quick question: If 20-30grams of protein every 3-5hours is all we need to ensure the most muscle protein synthesis occurs during the day, shouldn’t we all just be eating the same amount of protein per day? (Whatever 20-30grams every 3-5 hours adds up to)
Snew,
An interesting thought for sure, but what if each of us has differing daily calorie goals and thus, differing carb and fat intakes? Wouldn’t that contribute to our total daily protein intake?
Oh, okay. Are you saying that because people have varying amounts of Carbs and fats, that the amount of calories that should be made up of protein will be higher or lower? Therefore people who need more protein will just simply take in more protein than they need to trigger a MPS event.
And going off of Snewmy’s question. In that 3-5 hour period when you’re allowing the potential for protein synthesis to reset, if you take in a small amount of calories, let’s say a cup of coffee with 2 tbsp of half&half, will that prevent this from happening. In other words, will drinking a cup of coffee with a small amount of cream add an additional 3-5 hour waiting period? Thanks!
I am explicitly saying that almost no one is eating JUST PROTEIN and thus, people will have higher daily protein intakes due to trace protein intake.
Not necessarily.
Potentially, but unlikely without a good dose of carbs or protein.
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My followup question would be more along the lines of whether the additional protein beyond that point is important, or if it’s just a side effect of eating enough calories.
For example, let’s say I’m a 200lb man trying to lose fat, and my caloric allotment is 2300 calories. If I eat enough chicken and whey protein to get 25g of protein four times a day, can I fill up the rest of my meals with sweet potatoes, vegetables, and fats, or should I be trying to eat more chicken breast in order to hit something like the 250g of daily protein that you recommend in To Be A Beast?
I’m personally someone who has a hard time eating a lot of lean meat, so it would be nice if I didn’t have to worry about protein intake past that 20-30g of animal protein per meal. I recognize that I will end up getting somewhat more protein from my carb sources, but life would be quite a bit easier if the target was something like “100g of animal protein over four evenly spaced feedings” rather than “250g of protein per day”.
How do you differentiate?
200-250 would be my recommendation
You can’t eat 100g of protein per day with 20-30g of animal protein at 4 meals and 2300kCal total.
I would differentiate by asking the question “should I make a deliberate effort to eat more protein if I’m already getting 20-30g of animal protein 4x/day?”.
Why not? As an extreme example, you could get your carbs and fats from oil and gatorade, which would have minimal trace protein. More realistically, if you’re eating steak and sweet potatoes, you could end up with around 100g of animal protein and 20-30g of other protein in a 2300 calorie diet. That’s still very far away from the 200-250g protein recommendation. Is the assumption that people are actually getting 100-150g of trace protein from their carb/fat sources, or are the MPS guidelines leading me astray?
I don’t see how this sentence enough information to make any informed decision about protein intake.
You could, yes. Try that out and report back 
Not really, no. If you eat 100g of whey protein per day that is ~480kCal, so 1900 kCal left. If you eat 350g carbs (1400kCal), approximately every 25g carbs has ~5g protein yielding another 70g protein. Similarly, every 10g fat has about 5g of protein (outside of pure oil), so 60g fat would yield 30g protein giving you 200g protein in a day.
I’m sure you could try and REALLY eat a low trace protein diet to come in at 150 or 160g per day, but I’m not sure why one would purposely do that.
I don’t know what this question means other than no, I am not assuming people are getting 100-150g trace proteins per day (probably at least 50-60 though) and I think total daily protein intake should be somewhere between 1.6-3.1g/kg per day.
I also find it somewhat frustrating that every few months people will make this same argument, yet not post the meal plan where you’re getting 100g of protein from animal protein and less than 150g protein total while getting the recommended amount of fiber and calories.
Everyone here could probably stand to eat more protein. Even you, Shem.
Maybe we’re working off of different sets of nutrient/calorie data. I was just getting my data from a quick google search of ‘nutrition in ribeye steak’ and ‘nutrition in sweet potato’, which tells me the following:
Eating 100g of ribeye steak gets me 22g of fat, 24g of protein, 0g of carb, with 291 calories total. If I eat that four times per day, that covers my ‘20-30g of animal protein 4x/day’ with a total of 1164 calories.
Let’s say that I add 350g of sweet potato to each of those meals. This gets me another 1.5g of fat, 280g of carb, and 23g of protein, with a total of 1204 calories.
All together, that adds up to a diet with 2368 calories and 119g of protein. It meets the guidelines you have laid out for optimal protein intake based on MPS, but it’s only half of the protein recommendation you’re explicitly giving here.
I’m not trying to be argumentative, but I’m honestly confused about how to reconcile this. I see a few options:
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My nutrition data is very wrong, and this diet would have a much higher protein content that I am assuming.
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You consider this a strange diet that is ‘really low in trace protein’. It doesn’t seem that way to me, but I guess that’s a subjective judgement. I did a quick eyeball of the numbers if we replace the sweet potato with white potato or with rice, and the protein numbers don’t really vary by more than 10g total. I guess if we eat a leaner cut of meat and replace those calories with more carbs, that drives up the protein count a bit, but it maxes out at around 140-150g of protein total, even if we’re assuming fat intake is basically zero.
