what's too much protein when bulking?
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So let go by those sources.... Someone has already done the summary.
http://mennohenselmans.com/the-myth-of-1glb-optimal-protein-intake-for-bodybuilders/
With a 0.82 g/lb bodyweight that comes up to about ..... 1 g/lb of LBM.
Edit: You gained 1 lb of LBM after a year of lifting? Newbie gains or not - that isn't what I'm looking for.0 -
I like the part in bold, many people on MFP, make recommendations based on "research" with out having any real experience in the subject. They blindly follow some paper because it's backed by "science" with out experience they have no idea how true the claims even are in the first place.
What's your experience?
My experience is actually living a lower protein diet and not having it affect my LBM. As I said I was consuming about 100g a day with an LBM of around 200 at the time.
Can you go into a bit more specifics?
What was your starting weight? What was your end weight?
What kind of cut did you do and for how long?
What was your training protocol like during that time frame?
How did you measure your LBM before and after?
Q: What was your starting weight? What was your end weight?
As I said it has been a while, it was around last summer. I guess it would have been around june or so. I weighed around 290lbs. When i stopped working out I was at around 250lbs.
Q: What kind of cut did you do and for how long?
I was doing ADF(Alternate Day Fasting) at the time. I would eat 500 calories one day. then 3,500 the next. I would even work out fasted eating 500 for the entire day. I would try to get in between 100-200g of protein on my eating days. That's an average of 50-100g of protein a day.
Q: What was your training protocol like during that time frame?
I was doing 5x5 3x a week with about 20mins worth of cardio on the elliptical. I modified the 5x5 routine and would do 5x5 of everything (including dead lifts) and with a 1 minute break between sets. This greatly increases the intense and burns a ton of calories.
Q: How did you measure your LBM before and after?
I used a tape measure method, the military body fat% You know there is error in that. My results actually showed an increase of LBM by 1lbs. That is within 5% so i exclude that as an error. I just say I maintained my LBM.
Newbie weight training and you kept your LBM - good. But it *might* show that had you eaten a little more optimally you might have had newbie gains too.
I was lifting for well over a year. They weren't newbie gains. My lifting didn't change, what changed was my dietary approach and protein intake.
ETA: I believe it boils down to nutritional partitioning. The more in demand a specific macro is, the more efficiently it will be used I believe.
Yep, that's true. The body tends to adapt to whatever you feed it with, and partition more towards the "main" macro you are taking in as an increasingly viable source of energy.
But saying that, lifting for 1 year is pretty much all newbie gains. Even for those not really blessed with muscle building genes, 1 year of lifting is basically a flash in the pan. The reason is the learning curve of weight lifting, kinetic chain conditioning, neural pathways, hormonal signalling all take much longer than a year to "master" or "adapt to". And before you master them, you are not realizing your optimal training standards. I would say most "intermediate" weight lifters are in the 2-3 year mark, past their initial growth phases, and having to be more precise in their progression to see new gains.
By the time you're in your 5-7th years, you progress at a rather snail's pace, putting on a pound or two here and there over years. From there, you'll be limited by your genetics, and regression is more of a concern. If you've been at it for over a decade, you're lucky to put on 2 pounds per year of quality muscle. At least from my personal experience.0 -
like what everyone said with 1g per lb
excess protein is also synthesized for other functions within the body. Nothing is every truly wasted
look up gluconeogenesis and denovo lipogenesis
DNL is highly inefficient process if it even occurs. Exercise is mostly glucose dependent not protein dependent. It takes quick energy to be able to lift and recover. Gluconeogenesis would take to long. Just go directly to the source and eat the carbs...
Ummm, DNL is certainly what happens when dietary carbohydrates exceed total energy expenditure. VLDL synthesis in the liver is actually rather efficient. Or are you talking about something else?
I was talking about gluconeogenesis being highly ineffective. About DNL, I remember reading a study saying that our ability to store carbs is greater than what we think. Also that DNL doesn't happen in humans. I just read an abstract right now to refresh my memory. It's saying DNL does exist in humans from a logical stand point(thinking about it in a common sense way) it has to exist.
Of course your body stores carbs preferably, but if protein cannot be stored, and carbs cannot be stored, the energy is not going to magically disappear.
You are not interpreting the study properly0 -
It was a compliment man, I agreed with everything you said.
