How to Build Muscle

Now that you have hopefully made your S.M.A.R.T goal you have probably come to one of two conclusions. Do you want to lose weight or do you want to gain weight/muscle mass.
Today i will be catering to the people who are looking to build muscle but I will also be doing a post by the end of the week for those people looking to lose weight

Building Muscle Mass

The first step in this process is going to be to learn some of the basics of your body and nutrition. In order to gain weight your body needs to be in a caloric surplus (meaning you need to take in more calories then you burn in a day) Next you need to understand that you need to eat approximately 200 extra calories a day to gain weight. Third but most important is you have to still eat healthy!!!
Start by determining your daily caloric in take which I will put a link for the government of Canada's suggested intake.
( http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/food-guide-aliment/basics-base/1_1_1-eng.php )

Once you have figured that out you should know approximately how many calories you need to consume. this can be monitored by tracking your macro-nutrients which are fats, protein, and carbohydrates. 1 gram of fat is 9 calories, proteins and carbohydrates are both 4 calories per 1 gram. An easy way to make up your diet would be the 40,40,20 rule which means 40% of your diet should come from carbs, 40% should come from protein and 20% should come from fat. A useful tool to track all of this and give you good estimates is and app/website called ( http://www.myfitnesspal.com/ )

Here is an example for a person that needs to consume 2000 calories a day
2000*.4=800 calories of carbohydrates, which would also mean 800 calories should come from protein while only 400 calories should come from healthy fats. 2000*.2=400

These are just basics and you should understand everybody's body is different and these are just some simple guidelines to help get you started. The number one thing to do is to track your progress and record everything after a month reevaluate your body and how its changed. This will allow you to make the necessary changes to your diet and continue to progress without plateauing.

I hope these tips have been helpful and good luck to all of you, there is no secrets or quick way to doing this it's about hard-work, dedication and self-motivation and in the end it will all be worth it if you don't cheat yourself!

Starting a Fitness Plan

Many people are beginning to take a step towards a healthier lifestyle this new year. In my opinion the first step should be to make a s.m.a.r.t goal. A smart goal has 5 components to it. These components  consist of specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely.

Specific: make a goal with a specific outcome. It must be as detailed as possible, no vagueness.

Measurable: you must be able to measure the goal you have set. An example would be to lose a pound a week for ten weeks.

Attainable: the goal should be attainable meaning you need to do a self analysis and see what skills or attitudes you have to reach this goal.

Realistic: the goal you have set should be realistic. The goal shouldn't be far fetched and should be a smaller step towards a bigger goal. You want to achieve this goal so start with a small step.

Timely: last but definitely not least is you're goal needs to have a specific time frame or time frames. The time limit should be no longer then one year to start. This will give you a solid foundation for all of your future goals.

Now I'll begin with the first steps to creating a healthy lifestyle plan and what most people are looking to slim down and add muscle.  

The first thing you should do is to get a full body assessment. This should include height, weight, body fat percentage, get a basic understanding of your body type, ie Ectomorph.

Once you have gathers this information create the goal you want to achieve and I will be back next week to help you start an exercise program and give diet tips