it's best to cycle creatine,
4-5 weeks on, then off....
4-5 weeks on, then off....
Help me build a balanced vegetarian diet
- Thread starter Patriarch
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What I suggested is just protein powder not creatine. If you are a vegetarian there is no way around it you're going to have to take supplements if you want to bulk up.
What kind of supplements? In my experience, besides protein powder (which should only be used as a real supplement.. not a staple) and a multivitamin, you don't actually need them. I gained almost 15 pounds of muscle in 9 months with a purely vegetarian diet and lifting only 3 times a week, and I didn't even take the powder every day. I also didn't eat any soy products of any kind, and took no creatine or other supplements.
IMO, the problem with being a vegetarian is that most people don't know how to do it properly. I recommend talking to generational vegetarians (people who come from vegetarian families) if you know any, because they know how to do it much better and in a more balanced way. Generally, though, I know more than one bodybuilder/martial artist/etc. who went vegetarian and suffered no losses or weakness in their performance.
Just to save time, I found a vid by this corny white, bodybuilder dude who actually drops a lot of the relevant info- what he says is accurate:
A shortlist of good protein sources: all dairy, eggs (just whites if you want to keep it super clean,) brown bread, whole wheat pasta, brown rice, quinoa, spinach (believe it or not,) lentils (the kind you find in Indian food, especially, if you know what I'm talking about,) other starchy beans, all kinds of nuts and seeds (go for almond instead of peanut butter if you can,)
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Yea you can do it without protein powder if you feel like eating 10 lbs of food a day. No matter what your diet restrictions are it all breaks down to the numbers if you want to get big. 1 gram of protein per lb of body weight. So you want to get that from eggs fine, 1 egg is 3 grams of protein (whites only). So a 180 lb dude would have to eat 60 eggs in a day.
Yea fukk that I'd rather take a few scoops of protein powder along with some food with protein. But you do whatever you feel, I already gave my advice.
Yea fukk that I'd rather take a few scoops of protein powder along with some food with protein. But you do whatever you feel, I already gave my advice.
Yeah, 1 lb of protein per lb of muscle (not full bodyweight, imo,) is optimal, so I agree there. I also don't disagree that protein powder is efficient. Like I said, I use it myself. I just think you're overstating the case in terms of its necessity.
Assuming you're eating 5 meals a day (which is what I do, so I'll use it as an example,) even if you're using powder, you shouldn't/don't need to use it more than once (additionally, especially if it's whey, more than 2 scoops is going to be absorbed too quickly because of the specific kind of protein, meaning even if your body could use it for muscle, it won't, and it'll be used for energy/fat instead.) If you're only eating 4 meals a day, then I think your point becomes more valuable.
He's vegetarian, he can't eat meat. And the 1 gram / 1lb ratio is recommended but a lot of people more experienced than both of us so it's not something I made up. A lot of the bigger guys go with a higher ratio. 1.5 and even 2 so a 1:1 ratio isn't even that high. Don't take my word for it, go read some good articles and books.
I know breh. I'm only speaking from experience here. I did what he wants to do for a full year as a vegetarian, after talking to a ton of folks, including nutritionists, and doing a lot of reading on the subject. I'm no expert, you're right about that, but I'm only speaking on it because I went through it.
