Mainstream dieticians and scientists condemn high protein
diets. They argue that it is wasteful and expensive to eat so much protein
because the excess will be converted into glucose and used for energy (or stored
as fat if there's a calorie surplus). This is true, but in the absence of large
amounts of carbohydrates, it's this conversion of protein to glucose, a process
called gluconeogenesis, that helps bodybuilders get leaner. The process is
"metabolically costly." In other words, you actually burn off calories and speed
up your metabolism by eating too much protein.
Critics question whether this practice is healthy. More will
be said about that later, but let me just get this off my chest right now before
I explode: Yes, it's true! I admit it! I confess! We bodybuilders are all
guilty; we eat entirely too much protein before competitions. And perhaps, if
sustained for a long period of time, it might not be the
healthiest of all diets. I can't argue that a diet with higher fiber content and
more variety isn't healthier than one that is mostly protein.
But guess what? We do it anyway - knowingly and on purpose!
We do it for a reason - because it works! This goes beyond a mere health and
nutrition lecture; this is about the competitive nature of an athlete.
Bodybuilders are highly competitive, and competitive athletes will do whatever
it takes. They are willing to put greater strains on their bodies in order to
achieve the rock-hard, dried-out look that is necessary to win.
This phenomenon is not isolated to bodybuilding. Take a look
at the training regimens of any Olympic, professional or world-class
athlete in any sport. You will find that extreme training or nutritional
practices are par for the course. Is it "normal" to train or work out for 6 or 8
hours a day like some Olympic athletes do? Is it "normal" to run 10, 12, 15
miles a day? Is it "normal" for a wrestler to lose 20 pounds in one week to make
a weight class? Is it "normal" to practice your stroke or swing for hours and
hours and hours every day? Who is to judge what is healthy or what is normal
anyway?
The fact is, competitive athletes are never "normal." You
could easily argue that the training and preparation for any sport at a high
level is "unhealthy." Competitive athletics is an extreme arena and competitive
bodybuilders are the most extreme athletes of all. Putting your body under
abnormal stresses and strains is part of the business.
This is not to say that you should throw all caution to the
wind and adopt unhealthy nutritional practices as part of your lifestyle just
for the sake of a trophy. A key distinction must be made: A pre-contest
bodybuilding diet is temporary. Diets should be cycled just like training
programs. Bodybuilders wouldn't train for power and strength all year round and
neither should they diet the same all year round either. After the contest is
over, an intelligent bodybuilder will cycle back to a much more balanced diet
that contains a wide variety of foods, with more carbs and less protein.
Let me give you an illustration:
Suppose you are a male bodybuilder and you weigh 195 lbs.
Your minimum protein requirement would be approximately 1 gram per pound of
bodyweight or 195 grams. But remember, that's the minimum - As a bodybuilder,
I'd rather err on the side of too much - I'm not waiting around for some new
study to confirm what I already know from experience.
In the off-season, your baseline diet for gaining muscle
should be high in calories and high in carbs. It would look something like this:
Bodyweight 195 lbs.
Calories 3800
Protein per pound
of bodyweight = 1.4 grams
55% carbs = 2090 calories = 522 grams carbs
30% protein = 1140 calories = 285 grams of protein
15% fat = 570 calories
= 63 grams of fat
Now, suppose you decide to compete; you'd begin phase 1 of
your contest diet simply by reducing your calories and adding in more cardio. No
change is made to your nutrient ratios. This kick starts the fat burning
process. If you have good genetics and you are not carb-sensitive, you might not
need any other changes; you could get very lean on this diet, just from the
cardio and the calorie deficit:
Bodyweight 195 lbs.
Calories 3200
Protein per pound
of bodyweight = 1.23 grams
55% carbs = 1760 calories = 440 grams carbs
30% protein = 960 calories = 240 grams of protein
15% fat = 480 = 53
grams of fat
As the show gets closer, you enter phase 2 of your contest
diet; this is where you start to reduce your carbohydrate intake. You also
increase your calorie deficit, but to avoid letting your calories drop into the
dangerous starvation zone, you increase your protein intake. This is the phase
where you will do most of your dieting and where you will lose body fat the most
efficiently:
Bodyweight 190 lbs
Calories 3000
Protein per pound
of bodyweight = 1.6 grams
40% carbs = 1200 calories = 300 grams carbs
40% protein = 1200 calories = 300 grams of protein
20% fat = 600 calories
= 66 grams of fat
Phase 3 is the last leg of your contest prep. At this point,
you are already lean and you want to go from lean to "ripped," so you reduce
your carbohydrates even further (never eliminating them completely). To avoid
metabolic slowdown, you carb-up at regular intervals:
Bodyweight 181 lbs.