Also this thread has gotten ridiculous. If you want to get jacked, do what a natural bodybuilder does (with a grain of salt). 1g/lb of either lean mass or bw, it doesn't matter. Then you experiment and reduce or increase and log what happens. You need to be your own experimenter and test subject. You can argue about studies all day long but there are guys who already look like you want to and genetics/fake nattys aside, it's not a terrible bet to try their advice.0 -
If a study does something and gets a result they're implying their results are true. For example if they do an experiment and find out that x = 5, they will write about how x = 5 in the the study, a lot of people on the fourms will say "they did this study and x = 5 and that's just how it is, it's backed by research blah blah blah" without even testing it themselves. Just a bunch of parrots.
If I did the opposite (different experiment) and used y instead of x and i still got 5, y = 5 then the claims of the study aren't that greatly supported. Possible that x and y both equal 5, but in this field, no... Ask everyone who makes the claim to eat 1g of protein per lbm if they ever cut their protein in half and what results did they get??? More then likely they never done that at all. They're not speaking from experience.
Until you can back up your own personal experiment the study still wins.
As I mentioned above, i have many studies that support my claim. Here is part of a topic i wrote with referencesEveryone agrees that the key to muscle growth is resistance training. Without it, you won’t grow muscle mass without any form of muscle stimulation. The load and proper rest are the main things that influence muscle growth [Goldeberg Al, 1975]. Any good resistance program will cause a muscle gain of 2-5lbs in 2 to 4 months. Remember this number, 5lbs is near the top of muscle growth during this period of time. It is our baseline for the studies as well.
Steroids and muscle growth
There was a steroid study that contained 43 men who were experienced weight lifters. There were 4 groups in the study.
* Group 1: NO EXERCISE + NO STERIODS
* Group 2: EXERCISE + NO STERIODS
* Group 3: NO EXERCISE + WEEKLY STEROID INJECTION
* Group 4: EXERCISE + WEEKLY STEROID INJECTION.
Each member of this study consumed roughly 120g of protein (which is on the lower side of current recommendations) and about 16calories per pound of bodyweight.
Group 1: no gain in LBM
Group 2: gained 4.5lbs
Group 3: gained more than group 1
Group 4: gained over 13lbs of LBM
120g of protein was sufficient protein to be able to build up to 13lbs of LBM.
[Bhasin S, 1996].
Lacto-ovo vegeterians
Lacto-ovo vegeterians(I’ll just call them veggie’s for short) Consume about 79g of protein and about 450 calories less than non-vegetarians. Non veggie’s consume about 138g of protein on a daily basis. Both groups in this study gained between 2-5lbs of LBM. The point of this study is to show once you meet the minimum requirements you don’t need more protein. Remember 5lbs of LBM is what can be gained with a good resistance plan. In this study both groups came close to average results, even the veggies who ate very low amounts of protein.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14600563
Renal Disease
People with renal disease must consume low amounts of protein to delay their disease. They must under 0.3g of protein per pound of body weight. A man of 160lbs would consume 48g of protein. Their disease is highly catabolic(breaks down their muscles). One group lifted weights while the other group did not. Even with ridiculous low amount of protein the group that lifted weights had a slight increase of LBM. The group who didn’t do any resistance training? They lost 7lbs of LBM. This shows how powerful resistance training can be.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11730397
Here are others, names of the researches are provided and year so you can look up the study if you wish.
• Tarnopolsky et al. (1992) observed no differences in whole body protein synthesis or indexes of lean body mass in strength athletes consuming either 0.64g/lb or 1.10g/lb over a 2 week period. Protein oxidation did increase in the high protein group, indicating a nutrient overload.
• Walberg et al. (1988) found that 0.73g/lb was sufficient to maintain positive nitrogen balance in cutting weightlifters over a 7 day time period.
• Tarnopolsky et al. (1988) found that only 0.37g/lb was required to maintain positive nitrogen balance in elite bodybuilders (over 5 years of experience, possible previous use of androgens) over a 10 day period. 0.45g/lb was sufficient to maintain lean body mass in bodybuilders over a 2 week period. The authors suggested that 0.55g/lb was sufficient for bodybuilders.
• Lemon et al. (1992) found no differences in muscle mass or strength gains in novice bodybuilders consuming either 0.61g/lb or 1.19g/lb over a 4 week period. Based on nitrogen balance data, the authors recommended 0.75g/lb.
• Hoffman et al. (2006) found no differences in body composition, strength or resting hormonal concentrations in strength athletes consuming either 0.77g/lb or >0.91g/lb over a 3 month period.
Well where was their starting point?
Are they experienced weight lifters?
