Protein intake
bgonzalez1925
Posts: 16 Member
Does it matter how much protein you take? According to Bodybuilding.com I'm supposed to consume 149g daily, but according to this app it varies one day it tells me to consume 60g another day 120g another day 45g. Does protein intake affect weight loss?
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Replies
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Calories are all that matters for weight loss. But enough protein (.8 grams per pound of lean body mass you carry minimum) will help you retain as much muscle as possible and focus the loss on fat.4
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MFP is more a compilation of consensus recommendations and databases than it is an up-to-date "guide". When it comes to protein intake--esp in regards to weight loss and exercise, the RDA and consensus recommendations are a little out of date. Among the folks who are considered "authorities" on this subject, the recommended level is generally thought to be 1.2-1.6 g/kg body weight. I would use a number derived from that rather than any MFP recommendations.3
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Also, what is recommended for someone at maintainence is not ideal for someone in a deficit. Also, there is no downside to eating more than necessary but there is to not eating enough. The general rule of thumb is 1 gram per pound of lean mass. Since most people don't really know what their lean mass is, .8 grams per pound of body weight is often recommended instead.1
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I eat 1g/lb of lean body mass. I strength train 3/week so I need about 130g daily. Mfp gives pathetically low amounts of protein, but as someone mentioned eat for your goals.1
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Your protein amount is changing like that cause when your exercise is added, your calories increase on your diary.
Keep in mind the protein amount you start out with at the beginning of the day before exercise is the min MFP recommendations. While in calorie deficit it is very beneficial to eat additional protein as its helps with muscle sparing and it also provides satiety or a balance of protein and healthy fats and fiber rich foods.
For me my calorie deficit and also my training needs I am for a min of .8 grams per my body weight.1 -
Also, what is recommended for someone at maintainence is not ideal for someone in a deficit. Also, there is no downside to eating more than necessary but there is to not eating enough. The general rule of thumb is 1 gram per pound of lean mass. Since most people don't really know what their lean mass is, .8 grams per pound of body weight is often recommended instead.
The only downside to eating too much protein would be if it completely crowded out healthy fats and other essential nutrients.
The numbers I've always heard are 0.8-1 gram protein per pound of lean body mass or 0.6-0.8 grams protein per pound of total weight for people in a deficit. Which are consistent with your numbers; you're just at the top of each range.
The key is to view the protein target as a minimum not a maximum. I aim for 100 grams per day on average but am happy to see numbers in the 110 to 130 range.0 -
I aim for 100g minimum for protein but am happy to go over that0
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According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.1 -
gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
Do they give a reason? The US Dietary Guidelines has a range, but when I researched what the high end was based on it said only to allow room for the recommended amounts of the other two macros.0 -
gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I don't think I've eaten under 110g of protein, on any day for the last 8 years. I've only died twice.6 -
gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
would love to see the medical research behind that recommendation, because the RD's I work with (many who have PhD in their respective fields) do .8-1lb per goal lean muscle mass (but have said you are ok for more). I take 130g a day which is def. more than 2x the daily intake with no issues (my last blood work was to quote my PCM, as close to perfect as she has seen)2 -
gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
That's so absurd to me. I wonder why that's stated. I'm 113 pounds and I usually get 110g of protein per day, sometimes higher but rarely lower. I couldn't imagine never exceeding 90g and if I followed the 0.6 to 0.8g per pound of bodyweight I'd be miserable.2 -
I eat around 90g because i heard that eating alot of protein will help prevent excess skin and it helps with weightloss, but too much will stall weightloss.0
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1g of protein = 4cal
1g of carbs = 4cals
1g of fat = 9cals
I usually try to stick to 1g per pound of body weight.
Dr. Jordan Feigenbaum has a table on his website, barbell medicine(Scroll down): http://www.barbellmedicine.com/584-2/0 -
angela2520682 wrote: »I eat around 90g because i heard that eating alot of protein will help prevent excess skin and it helps with weightloss, but too much will stall weightloss.
