The diet you eat every day affects the results from your exercise. You can spend all day in the gym, but without a proper diet, you won't get the results you seek. Muscles are the biggest energy-burning cells in your body. When they don't get sufficient food, they literally begin to break down. Muscle tissue that is worked without sufficient food will break down its own mass to create energy to burn. This is why low-carb (carbohydrate) diets aren't the answer to those hoping to burn fat and build muscle. Results in the gym start in the kitchen, so let's explore some of the best workout supplements to support your gains.

What Macros Contribute to Muscle Gain?

Carbohydrates are the fuel that muscle cells use to do their work. Protein provides the building blocks the body uses to repair damaged muscle and build more muscle. It is important that you time your intake of these nutrients. This timing will give your muscles fuel during exercise and the building blocks to repair themselves and grow afterward.

Preworkout Supplements: What Are The Best Supplements to Take Before Exercise?

It is generally a good idea to eat a small snack consisting of easy-to-digest carbohydrates before the workout. This can be as simple as eating a piece of fruit. 

As for supplements, there are a number of pre-workout supplement powders available. These often contain essential vitamins and minerals, as well as energy-boosting supplements. These pre-workout supplements also contain nutrients that boost your muscle metabolism, and as long as these nutrients are quickly absorbed, they can help increase your energy as you go into your routine.

It is important to warm up for at least 5 minutes prior to any exercise. This can include a light jog, jumping rope, or doing slow jumping jacks. This gives your body the time to increase your heart rate and promote increased blood flow to your muscles. Blood flow to the muscles is extremely important for nutrient delivery and waste removal during your workout.

Intra-Workout Supplements: What Supplements Should I Take During My Workout?

If you exercise for longer than 2 hours, you should include simple carbohydrates (complex sugars). This will prevent your body from breaking down muscle and to rebuild depleted energy reserves. These carbohydrate boosts are often supplemented using an energy gel or bar.

The average person hitting the gym has very little dietary requirement during their workout. It is generally not necessary to eat during a workout unless it goes on longer than 2 hours. The premise is that your pre-workout snack should cover your energy requirements for the first 2 hours. However, adding the above mentioned carb boost during a workout can interfere with weight loss goals. This includes sugary beverages, even if they claim to be "sport drinks". Excess carbohydrates ingested above and beyond that used for activity are stored as fat in the body.

Fluid intake during exercise is also important to prevent dehydration. In general, it is beneficial to simply drink water during a workout to keep fluids balanced; however, with more strenuous activity, a gentle electrolyte solution may help keep electrolyte levels up as well, which can reduce muscle cramping.

Post Workout Supplements: What Supplements Should I Take After My Workout?

The average person exercising to maintain fitness should eat and drink as soon as possible after a workout. This can simply consist of a healthy portion of protein, complex carbohydrates (starches), and fluid such as water. It's often not convenient to prepare a full meal immediately after a workout. One simple way to get the benefits of the meal, without the work, is to supplement with a protein shake or bar. These protein supplements often contain sufficient protein and carbohydrate to replenish what you lost during your workout. With protein powders, you are mixing it with a fluid, which helps replenish fluid balance as well. If you are using this to replace a meal, you can also try a meal replacement powder, which contains essential vitamins and minerals you may have depleted during your workout.

For those training harder for marathons or endurance events, you should be sure to include a much higher amount of carbohydrates and protein. In general, fat should make up 20 - 30% of your daily caloric intake. Healthy fats are important for health, particularly skin, hair and digestive health.

How Can I Reduce DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness)? 

Anyone who has ever done an intense workout is familiar with delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS). DOMS is that feeling you get the next day, or even two days following a workout, where your muscles are stiff, sore, and not as strong as they usually are. This is caused by the microscopic damage that strenuous exercise does to our muscles. An accumulation of tiny muscle tears and the buildup of lactic acid from exercise without sufficient oxygen and blood flow causes local pain. If you are having difficulty performing your normal activities the next day, it is generally a sign that your workout was too intense for your current fitness level. When this occurs, it is a good idea to scale back a bit until your fitness level improves, and then gradually increase your intensity over time.

If you are just trying to avoid the slight stiffness and sore muscles of a challenging workout, there are a few supplements that can help, such as branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) or glutamine powder. Both of these are supplemented prior to a workout to help prevent the problem in the first place.