You Can’t Build A House With No Bricks
Imagine you’re building your dream house. You’ve worked with an architect to design it just how you want it, you’ve bought the perfect lot next to the water, and you’ve contracted the best workers to build it for you.
But on day one, the workers show up and there’s no material to build with.
All the planning in the world won’t allow you to build a house out of nothing.
Your body is just the same. All the working out in the world, even if they’re the best workouts, won’t allow your body to build bigger muscles if you don’t give it material to build with.
Building a body you’re proud of requires the right foods, and the right amount of them.
How do I build muscle?
If you want to build muscle, you need to eat more calories than you burn.
By eating more calories than you burn, your body has the extra energy available that is required to build muscle.
It’s simple, but not easy.
Simple Math
If you know that you need to eat more calories than you burn, then the first logical question is, how many calories do I burn?
There are fancy machines that can calculate this for you, but Sean Nalewanyj has a simple solution to estimate about how many calories you burn per day, based on your bodyweight and activity level.
Not Active = Bodyweight x 14
Lightly Active = Bodyweight x 14.5
Moderately Active = Bodyweight x 15
Very Active = Bodyweight x 15.5
Extremely Active = Bodyweight x 16
For instance, I’m 185 pounds, and moderately active, so according to this equation I burn 2,775 calories per day.
How accurate is this? A $10,000 machine calculated that I burn 2,813 calories per day. 38 calorie difference— not bad!
X + Y = Bigger Muscles
Ok so now that you’ve figured out how many calories you burn per day, how many calories do you need to eat per day to build muscle?
Sean Nalewanyj suggests eating 250-350 calories over your daily burn rate to build muscle. Any less than that, and it’s going to be a slow journey for you. Any more than that, and your new muscles will be hiding under a warm, fluffy layer of fat.
Taking my estimated burn rate of 2,775 calories per day that we just calculated, and adding 250-350 calories to that, then I should be eating 3,025 – 3,125 calories per day if I want to build muscle.
Pretty straightforward, right?
But now there’s the one last question…
What should I eat?
This can pretty much be summed up in two words: whole foods.
Remember the three little pigs? The first pig built his house of straw, the second built his house of sticks and then they partied the rest of the day.
The wolf came and blew their houses down so they ran and hid with their brother who did the job right and built his house of bricks.
You want to be like the third pig. Eating processed junk is just like building your house with straw or sticks. It won’t hold up long term and in the end you’ll be wishing you had done it right and built your house with bricks.
Macronutrients
Macronutrients are carbohydrates, fats and protein. These are the nutrients that give your body energy in the form of calories. See the table below for good sources of each macronutrient, and how many calories per gram it has.
| Good Food Sources | Calories per gram | |
|---|---|---|
| Carbohydrates | Bread, rice, quinoa, fruits & veggies | 4 |
| Protein | Meat, beans, nuts | 4 |
| Fat | Fish, avocados, nuts | 9 |
To make it easy to figure out how much of each you should eat, Sean Nalewanyj recommends these basic daily guidelines:
Protein:
1 gram per pound of body weight
Fat:
25% of total calories
Carbohydrates:
Remaining calories after protein and fat is calculated
Back to using the example of my bodyweight, if I want to build muscle I need to eat about 3,100 calories per day, that should be made of:
Protein:
Since I’m 185 pounds, I’ll need 185 grams of protein.
