Add Carbs or Protein?

[T3hPwnisher]

Either path you pick, get those fats up.

[TrainForPain]

@RT_Nomad

I would agree. OP is testing if dietary fat increase helps hormones build muscle

He’s 187 lbs. In my meaningless opinion, anything over 200g is removing protein as a variable.

That said, I’m more here:

@T3hPwnisher

get those fats up

I do think preference drives it at this point. He said he trouble gaining weight; I would be more inclined to take a little room off the satiating macro.

All that said, I’m not really disagreeing; I think it just doesn’t matter.

[RT_Nomad]

@TrainForPain

He’s 187 lbs. anything over 200g is removing protein as a variable

Is there any circulating opinion on how much protein can be absorbed in any one sitting? Is there any consideration that the body could utilized protein continuously?

Those two factors were an important component of every diet strategy that I took.

Does anyone believe that one meal of 200 grams of protein is more effective than five equally spaced meals of 40 grams of protein each meal?

[TrainForPain]

Are those relevant questions when the variable is daily total?

[RT_Nomad]

@TrainForPain

those relevant questions when the variable is daily total?

They were extremely important from my approach. I could not get a single person who believed that it was any muscle building benefit to eat more than 50 grams of protein at any one sitting. In other words, three 100 grams of protein meals only added to being able to utilize 150 grams of protein that day. The other 150 grams of protein contributed no muscle growth or repair.

How many grams of protein can be utilized at one sitting? Is there science that you trust on this? Doesn’t it make sense that a 24 hour protein drip might grow the most muscle?

[TrainForPain]

Those are good questions and I don’t really know. Even if the answer is “yes, a protein drip is better,” I’d imagine it’s better in the sense that after 100 years of treatment maybe we’d see a practical difference.

I’ve always found it somewhat counterintuitive that we look at how much protein you can assimilate in a meal in absolute terms, and your daily needs relative to body weight. It makes much more sense to me that there’s an absolute threshold and any relative needs are a margin above that. This appears to be the case with the other macros, why not protein?

So, instead of 1.25x body weight (or whatever the suggestion is), it would be 100g for your body’s daily processes + .5x body weight to add muscle tissue (made up numbers).

To come back at myself, even if that’s the case, I wouldn’t expect any practical different between that level of confusing and our standard recommendations. It would only matter for somebody like an undernourished patient for whom you’re establishing absolute minimums.

To conclude this rambling novel, I really don’t think there’s an anabolic benefit to grossly overeating protein. There’s certainly no risk, and it’s better than under eating protein, and there may be other situation-dependent benefits (satiety, for one). As an independent variable for hypertrophy, however, I think the trainee needs “enough”… which appears to be about 1g/ lbs body weight.

[T3hPwnisher]

@RT_Nomad

Does anyone believe that one meal of 200 grams of protein is more effective than five equally spaced meals of 40 grams of protein each meal?

Ok…maybe not, but I suppose it’s a question of what we mean by “effective”. Dr. Robert Kitlz has some interesting commentary on the benefit of limiting meal frequency for the sake of healing digestion and limiting the negative impacts from frequent insulin/blood sugar spikes. We actually saw something like that here on T-Nation as well regarding the impact of frequent eating and premature aging.

Eating Like a Lifter Makes You Age Faster

[Eating-Like-a-Lifter-Makes-You-Age-Faster] by TC Luoma The Downside to Multiple Daily Meals All those meals you eat every day to keep blood sugar stable? They're gradually causing you to become insulin resistant. Here's what to do. Whenever you cook a steak or burger, you’re witnessing what’s known as the Maillard reaction, which is simply the binding of proteins to sugar. It’s also virtually identical to what happens in your body when you habitually keep blood sugar levels above what the me…

[s.gentz]

@TrainForPain

So, instead of 1.25x body weight (or whatever the suggestion is), it would be 100g for your body’s daily processes + .5x body weight to add muscle tissue (made up numbers).

I think this need to be based on lean body mass. Fat does not require protien. A man that is 300lbs and 40% does not require any more protien than a man who is 200lbs and 10% no matter what their goals are. My thought process has always been 1x LBM is the bare min you would want to consume for a typical diet. Not any science here but based on my experience and a few others that I have consulted with that are much smarter than me.
My typical diet is +/-1.25g/LBM year round whether growing or dieting. This number rarely changes. The end value does based on my LBM, but the formula is the same. There are a few exceptions but for normal growth/diet this number works for me.

[RT_Nomad]

@TrainForPain

Even if the answer is “yes, a protein drip is better,”

Let’s look deeper at this angle. I doubt there are many people who strive to optimize their muscle mass who has taken as many mathematics classes as I have. From a mathematical perspective: A “protein drip” is a flat curve of protein feeding. How much in-depth coverage has T-Nation had about exogenous testosterone (and other anabolic steroids) absorption and half-life. Protein acts likewise in that there is an absorption rate, and a period of available amino acids flowing through the body (similar to half-life.)

The more protein meals you eat per day “flattens the protein curve.” If you are interested in flattening the AAS curve, why wouldn’t you also equally be interested in flattening the protein curve?