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There are other considerations that you think outweigh the MPS guidelines you’ve laid out. My feeling is that this is probably correct, and I’m trying to figure out what these considerations are.
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With a much higher fat intake than I would recommend, sure.
And you missed the fiber recommendation too.
Again, yes, you can arbitrarily create a diet that does not fulfill all the criteria I’d like to see. Just not sure how meaningful that is.
- My nutrition data is very wrong, and this diet would have a much higher protein content that I am assuming.
It doesn’t look wrong.
I consider a diet “strange” if it’s being used as an example against my recommendations, yet doesn’t represent my recommendations with respect to fat and fiber intake. Yes, you can eat a keto diet with (necessarily) low protein. You can also eat a higher fat diet with lower protein. I wouldn’t recommend either of these things. I also would recommend eating 30-35g of fiber per day, which requires less energy dense carbohydrate sources.
No, it doesn’t (last sentence). If you eat a diet with 30-35g fiber per day, includes fruits and vegetables, and is around 50-60g fat per day at 2300kCal (which is what I typically recommend), you’re going to have a hard time eating under 180-200g protein.
Yes there are, which I’ve discussed before and it pains me that people are so hyper-focused on MPS from this minimal dose of protein. We discuss essential amino acid content (which includes BCAAs) quite often and when your EAA levels are lower (or depleted), MPS stops. People see 3g leucine= MPS and think the story is over, but no one ever said that. Rather, we accept that 3g of leucine in a protein source is enough to drive MPS and this is about 25-30g of animal protein per meal. We also accept that there will be a significant mount of trace proteins consumed proportional to calorie intake unless fairly unique approaches are taken to avoid this, which likely violate other dietary recommendations. Finally, we have said that the data suggests 1.6-3.1 grams of protein /kg per day per the recent literature, with higher intakes advised for lifters, athletes, older individuals, and vegans.
I do not think that you isolate one portion of the recommendation from the other.
This last portion solves all my questions, thank you ! Also jordan just a quick side question, I ordered Peri Rx like 10 days ago, got email with receipt but no tracking, I see it is now out of stock, just wondering if something went wrong somewhere, thanks!
Nevermind to the above question ^ Found the contact page sorry!
As far as I can tell, eating 1400g of sweet potatoes gets you 42g of fiber, which is even higher than your recommendation.
Here’s the meal plan you requested:
2 meals of 80g chicken, 200g white rice, 100g broccoli, 100g apple
2 meals of 200g eggs, 200g sweet potato, 100g carrots, 200g blueberries
That gives you 132g of protein, 54g of fat, 338g of carbs, 41g of fiber, and a reasonable amount of fruits/vegetables at just over 2300 calories. I can add in more food variety or move more of the calories from starches to fruits and vegetables, but it doesn’t really change the protein numbers much. It’s not difficult to come up with all kinds of realistic diets that meet the criteria you mentioned. To be honest, I’d have a harder time coming up with a diet that hits 250g of protein at 2300 calories without deliberately increasing the amount of animal protein. Even if you eat chicken breast for all of your animal protein needs and fill up the rest of your calories with beans, you’re barely breaking 200g of protein.
I think it’s mostly because of the “7 Rules to Optimize Protein Intake” article where you say that “the optimal protein intake per day is initially based on how much protein a person needs per meal to maximize MPS multiplied by the number of meals they will have per day.” I recognize that you include some additional modifiers (age, gender, animal protein vs vegan protein), but none of them seem applicable to this conversation. My conclusion from reading this was that I could achieve optimal protein intake by eating enough protein to maximize MPS 3-5x/day, which seemed to conflict with other common recommendations, including your own guidelines written elsewhere.
It seems to me that the amount of trace protein in a 2300 calorie diet is probably going to be somewhere between 20-50g, unless the diet is heavy on legumes or something like that. That explains why not everyone needs exactly the same protein intake, but this seems like a bit of a red herring. If trace protein was the primary reason for differing protein recommendations, I would expect you to be recommending higher protein intakes for bulking diets than for cutting diets, and that’s the opposite of what I see.
I apologize for belaboring this point, but I’d like to try to clarify my original question that was unclear to you:
If I am currently eating the 2300 calorie diet described above, which meets all of your requirements for fat, fiber, and optimal protein intake (as per “7 Rules to Optimize Protein Intake”), would I benefit from eating more chicken and less rice/potato?
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Ah yes, an oversight on my part there.
Neither of these meals would be likely to generate muscle protein synthesis given this is about 15g protein in sum with chicken (so 2 meals of 7.5g animal protein) and the eggs would be about 12.5g of animal protein per meal. Sorry dude.
Sure, if you’re not trying to get enough EAAs to drive MPS it’s reasonably easy.
LOL. Look, Shem- if you allow for 20-30g of protein from animal per meal and constrain your fat and fiber as indicated, you’re going to get a higher protein value. I am not sure why you keep disputing this.
