Pre Contest Sodium

[JonnyO]

Here is an article written by a fellow KingKong. It is very well put together and will give you a very good understanding of sodiums role to us competitive bodybuilders and how to use it to our advantage.

Sodium, I am sure many of you have heard of this troubling mineral. From everything of it being the worst foe leading up to contest to the infamous "sodium loading" which some have tried only to become a water logged buffalo. So what is sodium? Can it be used? Should it be avoided? WEll lets take a look and see.

Sodium is the major extra cellular cat ion that causes balance of water between the intracellular(subQ, Muscle,) and extra cellular(Vascular System) compartments. If you have ever been prepped by an old schooler they probably had you avoid it like the plague. Besides playing a balancing role of the compartments of the body sodium also affects the hormone system aldosterone. Aldosterone is produced when the body senses low sodium levels. Im not gonna get into the whole renin angiotensin system as that is overkill. Basically it goes like this. When your body senses that it doesn't have enough sodium aldosterone levels raise causing the body to recirculation sodium instead of releasing it. And as most of you know where sodium goes WATER goes. So by Decreasing sodium leading up to contest once again people are trying to push and pull at the same time. Think about it the body is trying to retain sodium and what do most people do, HIT A DIURETIC. Then not only do they pull sodium from the vascular space, but also from the muscle, and BOOM they go flat as a pancake. Now many of you have heard about the infamous "Sodium" loading and are curious about what this involves. Unfortunately just like with all concepts people got ahold of this and everyone started using it in an overkill style, ended up watered down, and it has since got a bad rep. First lets look at sodium leading up to contest. As stated in the Contest Water we want the body to be in a “releasing” state therefore if we know that decreased sodium will increase Aldosterone levels which cause the body to recirculation sodium we know that upping sodium will Lower aldosterone levels and cause the body to be constantly ridding the body of sodium. Timed right we can cause the body to release sodium which as stated before water follows. So a general example might be raising sodium levels 7-10 days out from contest then a day before dropping sodium along with water and watching the body naturally kick out both. Now typically a diuretic is used as well and this is where I see the most confusion. You have to realize that most diuretics work by causing acting on the kidneys area of recirculation of sodium blocking its ability to reabsorb and hence causing excretion. As we know WHERE SODIUM GOES SO WATER FOLLOWS. But people get so caught up in getting rid of water they forget that sodium plays a VITAL role in keeping the body full and vascular. So what do you do?? YOU REPLACE LOST SODIUM. Lets look at it like this. You have depleted yourself and its Friday night. Your body looks flat, you have no vascularity, so what do you do? Most people will say to hit some grape juice or carbs right before a show to get the vascularity going and often times they get so caught up in trying to get that vascularity back they had two weeks ago they take in to many simple carbs. The problem is that lost vascularity is NOT A CARB ISSUE but rather a sodium issue. Think about it what causes vascularity,,, INCREASED BLOOD PRESSURE. Do carbs do this,, NO,, does salt,, YES. So the first thing that comes to mind is ADD SALT back into your diet. Now many people freak out over this cause they have been taught that sodium is bad, but what has been the constant theme throughout all this?? Sodium causes water to follow. So if your depleted of water YOU WON”T HAVE A PROBLEM. In fact I have had people the day of the show eating PIZZA, BACON, SAUSAGE, and other salty foods the morning of the contest and even back stage. One guy I had do this said that everyone was freaking out that he had half a pizza back stage eating it,, besides the fact that everyone else was looking at their Rice cakes and Jam LOL. I also have people take in about a tablespoon of pure salt before stage. Yea its nasty but it causes the blood pressure to sky rocket and the veins to POP out. Granted this is not a method to where you just go in and go gun ho on your salt. You have to feel it out. As with all of these methods the key to getting the results is being as lean as possible as well as trying a test run before hand. IT definitely takes some practice as well as knowing your body, but I will guarantee it works way better than relying on carbs to get your vascularity out. Anyway,, there is a lot more depth to this topic but I thought I would get the basics in for those interested.

[bigdaddydrew123]

i always do a macdonalds shit load fri night then bkfst at macdonalds hotcakes sausage and hash browns,fills you out lots of fat sodium and carbs,like said your so depleted almost impossible to spill over,not to mention you feel great the day of the show

[bigtavi8]

interesting read about sodium..Ill tell ya one thing about sodium i noticed after my competition. I depleted sodium for my show although not to crazy and my coach warns me DONT GO OUT AND EAT MCDONALDS or else the sodium will get to you. Me being the smart person i am i figured **** i worked really hard im going to get wendys baconator....WOWOW what a bad mistake my feet swelled up the next morning like balloons just like she sed and it hurt to put my shoes on..lollol...

[Praetorian]

There were some intense discussion on this over at IM. Most guys now go with somewhat less drastic plan. Sodium should be relatively high during your entire contest prep. When you lower carb intake you will flush water much more frequently hence electrolytes. Thus adequate sodium intake is necessary. If this is done consistently through the diet you will not retain any water and be very hard come a few weeks out. All that is necessary is to lower sodium slightly on the friday 24hours out. You can still eat foods with naturally occuring sodium ie eggs. Remember you need sodium to carb up effectively as well. Sodium can be added back into the diet Saturday morning as you are already dry.
P

[natenator]

There were some intense discussion on this over at IM. Most guys now go with somewhat less drastic plan. Sodium should be relatively high during your entire contest prep. When you lower carb intake you will flush water much more frequently hence electrolytes. Thus adequate sodium intake is necessary. If this is done consistently through the diet you will not retain any water and be very hard come a few weeks out. All that is necessary is to lower sodium slightly on the friday 24hours out. You can still eat foods with naturally occuring sodium ie eggs. Remember you need sodium to carb up effectively as well. Sodium can be added back into the diet Saturday morning as you are already dry.
P

Curious as to how sodium much one (me on your plan) should be taking in? I don't measure it but try to be fairly liberal with the salt, hot sauce on eggs and dijom on my fish meals.

[Praetorian]

Liberal is about perfect.
P

[Andre Gregoire]

Good thread, I read those discussions on IM and learned a ton. Between Skip, Justin Harris and Zilla it's a gold mine.

[steve_d]

I agree with a lot of this...but the big question I have is this:

what is the difference if you have vascularity comparable to a couple weeks ago...Veins don't win shows. If sodium helps carb up properly, then for sure, add a little sodium once your dry. But I wouldn't go overboard trying to get veins to come out. I've never really had any salt in my diet friday and saturday before a show. I've always felt as though i've carbed up properly. This time I will try a little sodium - so hopefully that helps even a bit more.

[Andre Gregoire]

Justin Harris made it a point to say that even if you cut sodium out 2 days before a show your body still contains tons of sodium so that is more then enough to carb up. He believes in having lots of sodium during prep and low sodium the last 48hrs I believe.

The average human has like 50g of sodium in their extracellular fluid so even if you cut salt you will probably be able to carbup properly with your bodies sodium stores.

I just don't like the fact that cutting salt sends a signal to your body to increase aldosterone which eventually makes you retain sodium and water, that's why I like to keep my sodium the same all the way through.

I still cut water 20hrs before prejudging though and most guys seem to do something similar but Layne Norton doesn't touch sodium/pottassium or water and his guys always look great.

There are lots of ways to peak and people get excellent results using many different techniques. I think the most important thing is to be lean enough and to test your peaking strategy beforehand.

[ironwill]

That article is pretty much bang on........Great read, thanks JO....