Recovery Strategies to Maximise Your Muscle Development and Fat Loss

Today we will discuss an area that is often overlooked in the quest to look lean, muscular and ripped. Everything is usually focussed around your workouts, however the most important aspect of any plan to get ripped and build significant amounts of muscle is to get adequate rest and recovery.

Optimum recovery from your workouts is absolutely essential if you are to gain results. Your nutrition doesn’t have to be super strict during this period, but the more regimented and specific you are with your nutrition is only going to help you get results quicker.

Just following a few simple recovery guidelines can help you not only promote muscle growth, but a more improved immune system function and increased metabolism leading to quicker calorie burning and rapid fat loss.

Remember that we only really grow stronger through adequate rest, so take the time to recline and factor in those occasional moments when you can allow yourself a cheat meal or a glass or two of wine.

Friday evening is my time when I allow myself to really relax with a few beers or a glass or three of red wine and a little of what I shouldn’t usually eat.

AND – This usually triggers my body to become even leaner

Also getting plenty of high quality sleep is vital for growth and development. It’s funny but we actually get leaner as we sleep, but our body will crave a good protein based breakfast when we wake.

This will kick start our metabolism for the day. When I’m going for a super-lean look I will perform my 4 minute metabolism raiser before eating breakfast (usually in the form of a vanilla protein shake, with a banana and oatmeal blended in….great).

Try to get at least 7 hours sleep but no longer than 8 hours which can leave you drowsy and sluggish all day.

Tips to Maximise Muscle Building and Fat Loss

After your workout always have a 60% carbohydrate 40% protein drink within 15 minutes of finishing – you need to replenish your muscles immediately after exercise, if you miss this meal your body will break down vital protein (muscle) stores which will only decrease your metabolism, making the session you’ve just done pretty much pointless.

One of the key secrets to muscle growth and fat burning is to replenish your body with protein. Protein is broken down into amino acids for use. The secret here is that your muscles will be craving these amino acids such as L-Glutamine which is easily depleted but is responsible for optimum anabolic hormone secretion.

When you take on protein immediately after your workout it is also very cleverly directed to the muscles that need it most, replenishing them faster for removal of waste products, more growth and recovery.

Maximising muscle gains and fat loss is achieved much easier through this immediate replenishment process.

The protein shake restores lost Branched Chain Amino Acids (BCAA’s)which also boost our immune system and maximise our muscle metabolism quickly to burn more fat.

 ‘Remember that lost muscle results in a reduction in your overall body metabolism and an impaired ability to burn fat.’

Try to get at least 7 hours of quality sleep per night but no more than 9 hours. This is vital.

Finally that little hardgainer secret I mentioned at the start.

Many hardgainers struggle to build muscle because they don’t digest all the food they eat. It is very hard to load with the quantities of food you are supposed to significantly build muscle. So here’s a little secret I have used to get private clients building huge slabs of muscle in record time.

The secret is not only to eat high quality sources of lean, high biological value protein alongside fibrous sources of carbohydrate, but you need to eat them in small quantities and quite often e.g. every 2-3 hours.

But (and here’s the bit I’m eventually getting to guys!) the key for most hardgainers is to be able to digest every bit of food you eat to stimulate increased levels of muscle growth, so I recommend the you take a digestive enzyme with every meal to ensure that all foods are broken down into their constituent components ready to build muscle.

I’ve seen great results simply from making sure adequate BCAA’s are delivered in your post workout shake, alongside a digestive enzyme taken after every main meal.