When to eat

It's pretty usual to find plenty of information on what to eat and how much to eat. These topics have been covered to death in magazines and website.  But the final piece of the diet puzzle is: When to eat.

While this isn't quite as important as learning to eat the right amount of good food, it can be the difference between a good physique and an outstanding one. There are a few times during the day that your body needs nutrients more than usual. The first is when you wake up and have breakfast.  It's called breakfast for a reason. You're breaking the fast you've been on for a little while.  Make sure you eat a decent meal as soon as possible when you wake up.  This kickstarts your metabolism and gives it
the nutrients it needs.

Something else you should know is that when you go without food for long enough, your body starts to eat itself in order to survive.
This is because the lack of nutrition causes their bodies to break down muscle and use it as energy, in order to keep the people alive.

The other two times you need to desperately ensure your body is fueled up is before and after your workout.

A workout is pretty stressful on the body. When you work out, you're putting microscopic tears in the muscles and so they need building blocks to put everything back together.  This is where food comes in. If you workout and your body is fueled with the correct amounts and types of food, then your body is able
to repair it stronger than ever, which means muscle growth.

If, on the other hand, there is no food there, then it's a bit like trying to build a house without any bricks.  So, about an hour before every workout, make sure you have a meal that contains plenty of protein and also some low GI carbs.  After a workout, your body is screaming out for more nutrients, so
you will want to make sure you give it to it. A large serving of protein and some high GI carbs here is what the doctor ordered.

The protein will help repair your muscles. They're like the bricks in a house. The high GI carbohydrate will give you an insulin spike, which acts like a transport system for the protein, making sure that the protein gets to where it's supposed to go.
Take your protein shake down after a workout.Within 15 minutes after you have finished is optimal. Any
longer and you risk not gaining the amount of muscle that you could.

 That's diet out the way. Seriously, diet is the most common area for people to mess up. So now you should understand the basics of how a muscle building diet should look, you should also be able to ask yourself "Am I doing everything I can in order to eat right, so that my body must build muscle?".