Anyone who has started that process will know that spending hours in the gym can make muscle mass grow. Exercising muscles is an essential part of obtaining results; however, if we do not eat a proper diet, if our muscles do not receive the required nutrients, no matter how hard they work, they will not be able to grow, and we will be doing practically useless work.
Outside the gym, an important battle is being fought, in which diet and food play a fundamental role. However, we also have a series of supplements at our disposal that can bring us closer to where our diet does not reach, extra help to improve our muscle growth.
If you want to know which ones you should choose, in the following oneHOWTO article, we will explain which are the best supplements to increase muscle mass.
What are supplements for?
Taking supplements is not essential to gain muscle mass; it can be achieved with good training and a proper diet. However, these products can help you maximize every effort you make, reach your limit much faster, and achieve your goals quickly.
In the market, and increasingly, there are numerous supplements with different objectives that you should keep in mind. You must know that these are not food substitutes but that they help fill gaps in your diet. Some of the cases in which supplements can be taken are as follows:
To achieve ingesting a sufficient amount of calories or protein.
To be able to recover more quickly.
To follow a complete diet if your schedule does not allow you to make all the necessary meals.
Next, we will talk about the best supplements to increase muscle mass and the characteristics of each of them.
What you need to gain muscle mass: protein
Whenever you talk about gaining muscle mass, there is a word that immediately appears in the conversation. It is none other than the ubiquitous protein, an essential nutrient responsible for the muscular processes involved in the development and growth of muscles. You can introduce many products into your diet that are a great source of protein, such as eggs, nuts, meat or fish, dishes with which you must provide your body with all the necessary proteins so that the muscle can grow.
Now, proteins are not everything, and although, indeed, they cannot be missing in your meals, it is no less accurate that you should not neglect the leading role that the rest of the groups of nutrients must-have, whether they are carbohydrates -vital in the energy supply- or fatty acids.
Nutrition tips to gain muscle mass
Working your muscles without giving them the fuel they need will only overload your body, and you won’t get the results you want. The best thing is that you keep in mind the essential points of diets to increase muscle mass:
Protein is the building block for muscles. It's not just about gorging on protein after training - what matters is the total amount of protein you take in per day. If you want to see results, you should know how you distribute the macronutrients throughout the day. Beware: our body can only absorb about 20 grams of protein at each meal, so don't go overboard!
To gain weight (muscle or fat), you need to eat a little more calories than you burn. Learn to gain weight healthily, without overeating or gaining weight.
But what if you already have a good level of muscle mass and what happens to you is simply that it is not very visible? Many people want to have a more muscular body, but that does not necessarily mean gaining weight. Are you trying to score abs but can't do it? In that case, you should focus on losing fat and not increasing your caloric intake.
Use amino acids in your supplementation plan.
This depends on many variables, but you can use any product with BCAAs or all nine essential amino acids. To start, I recommend:
20 to 30 g of simple carbohydrates, dissolved in 400 to 500 ml of water
Add 10 to 20 grams of amino acids.
During training, drink this drink between each series.
They can also be used between meals, 10 to 15 grams two or three times a day, to create a state of abundance of amino acids (hyperaminoacidemia) and generate an environment where the anabolic rate in proteins is more incredible than degradation (catabolism).
We could eventually use pre and post-training formulas, but this will be a topic for a later article in future issues.
We hope this information has been to your liking and has helped you better understand how or amino acids help muscle development.