Everybody probably knows what the #1 most important meal of the day is. It’s breakfast. That fact has been drilled into us since we were little. It sets your body’s tone and metabolism for the day. Fat loss is virtually impossible with out it.

Problem is a lot of people don’t know about this little fat loss secret I’m about to share with you. What you eat before a workout is one of the most important things you can do during the day for ultimate fat loss. Without a solid pre-workout nutrition regiment your post-workout meal will be a lot less effective.

The questions I get asked the most are "what" and "when" to eat this meal. First off let’s talk about why you need to be eating this meal.

The pre-workout meal ensures that you will have adequate nutrition to make it through your workout. You should concentrate on getting fuel into your body. And the body’s best fuel source is carbohydrates. Most importantly you want to concentrate on complex or fibrous carbs, which are the carbs that give you sustained energy. What you are doing with these carbs is making sure that your glycogen levels (stored carbohydrates) are full, because when you workout your body pulls the carbs out of glycogen storage to be used as energy. So if you your levels are depleted, like when you wake up in the morning, and you skip the pre-workout meal then you have no glycogen to pull out. So the body will resort to pulling lean muscle tissue off your muscles to fuel the workout, which results in less muscle mass, decreased metabolism, and increased fat gain.

You also need to get a lean source of protein. Protein should be consumed with every meal regardless, to keep the protein (amino acid) stores up.

If you workout on an empty stomach your body doesn’t have any energy. You can’t give 100% intensity, and if you do you will most likely feel sick, light-headed, and nauseous. You will reach fatigue a lot quicker also.

When to eat this meal ideally would be at least 60 minutes before hand. And about 60-90 minutes is a good time range. This will give the body enough time to digest the meal and give the body a full dose of energy for the workout. If this is not possible, as in an early morning workout then 20-30 minutes should suffice, but the meal should be a lot lighter. Early morning workouts are ideal for a meal replacement shake, especially if you have trouble eating so early.

Now to the part you probably care, and want to know the most about—what to eat. The best carbohydrate source to eat before a workout would be oatmeal in milk, or some added whey protein if lactose intolerant. It supplies long lasting energy and is a good source of protein when combined with milk. Other things you could consider would be a bowl of cereal, peanut butter sandwich on whole wheat, fruit, vegetables, whole grains, and energy bars. But be careful with the bars, I only really recommend Lara Bars, Luna, Cliff Bars, and Prograde Cravers, other then that it pretty much is just eating a bunch of sugar and chemicals.

Good choices of protein would be whey protein shakes, chicken breast, turkey breast, lean cuts of steak, fish, or meal replacement shakes or bars.

The meal replacement shake I use is Prograde Lean. It’s definitely the best tasting one I’ve found. And the whey protein I use is Buy Bulk Whey. It’s a natural protein, which is good because you can mix it with almost anything and it will maintain its flavor. I add it to yogurt, pancakes, Gatorade, fruit juices, and a lot of different recipes.

Jason Yun, a certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist and Sports Nutritionist, is the owner of Yun Strength and Fitness Systems, LLC and runs Yun Fitness Bootcamps in Columbus, OH and the Metabolism Makeover Nutrition Course. Please visit the website for more information about pre-workout nutrition supplements at:
http://www.Yuntraining.com/lean.html and http://www.Yuntraining.com/whey.html

There is no doubt that protein plays an important role in building muscle mass. In fact, without enough protein in your daily diet, building muscle will be impossible.

Any growth promoting process that occurs in your body requires protein. It is the single most abundant substance in the body, next to water.

It is in every organ in your body. It is essential for blood, hormone, and enzyme production, as well as optimal immune system function.

Protein is required for optimal muscle tissue growth and repair. The more muscle you have, the more protein you require. Resistance training places a huge demand for protein by the body.

If you do not supply your body with enough protein, it will take it from your muscles, which is called catabolism (muscle breakdown). If you go any length of time without eating, your body will attack muscle tissue for its protein requirements.

