Well, I'm a Kinesiology major and I'm learning from my prof who has a doctorate in exercise science and nutrition. My textbook is full of evidence saying what you eat matters more than just eating your calorie requirement.
Very few people eat enough protein sources to keep muscle mass. If you eat too many carbs instead of more protein, your body turns some of those carbs into fat or it becomes empty calories as your body can only store a minimal amount of ATP (energy sources) within your body. Thus the reason why most people gain fat with muscle. If you reduce carb intake and increase proteins (as bodybuilders do) you can minimize the process of requiring to put on fat before turning it into muscle. With slow and very precise eating/exercise plan you can slowly buildup the size and muscle while keeping definition or the lack of a tire tube, lol.
You are never going to gain 100% muscle. No matter what, if you are putting on weight, some of it will be fat. Your body is not perfect. You minimize the gain of fat by eating closer to your caloric maintenance. Also, I really hope you are not saying that you can turn fat into muscle.
Eating Carbs produce ATP moles (bodies main energy source) that come out in the form of instant energy in the forms of glycolysis and phosphate creatine cells. If the energy from carbs is not used within a short period of time it turns into fat or becomes empty calories as I stated above. There's also a limit to the amount of ATP which can be stored in your body as reserves. You might be surprised to learn that protein rich ATP sources retained from eating proteins can remain in storage within the bodies energy systems in higher quantity and be pumped out to your muscles (so to speak) when they're needed.
Reducing fat intake to an absolute minimum daily requirement (about 65 calories for the avg person) along with proper protein in the diet and carbs enough to just get through your workouts and daily activities will result in minimal muscle loss ( if any) and the loss of fat if there's any to burn. It's not a common method for trainers to tell most people because it requires the strictest diet and training regiment. In other words, going out for fast food once in a week can destroy this method. This is an eating perfect method only. No coke, no juice, no beer, no starch and not even a few pretzels. Not even dairy products. Oh and eating food rich in fibre. If you eat lots of fibre you can safely reduce your fat intake.
If you are concerned with athletic/physical performance, why would you ever eat like this? There's absolutely nothing wrong with eating animal fats.
You're right, protein isn't stored in the muscles, but after working out and your muscles are tired your brain asks for more ATP to be produced from protein rich foods to be sent to those muscles. I could go into more science of why protein does matter, but takes a crazy amount of time to learn yourself, let along trying to tell someone else.
Whey protein along with glutamine help repair muscle tissue and amino acids accelerate the process of energy and protein throughout the body by meeting with ATP inside the mitochondria and being transported by the body through the Krebs cycle. I'm guessing you haven't got a clue what I just said and that's why I won't go into further scientific analysis.
I am a first year Kinesiology student, but no, you're right, I don't really know what much of that means.
I'm not obese in the least and in the last four weeks I upped my nutrition to my perfect diet (carb/protein/fat percentages) resulting in the loss of 7 lbs of body-fat, while putting on approx 5 more lbs muscle in the same time-frame.
You just lost every shred credibility by trying to say you lost 7 lbs of body fat and gained 5 lbs of muscle in the same time frame. That's absolutely laughable, since it's literally impossible.
Do I need to provide scientific evidence for that? Two quotes from an extensive review by Hartgens and Kuiper:
Most studies show that bodyweight may increase by 2–5kg as a result of short-term (<10 weeks) AAS use.
The greatest drug-enhanced gains seen in the scientific literature are 7 kg (15.4 lbs) in 6 weeks, or about 2.5 lbs per week.
And yet you're claiming to have lost seven pounds of fat and gained 5 pounds of muscle in the same time period? So you simultaneously lost seven pounds and gained five pounds?
Beside the above being physically impossible, do you actually know how long it takes to naturally gain 5 lbs of lean body mass? An extremely long time.
Losing weight requires a caloric deficit.
Gaining weight requires a caloric surplus.
How can you possibly do both at the same time? How can you not understand that simple law being in Kinesiology?
Just a correction, but it didn't take 7 years to put on the weight and muscle I mentioned - it took about 7/8 months of eating the perfect percentages and working out like crazy. This was five years ago that I did it. So, very minimal change since then. I'm now back on that perfect diet plan. Actually I ate considerably more food prior to this! Eating has NEVER been an issue and usually when others are sitting at the dinner table with white space left on their plates, mine would be overflowing. The difference was that back then I ate a lot more carbs.
And I'm talking about taking protein supplements (in addition) to regular good proteins such as almonds. Wasn't recommending anyone should supplement a meal with these supplements, but they certainly help (in addition) to eating protein rich natural foods. Although you're intaking an awful lot of fat eating those which could explain why you may have had issues with gaining muscles and fat at the same time. Considering how many almonds you'd have to eat instead of a protein shake, I can understand why you might have had issues doing both at the same time. Almonds are great source for reducing bad cholesterol and upping the good cholesterol, but in order to intake 30 g of protein from almonds 2-4 times a day, you'd have to intake a hell of a lot of fat from those almonds, resulting in fat buildup. Eating more protein in your diet and eliminating unnecessary fats would have helped do both at the same time. Less than a handful of almonds a day results in more fat calories than your body needs daily as a minimal requirement. If you're using it to fulfill protein requirements instead of a shake, it's going to result in fat buildup and unneeded calories.
I didn't and don't have any "issues" with fat gain, because I don't desire to look like the recent trend of manorexic Hollywood actors. Do you really think the fat from almonds is bad fat? Almonds are very healthy and I eat a ton of them. I still don't think you realise that you can't gain body weight without gaining fat. Your body fat percentage may remain relatively stable, but you are going to gain fat.
Eating fat does not = gaining fat........ Eating too many calories = getting fat.
Please define unneeded calories for me. That entirely depends on your goals.
To say that what types and percentage of your calorie intake doesn't matter is just not true.
Just take this for example, if you ate 100% of your daily caloric requirement in fatty foods, you'd be a walking blimp in no time and have serious issues with health besides the weight.
If you ate 100% of calories required in only carbs, your insulin lvls would jump through the roof and you'd end up as a blimp once again.
I exaggerated the affects of eating fat and carbs in the above sentences to show that it does matter what calories you put in your body.
Ratios might matter if you're into "getting ripped bro" and training for looks.
I don't really have that problem, since I eat and lift for strength. I don't sit down, count calories and figure out my macro ratio, though.
If you are active and eating a mostly healthy diet, there's no reason for you to be counting ratios.
Again, I will go further into the science of it if you like, but it's very time consuming, lol.
After reading this post, I don't know if you should.
It honestly really worries me that you are in kinesiology and can spit out all that scientific jargon, yet not understand the fundamentals. It doesn't matter who your prof is or what kind of piece of paper they have framed on their wall.
I don't know what your goals are for training, but mine are purely performance based. I eat and train to get bigger and stronger. I have never counted calories, nor will I ever. I eat healthy and I eat a lot. Am I "ripped"? Nope. Am I fat? Nope. But I'll carry a little extra weight if it means I can perform better. It's funny when really skinny guys say they're "ripped". No, lol, you're just malnourished and you're very weak. If I ever want to lose weight, I'll cut out any junk food and eat the exact same foods, except less of them. If I want to gain weight, I will eat the same foods, but more of them. The beauty is that it really is that simple.
My diet mainly consists of oatmeal, yogurt, fish, meat, eggs, almonds, veggies, fruit and, most days, I drink around 2L of homogenized milk. Some days, I'll drink 1L of chocolate milk on top. Donuts, hamburgers, pop, candy and Doritos all make occasional, but rare guest appearances.
At 5'9-10, 210 lbs, I am still small. At 6'1, 195, you are quite skinny.
