When it comes to achieving your fitness goals, it’s easy to focus solely on the physical aspects – hitting the gym regularly, trying out new workouts, and pushing yourself to reach new levels of strength and endurance. But just as crucial to your success is what you put into your body – and that’s where nutrition comes into play.
Proper nutrition is essential for providing your body with the fuel it needs to perform at its best. Eating the right mix of nutrients helps to support your muscles, ensure that you have enough energy to power through your workouts, and aid in muscle recovery after a tough session. In short, it’s crucial for supporting your overall health and fitness.
But how do you make sure you’re getting the right nutrients to support your fitness goals? Here are a few tips:
Pay attention to your macronutrient intake. Macronutrients, or macros, refer to the three main categories of nutrients that provide energy – carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. Each of these plays a different role in supporting your fitness goals, so it’s important to get the right balance. For example, carbohydrates are a key source of energy for your muscles, so if you’re doing a lot of high-intensity workouts, you’ll want to make sure you’re getting enough. On the other hand, protein is essential for building and repairing muscles, so if you’re looking to build strength or recover from a workout, make sure you’re getting enough of this macro as well.
Choose nutrient-dense foods. It’s not just about getting the right mix of macros – it’s also important to focus on getting the right nutrients from the foods you eat. So, instead of reaching for processed snacks, choose foods that are packed with vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients. Fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, and healthy fats are all great choices.
Don’t skimp on hydration. Water is essential for keeping your body hydrated and functioning properly, so make sure you’re drinking enough throughout the day. This is especially important if you’re working out, as sweat can dehydrate you quickly. Aim for at least 8-10 cups of water per day, and more if you’re exercising or it’s hot outside.
Don’t forget about micronutrients. While macros provide your body with energy, micronutrients are essential for supporting various bodily functions and keeping you healthy. These include vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients that are found in smaller amounts in your food. For example, vitamin C is essential for supporting your immune system, while calcium is crucial for maintaining strong bones. Make sure you’re getting a variety of micronutrients by eating a well-rounded diet that includes a variety of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and other nutrient-dense foods.
In conclusion, nutrition plays a crucial role in supporting your fitness goals. By paying attention to your macronutrient and micronutrient intake, choosing nutrient-dense foods, staying hydrated, and following a balanced diet, you can give your body the fuel it needs to perform at its best and achieve your fitness goals.
Eating optimally to lose weight can be a daunting task, especially for beginners. However, with the right approach, it can be a simple and effective way to shed those unwanted pounds. Here are some tips on how to eat optimally to lose weight:
Plan your meals: Before you even step into the kitchen, plan out your meals for the day. This will help you stay on track and avoid reaching for unhealthy snacks. Make sure to include a balanced mix of protein, healthy fats, and complex carbohydrates in each meal.
Choose healthy, whole foods: Processed and packaged foods are often loaded with added sugars and unhealthy fats, which can derail your weight loss efforts. Instead, opt for whole, unprocessed foods like fruits, vegetables, lean protein, and whole grains. These foods are packed with nutrients and will help keep you feeling fuller for longer.
Drink plenty of water: Water is essential for weight loss and overall health. It helps flush out toxins, keeps you hydrated, and can even help you feel fuller, which can prevent overeating. Aim to drink at least eight 8-ounce glasses of water per day.
Don’t skip meals: Skipping meals might seem like a quick way to cut calories, but it can actually have the opposite effect. When you skip meals, your body goes into starvation mode and starts to hold onto fat. This can slow down your metabolism and make it harder to lose weight. Instead, eat regular, balanced meals throughout the day.
Portion control: Portion sizes can make a big difference when it comes to weight loss. To avoid overeating, use smaller plates and bowls, and measure out your portions. This will help you avoid consuming more calories than you need.
Eating optimally to lose weight is all about making healthy, balanced choices. By planning your meals, choosing whole foods, staying hydrated, and controlling your portions, you can set yourself up for weight loss success.
As you prepare yourself a nice dinner, you may think to pair the meal with a nice wine. Or perhaps the weekend rolls around and you plan social outings with friends or relatives, in which you think to indulge in a few drinks.
However, if you’re in preparation for a fitness event or care a lot about your performance in the gym — can alcohol still be included in your diet?
Before we dive into how alcohol may affect your body, let’s first review some basic alcohol metabolism.
