The Power of Protein: Unmasking its Role in Weight Loss and Muscle Growth (Re-Run)

November 23, 2023 · 23 min

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(Originally aired 2020)  Are you ready for an eye-opening exploration of proteins and amino acids and their impact on your health and fitness? We're getting real about protein intake and debunking prevalent myths as we question whether the recommended daily allowance is actually low. Hear us highlight the essential role protein plays in muscle growth, metabolic rate, and weight loss while addressing the controversy around potential kidney damage from excessive protein. Learn about the varying protein needs of sedentary individuals and athletes, and get ready to be challenged by the latest research and best practices.

Dive into the intricate world of amino acids and their sources as we distinguish between essential and non-essential amino acids, and spotlight why lusine is a crucial player in muscle repair. Discover complete protein sources from both animal and plant origins, and unravel the secret of protein-rich food combinations that can revamp your diet. As a bonus, we're celebrating the two-year anniversary of our podcast, Health and Fitness Redefined, and reflecting on the transformative impact it's had on our listeners' lives. Fitness is not just about physical health; it's the fuel that ignites our mental well-being, motivation, and resilience. Embrace the redefined difference in health and fitness with us.

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Full transcript

Hello and welcome to Health and Fitness Redefined. I'm your host, anthony Amin. Join me today as we take a dive into the world of health and fitness, where we learn how to overcome adversity, to pick facts for our addiction and see health and fitness as a whole new light. Welcome, guys. And today we are talking all about protein. Why protein? Because it is a macronutrient that most people think they understand but really don't. So we're going to talk about how much protein you should intake. When should you intake protein? What does current research state about protein? What are amino acids? Why should I be taking any of this? Should I be supplementing? Am I having protein? All of those questions and more will be answered today. So, without further ado, let's dive right into this episode of protein. All right. First question we hear all the time. We're jumping right into it how much protein should I intake? We hear this from a bunch of clients. We hear this from all across. People ask how much protein they should be intake per day. Well, the jurors out. I can tell you that Currently, the recommended daily allowance of protein is 0.8 grams per kilogram. So this is all in kilograms. Don't think this is pounds. First you got to convert your weight into kilograms and then you'll be able to figure out how much protein so right now, the RDA states that it is 0.8 grams per kilogram is your recommended daily allowance of protein. This is something that started being recommended about 10 years ago and it already has been disproven, so a lot of people think that protein should be 0.8. I know there's some nutritionists out there that might disagree with me on this, but I think the numbers are very low and I'm going to give some examples why. According to my current protein research, my house's steak tests better than leave stocks. Fair enough, mike, thank you so much for your appreciate that, but this is why I like doing this live. So, no, I think point 8 is too low. I don't think point 8 is enough, and I'm going to start with just sedentary people, so not athletes. If you're an athlete right now, just kind of tune this part out, but this is for the majority of people. I personally believe you should be at that 1.2 range. Why 1.2 range? Because it's enough protein needed to go through protein synthesis to make sure you don't have muscle loss, which is going to occur if you're not eating enough protein. Now why do we need protein? Why do? We need muscle. Maybe you could do the whole episode on this. Let's go. Technically speaking, the more muscle we have in our body, the higher a metabolic rate. Meaning the more calories a day we burn at rest, meaning the more weight we can lose. Even for weight loss clients, having a higher protein intake is extremely important when we're in the gym working out. A lot of people think you're building muscle in the gym and I'm sure you see it all the time you do some bicep curls, your biceps pump and you're like look, look, how big my bicep got. And they're like see, it got bigger. And then an hour and a half later it's gone and you're like, darn, there goes my bicep, but it was there, so I grew it in the gym. That's not necessarily true. You may have know from previous episodes what you are doing in the gym is, as you're weightlifting, you're actually creating these little micro tears into your muscle, so you're ripping it up. And what happens? What does your body do when we start causing trauma in any area? It's the same response that happens when you stub your toe Blows up, your body's information response kicks in and it blows the area