Why Insulin and Insulin Sensitivity are Keys to Maximal Muscle Mass

Why Insulin and Insulin Sensitivity are Keys to Maximal Muscle Mass Insulin is the most anabolic hormone you produce. It’s a powerful force for driving nutrient uptake into the cells. Insulin helps to shuttle both glucose and amino acids into your muscles, glucose for use as fuel (stored as glycogen) for workouts and daily activity, and amino acids that contribute to both repair and growth. It’s important to note that insulin is also the most potent fat storing hormone. It’s the main driver of glucose and fatty acids into fat cells, leading to increased bodyfat. This makes managing insulin one of the most important factors for putting on muscle and limiting bodyfat accumulation. With traditional “linear” bulking, where calories are constantly elevated, insulin begins to lose its anabolic benefits over time, leading to a higher accumulation of bodyfat and less muscle growth. Insulin functions as its own feedback signal. The more insulin you make, and the more often you make it, the less sensitive your body becomes to it. The body begins to ignore constant stimuli from any hormone over time. It’s like walking into a room with a fan. At first you notice the noise, but because it’s constant, you eventually tune it out. However, your body does more than just ignore the signal when insulin is present too frequently. It also downregulates production of insulin receptors, which is referred to as “insulin resistance.” In the case of insulin resistance, insulin production increases because it now takes more insulin to control your blood sugar. Your blood sugar stays elevated because the cells aren’t as receptive to insulin and glycogen uptake, so the body keeps producing more and more insulin to do the job that used to be done by much less. This often also leads to hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar. The net result is that your blood sugar starts to run a little higher, and you have a constant elevation of insulin as well. And this is where bodyfat really starts to come on. Muscle cells take up glycogen mostly in bursts after exercise or during large spikes of insulin. When your blood sugar and insulin are only slightly raised, your body stores the circulating glucose as body-fat to keep your blood sugar under control. This is why long-term bulking programs lead to large amounts of fat accumulation. It gets worse. Along with increasing fat gain; when you enter a state of insulin resistance it actually becomes harder for you to gain muscle. Remember, insulin is your main anabolic hormone, and when you stop making as many receptors, it decreases your ability to shuttle nutrients into the cells during and after training. So your recovery and growth are being starved, despite you consuming larger amounts of calories. If we look at the opposite scenario, cutting on lower carbs and lower calories, insulin sensitivity is affected very differently. When you keep carbohydrates and calories low, insulin levels are low, and so the glycogen levels in your cells start to shrink. Your body responds by shifting to using more fat for fuel to conserve the remaining glycogen in your tissues. It also increases the number of insulin receptors your cells have so that when you do take in carbohydrates it can quickly and efficiently start to rebuild those glycogen stores. This makes it very easy for you to get nutrients into your muscles after training to recover and grow. So this brings about the big question… “How can you optimize insulin during the bulking process?” You need extra calories to grow, and you need insulin to take advantage of those calories. But the longer you take advantage of the high calories and insulin, the less effective it becomes, and the more fat you’re likely to gain. Anyone who’s ever “dieted,” whether for fat loss or bulking, knows that things can go stagnant fast. The best results always come during the initial stages of a program, and become less and less effective the longer you are on it. It’s no different to your training, if you don’t change it up, your body adapts and you plateau. The standard diet process (linear dieting) has never worked well for me, and probably not for you either (although it does work for some genetically blessed individuals). It’s extremely frustrating when you keep cutting calories in small increments only to find that your bodyfat doesn’t seem to drop any faster, or worse, just stays the same. This also holds true when you keep trying to add small amounts of extra calories each week, only to start packing on bodyfat while seeing muscle gains stagnate. But this is the traditional logic, you simply keep increasing calories in linear intervals to bulk, and decrease them in linear intervals to cut. There’s a better way. It’s called CYCLING, and it refers to not sticking to a bulking or cutting style diet 100% of the time. There are many ways to cycle your nutrition up and down. One method is called micro-cycling. This is done throughout the week. Micro-cycles consist of eating lower calories and lower carbs for a period, and then drastically increasing calories and carbohydrates for a day or two. Refeeding periods have been used for a long time as a practice during cutting phases, but I’ve experienced substantial improvements in my off season with a similar approach. As a pro-bodybuilder with a family and busy travel schedule, it can be impossible for me to get in all the calories I need some days — sometimes even weeks — and so refeeding periods have become a part of my diet to compensate. Here’s how it works. On busy days of travel and giving seminars, I may not be able to train, or my training is cut short. So I keep my carbs low to minimize fat gain and maximize insulin sensitivity. If you’re not training, why would you need large amounts of unnecessary nutrients? You need what you need to sustain your current state. No need for extra protein to recover, no need for extra carbs to refuel. My training is not exceptional during these periods, but then when I get back on schedule I use a refeed day and find that my training intensity and strength goes through the roof. Great pumps, great energy, and great recovery. Over a few months, I saw that I could pack on a substantial amount of muscle with minimal fat gain using this simple method. Obviously, traveling and missing workouts isn’t ideal. Yet there is something to be learned in this. By optimizing your body’s ability to use nutrients, you massively increase your long term growth potential, and also all but eliminate plateaus. A “plateau” now might last 3-4 days as opposed to weeks or even years for some gym goers. Caloric Micro, and Macro-Cycling is the solution. The best athletes in the world have been doing it for years and now, finally, the rest of the world is catching on. There are many ways to cycle macros. Many ordinary folks subconsciously do it already, by eating “normal” during the work week and then indulging on the weekends. However, if you apply a bit more structure and a lot more discipline, it works much better. Better than any other system ever conceived. The catch is, everyone is different. Some do not handle carbs very well but thrive on fat. Others have very high carbohydrate tolerance but get torpedoed by extra fats. But when you get dialed in and find your ideal level of carbs and length of reefed, watch out. Pumps, muscularity, and vascularity explode while fat seems to melt away. You start to make progress again, and training gets fun again. So how do you set up your micro cycle? Stay tuned for the next instalment BNR FITNESS