A Closer Look at Alcohol & Its Effects on Our Bodies
Alcohol contains 7 calories per 1 gram or 0.04 fl. oz. When we consume alcohol, it travels to our liver to be metabolized. Alcohol is quickly broken down into ethanol, which is an extremely toxic by-product. The body’s main priority after alcohol consumption is to metabolize the ethanol into other less harmful by-products which can potentially be used for energy. However, alcohol metabolism disrupts other metabolic pathways that are also responsible for energy production.
To digest and break down carbohydrates and fats for energy, certain molecules are required. Alcohol limits the body’s ability to burn carbohydrates and fatty acids because it hogs these molecules and decreases their availability to do other things! Remember, how we mentioned that the body registers methanol as extremely toxic? Therefore, it will prioritize the breakdown of the methanol before it tries to break down carbohydrates or fatty acids!
Okay, so alcohol interferes with our ability to digest carbs and fats… but does it affect muscle growth? Unfortunately, yes.
3 Ways Alcohol Affects Muscle Growth:
It disrupts protein synthesis
Alcohol inhibits signals to build proteins
Alcohol reduces insulin resistance – which is a stimulator of muscle growth
#1 Alcohol Disrupts Protein Synthesis
Muscle tissue is in a constant flux of building and breakdown. When we exercise, various signaling pathways are activated to release amino acids from our muscles to help build new ones. To BUILD muscle, we need to consume dietary protein. The process of building new muscle is called protein synthesis. When alcohol is ingested, it inhibits or disrupts certain signaling pathways that tell the body to build muscle.
#2 It Inhibits Signals for Building Proteins
Additionally, it is also speculated that because alcohol inhibits signals to build proteins — this allows for activation of molecules that are responsible for muscle wasting. While signaling pathways are disrupted, studies have shown that total amino acid content is not decreased.
#3 Alcohol induces insulin resistance
Furthermore, alcohol induces insulin resistance. Insulin is a potent stimulator of muscle growth and is responsible for the absorption of carbohydrates into muscles. With limited absorption ability, muscle growth and recovery are impaired.
However, it doesn’t end there… Alcohol affects men and women differently…
How Alcohol Affects men Versus Women
Fun fact ladies! Alcohol seems to have a more profound effect on muscle metabolism in men!
Alcohol seems to affect protein syntheis in males more than females.
A study showed that alcohol affected signalling pathways in men but not women.
In rat models, the effects of alcohol on protein synthesis were seen more commonly in male rats with little to no effect in females. In human studies, similar findings are still present.
In one study that looked at the effects of alcohol consumption in physically active males, there was a significant reduction in muscle protein synthesis (37%) when 1.5g/kg of alcohol was consumed after exercise. Even when 20-30g of protein was consumed in combination with alcohol, muscle protein synthesis was still reduced by 24%! For a man weighing 160 lb., that’s roughly 8 drinks.
Another study that compared the effects of alcohol on muscle protein synthesis following exercise in both men and women, found that alcohol only affected signaling pathways in men but not women. However, it should be noted that women are more sensitive to the long-term health effects of drinking. So, ladies, still not an excuse to try and out-drink your male counterparts.
Alcohol and Testosterone
As you can imagine by this point if alcohol interferes with carbohydrate, fat, and protein metabolism it most likely interferes with our hormones as well. And you’d guess correctly because it does! Let’s talk about our favorite hormone involved in muscle growth… Testosterone.
Both acute and chronic ingestion of alcohol lower testosterone. While the mechanisms aren’t fully understood yet, studies in male rats have shown that alcohol use largely affects the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal system, leading to lower levels of testosterone, decreased sperm production, and altered production of other reproductive hormones. The belief is that alcohol damages the cells that produce testosterone and causes inflammation in the body that suppresses testosterone production.
And as mentioned, alcohol affects many other hormones that are responsible for your performance in the gym as well!
Alcohol & Cortisol
Alcohol increases cortisol. If levels are elevated for long periods, this can lead to increased tissue breakdown. Alcohol decreases growth hormone which has negative effects on blood sugar maintenance and metabolism of muscles, bones, and the brain. Alcohol decreases luteinizing hormone, which in turn reduces testosterone production. Alcohol increases estrogen, which can have feminizing effects in males.
On top of the changes, alcohol induces on metabolism and hormones, it also creates damaging products in our body that damage cells. As mentioned previously, the body registers alcohol as very toxic. When alcohol is metabolized it creates reactive oxygen species, which are molecules that cause a lot of damage to other cells in the body.
So how much alcohol is too much? Where does the threshold exist before you start to do some serious damage to your fitness goals?