up and swells it. That's exactly what's going on in our muscles. When we're working out in the gym, we're tearing our muscles and our body's information and response is blowing those muscles up and that's why it's seeming big. Wait, but I thought you grew muscles in the gym, yes, kind of. When you're working out and you're creating these muscle tears, what's happening over the next 48 hours which is why rest in between muscle groups is important is that muscle's now growing back bigger and stronger, so your body doesn't want to tear again. So it's gonna say, okay, let's make this stronger. This way they can't tear it. And then you go in to tear it again and it's like drats, now we have to make it stronger again so it adds more muscle tissue. And then you go and you tear it again and then it goes drats, and this cycle ultimately repeated itself over and over again, and this is how you're gonna start building muscle on your body and why you get stronger, et cetera, et cetera. But why does protein play a role? Protein is the building blocks for muscles. I'm not gonna get into the nitty gritty, boring orgo-chemistry side of protein. So for all of those doctors out there and those scientists that want me to break down exactly what happens with the E protein. It's not happening. We're gonna keep it entertaining for the masses. So we're just gonna talk about what really happens on a general level. So don't yell at me if it's not well, not necessarily exactly what happens. Generally speaking, it does. So that's one thing. So we wanna shoot for that. 1.2. That's what current research is doing now. Now for athletes or people who are weightlifting a lot more and doing that anaerobic training. Anaerobic training is weightlifting. It's training with that, it's working out with that oxygen. That range we're actually sitting right now 1.8 to 2.7 on the extreme. There's theories out there. Some older studies state that there's a chance that you can cause some kidney damage by intake too much protein. It's not necessarily proven. It's too iffy out there right now. So there's really no harm in having that 1.7 to 2.4. I mean, if proteins, literally you're only meal you're eating and you're eating that four or five range, that can't be healthy. But that's a lot of protein. Like you just gotta be downing jugs and jugs of protein. So please do not do that. What they're showing is that higher protein intake is actually gonna help you maintain more muscle as you're working out. You're not gonna use it as energy, it's gonna grow back quicker. So that's why you wanna be at that higher range with protein intake. Yeah, great, anthony, we're understanding this a little more and more. But what Are we talking about? Protein shakes? Well, no protein can be from anything, and what sources have protein in it? Do you guys know? I'm not talking about grabbing some whey protein down from down the block. What sources have protein in it? What kind of foods do we eat to get protein? This is where we're gonna get the best absorbed and they're gonna have other nutrients with it. These are your meats, so that's your fish, that's your beef, that's your chicken, turkey All of these have really high protein intakes and even some veggies where we're gonna have higher amounts of protein. Here you go, michael. As he says, protein poisoning happens in survival situations, when you try to live off ultra lean protein and nothing else like rabbit meat Probably be okay in normal living, and that's exactly what I'm talking about. You literally just have to only eat protein, and I really hope no one's just doing that. That's like saying I'm only gonna eat bacon, that's it. For four straight days, nothing but bacon. What can go wrong? Balanced eating is what we're going for this. So you got your ranges, you got an understanding about how much you should eat. Now this is where my personal advice and research has really come in and shown about time of day. So hear me out when you wake up, you haven't eaten in 12, 14, 16 hours in some cases. That's a long time and your body pretty much has depleted all its resources at that point. So you need to have some kind of protein meal early. A lot of people with these continental breakfasts are missing that protein and they're having just sweets and stuff for a morning. That's not gonna hold you over, it's not gonna satiate you, but on top of that, your body is not gonna be able to use it. It's deprived. It hasn't had anything in like 12 hours. So having protein in the morning is one really essential. The next part is gonna be right after a workout, within a half an hour after working out. Research has shown that is the most ideal time to have protein, whether it's in the form of actually eating, which I always recommend, or if you're somebody that just doesn't feel like having a steak after a workout. Have a protein shake, obviously, depending on what you want. There's many different types out there, but that's something that's gonna help you Is within a half an hour. It's gonna help preserve more muscle fiber and you're not gonna burn it off. So that's one thing, all right. How much per meal? Per meal, they stay between 