13.7.12

Lifting 101

I know I have told you before on here that strength training is the key to weight loss. I train people via the many distance-based tools available: telephone, Skype, internet, email, webcam, etc. How do I make sure that you are doing what I say?

First, I send you a workout. Second, I make you Skype or turn on a webcam. You get to show me how you intend to do the basic moves in your workout before weight is applied. We work this way to make sure that you know the key parts of good form, and the critical things not to do.

Now, I have added something for those of you who do not train with me. Next month I will be adding some items to my Go To Training account for everyone! :) Please clap excitedly now...

I will go through the bodybuilding bible, otherwise known as Strength Training Anatomy, and demonstrate the moves discussing form. I will also put up a fun little contraindications to exercise quiz that you may take for free...or, maybe I'll make you at least subscribe to this blog...or something. We will see when it is up.

If you want a chance to get your BCA completed for free, email your questions to information@haneylifestylemanagement.com with a subject of "Wednesday Question" or similar so that I can figure out that is what you want. I answer one question the next week, and that submitter gets a free Warrior caliper and Orbi-Tape set!

Until then, keep training and send me your questions!

OOh, and I have some good journal review items for tomorrow...

BCAA's - What do you need?

Your basic BCAA (branch chain amino acid) requirements come from multiple sources, summarized in an fao.org page here. Additional information used here comes from a Journal of Nutrition publication here. Both utilize the WHO tables.

Great, what is a BCAA and why do I care?

BCAA's are the building blocks of protein. Any protein. And, in order to build muscle in your body, you need to ingest these. So, technically, you are what you eat. Of note, if you short yourself on carbs, some proteins are deaminated into glucose for cellular energy. This is bad for both the reason that toxic ammonia is a byproduct and that you are now shorting your tissue repair process its proteins. BCAA's in your meal become your body tissues within four hours.

Why four hours?

BCAA's only circulate in your body for four hours trying to match up with each other, after that any remaining unpaired ones are excreted from your body. Wasted food if you ask me. Think High School biology here. Remember DNA base pairs? A only pairs with T and C with G, etc. All ingested proteins are composed of three base pair amino acids. Which, while interesting to biochemists, is really more than you need to know.

So, what do I need to know?

Of the 22 BCAA, there are 11 that concern us as muscle building, fat reducing humans. Muscle building seems to focus on Leucine, Isoleucine and Valine. Luckily, the WHO (World Health Organization) has paid people much smarter than me to tell you that the basic requirements for an adult are (in daily mg/kg of body weight):

Histiane: trace
Isoleucine: 9.5mg
Leucine: 12.5mg
Lysine: 9.4mg
Mehtionine: 12.1mg (Cystine may make up 80 to 89% of this.)
Phenylalanine: 12.1mg (Tyrosine may make up 70 to 75% of this.)
Threonine: 6.5mg
Tryptophane: 2.9mg
Valine: 10.7mg
(You can see this and the child/infant/etc. tables in the first link.)

Ok, so how do I use this?

The easiest way is to just eat complete proteins. They have all of these in them in sufficient quantity. Remember the four hour circulation time? Yep, multiple small meals a day is staring to make even more sense now, huh? Well, in order to see what you are eating, I will again refer you to one of my favorite online resources for those things that enter your mouth (at meal time): NutritionData.com 

While their front page is always the same, boring black eyed peas, I have now found this useful. (You need an item with protein to see the data.) Click on the title that says "Black Eyed Peas." When the page loads, there are two graphs I want you to look at. The first says "Nutrient Balance" and the second "Protein Quality." In the first is the blue pie slice labeled "Pr" for protein. Genius, I know. In the second is what comprises that protein. THE KEY: AS LONG AS THE PROTEIN QUALITY IS BLUE FOR ALL 11, YOU HAVE A COMPLETE PROTEIN. If you take nothing else away, remember this. If it is not, combine protein sources for each meal until you have all blue. :) This is the easiest way I can tell you to do it short of writing a program. Maybe, someday, I will get to that part of my to-do list. EVERY FOUR HOURS, COMPLETE PROTEIN. Ok, so two things you have to remember.

Uhm, you said daily requirements; what if I work out?

See, I knew you were smart. :) Ok. This is what I have worked on. You know all of those supplements out there? I have yet to find one that follows the WHO set. So, something I am not aware of may be at work here. (i.e. use this part at your own risk and do some research)

Given: Proteins are 4 cal/gr, and you can measure how many calories you burn exercising.
BMR: The "average joe" needs 25% of calories from protein. More for weight loss, less for weight gain. This follows for your workout calories as well.

Take your energy expended from the workout (Ew) and multiply it by 20% to get your protein caloric requirement in grams (Pg). So, we have Ew * .2 = Pg. Stick with me...I need to get to milligrams, means: Ew * 200 = Pmg. Sweet. Now you know how much protein you need.

Now, here is the sticky, gray area. And, if you hate math, you may want to skip this.

ASSUMING (I know I hate the word too, but don't have the research to know for sure) that you need the same mix of BCAA's (same relative quantities) then you can find the individual requirements using:

Pmg / 75.5 * BCAAmg = BCAA requirement : 75.5mg is the total from the daily and converts the protein to a relative 1. Then you multiply by the mg stated for each specific BCAA to get that specific BCAA mg requirement. This at least lets you check out the supplement labels with a little more knowledge. On supplements, one last thing, avoid hydrolyzed...the process tends to render the BCAA's useless. Just saying...

Or, ignore the math and just eat a hard boiled egg with some black eyed peas.

9.7.12

Posts Back on Schedule

Good afternoon!

If you read the press release, you can see that I have been busy, but not to fear, I will be posting as scheduled again starting this week.

I am also happy to announce that, among all of the swirling chaos lately, the Lifestyle Shop is opening tonight! What you can do there:

Current subscribers: Pay for your training subscriptions.
Potential subscribers: Download and upload all of the required screening forms, (Please remember these are propriatary.) and request an account.
Anyone: Purchase select items of my choosing! Yep, I get all the say here. Isn’t that great? Anything on the store has my approval and I believe in it.

So, that about sums it up. Time to start working on the posts for the rest of the week…want a sneak peek?

Tuesday – BCAA’s: What, When and How

You’ll have to wait for the rest! ;)

Have a great week.