People can gain a considerable amount of LBM for just starting to resistance training with minimal protein intake.
Your arguments are crap and your basis for aruging was talking about an obese individual being able to maintain off of .5g per lb of lbm. now you are linking studies to me in regards to maintaining muscle mass on 0.75+-0.1 g/lb
You should actually properly interpret the study. Now you are just making yourself look like a fool, because your studies that you link provide no basis for your argument.
So lets make another list.
1. you were saying you maintianed lbm eating .5g/lb
2. you were an obese individual and able to maintain lbm at a lower protein intake(go figure)
3. you started linking studies about LBM increase with people that probably never lifted
4. The studies you linked provide no basis for your .5g/lb
5. EVEN THE ARTICLE YOU ARE QUOTING FROM RECCOMENDS .82g/lb WOW ARE YOU SERIOUS?
You are not even giving credit to the people who are writing the article..... wow...
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/muscle-gain/protein-requirements-for-strength-and-power-athletes.html
http://www.simplyshredded.com/protein-intake-how-much-protein-should-you-consume-and-what-does-the-research-really-say.html0 -
ok, well what if all are full?like what everyone said with 1g per lb
excess protein is also synthesized for other functions within the body. Nothing is every truly wasted
look up gluconeogenesis and denovo lipogenesis
DNL is highly inefficient process if it even occurs. Exercise is mostly glucose dependent not protein dependent. It takes quick energy to be able to lift and recover. Gluconeogenesis would take to long. Just go directly to the source and eat the carbs...
Ummm, DNL is certainly what happens when dietary carbohydrates exceed total energy expenditure. VLDL synthesis in the liver is actually rather efficient. Or are you talking about something else?
I was talking about gluconeogenesis being highly ineffective. About DNL, I remember reading a study saying that our ability to store carbs is greater than what we think. Also that DNL doesn't happen in humans. I just read an abstract right now to refresh my memory. It's saying DNL does exist in humans from a logical stand point(thinking about it in a common sense way) it has to exist.
Of course your body stores carbs preferably, but if protein cannot be stored, and carbs cannot be stored, the energy is not going to magically disappear.
You are not interpreting the study properly
I remember now(you jogged my memory). the study was pretty much saying that protein gets converted to glucose as you know, and carbs obviously get converted to glucose and both are stored as glycogen, not converted to fat. What happens is we limit the fat oxidation. It mentioned how we can hold a lot more glycogen than previously thought.
That is my point0 -
So let go by those sources.... Someone has already done the summary.
http://mennohenselmans.com/the-myth-of-1glb-optimal-protein-intake-for-bodybuilders/
With a 0.82 g/lb bodyweight that comes up to about ..... 1 g/lb of LBM.
Edit: You gained 1 lb of LBM after a year of lifting? Newbie gains or not - that isn't what I'm looking for.
I was in a calorie deficit the entire time. That's about the time i lost my first 100lbs. I was lifting through 90% of it. I wouldn't expect much of a gain on LBM.
Are you familiar with the work by Dr.Barry Sears(Biochemist)? He's the creator of the zone diet, the popular 40/30/30 was created by him.
He has produced 25 olympic gold medalist... His highest recommendations for protein?
Sedentary - multiply lbs of lean body mass by .5
Light activity (e.g. walking) - multiply by .6
Moderate (30 minutes of vigorous activity 3 days per week) - .7
Active (1 hour per day 5 days per week) - .8
Very Active (10 hours of vigorous activity per week - .9
Athlete - multiply by 1.0
Yes, more than heard of him. Let's see.
A 40:30:30 diet, if you are not overly restricting, guarantees a protein consumption well above 0.7 g / lb of LBM.
So is he right or wrong?
How many grams would that be for 2100 calories (my cut)? Might it be 158g? Why yes.
And for me, that translates to 1.02 g/lb of LBM.
Thanks, Dr Sears. (And the zone "anti-immflamatory" thing is bull pluck)0 -
To answer the OPs question I believe 1.5 grams per LB of bodyweight is probably the limit for protein when trying to bulk.0
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yea, agreed.To answer the OPs question I believe 1.5 grams per LB of bodyweight is probably the limit for protein when trying to bulk.
.8-1.4 range is good enough0 -
It was a compliment man, I agreed with everything you said.
Also this thread has gotten ridiculous. If you want to get jacked, do what a natural bodybuilder does (with a grain of salt). 1g/lb of either lean mass or bw, it doesn't matter. Then you experiment and reduce or increase and log what happens. You need to be your own experimenter and test subject. You can argue about studies all day long but there are guys who already look like you want to and genetics/fake nattys aside, it's not a terrible bet to try their advice.
