Protein facts for fitness, these will be some critical facts you should know whether you are a beginner or years into your fitness journey!
How’s everyone doing? Good? I sure hope so! You have a lot to be thankful. There will always be people less fortunate than you, so keep your head up high!
Man, I just had a few weeks off work and I ended up eating so much chocolate cake that I gained like 7 pounds (lbs). Terrible thing to do on my part and not healthy at all. That’s why everything in moderation is so important.
I should have taken my own advice. No one is perfect though, but I’m losing the weight now. It’ll be easy, because I know what I’m doing!
Anyways, today we will be touching on protein, in terms of fitness! What is protein? Protein benefits? We will have protein fun facts!
Let’s get into it! This will be the BEST article about protein facts for fitness!
Protein Facts – MUST Know Facts
1. What Is Protein?? Protein Benefits??2,4
Whattt is broooooootein?? All the broskis love it, but why?
To start off with, protein is made up of chemicals known as amino acids. Amino acids build and repair muscles and bones. They also play a part in making hormones and enzymes. So there is function even down at the cellular level!
As you get older, you progressively lose muscle and your bones get weaker. Eating enough protein and regularly exercising will slow the degradation of both!
Protein is not just for meatheads to build muscle! You MUST get enough of it in your diet.
Amino acids can be further broken down into essential and non-essential amino acids. Non-essential amino acids your body can produce, essential amino acids, you need to get through your diet!
That’s as far as I’ll go in term of the science!
2. Interesting Protein Facts: How Much Protein Do You Need To Build Muscle?
Around 0.8 to 1 g/pound of body weight is sufficient. You don’t need to go crazy and start eating only protein, unless that’s what you enjoy!
I’ve been eating around 1 g/pound of my body weight in protein mostly consistent the last 6 years and I’ve build some muscle. Or people I’m around are just lying to me. They’re probably just trying to make me feel better about myself when I think about it.
Anyways, it’s that simple, 0.8 to 1 g/pound of body weight is the golden rule, for fitness purposes!
3. How Much Protein Can You Digest From One Meal?3
So now you be asking, you have the rule of how much protein to eat in a day, but how do you split it up? Should you split it into the 3 or 4 meals? 1 meal? 16 meals? 800 meals?
A common method has been to split your daily protein intake into 4-5 meals. It was said, if you eat too much protein, the protein will just go to waste. So for a 150 lbs individual, they would need to consume 150 g of protein a day. That would be split up into 30 g of protein per meal over 5 meals.
If an individual decided to eat 50 g of protein in one meal, the extra 20 g of protein would go to waste, is what was thought.
A new study, The anabolic response to protein ingestion during recovery from exercise has no upper limit in magnitude and duration in vivo in humans, was published in December of 2023. It debunked the how much protein can be absorbed from one meal myth.
They had three groups who ate protein after they exercised. One group ate 0 g (control group), another 25 g and the third, 100 g. What they found, simply put, was that the group that ate 100 g of of protein in one sitting, they had muscle building going on for a longer period of time as opposed to the 25 g group.
The study only measured up to 12 hours, so the 100 g group could have had protein synthesis continue even after that.
The protein they ate, didn’t just get pooped out, it was still utilized by the body for muscle building.
So, you could potentially eat up to 100 g grams of protein in one sitting and it still be utilized 12 hours later for muscle building.
This threshold might be even higher and go for a longer time, but, I would want to see data before I would be comfortable making that claim! So, maybe next time a study should be conducted that assesses this over a 24 hour period. Maybe even testing higher doses of protein as well!
So, don’t worry too much about being exact, if you like getting a lot of protein into your body in fewer meals, do that!
You’re perfectly fine eating smaller and more frequent meals as well with less protein.
4. Protein Fun Facts: Protein Can Help You Lose Weight!1
We know that protein is key to helping you build muscle, but it can help you lose weight as well!
Protein is much harder to digest as opposed to fats and carbohydrates (carbs), so it takes longer to digest protein. That means, you will feel more full for a longer period of time! Believe me, when you’re on a diet, that makes a difference.
For me, I can eat carbs all day and still feel hungry!
Also, protein takes more calories to digest. More of the calories you consume from protein are being used to digest them as opposed to fats and carbs. Here is the breakdown of that!
- Carbohydrates: 5-10%
- Fats: 0-3%
- Protein: 20-30%
See how much more calories are used to digest protein?!
Now, I’m not saying you need to remove any macronutrient (macro) from your diet. Each macro has it’s own role for helping you function!
If you prioritize protein though, you’ll definitely have an easier time losing fat and gaining muscle!
Also, look at it like this, is it easier to overeat chicken breast or brownies? I know there’s a smart butt saying “I don’t even like brownies”, calm down. First of all, if you don’t like brownies, check yourself into a mental institution. Also, just compare the chicken breast to your favorite dessert instead!
The dessert is obviously so much easier to overeat!
Just remember this though, above all else, whether you lose weight or not depends on calories and in and calories out. If you are eating more calories than your body requires you will GAIN WEIGHT. You MUST be in a caloric deficit (eating less calories than your body requires) to lose weight!
Confused at how many calories you need to eat in a day, read my article, EVERYTHING About Calculating Calories. This is a great starting place!
Well, my beautiful people, that’s it! I will be continuing the protein facts series as there is so much more. If you have specific questions, I’d love to write about them! See you gorgeous people in the next post!!!!
Disclaimer: I’m not your doctor. Please consult your doctor, nutritionist or any health care professional before making any changes in your own lifestyle. These blogs are just me sharing my knowledge for you reading entertainment purpose only. None of this is medical advice.
Other Posts You May Like
Paleo Diet Weight Loss: Most Effective Diet At Improving Markers For Chronic Illness
Fat Loss Diet Example to Lose Fat Mindlessly: Current Diet and Training Regimen 2023
5 Mouth Watering High Protein Meals For Weight Gain/Fat Loss – Lose Fat
Resources
-
BSc, Kris Gunnars. “How Protein Can Help You Lose Weight Naturally.” Healthline. N.p., 29 May 2024. Web. <https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/how-protein-can-help-you-lose-weight#increases-calories-out>.
- Department of Health & Human Services. “Protein.” Better Health Channel. N.p., n.d. Web. <https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/protein>.
- Trommelen J, van Lieshout GAA, Nyakayiru J, Holwerda AM, Smeets JSJ, Hendriks FK, van Kranenburg JMX, Zorenc AH, Senden JM, Goessens JPB, Gijsen AP, van Loon LJC. The anabolic response to protein ingestion during recovery from exercise has no upper limit in magnitude and duration in vivo in humans. Cell Rep Med. 2023 Dec 19;4(12):101324. doi: 10.1016/j.xcrm.2023.101324. PMID: 38118410; PMCID: PMC10772463.
- “What Are Proteins and What Is Their Function in the Body?” Eufic. N.p., n.d. Web. <https://www.eufic.org/en/whats-in-food/article/what-are-proteins-and-what-is-their-function-in-the-body>.