Eating frequently throughout the day is a big part of gaining muscle size and strength and a major part of our bodybuilding nutrition program.
A bodybuilding nutrition program should be based around a balanced meal specially designed for muscle building and eaten every 2-3 hours—this puts your body into an anabolic state and increases your fat burning metabolism while steadying your energy levels.
During the regular course of the day, maintaining this bodybuilding nutrition program isn’t that difficult….
But what do you do when you’re asleep at night?
Take into account that you probably consume the last meal of your daily bodybuilding nutrition program about an hour before going to bed... then you sleep for a full night... and eat breakfast about half an hour after you get up…. sleep for 8 hours... and then have our breakfast half an hour after awakening…
You have wasted 9.5 hours of potential muscle building nutrition!
The fact is that if a well-balanced bodybuilding nutrition program made up of top quality, growth-supporting nutrition is something you focus on during the day, you can’t just “put it to sleep” at night.
Our muscles need plenty of protein, carbohydrates, and fats to help them with growth and recuperation… doesn’t it make sense to give it to them during the time period when recovery and growth is at its peak?
Why would you let your body suffer through a starved, catabolic period when it’s easy to continue your bodybuilding nutrition program at night?
Maybe this technique isn’t right for everybody, but if you take in a well-balanced muscle building meal at the halfway point of your long night’s sleep you should notice an increase in your bottom line gains.
It may seem a little ridiculous and over-the-top at first, but if you really consider the approach, you’ll realize that this bodybuilding nutrition program is actually pretty simple to implement.
Firstly, realize that your midnight meal is NOT going to be a regular solid-food meal that you’d eat during the day. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to start pounding back steak and potatoes or a large of meal of chicken and rice here.
This method will probably interfere with your sleep and it’s not a long-term approach that you can maintain as a part of your bodybuilding nutrition program.
Instead, make use of a liquid meal here so that you can consume it quickly and get back to bed.
The best approach is to blend 30-40 grams of whey protein in 1 to 2 cups of skim milk. Other high quality proteins like egg or casein work fine as well. This way you can get a nice shot of slow release protein without disrupting your sleep.
Another thing you can do is add a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil or flaxseed oil. This technique decreases the absorption rate of the protein shake (keeping you anabolic for longer) and also adds essential fatty acids to your meal which are important for recovery and growth.
So, what time should you drink this shake?
If you can wake up halfway through the night then that’s ideal, but anytime you naturally wake up is okay as well. You don’t want to set a clock or anything because this can leave you fatigued the next day and will also mess with your sleeping patterns.
Now, you may question whether or not this middle-of-the-night-protein-shake method should be used in everyone’s bodybuilding nutrition program.
Maybe it isn’t for everyone, but I see no reason to not give it a shot. After tacking this onto my own bodybuilding nutrition program and adding it to certain clients’ programs, I almost always find the effects to be positive.
For most people, waking up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom is pretty common, so taking a quick moment to drink a protein shake is easy.
If you want to boost up your bodybuilding nutrition program, that one shake might be just what you need. You’d be surprised at the difference a few hundred calories can make between maintaining weight and gaining some.
Want to get the most bang-for-your-buck from your bodybuilding nutrition program? Then give this technique a try.
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