185 grams of protein x 4 calories per gram = 740 calories from protein
Fat:
25% of my total 3,100 calories per day = 775 calories from fat
Carbs:
3,100 total calories – 740 calories from protein – 775 calories from fat = 1,585 calories from carbs
So there you have it, my daily intake should be roughly:
Protein: 740 calories
Carbs: 1,585 calories
Fats: 775 calories
In other words, knowing that carbs and protein are four calories per gram, and fat is nine calories per gram, my daily intake should be:
Protein: 185 grams
Carbs: 396 grams
Fats: 86 grams
Eating right in the Real World
What exactly does this 3,100 calorie diet look like? Here is one day of meals for an example:
Breakfast
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Granola Bar | 140 | 3 | 25 | 4 |
| 2 Hard Boiled Eggs | 148 | 12 | 0 | 10 |
| Mixed Nuts | 160 | 5 | 5 | 14 |
| Banana | 105 | 1 | 27 | 0 |
| Baby Carrots | 35 | 1 | 8 | 0 |
| Cucumber Slices | 8 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| 2 Pieces of Whole Wheat Toast | 134 | 4 | 24 | 0 |
| Total | 730 | 26 | 91 | 30 |
Morning Snack
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ham Sandwich | 225 | 14 | 29 | 2 |
| Orange | 62 | 1 | 16 | 0 |
| Oatmeal | 145 | 6 | 25 | 2 |
| Total | 432 | 21 | 70 | 6 |
Lunch
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grilled Chicken | 368 | 69 | 0 | 8 |
| Broccoli | 31 | 2 | 6 | 0 |
| Couscous | 176 | 6 | 36 | 0 |
| Sweet Potato | 165 | 4 | 38 | 0 |
| Total | 740 | 81 | 80 | 8 |
Afternoon Snack
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple | 72 | 0 | 19 | 0 |
| PB & J | 278 | 9 | 40 | 10 |
| Total | 350 | 9 | 59 | 10 |
Dinner
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Steak Chipotle Bowl w/ Brown Rice & Veggies | 737 | 50 | 87 | 18 |
| Sweet Potato | 130 | 1 | 6 | 12 |
| Total | 867 | 51 | 93 | 30 |
Total
| Calories | Protein | Carbs | Fat |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3119 | 188 | 393 | 84 |
Potential Pitfalls
There are two ways most people mess up their eating: eating too little, or eating too much junk.
The Snowball Effect
A few weeks ago I went to a baseball game with my dad. The game was on Sunday afternoon and then we went out to eat after. Ball park hot dogs and beer for lunch, burgers for dinner. Not the best day of eating.
We were gone all Sunday afternoon, which is when I usually meal prep, so I didn’t have any food for the week.
When Monday morning came around, I scavenged together a light breakfast, but had no food for lunch, so I went out with a buddy. I was starving, so my stomach made the decisions instead of my brain. Chicken wings and a soda it is. Whatever, it’s just one lunch right?
That night I meal prepped and had everything ready to go for the rest of the week. However, my wife’s ice cream in the freezer was eyeing me extra hard, and I just couldn’t say no. After all, my eating yesterday and today were disasters, what’s a little ice cream going to do?
This is a classic example of the snowball effect. One thing goes wrong, then another, then another, and then you just don’t really care.
This is often how eating too much junk happens.
The best thing to do is quickly recognize your eating is going wrong, and then take control of the situation by making healthy decisions that align with your goals.
Not eating enough
The other way most people mess up is not eating enough. See tips 1-3 below to conquer this pitfall.
4 Tips to Eating Right
- Front load your day. If you have a huge breakfast, it’ll be easier to get in the correct amount of calories for the rest of the day. If you have a small breakfast, you’re going to be full and feel like you’re stuffing your face for the rest of the day.
- Be prepared. The best way to succeed at eating correctly is to plan ahead. Most people meal prep on the weekends for the upcoming week. Nothing makes it easier to follow your meal plan than having a fridge full of delicious, already prepared food.
- Learn to cook delicious food. If the thought of your next meal makes your mouth water, you’re much more likely to stick to your eating plan.
- Don’t keep junk food in the house. It’s a lot harder to binge on a bag of chips when there’s none in the house.
Conclusion
What you do in the kitchen is just as important as what you do in the gym, so tackle your meal planning with the same determination as your workouts.
First, determine how many calories you burn. This can be done by this simple formula:
Not Active = Bodyweight x 14
Lightly Active = Bodyweight x 14.5
Moderately Active = Bodyweight x 15
Very Active = Bodyweight x 15.5
Extremely Active = Bodyweight x 16
Then, eat the proper ratio of each macronutrient, mostly from whole foods. These ratios can be calculated using these guidelines:
Protein:
1 gram per pound of body weight
Fat:
25% of total calories
Carbohydrates:
Remaining calories after protein and fat is calculated
Now that you know what to eat, and how much of it, the only thing left to do is lift hard and eat right.
Happy feasting!
P.S. To make sure you’re working out right and putting your food to good use, check out our Ultimate Guides to Building Bigger Biceps and Triceps.