Once again, proving my point that you need to be more active on the forums.0 -
I can't believe I really did just sit here and read all that, lol. Thanks for the input, i'm shooting for 1-1.5g/bw daily.0
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I can't believe I really did just sit here and read all that, lol. Thanks for the input, i'm shooting for 1-1.5g/bw daily.
That's not a bad goal. Try it and see if it works. If it doesn't, adjust.0 -
I can't believe I really did just sit here and read all that, lol. Thanks for the input, i'm shooting for 1-1.5g/bw daily.
Hope you are able to stick with it being new to this and all. Just don't want to get tired of protein intake and want to quit. Has happened to a lot of people, they feel they have to follow certain protocols and can't stick with them and they get upset and just quit... good luck.
ETA: I just read it said per lbs of BW. You think that's a good formula? If you weighed 400lbs you would consume 600g of protein? not a good formula, it should be calculated based on LBM.
Why? High protein diets aren't hard.0 -
So let go by those sources.... Someone has already done the summary.
http://mennohenselmans.com/the-myth-of-1glb-optimal-protein-intake-for-bodybuilders/
With a 0.82 g/lb bodyweight that comes up to about ..... 1 g/lb of LBM.
Edit: You gained 1 lb of LBM after a year of lifting? Newbie gains or not - that isn't what I'm looking for.
I was in a calorie deficit the entire time. That's about the time i lost my first 100lbs. I was lifting through 90% of it. I wouldn't expect much of a gain on LBM.
Are you familiar with the work by Dr.Barry Sears(Biochemist)? He's the creator of the zone diet, the popular 40/30/30 was created by him.
He has produced 25 olympic gold medalist... His highest recommendations for protein?
Sedentary - multiply lbs of lean body mass by .5
Light activity (e.g. walking) - multiply by .6
Moderate (30 minutes of vigorous activity 3 days per week) - .7
Active (1 hour per day 5 days per week) - .8
Very Active (10 hours of vigorous activity per week - .9
Athlete - multiply by 1.0
Yes, more than heard of him. Let's see.
A 40:30:30 diet, if you are not overly restricting, guarantees a protein consumption well above 0.7 g / lb of LBM.
So is he right or wrong?
How many grams would that be for 2100 calories (my cut)? Might it be 158g? Why yes.
And for me, that translates to 1.02 g/lb of LBM.
Thanks, Dr Sears. (And the zone "anti-immflamatory" thing is bull pluck)
you did it backwards. You don't determine your calories first. His method is you determine your protein intake first, and make your calories around that. I have no idea what my LBM is... for example if i was still at 200lbs of LBM, athlete(1g of protein per LBM for simple math)
1. Calculate protein calories
200g protein ( 4 calories/1g protein) = 800 calories protein
2. Calculate total calories
800 calories(protein) is 30% of something.
800/.30 = ~2,666 calories total.
2. Calculate carb calories
We know that we are going to eat 40% of total calories.
2,666 * .40 = 1,066 calories(calories for carbs)
2. Calculate fat calories
It should be same amount of calories as protein since both are 30%. Just to verify we should still calculate it to make sure we did things right, fat is 30% of total calories.
2.666 * .30 = 799.8 calories (some precision was lost due to sig figs) but close enough. So we did things right.
Doing it this way, either way my protein is still the same 800 calories or 200g.
His diet is automatically a reduced calorie diet, I mean for me... I was calculated at 1,700 calories a day weighing in around 290-300lbs with an LBM of around 200lbs or so.
A lot of people do it wrong(the 40/30/30) thing. Well it was originally created by the zone but people don't follow it using his protocol, they just randomly do 40/30/30 based off their calculated deficit.
I'm sorry, a diet that suggests 1700 calories for a man weighing 300 pounds with 200lbs of LBM is well below estimated BMR (sterling pasmore equation is easy). Why would you follow that?
But let's do it your way.
Me: Active - .7g (according to you). My LBM of 150 lbs = 105 g x 4 cal/g = 420 cals from protein
420/0.30 = 1400 calories. That is what you are suggesting I should do?
I don't think that makes any sense. I eat 2100+50% of cardio to lose.0 -
If you where following the zone than yes. I am sure you're well aware of the research on lower calorie diets.
The real question to ask yourself, "why do you believe it's wrong to do it?"