[RT_Nomad]

@T3hPwnisher

Ok…maybe not, but I suppose it’s a question of what we mean by “effective”. Dr. Robert Kitlz has some interesting commentary on the benefit of limiting meal frequency for the sake of healing digestion and limiting the negative impacts from frequent insulin/blood sugar spikes

I took great interest in this article. Maybe there is some truth in that, or maybe it is precisely on point. My trouble is that I must deal with the fact that I ate 5 to 6 protein meals per day for the entire three decades that I competed. Over that time, it only got easier to get into contest shape. How do I reconcile what I experienced against the scientific study? I always default to bro-science when there is a conflict, especially when the bro-science seems effective.

[T3hPwnisher]

@RT_Nomad

especially when the bro-science seems effective.

And that’s really the rub. We have to ask what we’re measuring against. There’s a clear history of frequent eating of protein boluses in the world of bodybuilding producing champions, but we can also see a history of bodybuilding producing some premature mortality rates and negative health outcomes. But then we ALSO see that in high level athletics in general. Lots of things to consider.

[FlatsFarmer]

This little blurb says you get awesome protein synthesis for 12 hours plus after 100 grams in one sitting.

What Happens When You Eat 100 Grams of Protein At Once?

[How-Much-Protein-Can-You-Absorb] by Mike T Nelson, PhD The Trommelen Study Is 30 grams of protein the maximum you can use in one meal? New research says no. Here's why. A new revelation about protein just dropped in the journal Cell (1). Let’s dig into it. People always say, “The body can only use 30 grams of protein at once!” Is that true? Well, imagine eating a 16-ounce steak. If you can only use 30 grams of protein at once, you’ll find steak-shaped deposits in your toilet the next morning…

[TrainForPain]

@RT_Nomad

I doubt there are many people who strive to optimize their muscle mass who has taken as many mathematics classes as I have

So let’s grant this, and I have no reason to dispute this.

@RT_Nomad

How do I reconcile what I experienced against the scientific study?

This is where I feel like our debates get a little inconsistent. How can there be another opinion when either:

1. You come up with a different conclusion mathematically, or
2. The math doesn’t work out, but you were successful with your method

Neither is wrong, but we’re not getting any closer to the answer (whatever that holy grail is).

For my part, I go back to: it simply doesn’t matter in any practical sense. Your method was clearly effective, so why would you mess with it.

Let’s go back to flattening the protein drip curve vs AAS. This is only a direct relationship if the two interventions are mechanistically the same in the body. I’d offer they are not. I doubt we disagree there, so we don’t have to tear them apart.

I also don’t have any compelling argument that flattening the protein curve isn’t important, in fact it may well be. I still think it’s a different consideration than the daily total, which is more likely the limiting factor for most of us. There’s an amount of tissue we’re going to build, and excess protein won’t raise that absolute threshold. When we look at it that way, it makes sense we’d see similar net outcomes with frequencies on opposite ends of the spectrum. At the same daily totals, the frequent feeding may be numerically superior; in the real-world, at scale, it’s not a significant enough difference to actually “see” even if we it can be clinically measured.

Great discussion, by the way, and I do consider you a greater authority in this realm than myself.

[RT_Nomad]

@FlatsFarmer

you get awesome protein synthesis for 12 hours plus after 100 grams in one sitting.

Even if this is true, bro-science’s multi number of meals also offered insulin management before anyone knew anything about it. When you drop processed foods and eat frequent clean meals you keep your blood sugar from dropping and then spiking when you do eat. This inhibits the storage of fat.

[RT_Nomad]

@TrainForPain

• You come up with a different conclusion mathematically, or
• The math doesn’t work out, but you were successful with your method

I use my mathematics knowledge to form an hypothesis. I could find no mathematical absolutes in bodybuilding. Mathematical calculations did not exist in anything I did in bodybuilding.

[FlatsFarmer]

That’s true. That’s one way to eat and to manage insulin. And all the other hormones that are influenced by insulin.

And another method of eating could cause different rates of insulin secretion and hormone response.

Kind of like rep ranges or programs when you lift weights.

[T3hPwnisher]

Holy cow, good tie in to this

The Non-Linear Diet for Lifters

[Diet-for-Lifters] by Chris Shugart A Muscle-Sparing, Fat Loss Strategy Lifters and athletes need a diet strategy made just for them. This one preserves muscle mass and protects your metabolic rate. Every fat-loss diet is simple. In fact, losing weight is easy. It's basic calorie math and willpower. Eat fewer calories or expend more calories than your maintenance intake, and the excess weight goes right down the shower drain. The devil, of course, lurks in the details. First, you have to choo…

Would this be “Conjugate dieting”?

[FlatsFarmer]

Now I gotta figure out the difference between Diet Programming and Diet Periodization??!

[T3hPwnisher]

I feel like life figures out the periodization for us. Winter months mean soups, stews, roasts, while summer months mean BBQ and grill outs. Fall is for harvest foods, spring is the time to lean out for summer.

I heard Lent explained as a time that we stop eating the animals so that we give them time to reproduce so we can eat them later in the season, and that made so much sense to me.

[Mobc1990]

Just key in your information at this website and follow it.

Macro Calculator: Count Your Macros Like a Pro!