Nata Shustova: "My physical form is the result of my knowledge"

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Certified nutritionist, sports nutrition specialist
Nata Shustova
in an exclusive interview for Woman Magazine talked about how, at the age of 42, being a mother of many children, to keep herself in excellent physical shape and to be filmed for underwear and swimwear advertisements.

You look great. How do you get in such physical shape after having four children?

Mine physical fitness is the result of my knowledge and clearly structured work on myself. If I succeeded, then everyone who sets a goal and works to realize it will also succeed.

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Your specialty is sports nutritionology. Let’s talk about the role of nutrition in workout performance. What is the most important thing to achieve the result?

You have touched on a very important topic, because many people attribute the lack of good physical shape to the fact that they do not exercise enough, only a few realize that the reason lies in the wrong diet. It is important to clearly understand that people who engage in fitness activities have three main goals in most cases: fat loss, normalization of body composition, and muscle gain/improvement. So, in order to achieve each of these goals, nutrition is the most important prerequisite.

Many people argue that simultaneously reducing body fat and increasing body muscle mass is impossible. Is that really true?

I have good news – maybe! And in most cases, it is for those new to the sport. People who switch from an improper diet to an adequate diet observe almost immediately that muscles become toned and fat gradually goes away. Often, newcomers to fitness say they don’t want to lose weight, but want to maintain their current weight while melting fat into muscle. Of course, purely physically it is impossible: you cannot create muscle tissue from fat tissue. But at the same time, these processes can take place simultaneously: muscles gain tone, fat goes away, body volume decreases. Normalization of body composition occurs. Three factors contribute most to achieving these goals: nutrition, physical activity, and regimen.

And nutrition is a major part of the process to improve health and figure correction?

Yeah, that’s right. If we’re talking about normalizing body composition, then 60% depends on nutrition, 30% on training, and 30% on rest and a proper regimen. about 10%. When gaining mass depends 50% on nutrition, 40% on competent training and 10% on rest. When reducing fat mass, nutrition determines 80%. Therefore, no matter how a person trains, if their nutrition is not in line with their goal, they will never get results. This can be seen in any fitness club and sports center. We see few people with perfect physical shape. All because a person is always able to eat more than they spend. Therefore, it is extremely dangerous to expand your physical activity without adjusting your diet.

Very often we hear horror stories about women starting to work out at the gym and their weight and volume increasing. Why is this happening?

Oh, yes! Women themselves explain it by the fact that the muscles from the gym are immediately poured and the gym is not suitable for them. In reality, no muscle will grow in a beginner’s body in two weeks of training. The reason being. energy expenditure expands, appetite increases disproportionately, people very often overestimate their energy expenditure in training. As an example, I’ll say that an hour-long, moderate-intensity workout is an average of 200-250 kcal of energy expenditure. People, on the other hand, often think they are leaving 500 kcal or more at the gym. And, consequently, eat in excess of their norm. Plus, due to inexperience and not having a professional coach, beginners overdo the workload and thus put themselves under stress.

Intense workouts, high physical activity – these are all serious stressors for the of the body. There’s a response: cortisol levels rise. On the one hand, this hormone helps with stress. But, if the level of cartisol in the body is too high, it begins to break down muscle cells, disrupting the delivery of amino acids to them. We all know that the formation of muscle tissue is primarily due to protein. In the body, proteins are broken down to amino acids and enter the bloodstream. But under conditions of stress, when entering the body, proteins will not be able to take part in building muscles, and will either be intensively discarded with urine, or converted by the liver into glucose and deposited in fat depots. This is how our body works in emergency mode: when we are malnourished or when we give ourselves physical overload. As a consequence: no result or significant gain on the scale.

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What about the workouts of professional bodybuilders that are clearly outside of their comfort range?

I’ll tell you a secret: the catabolic effect of cortisol is inhibited. with anabolic steroids. But I think we’ve all been aware for a long time that this method is extremely dangerous to your health. The consequences of anabolic steroid use are most often irreversible. Professional athletes know this, so they weigh the health/career risks and choose what’s more important to them. Sports fans don’t need it and it’s extremely dangerous!

Let’s summarize: what is proper nutrition for athletes?

Uh, sure, proper nutrition is a very relative concept. It’s should be personalized, adjusted for physical activity, individualized for each specific person and their task. It’s impossible to make recommendations that will work for everyone or a menu that will work for everyone. I believe that when a person sets a goal to achieve a specific result in body building, at the initial stage it is necessary to consult a specialist who will help him to adjust the menu and physical activities to his task. Such a path will definitely be truer, and the road, as we know, arises under the footsteps of the one who walks.