Too much protein isn't going to stall weight loss unless you're eating a surplus of calories. Even then, carbs and fats would do the same thing at a calorie surplus.3 -
Protien requirements aren't usually set at one gram per pound of body weight. Country nutrient guides vary. UK suggests 53 grams per adult. The European Union suggests .83 per kilogram of body weight. North American standards appear to require higher amounts. IDK why. I aim for 55 per day as a sedentary old female of 5'7" and 9 stone. I am always over it by 20 or 30 grams. As summer depens My goals are to replace some protien calories with carbs from fruit. I heard too much protien is hard on the kidneys, I don't know if that is so or not though it would be good to find out. Young people can get away with more than those of us in the upper years.0
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NA RDA is like 60g, but that is like the bare minimum for healthy body functions. if you have specific goals then your protein intake will differ2
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Protien requirements aren't usually set at one gram per pound of body weight. Country nutrient guides vary. UK suggests 53 grams per adult. The European Union suggests .83 per kilogram of body weight. North American standards appear to require higher amounts. IDK why. I aim for 55 per day as a sedentary old female of 5'7" and 9 stone. I am always over it by 20 or 30 grams. As summer depens My goals are to replace some protien calories with carbs from fruit. I heard too much protien is hard on the kidneys, I don't know if that is so or not though it would be good to find out. Young people can get away with more than those of us in the upper years.
As you get older your body becomes resistant to protein, the starting strength guys (Dr. Jordan Feigenbaum and Dr. Austin Baraki) recommend more for older people as a result, unless you only have one kidney, or have some kind of medical problem with your kidneys, I wouldn't be concerned about it.3 -
FatWithFatness wrote: »Protien requirements aren't usually set at one gram per pound of body weight. Country nutrient guides vary. UK suggests 53 grams per adult. The European Union suggests .83 per kilogram of body weight. North American standards appear to require higher amounts. IDK why. I aim for 55 per day as a sedentary old female of 5'7" and 9 stone. I am always over it by 20 or 30 grams. As summer depens My goals are to replace some protien calories with carbs from fruit. I heard too much protien is hard on the kidneys, I don't know if that is so or not though it would be good to find out. Young people can get away with more than those of us in the upper years.
As you get older your body becomes resistant to protein, the starting strength guys (Dr. Jordan Feigenbaum and Dr. Austin Baraki) recommend more for older people as a result, unless you only have one kidney, or have some kind of medical problem with your kidneys, I wouldn't be concerned about it.
Yes, thanks. I think 70 or 80 grams probably won't hurt. Its amazing to me how even fruit and vegetables contain protien. Eating yogurt, some cheese and nuts and its relatively easy to meet the guidlines.
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gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I eat more than double that and just had labs run. My protein levels weren't even high. The only reason I can imagine for limiting protein is if your body isn't processing it properly.
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Protien requirements aren't usually set at one gram per pound of body weight. Country nutrient guides vary. UK suggests 53 grams per adult. The European Union suggests .83 per kilogram of body weight. North American standards appear to require higher amounts. IDK why. I aim for 55 per day as a sedentary old female of 5'7" and 9 stone. I am always over it by 20 or 30 grams. As summer depens My goals are to replace some protien calories with carbs from fruit. I heard too much protien is hard on the kidneys, I don't know if that is so or not though it would be good to find out. Young people can get away with more than those of us in the upper years.
The numbers we were recommending are for muscle preservation when eating at a deficit. Somebody who is eating at maintenance doesn't necessarily need as much protein, and the RDAs reflect that (though the UK one is stupid; so, my husband who is 9 inches taller than me and 80 pounds heavier needs the same amount of protein as me? I think not; any flat recommendation that doesn't take body size into account is bad).2 -
How do you mean 'process'? As in tmi, constipation, slow gastric emptying?gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I eat more than double that and just had labs run. My protein levels weren't even high. The only reason I can imagine for limiting protein is if your body isn't processing it properly.
Why do they recommend 55.5 and 45 grams then advise eating twice the amount? This seems misleading.
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MFP increases your macros with exercise you log. Drives me crazy. If you are a paid user you can turn that setting off. Instead of paying for another year (I did pay for 1 year, figured I owed at least that to MFP, but honestly I think it's too expensive), I calculate my daily goals and macros using a different site that figures in my average exercise per week (iifym.com). Once I have that amount I manually set my daily calories and my macros so that they don't change. When exercise is logged automatically in MFP, I simply change it manually to 1 calorie burned so it doesn't mess with my preset macros. As far as how much protein you need, it's my opinion (for whatever that's worth) that you should eat .8g to 1.0g/lb of your target body weight. Just be careful if you're overweight and don't use that weight to calculate. Calculate it by your ultimate goal weight. IIFYM.com can help you set those macros pretty easily and I believe it defaults to .9g/lb. YMMV.0
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How do you mean 'process'? As in tmi, constipation, slow gastric emptying?gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I eat more than double that and just had labs run. My protein levels weren't even high. The only reason I can imagine for limiting protein is if your body isn't processing it properly.
