BUILDING MUSCLE

LEADING TRAINER NICK MITCHELL TALKS ABOUT CREATING THE PERFECT WORKOUT ENVIRONMENT — PART ONE

What do you want to get from your next workout? Ideally you would answer “results and a sense of enjoyment/satisfaction.” I’d argue that anything else is a waste of time. Now I want you to remember the last great workout you had. Think about how time flew, how you were buzzing on an endorphin high and how your body felt like a well-oiled machine, up to any challenge you set. This feeling doesn’t happen by chance. It is something we create for ourselves, albeit often inadvertently. We should take control of our lives and not just cruise by waiting for things to happen. So, I want to give you a few strategies that can ensure that more often than not your gym sessions lift  your results and emotions sky high. PRE-WORKOUT NUTRITION When it comes to pre-workout nutrition, the fact that anabolic drive is a function of neural drive should be paramount in your mind. It is imperative to ensure you are operating at peak neurological levels during a training session. We could devote this month’s entire magazine to pre-workout nutrition and still not cover every permutation so I am going to keep things very simple. If you think the goal of pre-workout nutrition is to get energy from carbohydrates one hour prior to training, you’re wrong. Assuming that we want higher glycogen levels for weight training (sometimes we will and sometimes  we won’t) then what you eat the day before, or up to four hours before if you train later in the day, will dictate the glycogen storage that is so important  for maximising a training “pump” and  the sarcoplasmic hypertrophy that all bodybuilders should be aiming for. The problem about pre-workout carbs for most of us is that they calm us down because they raise both the neurotransmitter (brain chemical) serotonin and the hormone insulin. But prior to a workout you want to be bouncing off the walls. This means we need elevated dopamine and cortisol levels. Yes, cortisol, the allegedly evil hormone, can actually be a bodybuilder’s best friend if harnessed properly. Think of it as the “energetic hormone” that allows “ SALMON IS A PERFECT PRE-WORKOUT FOOD” us to use fatty acids for energy and operate at a high pace. Insulin is elevated by carb intake and counteracts cortisol,  so lower carb nutrition is the best option immediately prior to a workout. Incidentally, this is one reason postworkout carbs are usually the right option. Carbs will help lower acutely raised cortisol levels and push the body out  of catabolism and into anabolic state much better than replenishing glycogen stores does. The best pre-workout meal for your brain is one limited in carbohydrates  and packed full of protein and good fats (remember, you should be eating for  your muscles and glycogen all the time before this). The best option is typically something like salmon, a handful of almonds and some green vegetables  one to two hours before training. A lot of people get too wrapped up thinking they must eat at a precise time pre-training. Generally, I would suggest an hour before, but some people function better eating 30 minutes before while others may need two hours to feel they have properly digested everything.  I remember well the days of my youth when I could stomach no solid food for four hours prior to some awful leg workouts. PRE-WORKOUT  SUPPLEMENTS Everyone asks: “Should I take product X/Y/Z as my pre-workout?” The truthful answer is that the mind and the imagination are the most powerful stimulants so we need to think what we can do to make our best muscle (the brain) operate at peak capacity. A pre-workout supplement regime should heighten the functions of the brain and the body. We want something that allows us to train for longer, focus more intensely and lift stronger than we would otherwise be able to. And, ideally, we don’t want to crash after the session. When it comes to supplements we want things that work neurologically rather than something that spikes blood sugar for a high followed by an inevitable crash. Below is my favourite stack if you really want to smash it up! Rather than jump into this straight away, pick a couple of the products at a time, take them 30 minutes prior to your workout and see what they do for your training focus and concentration: ▪  Caffeine: Fires up the adrenal glands to raise cortisol and increase the energy of your session—have 5-10 mg per kg of bodyweight.** PHOTODISC ▪  Acetyl L-carnitine: Boosts the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, which controls focus and drive during your session—1-3 g.* ▪  Chocamine: A stimulant that contains theobromine and theophylline, which work together to boost workout drive—50-500 mg. ▪  L-tyrosine: Can improve focus and concentration—5-10 mg/kg of bodyweight. ▪  Glycine propionate L-carnitine: Works as a vasodilator to improve blood flow and improve nutrient uptake for enhanced hypertrophy—3 g. If you want to be really on top of your game, consume your pre-workout supplements with a litre of water mixed with 5 g of para-aminobenzoic acid. PABA—pseudo B vitamin—is thought to increase the amount of oxygen taken up in the tissues when training, thus aiding both recovery and regeneration. PERI-WORKOUT  NUTRITION AND  SUPPLEMENTS The single most important thing to take while training is water. I know this is boring advice, but I see so many people not bothering at all or even swigging Diet Coke! A hard training session should see most people get through at least 1 litre of water—your energy, your ability to get a pump and maintain it, and your recovery will all thank you for this all too often ignored necessity. If you find yourself sweating a lot or ramping up your training volume then  I’d also look at adding an electrolyte powder to your water. If you’re on a budget then a quick visit to the chemist for a rehydration/diarrhoea sachet will  do the trick. You’ll recover faster, be more anabolic, and, of course, avoid potentially debilitating muscle cramps. My favourite peri-workout supplement is BCAAs, taken during training. BCAAs are a favourite bogeyman of some internet “experts” and deserve an article themselves to dispel some of the gross misinformation on social media. I’ll keep this very simple—if you take in enough BCAAs during your workout (the dosage can be between 0.2-0.4 g per kg of bodyweight) most of you will see an improvement in your recovery and training drive. BCAAs don’t give a stimulant-like effect but they do work wondrously well for many trainees who would otherwise hit the dreaded “training wall” too early in their workouts. This is because BCAAs (leucine, isoleucine and valine) compete with  the amino acid tryptophan, a precursor  to the calming neurotransmitter  serotonin, which we don’t want whilst trying to be focused and aggressive during a training session. As for those who say that you don’t need BCAAs because you can get them from whey/food, they are totally ignoring the pharmacological effect of ingesting just BCAAs during training. Yes, there are BCAAs in whey but there are many other amino acids too, all of which compete for absorption. Flood the system with BCAAs and you get a profoundly different impact than drinking a whey shake. Next month, I’ll look at firing up your muscles and neural system and getting into the right mindset for a training session. M&F