Wednesday, April 6, 2011

A PowerFuel recovery dictates your athletic performance

How you “powerfuel” your body post workout is more important than your training for achieving improvements in your athletic performance. Those athletes that fail to focus on post workout nutrition are effectively negating the impact of their prior training session on muscle protein resynthesis – necessary for the body’s ability to recover, repair and regenerate muscle cells to meet a tougher training stimulus for maintenance and improvement of performance.

Here are the latest recovery tips to help you succeed with your training:

1. Leucine appears to be a key amino acid for flicking on the switch for muscle protein synthesis to start.

2. The best sources of leucine come from animal sources, in particular, whey protein which is found in dairy products such as milk and yogurt.

3. Muscle protein synthesis is maximized with approximately 20 grams of high quality, leucine rich protein immediately post workout. Aging athletes (60 yrs+) will need slightly more protein post workout.

4. Leucine rich choices need to be integrated into snacks and meals repeatedly as part of snacks and meals throughout the next 24 hour period.

5. Overall energy intake needs to be sufficient or else muscle mass will be lost despite the higher protein intakes.

PowerFuelTM GOAL: To integrate in some leucine rich food choices at ALL snacks and meals. See the table below to get started.