Your body literally starts to "break itself down" It is a must to supply your body with adequate protein every three to four hours. This ensures your body of maintaining adequate levels.

Protein can be obtained from whole food and from protein supplements. Try to get your protein from whole food sources first.

However, eating whole food sources high in protein every three to four hours can be difficult. This is where the protein supplements like whey protein shakes or meal replacements come in handy.

As far as whole food sources, get your protein from lean sources like chicken, turkey, fish, lean red meats, eggs, milk, soy products, and legumes.

As far as protein supplements, the most effective protein source with the highest biological value (it is utilized most effectively by the body) is whey protein. When purchasing a protein product, stick with a quality company and use a quality whey protein shake or whey and milk-derived meal replacement powder. These will help ensure your body gets its protein requirements.

If you want to speed up fat loss and muscle gains, try replacing one or two of your whole food meals with a protein shake. It’s a quick and easy way to cut out calories while increasing your protein intake.

If you’re serious about building muscle, you need to make sure you’re getting enough protein in your daily diet.

Learn, step by step, how to build muscle mass, lose body fat, and get an amazing physique. Check out trainer Shawn Lebrun’s workout and nutrition program: Get Huge And Shredded

You might be one of the bodybuilders that are training hard but no results are visible or the rate of development is simply low. In this case we might be dealing with a problem that is not given by your bodybuilding routine but your bad eating habits. They can actually keep weight loss unreachable and even building muscles can become very difficult. Let us take a look at these bad nutritional habits you might be having.

Eating Before Bed

If you want to lose weight it is not a great idea to eat before going to bed. Things get even worse if you are eating bad carbohydrates. Sleep does not come with burning many calories so your body might just turn what you just ate into fat. When eating at night you should rely on vegetables and lean proteins. By eating these at dinner you can eliminate being hungry right before going to bed.

Too Many Processed Carbohydrates

This includes breakfast cereals, fruit juices, candies, breads and different other foods that come with higher than average quantities of sugar. If you do not burn the calories coming from them fast you will see that you end up with fat instead of muscles. Do not misinterpret this piece of information and believe that you need to lose carbohydrates from your diet. The best solution is including carbs in your nutrition at breakfast and directly before the workout.

Not Eating Vegetables

A lot of bodybuilders end up forgetting about vegetables. It does not really matter whether you love them or not because leafy greens, broccoli and asparagus are needed in your diet. Vegetables do come with a lot of vitamins and fiber. They are also harder to digest when compared with protein bars, protein shakes and yogurts. Contrary to popular belief, the food that is harder to digest will eventually make you burn more calories when eating it.

Never Skip Breakfast

This is one huge bodybuilding mistake. If you eat a lot at breakfast you will have all day to burn the calories you took in the morning. If you skip breakfast you will only feel hungrier during the day and you will probably overeat before going to bed. Watch the rule mentioned above and you will see that the combination is not good.

Don’t Get Too Hungry

Do not let your body become to hungry before the next meal. You do need to time the meals so that you eat right before getting too hungry. This will keep you from eating more than you need at every single meal.

Eating Frequency

If you do not eat often enough you will notice that the body will not digest food efficiently. Eating often is crucial to a bodybuilder. You will see that most trainer do recommend that you eat once every three hours and 6 meals per day is better than three. Do not misunderstand this and believe that you should eat more. You should ideally split the three daily meals into 6 and all will fall into place much better.

Bulking Up Does Not Mean Eating Everything

A lot of bodybuilders end up making a crucial mistake during bulk up phase. You do not have to eat as much food as possible in order to build up the muscle you want. High Quality foods must always be your goal and eating too much will generate an excess of fat that will not help you out. You might want to consult a specialist trainer or nutritionist if you think that you can not handle the problems that come with what and how much to eat during bulking up.

Bad Nutrition habits are always bad for bodybuilders. Here are 7 bad eating habits from bodybuilders curtesy of the Great Bodies blog.