0.4 and 0.6 grams per kilogram. There's a constant. I use that's in my packets I give all my clients, called protein pacing. What's protein pacing? Protein pacing is exactly what it sounds like. It's having protein constantly throughout the day. It doesn't make too much sense to me to have it all in one sitting. First of all, ow, that's going to sit in your stomach and you're going to have such bad indigestion. Second of all, your body is going to be able to use it and have it readily available throughout the day. Having protein every couple of hours is a lot easier to get your 1.2 to 2.0 grams per kilogram, and that it is all at once. This is the same thing if you want to get 200 push-ups, if you just do 20 for 10 hours. That's a lot easier to do with 200 at once. It's constantly having some protein in your day is going to a lot easier to hit those higher numbers, especially if you're someone who's going to be consuming at those higher levels, which is my love, love, love protein pacing Plus. What it does is dissociate you throughout the day. Now you're less likely to go grab some sweets because you're hungry, trying to wait for dinner, or you want that midnight snack that I know all of us crave and love. Little, important protein pace throughout the day. Nice little tidbit for everybody. All right, this is going to be probably the most confusing thing. We're going to talk about going to this next segment, but please, please, please, pay attention, guys. This is where you're really going to learn. Yeah, I'm excited. All right, there's something called amino acids. What are amino acids? Amino acids make up protein, so this is how you get all these little amino acids in it and they come in form of a complete protein. Protein isn't just protein. It's formed from all amino acids. Now there are essential amino acids and non-essential amino acids. What's the difference? Well, there's 20 of them overall. Some of them your body produce, some of them your body doesn't produce, so we're going to talk about the ones your body does not produce. So there's nine essential amino acids. These amino acids and this is going to be hysterical because I'm going to have to pronounce some of these right now, but where I'm just going to run through all nine and then I'm going to really break down one of them. So you got phenylaline, and I'm totally pronouncing this wrong. Then you got dailine, then drinonein, then tryptophan, which everyone knows that one. Then methionine, lusine, isolusine, lusine and histidine. Now I've pronounced all of them wrong. Great, we're only going to talk about one, and that one we're going to talk about is lusine, because lusine is that amino acid actually that they're doing a lot more research on and has actually shown to be critical for proteins than this is a muscle repair. Remember what I spoke about in the gym when you're working out and you're tearing your muscle fibers apart, lusine is that amino acid that's actually responsible for building more protein and helping repair that muscle more quickly. A lot of current research has been looking at lusine and the effects it has on the body, and they're showing a range between 2,000 and 5,000 milligrams per day. It's actually had benefiting effects for protein synthesis and might be one of the only essential acids that you want to get supplements from or just eat a source that has a lot of it in it. So this is something that I can't wait for research to come out about. It's really all brand new right now, but lusine is definitely one to look out for, definitely one to watch. Look up common sources of what has lusine in it, and this is something you can obviously get from most foods that you are consuming. Now we know we have our essential amino acids, right. So how do we know if a food source has all of these essential amino acids? Well, any meat products do so. Anything that's meat it's chicken, turkeys, whatever. If it's meat and comes from an animal, it's a complete source of protein because the animal synthesizes it for you and then you're getting that complete protein from the animal itself. So, a lot of people who eat meat, you have absolutely nothing to worry about. You're getting all of these sources through your meats and, yeah, it keeps it easy. Now, it's our vegans, it's our vegetarians. Protein usually is a problem for people who practice veganism and vegetarianism, but it doesn't mean it has to be a problem. You can easily get the sources you need of protein for our vegetarians any dairy products or any eggs or fish, if you guys love fish. Like I said, comes from an animal, it's complete, but dairy and eggs are gonna be your two biggest ones. For anyone who is a vegetarian, you need to make sure you're having some kind of source of this as well. Now, whey protein is a supplement form. You can find that's actually the protein from dairy. Whey comes from dairy. So if you were like me and you suffer from lactose intolerance and ou-milk hurts, if you don't have a whey protein isolate, you're gonna have some major GI distress going on. And on top of that, just a little tidbit of information whey protein is the only thing known to cause acne