want to increase your muscle mass. Bodybuilders who?ve built quality physiques understand that off-season mass building isn?t about gorging the body and getting enormous. Witness 220-pound Dexter Jackson, who never gets sloppy. Neither does Jay Cutler, nor others like Troy Alves and Darrem Charles, who always stay in good off-season shape. Eating for sloppy-free mass is more than eating a multitude of crappy calories. You have to pay attention to consuming good food all year long.
Other important aspects of off-season dieting are consistency and variation. Consistency means eating six times a day, every day. But one of the most essential elements is to vary the number of calories and macro-nutrients (protein, carbohydrates and healthy fats) that you take in daily. When you load up the body on one day with high calories, you drive your body into a temporarily heightened state of anabolism.
Here I explain how you can create such an anabolic state by rotating medium-, low- and high-carbohydrate intakes while varying protein and dietary fat consumption. I?ve built it into a two-week cycle. Repeat this cycle for as long as your off-season lasts, and you may find that you?ll achieve your best-ever off-season gains ? without getting fat.

Days 1-5
Start with the 2:1 rule
For the first five days of your cycle, you should eat a base of two grams (g) of carbs and 1 g of protein for every pound of bodyweight. For a 200-pound bodybuilder, that?s 400 g of carbohydrates daily with 200 g of protein. With regard to dietary fat, you don?t really need to count it. You?ll get what you need from your protein foods. Beef, chicken, whole eggs and low-fat dairy products will give you plenty, along with added calories to help you grow. Eat these core foods prepared simply, and you?ll be providing your body with all the basic nutrients it needs to grow as much as it can without the concern of adding large quantities of bodyfat. Do this for five days as you prepare to take your calories up even more.
* Hardgainers can go directly to a 3:1 ratio, and eat that for days 1-10. If that?s too much of a calorie shift, though, hardgainers can eat 2:1 on their first two-week cycle, then go to 3:1 for days 1-10 of their second cycle after the body has accommodated the increased calorie intake.

Days 6-10
Shift up to 3:1
Next, bump up your calories by taking in 3 g of carbohydrates per pound of bodyweight. The same 200-pound bodybuilder will now consume 600 g of carbs (that?s 2,400 calories just from carbs). Continue to take in 1 g of protein per pound of bodyweight. This high level of calories from carbs will help you keep your muscles saturated with glycogen. Glycogen ? carbohydrates stored in the muscles ? is an indicator of growth, so the more the better. Glycogen helps fuel your training, so saturated glycogen stores are important for maximal energy output at the gym. Follow this plan for five days.
Bodybuilders who don?t pay much attention to off-season nutrient shifting often miss the boat here.

Days 11-12
Drop to 1:2
After you have loaded up your glycogen stores, you can continue to make great off-season gains by dropping your carbohydrate intake. Your glycogen stores will fall. At first, this may seem detrimental, but it ultimately has the opposite effect.
Take your protein consumption up to 2 g per pound of bodyweight (400 g daily for a 200-pound bodybuilder), and drop your carbohydrate consumption down to 1 g per pound of bodyweight. This will provide you with enough total calories that you won?t drop weight. At the same time, you?ll be providing your body with all the aminos it needs to prevent muscle catabolism (breakdown). A high-protein lower-carbohydrate intake improves insulin sensitivity in muscle tissue, priming muscles to uptake not only a greater amount of carbohydrates but also amino acids on days 13-14.
The final dietary manipulation here is to switch your protein intake to include fattier sources. That doesn?t mean grease and oil. It does mean eating more beef ? cuts with moderate amounts of fat, such as T-bone steak and minced beef. Include more whole eggs, regular cheese and yogurt to make up, calorifically, for the drop in carbohydrates.
This dietary adjustment will help improve your muscle-building hormone levels. Hardcore off-season training can cause an increase in cortisol, and elevated cortisol can crush testosterone levels. A temporary increase in dietary fat can help keep testosterone levels in athletes (not in sedentary people) from falling. Also, when carbohydrates go down, an increase in dietary fat positively affects insulin sensitivity, further priming muscles for a greater anabolic response. At the same time, your glycogen stores will drop. Keep reading to find out why this is important.

Days 13-14
Eat up
Here comes the fun part. When you overeat, you generally get fat. However, when you overeat coming out of a dietary approach as outlined for days 11 and 12, your body?s response is super-compensation and a burst in anabolic hormones. Now, you?ve set up your body to store more carbohydrates than ever before. Temporarily overeating also causes thyroid, growth hormone and insulin-like growth factor levels to rise. All are important anabolic hormones, messengers that stimulate growth. Calories are certainly vital for growth, but hormones play a huge role. This approach harnesses both.
Take your carbs back up on these days. Eat as much as 4 g of carbs per pound of bodyweight, and fix your protein consumption at around 1.5 g per pound. A 200-pound bodybuilder will take in 600-800 g of carbs and 300 g of protein. In terms of dietary fats, go with lean sources of protein, as you?re getting plenty of total calories on these days. Emphasise a mix of one or two whole eggs with egg whites, protein powders, chicken and turkey breast and lean cuts of red meat.
This phase will fully saturate your glycogen stores and encourage them to fill up even more than they have before. When you drop your carbohydrate intake, your glycogen stores diminish, but the pathways responsible for retaining and storing carbohydrates as muscle glycogen over react. You can take advantage of this over reaction to fill up your muscles and keep growing.
Follow this cycle as long as you want to keep adding quality mass. At the end of a two-week phase, start over. You?re eating enough every day to keep growing, but the variations in calories and macro-nutrients will encourage the addition of muscle mass rather than bodyfat. FLEX

Is any one else considering giving this a go?

Im back to the bulking again after cutting for four weeks so I reckon now is the best time to give this a try with a bit of the "rebound" on my side.

I will start with what he recommends for hardgainers

hardgainers can eat 2:1 on their first two-week cycle, then go to 3:1 for days 1-10 of their second cycle after the body has accommodated the increased calorie intake.

I will need extra calories from fats on both 2:1 and 3:1 phases more so the 2:1.
I will keep my higher fat meals low carb and my low fat meals high carb to minimize fat gain.

will update my progress over the next few weeks.

looks very interesting, id of nearly given it a try my self, but ive gotten my new diet from razor, hey howard if you have any questions why not ask chris your self, he is answering questions on rx muscle.

Yeah was flicking through his thread the other day, very interesting info.
Any queries come to mind I'll be sure to ask him.