The practice of eating small, frequent meals - one approximately every three waking hours - is by far the most effective way to speed up your metabolism.  Five meals a day seems to be the optimal number for women and six meals is ideal for men. The difference is because men require on average, about 600-900 calories per day more than women.

So, if five or six meals a day is good, then seven or eight or even ten must be even better, right? Well, not exactly. You could experiment with one extra meal and it might produce slightly better results. However, it takes a minimum of two to two and a half hours to digest a meal, so it doesn't make any sense to eat more than six or seven times per day. If you did, you would only be piling food on top of undigested food. How much you eat isn't as important as how much you fully digest and assimilate. Unless each of your meals was tiny, you also might be eating too many calories for the day.

After 12 to 16 weeks of strict pre-contest dieting on super clean high protein foods eaten six or seven times a day, competitive bodybuilders often have metabolisms "spinning" so fast, they burn through huge quantities of food - even junk food! (and they just keep getting leaner and leaner).  When frequent eating is combined with the right food choices, your body will literally turn into a turbo-charged fat burning machine!

Coincidentally, eating a properly constructed meal every three hours is also the only way to effectively build and maintain muscle. The longer you consistently practice the five to six meal per day discipline, the more muscle you'll develop. The more muscle you develop, the faster your metabolism will become - it's a positive, self-reinforcing cycle.

Of course you can still get results on three meals a day.  A traditional breakfast, lunch and dinner, carefully selected using the guidelines in this program and combined with aerobic and resistance training, will definitely get you some noticeable results.  However, If you have ambitious goals, such as bodybuilding or fitness competition (or if you just want to look like a bodybuilder or fitness model), then five or six meals meals per day is an absolute requirement.

Rest longer if the goal is maximum strength development (5 minutes or more between sets).  Rest 3-5 minutes between sets when lifting loads less than 90 percent of maximum effort.  Rest 3 minutes when training for muscular power, and take short rest periods (30-60 seconds) when attempting to boost growth hormone levels.  Short rest intervals of about 30 seconds work best when training for muscular endurance.  Rest time doesn't mean much if you haven't optimized intensity and volume.  Constructing the optimal workout program is as much art as science.
 

There are many factors that can cause muscle cramps, but there are easy ways to prevent them from occurring. Here are some common causes and preventions of muscle cramps:

Cause: Overexertion -- By rushing through sets and not giving your muscles enough time to recover, you can cause a spasm.

Prevention method: Have adequate breaks of 60-90 seconds between sets. If your doing a total body exercise like squats or dead lift with a very heavy weight, give yourself 2-3 minutes to recover.

Cause: Dehydration/lack of Vitamins -- Muscle tissue is made up of a large percentage of water, if you don't drink enough water you will cramp up a lot easier. Not having enough vitamins such as potassium can also fast track cramps.

Prevention method: Drink large amounts of water consistently throughout the day, not just before your workout. To test if you're drinking enough water you can check the color of your urine. If its yellow you're dehydrated, if its clear your doing fine.

Try to avoid soft drinks and coffee as they will dehydrate you faster then not drinking anything at all. If you do end up drinking some coffee or a soft drink, try to consume twice as much pure water to rehydrate yourself. Banana's are a good source of potassium, if you cant get a hold of one though, drink a multi-vitamin.

Cause: Not warming up or stretching your muscles -- Its surprising how many people in the gym don't stretch and do warm up sets, they just rush out of the locker room into the weights room and start their normal heavy sets. This is a sure way to not only get a cramp, but to also tear a muscle and get injured.

Prevention method: Even if you're late to the gym and its about to close, you must spend at least 20 seconds stretching each muscle. You should then perform a warm up set of 15-20 reps with a light weight before you go all in and start lifting heavy. This doesn't tire you muscles, it just gets blood pumping, ensuring proper circulation.

Cause: Excessive heat: This is the common cause of cramping during summer. Your body's heat rises above what it can cool down and your muscles then overheat, causing them to start cramping.

Prevention method: This relates back to staying very well hydrated, you must make a conscious effort to keep drinking lots of fluids. If it's hotter then normal, you may want to turn the pace of your workout down slightly to prevent your muscles overheating.