Why do they recommend 55.5 and 45 grams then advise eating twice the amount? This seems misleading.
because the recommendations are the MINIMUM daily amount for healthy body function1 -
How do you mean 'process'? As in tmi, constipation, slow gastric emptying?gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I eat more than double that and just had labs run. My protein levels weren't even high. The only reason I can imagine for limiting protein is if your body isn't processing it properly.
Why do they recommend 55.5 and 45 grams then advise eating twice the amount? This seems misleading.
I was responding to another comment that said it is harder for our bodies to "process" protein as we age or when taken in excess. I assume they meant digestion and absorption, neither of which are really an issue.
There was also mention of it being hard on your kidneys which is not my experience at all. As stated my labs were just run and I am smack in the middle of the "healthy" range for the amount of protein detected in my blood work. And that level was with eating 100g+ a day0 -
gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
NHS admittedly low-balls protein but I've never seen that 'avoidance' recommendation. NHS advice (and consequentally almost all UK food packages) base a 50g/day recommendation on a 2000 cal/day diet, which is over 60% carbs and then roughly 15% each fat and protein. Cray.0 -
Spliner1969 wrote: »MFP increases your macros with exercise you log. Drives me crazy. If you are a paid user you can turn that setting off. Instead of paying for another year (I did pay for 1 year, figured I owed at least that to MFP, but honestly I think it's too expensive), I calculate my daily goals and macros using a different site that figures in my average exercise per week (iifym.com). Once I have that amount I manually set my daily calories and my macros so that they don't change. When exercise is logged automatically in MFP, I simply change it manually to 1 calorie burned so it doesn't mess with my preset macros. As far as how much protein you need, it's my opinion (for whatever that's worth) that you should eat .8g to 1.0g/lb of your target body weight. Just be careful if you're overweight and don't use that weight to calculate. Calculate it by your ultimate goal weight. IIFYM.com can help you set those macros pretty easily and I believe it defaults to .9g/lb. YMMV.
But your LBM isn't necessarily your goal weight is it? Wouldn't that mean 0% body fat? Not sure if I'm right on that, but I've always tried to be .8-1 g per LBM pound, which is about 18-22 pounds less than my goal weight.
Of course hitting that .8-1.0 g can be a little tricky, but I'm in the ballpark most days.0 -
How do you mean 'process'? As in tmi, constipation, slow gastric emptying?gebeziseva wrote: »According to NHS
"The Department of Health advises adults to avoid consuming more than twice the recommended daily intake of protein (55.5g for men and 45g for women)."
I eat a bit over double, at around 100gr.
I eat more than double that and just had labs run. My protein levels weren't even high. The only reason I can imagine for limiting protein is if your body isn't processing it properly.
Why do they recommend 55.5 and 45 grams then advise eating twice the amount? This seems misleading.
I was responding to another comment that said it is harder for our bodies to "process" protein as we age or when taken in excess. I assume they meant digestion and absorption, neither of which are really an issue.
There was also mention of it being hard on your kidneys which is not my experience at all. As stated my labs were just run and I am smack in the middle of the "healthy" range for the amount of protein detected in my blood work. And that level was with eating 100g+ a day
Protein and aging: Research is suggesting we need more protein as we age, not less. The only sense in which it's harder for us healthy oldies to process protein is that we may not utilize it as efficiently as we did when we were younger.
Also, I want to underscore what a couple of people have said, but some have glossed over: If you use a protein estimate that's given in terms of "body weight" (rather than "lean body mass"), then definitely use your healthy goal weight as that "body weight". Our excess fat doesn't mean we need extra protein, because protein is used for maintaining lean mass.
Bodybuilding sites often seem to say "per pound of body weight" without qualifying that, perhaps under the assumption that someone interested in bodybuilding is already reasonably lean. That can mislead people who're still overweight into eating more protein than they need (which isn't necessarily injurious to healthy people, within reason, but if the person's on low calories it can drive out fat calories or micronutrient-rich fruits/veggies that are needed for best nutrition).
This whole topic gets very confusing because the number of grams may be expressed as "per unit of body weight" or "per unit of lean body mass (LBM)"; the units may be expressed as pounds or kilograms; and different people have different beliefs about the right target range, so the same numbers (0.6g, 0.8g, 1g) may be used in any of the above combinations of units and base weight.1
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