HEALTH AND FITNESS: Dear Sir,

I’ve been losing my weight and now I’m underweight. I’m planning to gain weight in a healthy way. Some are suggesting me to take protein or mass powder to gain weight. Please advise. 

Sonam

Thimphu

Hi Sonam,

The healthiest way to gain weight is to eat a well-rounded nutrition, which has a variety of foods, backed by an intelligent resistance and cardiovascular training.

Nutrition:

A healthy weight would be building, strengthening and gaining muscle. Bigger and stronger muscle means a more fluid and stronger moving body.

The more pain free and fluid your movement is, the more willing you will be to lead an active life.

Without a sound nutrition, you will barely scratch the surface of your true potential for health, wellness and performance.

It is not mandatory that one must consume, a protein or weight-gaining supplement.

You want to build the foundation of your nutrition on food, as there is nothing more nutritious and potent than food, only when you have a solid foundation of food should you think of adding in supplements.

Despite their enticing and superhuman claims, supplements are not magic pills, and they do not deliver anything remotely close to what advertisements claim.

I appreciate and endorse supplements as an alternative source of food. It’s convenient to transport, prepare, consume, and offers an endless choice of flavours.

Also as you get bigger in size, it is almost impossible to consume all of your nutrients from food alone. That’s when supplements play a critical part in helping your progress further.

Few guidelines to help you design your nutrition:

1. Make sure almost every meal have some protein (eggs, lean beef, lean chicken), carbohydrate (brown rice/oatmeal), fat (nuts/olive oil/fish oil) and fibre (fruits/vegetable)

2.  Eat a meal every four hours

3.  The closer your food is to its natural form, the more nutritious it is

Weight or resistance training:

It has been proven through countless studies that weight training is the quickest way to put on muscle. Other forms of resistance training can be used such as bands, bodyweight training, kettle bell and strongman lifts, among others.

Cardiovascular exercise:

Intense weight training programme will indirectly benefit the heart and lungs. But it’s not as potent as an intense cardio session done separately. For optimal health, it is very important to include at least a session per week, fully focusing on cardiovascular health only.