Calories 2700
Protein per pound
of bodyweight = 1.8 - 2.0 grams
25% carbs = 675 calories = 169 grams
carbs
50-55% protein = 1350 - 1485 calories = 337 -371 grams of protein
20- 25% fat = 540 - 675 calories = 60 - 75 grams of fat
You're now ripped to shreds, you weigh 181 lbs. and all you
have to do to make middleweights is lose some water a few days before the show.
Your protein intake is now up to a whopping 1.8 - 2.0 g./lb./bodyweight.
1.8 to 2.0 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight? That's
an awful lot of protein, and I know what you're thinking...
"Holy Chicken Breasts, Batman! Isn't eating all that protein
bad for you?"
I knew this question would pop up. This "high protein is bad
for you" myth never seems to go away, so let me squash this ugly bug right now
once and for all.
At one time or another, you've probably heard the myth that
high protein diets are bad for your kidneys, they dehydrate you and give you
osteoporosis.
Well, here's the truth: It's a medical and scientific fact
that except in the case of pre-existing kidney disease, there is no documented
evidence that a high protein intake will cause kidney damage in a healthy
kidney. In fact, there is not a single study that has been published in a
peer-reviewed scientific journal using adult human subjects with healthy kidneys
that has shown any kidney dysfunction whatsoever as a result of consuming a high
protein diet.
In the textbook, "Total Nutrition: the Only Guide You'll Ever
Need," from the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, the authors, Victor Herbert and
Genell Shubak-Sharpe, had this to say about protein and kidney disease:
"High-protein diets have never proven to be a serious hazard
for healthy people, although processing excess protein can overburden a liver or
kidney's that are damaged by disease. That's why individuals with kidney or
liver disease are often put on protein-restricted diets. Likewise, very high
protein formulas can also be detrimental to very young or premature infants
whose kidney function is not fully developed. Some nephrologists have also
speculated the eating a high-protein diet throughout life may be the reason for
the 'slight' decline in kidney function that usually occurs with age, but this
connection is still under investigation."
What about the claim that high protein diets cause
osteoporosis? In inactive people, some studies have shown that increased protein
intakes lead to elevated calcium excretion. This is because high protein intakes
increase the acidity of the blood, and the body must "leach" calcium from the
bones to buffer the acidity. The researchers theorized that this calcium loss
could lead to accelerated osteoporosis, especially in women.
While this phenomenon has been observed in sedentary
individuals, there is no clearly established link between high protein intake
and osteoporosis. Women with risk factors for osteoporosis should be more
cautious, but if you are athletically inclined and participate in aerobic and
resistance exercise, you will probably have few risk factors. Here's what
Herbert and Shubak-Sharpe had to say on the subject:
A post-menopausal sedentary woman would not be well advised
to go on a high protein diet, but if you're a bodybuilder, or even if you just
train with weights recreationally, then you will have denser bones than someone
who doesn't work out. Therefore, extra protein should not be a cause for
concern.
Probably the only legitimate problem created by a high
protein intake is dehydration. Metabolizing protein requires more water than
fats or carbohydrates, so it is very important to consume extra water if you
increase your protein intake. The standard recommendation is 8-10 8 oz glasses
per day (64 - 80 oz). However, the higher your protein intake, the more water
you should drink beyond the standard guideline. For bodybuilders on high protein
diets, a gallon a day (124 oz) is more like it.
I sincerely hope that this series of articles has helped to
clear up some of the mystery, confusion and controversy surrounding bodybuilding
and protein. If there's a single take-home lesson in all this, then here it is:
Never do anything at the expense of your health, but understand this; in
bodybuilding, the bottom line is the results you produce. If a diet works for
you, then it works, period. So forget about what the critics, the conservatives
and the textbooks say; if bigger, harder, leaner muscles are what you're after,
then try increasing your protein intake using the guidelines this series has
suggested. If it works, stay with it. If it doesn't, then throw it out and try
something else; but you'll never know if a high protein diet will help you get
leaner or build more muscle unless you give it a try.