Monday, April 7, 2008

I'm sick of drinking protein shakes

I'm sick of drinking protein shakes
I woke up this morning excited about my day and went
straight into the kitchen to fix myself some breakfast. As
I looked into the cupboard (do people say "cupboard"
anymore?), I was disappointed to see the same boring
protein shakes staring back at me. I know that I have to
get enough protein everyday to complement my weight
lifting. If I don't get enough protein, then my muscles
won't be able to grow, right? But does it have to be so
bland?

Well, the first thing you can do to improve the taste and
not traumatize your taste buds is to add flavoring to your
protein shakes. Fruit, peanut butter, flax seeds, even
chocolate (but watch that sugar!) can add some much needed
zest to your daily routine. Even so, you'll still probably
get tired of drinking liquid meals all the time ' so what's
the solution? Simple: Don't drink them all the time.

Most of your meals should be coming from whole foods
anyway. You need to get plenty of fiber, vitamins, and
other nutrients which are often not available in your
everyday protein powders. Even if they are, it just isn't
the same, is it? Remember one protein shake supplements
were created. OK, they were made to make money, but
besides that they help to fill in gaps when we can't get
enough protein from other sources. Most of our protein
sources are less convenient for our busy lifestyles. We
can't always drive around with chicken, milk, tuna, or
almond butter (trust me when I say that all you'll get is a
dirty shirt and a bunch of laughing coworkers).

Nevertheless, these whole foods should make up the bulk of
your diet, at least the protein part of it. This will make
life a little more exciting, and when you do need to add
some liquid meals they won't be such a drudge. When you
consider that many experts recommend 1.5 g protein per
pound of body weight each day, you will likely need some
protein shakes as part of your overall weight gain plan.
Just mix it up a bit, and you'll be fine.

In my article "The funny pitfall of protein shakes and
weight gain," I told the story of my friend who tried to
gain weight with protein shakes alone. In all his
excitement, my friend failed to add a tiny, minuscule,
trivial little ingredient ' resistance exercise.

That's right, simply adding protein and overall calories to
your diet, even if it's a lot of protein and calories, will
not build muscle if you don't combine this with weight
training. Your body doesn't particularly like to grow
muscle because it's difficult to maintain so you have to
give your body a reason to build muscle. In other words,
you have to force your body to build muscle by exposing it
to strength training. When your muscles are challenged by
unusually heavy weights (at least unusually heavy for your
muscles), your body will respond by gradually increasing
muscle mass.


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