1. Does your protein powder disolve well? My protein powder( chocolate Wheys) dosent seem to disove into what ever i put it in. The only thing it does seem to work in though is oatmeal. Milk dosent work well for some reason either, even when i heat it up to drink it as hot chocolate.

2. The six meals a day way of eating; could this actualy help a teenager, like myself, grow beter, or would the nutrients that i consume be the factor that most likely contributes to my growth?

Sorry about asking two completly diferent questions. I didnt want to take up two diferent forums for two easily answered questions. Thanks for all who reply

Thank God, you have common sense.


1.) Try using a ****tail shaker. I use my parents', and it mixes it VERY well...no chunks or anything at all.

2.) The nutritional quality of what we eat or what is much more important than how frequently we eat. But still, eating frequent meals is important.

Calorie is king. To grow eat more than your body needs to live. Whether this occurs in 3 meals or 10 is pretty irrelevant.

Larger meals expand your stomach and increase the upward pressure against the esophageal sphincter. Having a very full stomach can make it hard for the lower esophageal (sp?) sphincter to stay closed....thus, eating less each meal or smaller, more frequent meals can help lower the risk of acid reflux associated with mealtimes.

Also, some study (forgot which one) was done that proved that six or more meals/snacks each day had beneficial total and LDL-cholesterol (“bad” cholesterol) lowering benefits when compared to those that consumed two or fewer meals each day.

The body is better able to metabolize the foods you eat in small increments versus large ones, resulting in successful weight loss and cholesterol levels.

The body also adapts to this in less than a 7 day interval.

Also ignoring the empirical examples, of which there are many, where this is a non-issue.

Throwing out studies is nice and all, but empirical evidence will trump it every time.

Irrelevant point to the discussion of gaining weight.

Also just since I'll bite, did the study control for overall calorie intake and food quality? How about change in diet from pre-study vs. during?

References?

there are more studies that prove how many meals a day you eat is irrelivant its your total calorie intake thats important.

Effect of the pattern of food intake on human energy metabolism.

Verboeket-van de Venne WP, Westerterp KR, Kester AD.

Department of Human Biology, University of Limburg, Maastricht, The Netherlands.

The pattern of food intake can affect the regulation of body weight and lipogenesis. We studied the effect of meal frequency on human energy expenditure (EE) and its components. During 1 week ten male adults (age 25-61 years, body mass index 20.7-30.4 kg/m2) were fed to energy balance at two meals/d (gorging pattern) and during another week at seven meals/d (nibbling pattern). For the first 6 d of each week the food was provided at home, followed by a 36 h stay in a respiration chamber. O2 consumption and CO2 production (and hence EE) were calculated over 24 h. EE in free-living conditions was measured over the 2 weeks with doubly-labelled water (average daily metabolic rate, ADMR). The three major components of ADMR are basal metabolic rate (BMR), diet-induced thermogenesis (DIT) and EE for physical activity (ACT). There was no significant effect of meal frequency on 24 h EE or ADMR. Furthermore, BMR and ACT did not differ between the two patterns. DIT was significantly elevated in the gorging pattern, but this effect was neutralized by correction for the relevant time interval. With the method used for determination of DIT no significant effect of meal frequency on the contribution of DIT to ADMR could be demonstrated.


And another:

Br J Nutr. 1997 Apr;77 Suppl 1:S57-70. Links
Meal frequency and energy balance.

* Bellisle F,
* McDevitt R,
* Prentice AM.

INSERM U341, Hotel Dieu de Paris, France.

Several epidemiological studies have observed an inverse relationship between people's habitual frequency of eating and body weight, leading to the suggestion that a 'nibbling' meal pattern may help in the avoidance of obesity. A review of all pertinent studies shows that, although many fail to find any significant relationship, the relationship is consistently inverse in those that do observe a relationship. However, this finding is highly vulnerable to the probable confounding effects of post hoc changes in dietary patterns as a consequence of weight gain and to dietary under-reporting which undoubtedly invalidates some of the studies. We conclude that the epidemiological evidence is at best very weak, and almost certainly represents an artefact. A detailed review of the possible mechanistic explanations for a metabolic advantage of nibbling meal patterns failed to reveal significant benefits in respect of energy expenditure. Although some short-term studies suggest that the thermic effect of feeding is higher when an isoenergetic test load is divided into multiple small meals, other studies refute this, and most are neutral. More importantly, studies using whole-body calorimetry and doubly-labelled water to assess total 24 h energy expenditure find no difference between nibbling and gorging. Finally, with the exception of a single study, there is no evidence that weight loss on hypoenergetic regimens is altered by meal frequency. We conclude that any effects of meal pattern on the regulation of body weight are likely to be mediated through effects on the food intake side of the energy balance equation