How Much Alcohol Is Too Much for Fitness?
While we all know “drinking in moderation” won’t incur any damaging health effects, many of us would like to know a number to have a clear understanding of “moderation.” According to research, consumption of 0.5g/kg of alcohol or less won’t have an impact on muscle recovery following exercise. For someone who weighs 120 lb., that’s about 2 drinks. For someone who weighs 180 lb., that’s about 3 drinks. Sounds about standard when we think of the recommended number of drinks for men and women, right?
Ideally, consuming 0.5-1g/kg of alcohol now and then won’t reverse all your hard work in the gym. However, as that number increases to 1.5 or even 2g/kg some serious negative impacts are observed. Referencing back to the study mentioned earlier, 1.5g/kg of alcohol or 8 drinks for someone weighing 160 lb. decreased muscle protein synthesis by 37%! Imagine the level of damage that occurs when that number is surpassed?
Alcohol and Fat Gain
Aside from muscle growth, excessive alcohol consumption also leads to fat gain. One of the metabolic products from alcohol breakdown is Acetyl-CoA. This molecule can be used to enter different energy pathways, one of them being triglyceride (or fat) formation.
Are there any hacks to alcohol consumption for fitness goals?
Well, to maintain peak performance in the gym, all alcohol should be avoided. However, some studies show if protein consumption is high and alcohol is consumed, the protein does seem to slightly blunt the damaging effects of alcohol.
Carbohydrate consumption combined with alcohol consumption seems to have no benefit in preventing muscle breakdown. The only benefit it will provide is to decrease the rate at which alcohol is traveling to the liver to prevent excessive alcohol in the bloodstream.
Overall, alcohol is not the most beneficial beverage when it comes to enhancing strength or performance. While it should be avoided, it’s also very prevalent in the diets of almost every culture. So, drink responsibly and drink in moderation!
Jackie Kaminski is a registered dietitian/ nutritionist with a Master’s degree in Exercise Physiology & Sports Nutrition from Florida State University. Her first introduction to working with professional athletes was back in 2017 when she worked at the UFC performance institute in Las Vegas, Nevada. Since then, Jackie has worked with various professional fighters and other clientele and now operates under her company she started back in March, The Fight Nutritionist LLC. The Fight Nutritionist is dedicated to providing the most effective nutrition plans to ensure her athletes are performance at their absolute best. All of her plans are individualized to the athlete and are backed by the latest research to ensure complete safety and efficacy. Jackie is also a member of the international society of sports nutrition, where she often participates in different research projects and data collection with other ISSN members from Nova University. When Jackie isn’t working, you can find her at Combat Club where she trains kickboxing and Muy Thai. As a sports dietitian, Jackie’s aim is to provide her athletes with the necessary fuel to excel in training and provide the proper education to ensure her athletes are engaging in the safest health practices (as they relate to combat sports).
Burrito bowls are all the rage right now, and it’s easy to see why. They’re simple to make, totally customisable, and full of fresh nutritious ingredients that leave you feeling as good as they taste.
The premise is simple. Load your bowl up with a grain, like rice or quinoa, a protein, like chicken, tofu or steak, and then top with beans and veggies. Add any extras that you’re craving such as Pico, creamy avocado, or tangy lime, and voila – a meal that satisfies all the burrito cravings, without the tortilla. Burrito bowls tend to have more veggies, and overall food volume, than a standard burrito, meaning they can be more nutritious and keep you full for longer.
You can make up your burrito bowl recipe as you go along, or you can try our fajita chicken burrito bowl recipe. Bursting with flavour, we’ve layered with charred seasoned chicken, lime rice, creamy avocado, black beans, and veggies.
It’s only 433 kcals per portion and is packed with 45g of protein and only 2g of saturated fat – making it the perfect meal option for anyone who’s counting calories or trying to up their protein. Burrito bowls keep well in the fridge too, so if you fancy making it for meal prep, just double up on ingredients for every portion.
We’ve gone classic with our recipe, but remember you can customise and add any extra ingredients or vegetables you might have in your fridge to reduce food waste.