DON'T Worry About How Much Weight Is on the Bar

DON’T Worry About How Much Weight Is On The Bar What I’m about to reveal may seem simple, but it’s brutally effective for building slabs of new muscle. Yet almost no one is using it because of two things… It requires you to drastically reduce the amount of time between sets during the workout and… it hurts! The method I’m talking about is called Max-Density. And if you truly want to grow, you’re going to have to get over your ego and “man up.” Too many guys want to build their muscles but train with their ego. Using proper hypertrophy training means LESS REST and MORE WORK; the exact opposite of what most meatheads are doing when they’re chatting about some chick’s Instagram photos and resting five minutes between slinging weights with everything OTHER than the muscle they’re trying to work. Quite simply, Max-Density requires you to do the same “volume” of work — sets and reps — in a fraction of the time. Bottom line… MORE work, LESS time. THAT is how adaptations happen. NOT trying to add an extra ¼ rep to your full body bicep curls. How does it build more muscle? First of all, you’re not leaving your muscles adequate time to recover. That means your body will figure out a way to recruit MORE motor neurons and muscle fibers to get the job done. You’re also making sure all those potentially anabolic signalling hormones stick around and accumulate in the muscle as opposed to letting them flow out after each set. Turns out many muscle fibers stay dormant because you never give them a good reason to wake up! Recruiting new “dormant” muscle fibers means exploding new growth of your slow-to-grow muscles -- 30-40% NEW GROWTH. Next, density training massively improves your muscular endurance and cardiovascular conditioning. That means fantastic pumps, and that kind of “cell swelling” is directly correlated with a growth stimulus that is now known to drive muscle building. Improved conditioning and metabolic stress of high density training means your muscles will become superstars at the efficient use of nutrients (aka insulin sensitivity). In other words, they will gobble up everything you stuff in your face, which means more muscle and zero-to-no fat storage. In fact, this type of training drives up mitochondrial function and often forces your muscles to tap into your fat stores to fuel recovery in the hours and days after each density-style workout. That means you lose fat while building brand new muscle mass!

Using the same Sets & Reps.....STOP

Unless you want to keep getting the same mediocre results, you’re going to have to get out of your comfort zone and switch things up. And one of the fastest ways to ignite massive new growth is to change up the total amount of WORK that you are doing in a workout — Volume. Now, before you start screaming about some lame-ass excuse like overtraining, let me tell you that 99.9% of the guys I’ve worked with aren’t anywhere NEAR the workload that could push them into a state of overtraining, and knowing exactly how long to subject your body to this type of training before you back off is what a great trainer is for. Strategic high volume phases push the boundaries of something called “overreaching,” which is akin to pushing well beyond where you’ve been in the past, before backing off and allowing your body to adapt and grow in response to this new stimulus. Strategically increasing your volume — your total number of sets per day, week, or month — at the right time, and in the right way, is actually one of the fastest ways to create a new growth stimulus. However, doing this wrong can spell disaster. Trying to get strong, building muscle, or losing fat, all have VERY different set and rep requirements. If you start playing with volume before you have a crystal clear goal — your ability to know what biofeedback to look for becomes skewed — you are setting yourself up for stalled progress. And with poor progress comes the vicious cycle of loss of motivation. Sign up with BNR Fitness for 2015 and get proper results!! ONE BODY,ONE LIFETIME, ONE CHANCE

Refresh Your Workout 5 ways!!