Status: online To a group of 8 healthy persons a slightly hypocaloric diet with protein (13% of energy), carbohydrates (46% of energy) and fat (41% of energy) was given as one meal or as five meals in a change-over trial. Each person was 2 weeks on each regimen. Under the conditions of slight undernutrition and neutral temperature the balances of nitrogen, carbon and energy were assessed in 7-day collection periods, and according to 48-hour measurements of gaseous exchange (carbon-nitrogen balance method) by the procedures of indirect calorimetry. Changes of body weight were statistically not significant. At isocaloric supply of metabolizable energy with exactly the same foods in different meal frequencies no differences were found in the retention of carbon and energy. Urinary nitrogen excretion was slightly greater with a single daily meal, indicating influences on protein metabolism. The protein-derived energy was compensated by a decrease in the fat oxidation. The heat production calculated by indirect calorimetry was not significantly different with either meal frequency. Water, sodium and potassium balances were not different. The plasma concentrations of cholesterol and uric acid were not influenced by meal frequency, glucose and triglycerides showed typical behaviour depending on the time interval to the last meal. The results demonstrate that the meal frequency did not influence the energy balance.


Meal frequency influences circulating hormone levels but not lipogenesis rates in humans.

Jones PJ, Namchuk GL, Pederson RA.

Division of Human Nutrition, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.

To determine whether human lipogenesis is influenced by the frequency of meal consumption, 12 subjects were divided into two groups and fed isocaloric nutritionally adequate liquid diets over 3 days, either as three larger diurnal (n = 6) or as six small, evenly spaced (n = 6) meals per day. On day 2 (08:00 h) of each diet period, 0.7 g deuterium (D) oxide/kg body water was administered and blood was collected every 4 hours over 48 hours for measurement of plasma insulin and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) levels. At each time point, the incorporation of D into plasma triglyceride fatty acid (TG-FA) was also determined by isotope ratio mass spectrometry after TG-FA extraction and combustion/reduction. Insulin and GIP levels were elevated over daytime periods in subjects fed three versus six meals per day. Contribution of de novo synthesis to total TG-FA production was not significantly different for days 2 and 3 in subjects consuming three (6.56% +/- 1.32% and 6.64% +/- 2.08%, respectively) and six (7.67% +/- 2.29% and 7.88% +/- 1.46%, respectively) meals per day. Net TG-FA synthesis rates over days 2 and 3 were 1.47 +/- 0.33 and 1.55 +/- 0.53 g/d, respectively, for subjects fed three meals per day, and 1.64 +/- 0.47 and 1.69 +/- 0.30 g/d for subjects fed six meals per day. These findings suggest that consuming fewer but larger daily meals is not accompanied by increases in TG-FA synthesis, despite the observation of hormonal peaks.

1. yes, mine dissolve well, but I've bought my share of brands that didn't dissolve well. I'm a fan of Nitrean, and ON protein dissolves well too.

2. I doubt the difference would matter, but you'd definitely have more consistent energy levels by eating more often, because the bloodsugar levels wont' bottom out like they do on '3 meals a day'.

agreed...

I have recently been eating 3 meals a day because of the current schedule i've been on, and i have definitely noticed a drop in my energy levels. come 10:30am and 3:30pm, I'm feeling pretty drained.

I find I generally feel better when i eat 6 small meals. I cannot say whether or not it has helped me burn fat or gain muscle, but i am more energetic, which means a harder workout, faster run, etc...

That's a good point.
It's important to pay attention to how your body reacts to a program. If you feel better, you work harder, which turns into better results.

I should also add, I find it easier to eat healthy on 6 meals, because whole, unprocessed foods are less calorie dense, so you gotta eat more of them to get your needed calories.

this is why 'clean bulking' can be so difficult...its hard to pack down that much food.

Thx for the replys, I will try somthing like a **** tail shacker like somone metioned up above. I have noticed eating six meals a day vs. three meals a day is much more satisfying. I droped body fat % to my goal level, and i have noticed that my workouts are more productive and im geting better results due to eating more protein. Thanks to all the help yall have offered to me on this site. You guys will probably hear a lot more questions from me in the future.