Do Bodybuilders Eat Junk Food?

As we all know, eating junk food isn’t the best idea. For most people, junk food puts on a ton of unneeded weight and will usually leave you craving more food just a few minutes later.

Bodybuilders are often shredded with a ton of muscle, but you may be surprised at how dirty their diets really are!

So, do bodybuilders eat junk food?

Yes, bodybuilders eat junk food. In fact, most of them are required too as it is the only way to get in all of those calories they need every day to build muscle. Due to their intense exercise regimes, this junk food rarely puts on serious fat.

Let’s explain why this is, because honestly- bodybuilding diets are crazy!

Do bodybuilders eat junk food? Photo by Eren Li from Pexels
Do bodybuilders eat junk food? Photo by Eren Li from Pexels

Bodybuilders NEED The Calories in Junk Food

As we all know, junk food is known for making people fat.

The truth is, junk food often has a lot of calories in a little amount of food. This means you can eat a lot less food, but get a lot more calories.

Most bodybuilders need to eat 150g of protein a day or so. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), foods like chicken and steak that are in protein do not have many calories in them. Plus, they are super filling and it’s hard to eat a lot of meat every day.

For instance, if you eat 2 big steaks- you could consume 100g of protein but only consume 1,000 calories. Plus, you’ll be full for hours.

That’s a big problem because most bodybuilders need to be eating 3,000-4,000 calories a day to gain muscle.

Junk food is much easier to eat and has way more calories.

This means that when those bodybuilders eat all of that meat, they can easily get 2,000 calories from junk food and still build muscle.

They still have gotten their protein in for the day, but now they got those calories.

A Caloric Surplus is Required to Grow Muscle

To grow muscle, you need a caloric surplus.

You can have a ton of protein, but you still need to have extra calories in your body- otherwise, nothing will grow.

It’s the law of conservation of mass, you can’t just create muscle out of nothing, you need extra energy to create that muscle.

Most bodybuilders tend to eat an extra 300-400 calories a day. Yet, that’s not where the problem is.

Bodybuilders have intense workouts. If they’re doing a program like the Arnold Blueprint to Mass and doing cardio too, they can be burning an extra 500-600 calories daily from the workout alone!

So, that means most bodybuilders need to eat 1,000 extra calories a day just to grow muscle.

Then things get more complicated, because the more muscle you have- the more calories you burn every day just existing.

This means that really big guys can be eating 4,000 calories a day and still be struggling to build muscle.

Junk food provides a ton of calories to help reach that goal. For instance, take a medium bag of Cheeto puffs, it can have 400 calories but most people can devour that in seconds. (Let’s not talk about the time I ate a whole family-sized bag of Cool Ranch Doritos on my bulk)

Having those easy-to-access calories is a game-changer.

Junk Food is Easy to Eat

At first, shoveling all that food down your mouth sounds fun- but it can get really hard to do.

That’s why bodybuilders regularly eat a ton of ice cream!

It really fills you up when you have to eat steak, chicken, and meat all day.

Comparatively, it almost seems like you can eat those potato chips endlessly. I mean, those foods are quite literally scientifically engineered to make you hungrier.

Now, when you don’t want to gain weight- these junk foods are really bad for you.

But, when you are trying to gain weight, it’s a different story.

Bodybuilders often need to find a way to get thousands of calories in, daily. Having an easy-to-eat food that doesn’t fill you up and has a ton of calories is basically the best thing since sliced bread for bodybuilders.

Junk Food Has a Ton of Carbs

Junk food has a ton of carbs, and carbs are actually an essential macronutrient in bodybuilding!

While most people are focused on the protein aspect of things- fats and carbs are just as important.

While some diets such as keto say you don’t need carbs, many bodybuilders prefer to use carbs during their bulk phase- and cut out the carbs during the cut (lose weight) phase.

This is because carbs give a ton of energy to the bodybuilder. After these hard workouts- bodybuilders can feel very depleted in their energy tanks. Plus, carbs have some benefits of reducing muscle loss as your body will break down glycogen stores for energy instead of muscles.

One of my favorite foods for bodybuilding is Chicken Shawarma. Chicken Shawarma is not only delicious, but it brings the much-needed calories we discussed in this article- while at the same time providing protein and carbohydrates. Making it one of the best post-workout meals you can have.

Conclusion of Do Bodybuilders Eat Junk Food?

So, yes. Bodybuilders do eat junk food. In fact, most of them eat way more junk food than you think! It helps them get a ton of much-needed calories in, and often doesn’t put on much fat due to their intense workouts.

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