Looking for a good nuts-and-bolts nutrition book

[VeinNewton]

Apologies if this has been discussed before. I searched around a bit but didn't see anything.

Over the years I've absorbed lots of little nuggets of nutritional information that have really helped me improve my diet. But the more I continue learning and the more I refine my diet, the more aware I become that what I'm lacking right now is the big picture of how everything fits together and what's happening down at the biochemical level.

A perfect example: lately I've started going a bit heavier with my workouts and have have gotten "need more sodium" and "need more potassium" signals from my body ever since. Now I can run the numbers to determine my daily intake of these nutrients, find recommendations on what my intake should be each day, and adjust as needed. I can feel cramping in my calves and know that's a sign I might need more potassium. Stuff like that. But all I'm doing is parroting snippets of info I've read here and there. What I'm lacking is a more intimate understanding of the role sodium and potassium are playing during workout and recovery and why I suddenly need more of them. I'm lacking an understanding of how potassium levels and calf cramping are related. Stuff like that.

That's just one example of many to give you an idea of the kind of information I'm looking for. I'm looking not so much for a "here's how many grams of protein you should eat" kind of book--I have several of those already--but more something that explains exactly when, how, and why protein, carbs, fat, water, nutrients, and so on come into the picture during the training and recovery lifecycle and how they relate to one another. I know that fat helps with testosterone production, but how? Things like that.

Anyone know of any good books that would help shed light on these sorts of things? As you can probably tell, my bio/chemistry clue isn't the greatest at the moment, so I would prefer something that doesn't go too terribly far over my head .

[agon123]

I am in the same exact boat as you. I've been pondering to find a book like that. You basically took the words right out of my mouth. Great description of what your looking for, at least in my opinion.

[bmay2]

Alan Aragon's Girth Control:
http://www.alanaragon.com/my-book.html

or just subscribe to his Research Review:
http://www.alanaragon.com/researchreview

Haven't read the book yet but his RR is amazingggg.

[Resisthrive]

Tom Venuto's Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle

[SwiftyX]

Undergrad stuff....pretty basic:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846

If you have a very large base of nutrition knowledge:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...715999-5651009

[355 Spyder]

Start here:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/layne36.htm