several questions - plz answer

[tsungwei]

hi i'm gotten pretty serious about bodybuilding lately and i have a few questions.

1. is it necessary to drink a lot of water as a bodybuilder? or is it ok if i just drink milk? i'm constantly drinking so many fluids that i'm almost always bloated. a gallon of milk a day on top of half a gallon of milk is quite a bit for me.

2. i've recently purchased a supplement called microlactin, the main ingredient in ETS. i've heard good things about it. will taking microlactin + zinc + magnesium give me the same effects as taking ETS?

3. whenever i work out, i like to do big lifts first. for ex. shoulders i will usually do barbell press, dumbell press, then arnold press, then upright rows, then side laterals. If i do the smaller lifts first, my presses suffer. I know it's good to mix up your routine, but how crucial is it?

4. i'm 6'3 , 193 lbs, trying to bulk to about 215 by the end of summer. how many calories should i be eating a day?

5. how beneficla are forced reps to growing? whenever i do forced reps.. i think they are forced reps ( when i have a spotter help me with 3 or so reps after failure) i feel the burn a lot more, i feel my muscles take a beating.

6. how benefical are negatives to growing? negatives as in say when you lower the weight from bench press very slowly. do you guys do negatives?

7. does protein go bad when its left mixed too long? what i like to do is make about 1/2 a gallon of protein shake and just sip on it at random times in the day. is this ok?

8. are there optimal times to be taking vitamins such as the vitamins im taking now ..
fish oil , salmon oil, multivitamin, potassium, C, B , zinc, magnesium , microlactin.

9. how effective is taking dextrose after working out? is regular table sugar ok?


thank you if you've answered my questions.

[CarlP]

4: Go to www.fitday.com Find out how many calories you usually eat per day. Add or subtract a couple hundred each day until you find out how many calories lets you gain a pound or two per week.
5 & 6: They can be helpful if you don't overuse them
7: Mixing a day's worth up at once is fine. Just shake it some more if it needs it.
8: Taking a multivitamin once a day is probably fine.

[CanadianBad]

1) If you reallly drink that much milk you will put on mass fast, I mean milk is high protien and moderatly low cals/carbs, but it is mesured in cups. If you drink a gallon of milk a day (4L) Your looking at roughly 1000 cals, 40g fat, 72g prot, 96 carbs. If you eat even in moderation around this you will put on mass fast. Just thought Id mention that.

I had this problem with milk drinkin 2L a day trying to cut, since Ive lost it im down 10lbs in 4 weeks... Still eating the same... THink about it...

[tsungwei]

another question i have is... how much is wasted with whey protein?

like say i'm taking it in the middle of the day.

approximately waht % of the protein will get absorbed, and what % will just pass through your body?

lets say i ate food, chicken. what % will get absorbed and what % will pass throught your body..

for comparison..

thanks

[wrestlemaniac]

1.
your body needs water. Also milk has a lot of sugar in it so I'd find an alternate but thats just me.

2.
not to big on sups personally (all I really take is whey), gunna have to get an answer off one of the other boys.

3.
errm... it depends. Shoulders most people would say thats the right way to do it (not me personally, I do my lateral/front raises first to pre-exhaust the delts and warm up the joint for the heavy lifting, but most people wouldn't agree with this way). Yeah, on chest day a lot of people would say you should pre-exhaust then do the heavy lifting. Really, what it comes down to is if you're making gains or not so you tell us if it's a good idea.

4.
errm.... well, how many do you eat now? have you counted calories before? If not take a week to keep track of everything you eat and your weight and figure out how many you need to maintain then add untill you grow. Just start keeping track of everything you eat starting today and you'll figure it out from there. Go to www.fitday.com and sign up. It'll help a lot. I have it as my homepage so that anytime I go to do something on the internet I'm reminded to update what I've eaten (helps me cuz I'm a complete ADD unorganized SOB).

5.
Depends who you ask. If I were you I'd throw them out. They're a tool and when they're used right they can help but you sound like you may be over using them a tad. Although I can't say from personal experience, too many forced reps seems like the perfect recipe for overtraining.

6.
erm... see 5. They have more benifit IMO and probably are at a lower risk of causing you to overtrain but still you should know how to use them.

7.
I don't think it can "go bad". I know if my shake is sitting around for too long though you'll see some stuff sink to the bottom but all you have to do is shake it to fix that. It should be fine

8. I wouldn't take them all together. I take a multi in the morning then a B complex later in the day because I was getting too much B from my multi in the morning and none at night. You can tell you're getting too much B because it turns your urin a bright colour. Also, I find the time released ones are a lot better than just regular ones.

9.
How effective? Depends on who you ask (some say you NEED it, others say your body isn't as depleted as you think after a work out). Is it better than table sugar? Yes, they work differently in the body. So yeah, PWO Dex > White Sugar.

I hope I was helpfull, if I'm wrong on anything I'm sure someone will be here to correct me quickly.