A Question

[Legion Kreinak2]

Not going against the grain here because I agree one must consume adequate calories, especially protein, in order to grow. However, I was thinking the other day, and wanted to know what you guys thought.

Firstly, you need enough calories to grow.
Secondly, you're muscles are said to grow and adapt so long as you're progressively adding weight (because that's what the human body does, is adapts)

Assuming you're lifting between 5-12 reps (anything for muscular strength rather than neural) and each week progressing in weight, even if you're not eating adequate calories, wouldn't you grow? Considering there's a progressive load to which the body must adapt.

True, progress can and will eventually halt, but I've gone for a month straight eating sub-par calories (not on purpose, just sort of happened) and managed to continue to add weight to all my lifts (except curls).

 

[bignate73]

cant build a house without wood.

 

[Legion Kreinak2]

BuMp

 

[Liftbig]

cant build a house without wood.

are you suggesting a diet high in wood?

 

[bignate73]

are you suggesting a diet high in wood?

thats what bfold eats...cause he's a house.



basically, you cant really build muscle until your maintenance requirements are met. thats why people tend to drop cardio, rest more etc when trying to grow. it helps keep the calories you are taking in, to go just for growth and recovery. some people can grow on 3000 cals, some it takes 5000. its all metabolism. thats why people say, do what works for YOU. we all have different metabolisms, there are baselines caloric requirements that can be closely estimated (which take activity,work and sleep habits into account). those help alot.

 

[The_Eviscerator]

cant build a house without wood.

Actually I remember reading studies where rats were given identical rationing of food and some of the rats were exercised and some were not. The exercised rats actually gained muscle mass.

That being said.... we are not rats, we are humans and your body needs to be properly fueled to grow. Especially after a training session... two post workout meals( 1 immediately and 1 an hour to 1.5 hours after) consisting of low fat and 50 grams of protein and 100-150 grams of carbs after each session will surely keep the growth moving in the right direction.

 

[BodyByFinaplix]

LK, not to change the subject, but progressive resistance is not everything. It is ONE theory of training. Actually, I think it is more necissary for strength than growth per se. I've met some freakishly big guys who were not very strong, and alot of guys gain a fair amount of muscle mass over the years without increasing their weights. Doing more reps with the same weight, or even taking shorter breaks with the same weight came stimulate a great deal of growth without increasing the weight, within reason.

 

[Legion Kreinak2]

We aren't rats, true, but at the same time from what I remember, our skeletal and muscular makeup is very similar to that of a rat, which is why tests are done so often on them. That and they're cheap and easy to deal with I'm sure.

Even still, I doubt rats are the only animal out there who can find themselves gaining muscular mass, while eating the same amount of calories as a rat who doesn't exercise. Basically saying, I'm still thinking that though eating excess calories may be optimal for gains, you can grow without it. I've noticed myself doing it in the past, so why not now?

Also, who's to say the body puts your rations towards everything else before building muscle? Yes, it deems muscle to be useless (excess, at least), but what if you body is thrashed and in need of quick nutrition to recover, but you only give it enough to preform 5 out of 6 tasks, let's say. How do you know the 6th excluded task would be the use of nutrition towards restoring muscles?

I don't know if that really made sense. It was hard for me to explain perfectly, but I think I got the point across.

Not trying to go against the grain, just saying, I don't think it's impossible to grow without adequate calories.

 

[Mike_Rojas]

I think if you worked out and ate under-maintenance calories you could increase strength somewhat, but probably not size.

It would be awesome if the body could just take your excess fat stores and use that energy to build bigger muscles, but it doesn't seem to do that