Too much Protein!

[Maxgain]

Hey Thought ye might be interested in a post i seen at Hypertrophy-Specific.com. Basically it says most of us eat too much protein and as a result hinder gains. Protein should only make up 15% of total calories. What are your views

"Actually, most guys take in too much protein. It isn't that too much protein will hurt them - assuming they are healthy to begin with - but too much protein can actually inhibit gains. I know, it sounds totally contradictory to what you read everywhere, but it is true. Let me explain.

The ability of the body to grow is effected by the ratio of protein to carbs. It is an inverted U shaped curve - or bell curve - where the top or highest point of the curve is a ratio of 12-15% protein to carbs (diet consisting of ~15% protein). At one peak you have all carbs, at the other you have all protein. It has to do with thermogenesis and hormones.

So, if a skinny guy wants to gain weight, he needs to plan a diet where he gets 15% of his calories from protein.
Now this may seem contradictory to the general rule of 1 gram per pound bodyweight. I'm not saying that a guy can't gain weight with more than 15% calories from protein, I'm only saying that weight gain is greatest at 15%. He will be ok with an intake of 0.75 grams/pound FFM to gain muscle. In fact, everybody should use FFM instead of bodyweight to plan protein intake, but sometimes it's just too hard to figure it out, so most people use bodyweight"

"Too much protein relative will lower insulin, and thus available IGF-1 and free test levels"

"There is some interesting research on protein coming out that indicates that when you add carbs to your protein, more of it gets "trapped" (incorporated into gut proteins and/or oxidized in the gut and liver) in the gut. This is because of the anabolic effect of insulin on enterocytes. Insulin isn't really anabolic in skeletal muscle but it helps nonetheless.

Anyway, my point is this, Take your protein without (or with less) carbs immediately after you workout. This will allow more amino acids to skirt past your enterocytes and liver and make it into the blood stream where they are taken up by skeletal muscle. Then take your carbs one hour later, which still allows you to take advantage of the metabolic "window" post workout."

what do ye think?

[Shroud]

It seems like this guy is passing off a theory with little or no backing evidence.

[bradley]

I will agree that in general most bodybuilders consume too much protein, and there are plenty of studies showing that one can consume much less protein and still make gains. Although I do not think you can just say that everyone should take in 15% of their daily cals from protein, without first knowing the amount of calories the person in question is consuming each day.


"Too much protein relative will lower insulin, and thus available IGF-1 and free test levels"

While I am not doubting the above statement, I am just wondering how much protein caused the above effect. Did the article/post contain any references?



""There is some interesting research on protein coming out that indicates that when you add carbs to your protein, more of it gets "trapped" (incorporated into gut proteins and/or oxidized in the gut and liver) in the gut. This is because of the anabolic effect of insulin on enterocytes. Insulin isn't really anabolic in skeletal muscle but it helps nonetheless.

Anyway, my point is this, Take your protein without (or with less) carbs immediately after you workout. This will allow more amino acids to skirt past your enterocytes and liver and make it into the blood stream where they are taken up by skeletal muscle. Then take your carbs one hour later, which still allows you to take advantage of the metabolic "window" post workout."

The above would seem to be less of an issue, assuming you are taking in a meal before training.

[SquareHead]

Maki talked about this with John Berardi in the link below.

http://www.wannabebig.com/article.php?articleid=114&pageid=2

[Maxgain]

Originally posted by bradley
I will agree that in general most bodybuilders consume too much protein, and there are plenty of studies showing that one can consume much less protein and still make gains. Although I do not think you can just say that everyone should take in 15% of their daily cals from protein, without first knowing the amount of calories the person in question is consuming each day.


I think what they are getting at is that no matter how much calories you take the perfect ratio for muscle gain is one with 15% protein compared to carbrohydrates This is supposedly optimum and anything on either side hinders gains for your body

[aka23]

Bryan Haycock wrote that post. The full thread is http://www.hypertrophy-specific.com/cgi-bin/ib3/ikonboard.cgi?;act=ST;f=12;t=7 .

I suspect his conclusions are related to the article on his site on diet and testosterone at http://www.thinkmuscle.com/articles/incledon/diet-01.htm . The authors concluded that a diet for increasing testosterone levels "would have roughly the following calorie breakdown: 55% CHO (carbs), 15% PRO (protein) and 30% fat. "

Lyle Mcdonald suggested that,
"Bryan is basing this on a paper I came across/sent him a year or two ago. In short, it looked at the influence of protein on growth in both animal and human models (in humans, it was during weight regain during refeeding). It demonstrated that both insufficient and excessive protein intakes produce less than optimal/maximal gains. Insufficient amounts provide less than optimal amino acid amounts so growth is limited. Excess protein stimulates protein oxidation and TEF which burns off calories that could otherwise go towards growth.

Optimal levels for humans was in the 15-20% total calorie range."

[bradley]

Originally posted by Maxgain


I think what they are getting at is that no matter how much calories you take the perfect ratio for muscle gain is one with 15% protein compared to carbrohydrates This is supposedly optimum and anything on either side hinders gains for your body

Yes, but one also has to take into account other factors, mainly total calories, since if you are not consuming enough calories to sustain muscle hypertrophy the amount of protein in your diet will be of less importance.

While I agree that most bobybuilders do take in more than enough protein, and I believe Lemon found 1.2g/kg to be an adequate amount, I have yet to see anything indicating that 15% is the ideal amount of protein. The links that aka23 posted were interesting, but it they certainly did not convince me that excess protein will hinder gains.

The 1g/lb of bw. is just a general guideline, and is used primarily out of convenience, as far as I can tell. You pretty much are making sure that you are taking in adequate amounts of protein when following this recommendation, regardless of your current goals.

[Maxgain]

Yeah I think Ill stick to the old age belief of eating high amounts of protein to gain weight which for me im taking 25-30 % calories from protein about 270g total protein.
Bodybuilding is difficult enough without getting contrasting reports on how protein affects muscle gains I think Ill stick to the fact that all bodybuilders throughout time have eaten high amounts of protein and have reached their physical potential.

[greekboy80]

so if im taking anywhere from 160-205 grams while cutting i should be alright (im 205 lbs). sometimes i find it hard to eat more.

[bradley]

Yes, that should be an adequate amount of protein.:)

[defcon]

Yap that should be enough.. i aim for atleast 1g/bw, with a min of 0.8g/bw.

Also.. about the 15%-20% protein thing.. that could be true for a hardgainer that needs to eat 5000 cals to gain weight.. IMO the study is to general... I'll just use 25-30% fat, 1g/bw for protein, and the rest carbs.. set to a calorie level that lets me gain a max of 1 lb/week.