Has your exercise routine gotten stale? Boredom with your routine quickly leads to shorter and shorter workouts, and then before you know it you're skipping the gym altogether. While it's common knowledge that the most effective exercise routines aren't routine at all, most of us stumble through the same exercises every time we hit the gym. And then we wonder why our results are lackluster. In order to really see results your routine must continuously change and challenge your muscles in new ways. Here are 5 ways to refresh your existing workout routine in order to see quicker and more dramatic results… Refresh #1: Circuit Training The days of doing single sets of each exercise are over, now it's all about circuit training. Increase your workout intensity by creating a circuit with 4 exercises and moving quickly between each one. Circuits will keep your heart rate up for longer periods at a time and will force your muscles to work double time. Always choose different exercises to be included in your circuit, to really keep up the intensity and the challenge. Also vary the resistance and increase the load at each session. Refresh #2: Go Heavier Most of us grab the same weights each time that we exercise, simply out of habit. Unfortunately this is one habit that is seriously hindering your results. Next time that you reach for a set of dumbbells grab heavier ones. This will force you to do fewer repetitions, and will challenge your muscles with greater intensity. Always use a spotter when using a heavier weight than you're used to. Refresh #3: One Side at a Time Do you find yourself doing presses, curls, raises and squats with both arms/legs at the same time? Increase the challenge and focus by singling out each arm and leg alone. Focus all of your effort and concentration on that single movement and be sure to increase the weight as you're able. Have you tried single legged squats lately? The act of using one leg forces all of your core stabilizing muscles to pitch in. Start without any weight at all, simply focus on your form and range of motion. You'll be surprised how sore you feel the next day! Refresh #4: Pump Up Music Do you have a personal exercise playlist? This is a quick way to instantly add some pep to your workout. Spend time selecting each song to add to the playlist. These songs should be ones that get your toes tapping and get you in the mood to move. Songs with a strong beat are always a good choice. Make your playlist long enough to cover your entire workout time. It's great to have fun, upbeat songs without any repeats. Unless you have a specific song that really gets you going – in that case play it on repeat! Refresh #5: Know Yourself Are you highly competitive? Then the best way to push yourself during your next workout is to exercise with someone who is in a little better shape than you. You'll spend the workout pushing yourself to new heights. Are you happiest in nature? Then move your workout to the great outdoors. Find a new and challenging outdoor activity to immerse yourself in. Are you a social person? Then structure your workouts around a group of likeminded, fit individuals. Don't try to go at it alone. Tap into that unique part of yourself that make you tick and cater your workout time in a way that best suits your needs. You'll be happier with your results and you'll be more likely to stick with it for a longer period of time. Use these quick and effective workout refreshers in your routine to instantly see improved results. Don't forget to change things up often, and to always keep your muscles guessing. If designing and redesigning your workouts doesn't sound like something you want to spend time figuring out, don't sweat it, let me do the work for you. My programs are specially designed to blast fat and to build muscle in all the right places. And you'll never get bored or do the same routine twice when you're working out with me! Call or email me today to get started on a fat loss program that really works. Bnrfitness@mail.com

How To Build more Muscle with BNR Fitness!!

Before you lift heavy, you have to understand something... As the muscle you're trying to build gets tired, your body will do everything in its power to shift tension AWAY from there to "protect" it. Ever notice that when you lift really heavy you seldom feel it in the right place? You'll always feel it better when the weight is lighter... right? Yup! Weak muscles stay weak, big muscles get bigger. That's just a fact of nature... Unless you learn to take control!... Listen, the ONLY reason for a lagging bodypart is a failure to put enough TENSION into the muscle over the complete RANGE OF MOTION of the muscle. Period... Until you learn to properly activate the muscle in the most scientifically optimal way, you will never pack on the kind of mass you desire and deserve... No matter how much weight you put on the bar! Now, if you're not building the legs you want... email me and discover how to place tension precisely where you need it to build a massive set of wheels...