Serves: 1
Prep time: 15 mins
Cook time: 25 mins
Ingredients:
Chicken:
120g chicken breast
9g fajita seasoning
Low calorie oil spray
Rice:
30g long grain white rice
60ml chicken stock
1 tsp crushed garlic
¼ lime, juiced
1 tbsp coriander, finely chopped
Fajita Bowl:
25g lettuce, shredded
30g black beans, washed and drained
30g sweetcorn, drained
15g red onion, sliced
¼ avocado, sliced
1 tbsp fresh salsa
Fresh lime and chilli flakes to serve
Method:
In a shallow dish or bowl, coat the chicken breast with a few sprays of low-calorie oil spray and the fajita seasoning.
Spray a frying pan with low-calorie oil spray, sear chicken on both sides and cook for about 8 mins per side on a medium to high heat. The chicken should be charred but juicy.
Once cooked, leave the chicken to rest on a warm plate and cover with foil.
While the chicken is resting, cook your rice: combine rice, stock, and garlic in a pan over high heat. Mix well and bring to a boil. Then reduce the heat and cover with a lid until the rice is cooked through.
Fluff up the rice with a fork and mix with lime juice and coriander. Add this to your bowl.
Next slice the cooked chicken into strips and add the lettuce, beans, corn, and onion on top of your rice.
Top with avocado slices, a squeeze of lime and sprinkling of chilli flakes.
High in natural sugars, dried fruits (such as apricots, raisins and mango) give a concentrated source of carbohydrate, making them agreat energy booster. You’ll also get a dose of fibre, potassium, phytonutrients, vitamins and minerals with every mouthful.
Fitness benefits:
If you can’t stomach energy gels during long races, dried fruits are a great natural substitute as they pack in plenty of high GI carbs to give you energy. Aim for one or two servings before a race and two to three servings for every hour of running (one serving is roughly three dried figs). As with all foods, if competing, experiment with dried fruit during training runs rather than on competition day to avoid the dangers of a washing-machine stomach mid-race!
2. SWEET POTATOES
Mash, bake or make into pâté – sweet potatoes are ultra versatile and are a healthier choice than regular potatoes, with disease-fighting beta-carotene, iron, fibre and vitamin C.
Fitness benefits:
Sweet potatoes are a good addition to a carb-loading diet before a long race, such as a half marathon. They are also high in the electrolyte potassium, which can help ward off muscle cramping during exercise.
3. BANANAS
Bananas are the perfect fitness food: compact, unfussy, soft to chew, and packed with nutrients. Don’t be too quick to bin the peel however – Taiwanese nutritionists found the peel is not only packed with even more potassium, but mood-boosting serotonin and eye-protecting lutein, too. Try the whole banana – peel and all – in a smoothie.
Fitness benefits:
Bananas are slightly higher in energy than other fruits but the calories come mainly from carbohydrate, which makes them brilliant for refuelling before, during or after a workout. They’re also packed with potassium, which may help with muscle cramps during exercise.
Combinations for extra energy…
4. BLUEBERRIES
Blueberries earned their ‘superfood’ status a few years ago, thanks to their high level of free-radical-beating antioxidants. Free radicals are thought to travel around your body damaging cells, causing disease, and triggering signs of premature aging. Berries are often lower in calories than other fruits, too.
Fitness benefits:
Like dried fruit, fresh fruit is also good to eat during and after exercise since it contains high GI carbohydrate-packed sugars, which provide energy to muscles in the quickest way possible. Frozen blueberries (often far cheaper than fresh in the supermarket) are brilliant when whizzed up into a post-exercise smoothie to replenish your muscles’ glycogen (energy) stores.
With hydrating water, muscle-healing protein, refuelling sugar and bone-healthy calcium in every glass, milk is great for those upping their activity levels. A warm glass around bedtime may also help you drift off and get the rest you need, thanks to its slow-digesting casein proteins and ability to boost sleep-inducing serotonin and melatonin.
2. Watch the portion size
Be careful not to overdo it when it comes to how much you eat before exercise. The general guidelines suggest:
Large meals. Eat these at least three to four hours before exercising.
Small meals or snacks. Eat these about one to three hours before exercising.
Eating too much before you exercise can leave you feeling sluggish. Eating too little might not give you the energy you need to keep feeling strong throughout your workout.
3. Avoid processed foods
Watch out, because processed foods have multiple negative side effects. Generally speaking, the fewer the ingredients, the better the food. Taking a quick look at food labels can tell you a lot, but ideally, the majority of the food you buy doesn’t need a label.
4. Protein up
Add protein powder to smoothies for an added boost. Choose unflavored powders for versatility.
5. Cut your coffee calories
Cut calories in your morning cup of coffee by skipping the cream and sugar. Instead, try drinking it black or reducing your amount of each.
