What are Essential Amino Acids???

What are Essential Amino Acids???

An amino acid is considered essential because the body cannot make it from other dietary components. Therefore if one's diet does not contain a full complement of the essential amino acids, a nutritional deficiency exists.

Consuming amino acids in the form of whole-food proteins is preferable to taking them in through supplements, however certain amino acid supplements can offer health and fitness benefits.

During exercise, protein breakdown increases with no rise in protein synthesis. This means that training and competing can be very catabolic times, no matter what type of exercise you do. Fortunately, during the post-exercise period, this muscle catabolism can be slowed as protein synthesis begins to rise.

However, this increase still isn't enough to counter the protein breakdown that's still occurring. The net result of this workout and post workout catabolism is that muscle recovery and improvement (if endurance exercise is your thing) or growth (if strength exercise is your thing) is hampered.
Current reach in dietary supplementation has targeted these catabolic times, attempting to minimize the catabolism and maximize the anabolism (including recovery, improvement, and/or growth). This research has demonstrated that essential amino acids (alone or with carbohydrates) ingested before, during, or after exercise promote huge increases in protein balance.

Essential Amino Acids are basic dietary components that comprise all of the proteins we eat. However, the provision of these amino acids individually (or as part of an easily digestible complete protein like Intek Evolution or Intek Isolate whey protein) can lead to more rapid digestion and absorption and faster recovery.

Choice Nutrition System EAA

Furthermore, 3 of the 9 essential amino acids are the often-discussed branched chain amino acids (BCAA). These amino acids are important to muscle metabolism and may prevent central fatigue.

Strength and endurance athletes will benefit from approximately 6g per 70kg mass of EAA ingested immediately prior to and/or during exercise.
Alternatively, athletes could choose to consume 0.4g/kg of rapidly digesting protein like Syntrax Matrix or whey concentrate/isolate like Elite Gourmet or Myfusion. For further benefit add 0.8g/kg carbohydrate to enhance the recovery effects of these amino acids.

Starting in Septemeber we will be giving away a FREE Essential Amino Acid with any purchase of  3 or more products! A $30 value stop 4x Nutrition today!

Til next time 

Seth

Gaining Muscle Myths and Bulking

TO BULK OR NOT TO BULK THAT IS THE QUESTION......

There are two big mistakes commonly made when trying to put on muscle; one is not eating enough and the other is too much cardio.

If you want to gain muscle you have to eat. Many people claim they eat enough when in fact they don’t because even if you weren’t gaining muscle you would at least be gaining body fat. If neither of those two things is occurring than clearly you aren’t eating enough. Yes, you most likely will gain some body fat when you are trying to put on muscle but that doesn’t mean cut calories to keep body fat low, it doesn’t work like that. To put it simply, in order to gain muscle you have to fuel your body with protein, carbohydrates, fats and get a sufficient amount of calories. To keep from putting on too much fat while you are trying to gain muscle you would want to create a diet that’s about 400-500 calories over maintenance. On average you may gain 0.5-1lb per week. Some of that weight gain will come from muscle and some fat. You can cycle your diet to try to cut some fat between gaining cycles. On training days eat more calories then non training days to help keep the fat down while gaining. Also more calories on training days will help to fuel your workouts. You have to monitor your body. If you aren’t gaining any weight then increase your calories. If you are gaining much more fat than muscle then change your diet.

I mentioned that you need not only protein but carbs and fats too. Don’t get in the mind set that all you need is protein in order to put on muscle. It’s almost impossible to get enough calories through protein alone, unless you want to eat 2-3 pounds of chicken breast per day for you small girls and much more if you’re trying to gain. Also protein isn't a sufficient source of energy. Studies have shown that, once protein requirements are met, more muscle is gained by adding carbs and fat than from just adding in more protein.

For my second point, Cardio!  Diet isn't the only mistake people make. Over doing it with cardio is also a big mistake. I do recommend cardio to just keep a healthy heart. Cardio for about 20 minutes maybe 3 times a week, low intensity is fine. For the guys and girls that burn a ton of calories from weight lifting, some cardio may help to increase appetite and keep some fat off while gaining but again nothing crazy like an hour on the elliptical or stair climber 5 days a week.

There’s a horrible myth that if you starve yourself and do an excessive amount of cardio that you’ll burn fat. Too much cardio will put your body in a catabolic state and burn muscle. Losing muscle leads to loss of strength and slower metabolism.  Too much cardio increases cortisol levels which weakens immune system.

Here at 4x Nutrition we can help you meet your goals by setting you up with a meal plan and also getting you the right supplements if your daily food intake isn't enough to reach your goal. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram.

Til Next time,

Seth

Protein Ice Cream

We've heard a lot of things the last 8 years in the supplement biz. And nothing comes up more then the complaint "I miss ice cream!"
 So we though, humm how do you get the yummy goodness of ice cream without feeling bad about it? Then it hit us, Protein Ice Cream!!!


So after much trial and error we've come up with OUR version of protein ice cream!

Ingredients

• 1 big tub of 2% Greek Yogurt (roughly 500 g)
• 1/2 cup of Intek Evolution Spread a thin layer of the mixture  nto the Tupperware. The thinner the layer, the faster it will chill.
• Place in freezer for an hour.
• Directions

1. In a large Tupperware container—ideally square shaped for the increased surface area—mix yogurt with the protein powder until you get a smooth mixture.
2. Spread a thin layer of the mixture onto the Tupperware. The thinner the layer, the faster it will chill.
3. Place in freezer for an hour.
4. After an hour, take it out, and give it a churn. Mix your protein-packed mixture with a spoon or, better yet, a fork to break up potential clumps. Stick it back in the freezer for 30 minutes.

Total Fat 8 g

Total Carb  20

Sugar 4

Protein  120g

Notes

1. Consider melting a square or two of dark chocolate and pouring that on top of the 

ice cream. It'll congeal on impact, creating a delicious chocolate shell.

2. You can make this recipe with casein too. If you do, be sure to use a bit over 1/4 

cup of casein, since it will absorb a lot more of the moisture from the yogurt than the 

whey does.

3. Try this with different flavors of whey, and consider adding some extra flavoring 

to the mixture. Cinnamon or vanilla pods would mesh well with this ice cream.

4. To heighten the banana flavor, mush a ripe banana in with the yogurt and whey. 

5. You could use 0 percent Greek yogurt to make this too. However, bear in mind 

that 2 percent or even full-fat yogurt will yield a creamier batch.

So there you have it a way to enjoy the summer heat and not feel like yoru doing damage to your diet, feel free to stop by and check out our other protein ice cream recipes were we use protein bars and paleo protein!!!

Til next time
Mikie