in food from food. So if you're acne prone, lay off the whey protein Instead. There's a many different bunch of proteins out there on the market. You have plant proteins, egg proteins, beef protein supplement. There's a lot. So read labels, get understanding what's in it. Our plant protein products. Half of them are complete, half of them not complete. Just read the products and they'll be able to tell if plants. Now, if you're vegan, for all of my vegans out there, you guys only wanna eat veggies. I get it, but let's talk about some plants that actually are complete proteins. It's only a few of them. So listen, you got my favorite quinoa. So if you like quinoa, this is why it's awesome. Quinoa is a complete protein. Soy, buckwheat, hemp, chia seed, spirulina, temper and amaranth are your only complete proteins, guys. So if you're vegan, you're eating one of these ingredients. Okay, you're making sure you're having this complete protein profile through anything such as quinoa, soy, buckwheat, hemp all of them again but that doesn't mean there's not other ways of getting it. So you actually have. I swear people from like hundreds of years ago knew all this stuff and just didn't write it down. But you have complete protein combos. Listen to this Cause I'm sure all of you eat these all the time and just don't even know. All right, whole wheat toast and nut butter is a complete protein. What? This is my favorite because I love Mexican food Beans and rice. I feel like it's a match made in heaven. Beans and rice form a complete protein. Yay, lento soup with a whole grain roll that sounds like fun. How about this one for my Greeks out there? Peter, chips and hummus is a complete protein. Or all of those summer greens people. We got spinach salad and sunflower seeds together. These are two incomplete protein groups You're putting together to form a complete protein group. Boom, we'll say, like in the industry bada bing, bada, boom. So now we know our complete protein products. We know we have to make sure we read labels, even though something like peanut butter might say seven grams of protein, if it does not a complete protein, we're not fully utilizing it unless we get the other essential amino acids from another source. We know that we should be protein-pasting throughout the day. Let's shoot to have 20 to 30 grams of protein per meal. It's a lot easier, it helps us eat smaller meals, it helps us throughout the day more, and we know we're going to get protein immediately after working out To help maximize our working out efforts, especially people doing anaerobic training, which we know is weightlifting. Training is hits that category and we know that the RDA comes in way too low. We know if we want to hit the recommended daily allowance, that should easily be bumped up to 1.2 grams per kilogram. We know if we live in America, we need to convert our pounds to kilograms before we figure these numbers out. I personally like the one to one ratio if you really want to hit a bare minimum. But, guys, moral of the story is eat more protein. Protein poisoning isn't going to happen unless you're stuck in the woods and, like Mike says, living off of just rabbit meat for the rest of your life. So go out there, enjoy yourselves, grab some fish, grab some chicken, get some protein in that diet. Oh, and before we go, did you know this is as important for the elderly as it is for the youths. So people from the ages of 19 to 90 should be taking this recommended daily allowances, and also a little. Did you know? Higher protein and six lead to increased bone density. A big study came out showed that the higher protein intake is elderly. So 65 and older actually had thicker lumbar spines from bone density tests than they those that had the lower intake of protein. So just because you get an older doesn't mean you don't need more protein in your diet. Just because you're getting older, as we talked about in previous episodes, doesn't mean you shouldn't be weightlifting. You should be lifting those weights until 90, 95, pretty much until you can anymore. The higher amount of muscle tissue you have, the a core, leads to increased bone density and we know we want to prevent osteoporosis and osteopenia, which is the onset of osteoporosis. Little tidbit, guys. Anyway, thank you for joining us on this week's episode of Health and Fitness Redefined. Don't forget, hit that subscribe button and join us next week as we dive deeper into this ever changing field. And remember fitness is a journey, not a destination. Congratulations to our team for hitting year two. Until next week, guys. For us we know what it's like to feel unhealthy, depressed and downright defeated. We want to show others there is a right way and through fitness you can do anything you set your mind to. Fitness can give you that motivation, confidence, energy you need to bridge that mental gap and prevent you from missing important life events. We understand it's about feeling better, living longer and being good examples for our kids. We understand this because we live it and for us, that's the redefined difference.

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