Welcome back, Misfits!
Well, as I said before, this is apparently going to be an entire series dedicated to each individual step of each phase. In order to do each part of both planning and nutrition justice, I can't just spend 10-15 minutes on all of them, so I am spending that time on each sub segment.
And today... we cover Protein!
Why is protein important?
Well, the protein we consume is a building block for building muscle and a catalyst for burning fat.
You might be curious as to how that works and why it works more specfically. And I might go into that later in detail in terms of chemical processes and such once we have covered the basics of this wholel planning process. But for now, we will simply discuss what all it does in the body and how much of it you need, as well as what good sources of protein are.
For now, this is what you need to know:
--Protein helps you to rebuild muscle after you’ve torn it down in a workout, and rebuild it bigger.
--Protein itself as a thermogenic in the body - meaning that it helps burn fat through its presence in the body .
--Protein, since it helps you build muscle mass, also continues to compound that fat burning ability, as more muscle mass means your body burns more fat, even in a sedentary state.
It's also important for a whole bunch of other functions, including your immune system, your central nervous system, brain health... really, its pretty vital in almost every system in your body. All of the macros play their part in most systems, in fact.
But ultimately, at the end of the day you can think of protein as your super macro.
When we say macro, we mean macro nutrients, and when we say macro nutrients, we mean the three main types of calories that everybody knows about.
And those three macros are protein, fat, and carbs.
Get used to hearing that if you somehow been living under a rock and weren’t well acquainted with those already, because those three macro nutrients will make up the focus of how you structure your diet after you’ve worked on trying to get your calories to an appropriate level.
If you think of calories as helping to determine your size, then you can think of macros as helping to determine how you look and/or are structured... and how you perform.
Additionally, protein is the macro nutrient, that when consumed, is the least likely to metabolize or convert into fat in the body.
Meaning that you would have to eat a lot of protein, and very little of your carbs and your fat, and not be using your calories or your macros during your daily life or workouts, in order for it to convert to fat. So, in general, it is the safest macro to consume more than your goals for.
However, protein is also the most satiating macro - meaning that you can feel pretty full after eating a lot less of it than you could of the other two macros.
One of the biggest struggles that I tend to find with my clients and even myself is just trying to get ENOUGH protein… Either from sources that are acceptable to our meal selection preferences or simply because of how much it can sometimes take to accomplish your goals. Even if that amount isn't extremely high, its almost always more protein than people are used to consuming.
Which... very neatly brings us to how much protein should you be consuming?
And the answer is roughly 80% of your body weight.
Now before you humorously miscalculate that in your head or misinterpret that to mean that if you weighed 200 pounds, you would have to eat 160 pounds of protein...
That would just be insane. And of course is not the answer.
(Don't think people haven't tried.)
The math is actually pretty simple on this. And it can be adjusted up and down both depending on your body weight and depending on how new you are to trying to consume the amount of protein that you need. For instance, someone who weighs 300 pounds might start off by simply trying to eat 50-70%, until they dropped weight. 80% of heavier body weight throws off the calculations and expectations there.
So the calculation...
Originally the calculations that were used recommended .8 gram per kilogram of body weight… But there have been more studies and such that have come out (and a lot of meathead lifters who have figured this out on their own) that have suggested that it is actually closer to 1.6 g per kilogram of body weight. OR. Or... keep that .8 and make it .8g per POUND of bodyweight (instead of kilo).
So there we have it: ideally, you need .8 grams protein per pound of bodyweight.
So someone who is 200 pounds would need... 160 grams of protein a day. Or more.
Now that still might intimidate people, but as I tell all of my clients and members, if hitting all of your nutritional goals and routines was easy, then you wouldn’t need a coach, and to quote A League of Their Own:
"If it was easy, everyone would do it."
It’s a process. So its a GOAL to shoot for and get closer to every day. If you are used to eating 50-70 grams of protein a day, and now I'm asking you to shoot for 160 grams, work on getting a little more every day. Make it a habit you BUILD.
You eventually get there, so cut yourself some grace and work towards it instead of expecting to be able to hit it immediately.
And all of this, of course comes with exceptions and caveats, depending on individual bodies, genetics, family, history, etc., as I said when we started down this nutrition rabbit hole.
Now how you get your protein is almost as important as getting enough protein.
First you need to focus on getting enough protein.
Then you can begin to be more selective and obtain better “quality “sources of protein.
Now here’s where I as a coach have a tendency to guide people differently than other coaches do. I don't consider myself a food snob, and I understand that in a lot of places people live in “food deserts" and have to work with what they can access and/or afford.
The most ideal sources for protein, unless you’re vegetarian or vegan or pescatarian, are animal sources. And even then, with pescatarian you can consume fish, and with vegetarian you can consume animal by-products. Eggs and the like.
Animal sources/meat sources of protein tend to be the highest amount of protein per pound consumed.
But after that, many legumes and beans and plants have high protein as well.
As a matter of fact, pumpkin seeds are one of the highest vegan sources of protein that you can consume… And if I’m wrong and somebody wants to fact, check me on that.. go ahead.
Also, protein shakes obviously serve to round out your protein needs. I am not at all hating on or discouraging or disparaging anybody for using protein powders or shakes whatsoever. I obviously use them. Trying to get to 160 to 200 or more grams of protein every day can be a challenge even for me.
But the more of your calories and protein that you can eat versus drink, the better off the results are going to be. That's a whole talk for later about digestive processes.
But by all means, if you need to round out your protein with a protein shake or protein powder, go for it. Again, the focus is on getting enough calories, then getting enough protein, and then getting a little bit more selective with your protein or finding what works better for you, and then moving onto the other macros.
That’s it for now, but stay tuned as next installment we will be going into carbs. *insert dramatic music*
For now,
This has been Coach Cap, helping put the Fit… in MisFit.
Comentarios