I trust Sears judgment, he claims the olympic athletes who he trained consumed no more than 2,500 calories. As you know these people are elite athletes doing intensive training sessions. Heybales(i think you know him) has also done the zone, he mentioned he was surprised how much more he could do with less calories.
Not sure if you read the anti-aging zone as well, talks a lot about free radical production(produced on higher calorie diet) and aging, calorie restriction(i know you know the benefits), elevated insulin production and how it shortens life span(too many carbs or too many calories). A good example is diabetics as you know they have insulin related issues and have a shorter life span.
Here is a list to all his references.
http://www.drsears.com/WhatistheZone/ZoneValidationStudies/tabid/423/Default.aspx
Given that his site states that an athelete may burn 3000-4000 cals a day I'm going to say that I do not buy a max/average of 2500 for elite atheletes.
Eating at those low levels would give me an eating disorder. No thanks.0 -
I can't believe I really did just sit here and read all that, lol. Thanks for the input, i'm shooting for 1-1.5g/bw daily.
Hope you are able to stick with it being new to this and all. Just don't want to get tired of protein intake and want to quit. Has happened to a lot of people, they feel they have to follow certain protocols and can't stick with them and they get upset and just quit... good luck.
ETA: I just read it said per lbs of BW. You think that's a good formula? If you weighed 400lbs you would consume 600g of protein? not a good formula, it should be calculated based on LBM.
Why? High protein diets aren't hard.
If you have food addictions as most over weight people do, it doesn't end well. it's too much of a big change assuming he's just starting out. That's my concern, jumping in to something that is a compete 180.
Umm, he has zero to go and he is bulking. So your assumptions are way off.0 -
Lacto-ovo vegeterians
Lacto-ovo vegeterians(I’ll just call them veggie’s for short) Consume about 79g of protein and about 450 calories less than non-vegetarians. Non veggie’s consume about 138g of protein on a daily basis. Both groups in this study gained between 2-5lbs of LBM. The point of this study is to show once you meet the minimum requirements you don’t need more protein. Remember 5lbs of LBM is what can be gained with a good resistance plan. In this study both groups came close to average results, even the veggies who ate very low amounts of protein.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14600563
They put vegetarians on creatine and they showed a gain in LBM? No *kitten*! What am I missing here? Of course they gained LBM.0 -
As I mentioned above, i have many studies that support my claim. Here is part of a topic i wrote with references
Those references were disputed heavily in the thread where you posted it.
This thread?
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/787083-muscle-growth-protein-recommendations-highly-over-rated0 -
So let go by those sources.... Someone has already done the summary.
http://mennohenselmans.com/the-myth-of-1glb-optimal-protein-intake-for-bodybuilders/
With a 0.82 g/lb bodyweight that comes up to about ..... 1 g/lb of LBM.
Edit: You gained 1 lb of LBM after a year of lifting? Newbie gains or not - that isn't what I'm looking for.
I was in a calorie deficit the entire time. That's about the time i lost my first 100lbs. I was lifting through 90% of it. I wouldn't expect much of a gain on LBM.
Are you familiar with the work by Dr.Barry Sears(Biochemist)? He's the creator of the zone diet, the popular 40/30/30 was created by him.
He has produced 25 olympic gold medalist... His highest recommendations for protein?
Sedentary - multiply lbs of lean body mass by .5
Light activity (e.g. walking) - multiply by .6
Moderate (30 minutes of vigorous activity 3 days per week) - .7
Active (1 hour per day 5 days per week) - .8
Very Active (10 hours of vigorous activity per week - .9
Athlete - multiply by 1.0
what does an olympian have anything to do with protein reccomendations?
I wouldnt take protein reccomendations from ronnie coleman
why would I take protein reccomendations from an endurance athlete?
You can gain LBM if you are that overweight. Its on the basis of fuel availability.
You were morbidly obese and what you could experience doesnt apply to a normal person.
Edit:STUDIES>EXPERIENCE.
I have never pulled this out but before you start talking about experience as a weapon and to eliminate studies.
GET ON MY LEVEL IF YOU WANT TO USE EXPERIENCE OVER STUDIES, AS LEAN AS ME AND LIFT AS MUCH AS ME!0 -
Actually you probably could take protein recommendations from Ronnie Coleman. Bodybuilders don't just follow **** blindly you know, there's a fair bit of research on the subject or rather if you want to do legit research from an athlete, I'd suggest reading any of the large amount of information put out by Dr. Layne Norton who is a natural professional bodybuilder and one of the worlds foremost authorities on protein synthesis.0
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