Of course, all bodybuilding meal are important. It is recommended that to keep your body in a constant anabolic (growth) state, you need to eat every 3 hours, and always making sure those meals include a fair amount of good quality protein.
But, it’s inevitable, even with good planning… that sometimes, we will miss a meal or two.
There are 2 meals, however, which should never be missed. Those are…
Breakfast
Why this meal should never be missed:
All of the time you are awake, you should be eating every 3 hours so your anabolic state doesn’t drop off. So, you can only imagine that after 7 hours of starvation during sleep is going to have stalled, or even put in reverse, your anabolic state.
For a bodybuilder, going without breakfast and waiting until lunch time some 3, 4 or 5 hours later, is too much. You are missing out on growth and need to get back into anabolism.
For breakfast, plenty of protein is definitely needed, and also some carbs. Also, if you workout in the morning, a big breakfast can double up as a pre-workout meal.
Post workout:
Why this meal should never be missed:
After you’ve broken down your muscles, they then begin seeking energy to repair. Because the muscles can’t take energy from fat to rebuild (the body doesn’t work that way), then all they can do is cannibalize themselves to release energy to repair the damaged parts.
That is why you need to make sure within 1 hour of working out (the sooner the better, in fact) you need to take in a good dose of protein and carbs. Never miss a post-workout meal, because you are going to do more harm to your body than good. If you know you can’t eat this meal for whatever reason, you would simply be better off missing the training session completely.