Not really, no.
That would be an incorrect conclusion then
YES!
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According to a Google search, 100g of chicken breast has 31g of protein, so a meal of 80g of chicken breast should have about 25g of protein. From the same source, 100g of egg has 13g of protein, so a meal of 200g should have 26g of protein. Again, I’m open to a correction if you think this information is wrong, but I think my math is correct.
I’m disputing the idea that a reasonably balanced 2300 calorie diet that has 20-30g of animal protein per meal, 30+g of fiber, and 50-60g of fat is going to have a protein intake anywhere near 250g. I think I’ve provided an example of a realistic diet that meets those criteria with only 132g of protein. I recognize that it could certainly have more than that, but I don’t think it’s likely to hit 200g, much less 250g, unless you start eating more animal protein. If I’m confused about what you mean by “higher protein value”, or if I’m missing something obvious here, please let me know. I feel like we must have some disconnect here, because this particular point seems very clear to me, regardless of my overall confusion about maximizing MPS.
What quantity of EAAs do you need per meal to drive MPS? Your “7 Rules to Optimize Protein Intake” article makes it sound like 20g of whey protein would be enough to maximize MPS, so I’m not really clear on where the requirement for more EAAs comes from.
Basically, I’m working off of the following paragraph from your article:
I don’t understand how to reconcile this with what you’re saying now about a need for significantly higher protein intake to drive MPS. I’m not trying to argue any point here, since I’m obviously not sufficiently well-informed about MPS to do so, but I do think this is something I should be capable of understanding. I feel like I’m coming off as an idiot, so I’ll try to lay out my logic as clearly as possible, so that you can point out where I’m interpreting you incorrectly or making a logical error. I’m getting the following points from the paragraph I cited from your article:
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3-4g of leucine maximizes MPS if consumed from a source that has all the essential amino acids.
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20-30g of animal protein contains 3-4g of leucine.
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Animal protein contains all the essential amino acids.
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Assuming these conditions are met, MPS cannot go any higher with additional protein.
Conclusion: 20-30g of animal protein will maximize MPS.
Fair enough; I appreciate your concise response to my practical question. I will adjust my behavior accordingly, although I do hope that I can understand more fully why this is the case.
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No. The USDA food products database says 100g of boneless, skinless chicken breast has 23g protein and 100g of egg has 12g of protein. I did the math wrong on the egg example,
So, a couple issues here with the premise:
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A 2300kCal diet is likely the diet for something in the 160-190lb range (in general). Sure, some larger or smaller people will be in this range too, but the average weight of a person limited to 2300kCal is going to be in that range. A 200lb guy needing 2300kCal to lose weight isn’t unheard of to be clear, but that’s rather low and in that situation, we know that higher protein intakes do better.
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Within that weight range, I’d be unlikely to recommend 250g protein as a minimum unless someone had additional factors to require that. In this thread I said 200-250 giving myself some wiggle room. A 200lb guy needing 2300kCal is likely dieting and maybe fairly low on LBM, dieting quickly, or not terribly well trained, which helps generate the 200-250g range. 200g would be fine- no worse or better than 250g without additional context.
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If you eat 20-30g of protein per meal from animal sources 4-5x/day, you’re consuming 80g-150g of animal protein per day. Depending on additional context I would make stronger arguments for a particular intake, sure, but when you add in another 30-40g of trace proteins you’re at 110-190g protein.
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Allowing for significant amounts of flexibility in the diet with the assumption that dietary protein is important, recommending a protein intake that is ~1g/lb is about where I shoot for.
That is what I would recommend.
Yes, in a younger or more trained population 20g of whey will drive MPS. Older folks would be better with a bit more unless they’re well trained. EAA’s are present in extraordinarily high quantities (with high bioavailability) in whey, which differs from animal and vegetable sources that are whole.
I’m not sure what the confusion is here other than taking a paragraph out of context and applying it universally.
The paragraph illustrates that in general, 3-4g of leucine with a complement of EAA’s will drive MPS and consuming more isn’t necessary from a MPS standpoint.
It can, until EAAs run out or MPS reaches its limit for a single meal.
Pretty close, though this varies by source. 4g would be a stretch, but 3g yes.
In varying amounts, yes.
With enough EAA’s, sure- though there is some variability based on age and training status. For example, a 60 year old dude who doesn’t train might need ~40g protein from chicken (4g-ish of leucine) whereas 4oz (28g pro and 3-ish gram leucine) would do it for a younger person.
Yes, if you interpret what I’ve said to mean 20g animal protein, 4x/day will be ideal for a 200lb man from a MPS standpoint and subsequently, produce ideal outcomes from a protein intake standpoint- then that’s a miscommunication.
At present, our protein recommendations are 1.6-3.1g protein per kg body weight per day and we aim for a specific context based on other factors.
My apologies; not sure where Google was getting their data from for the chicken breast.
Thank you for your detailed response; that cleared a lot of things up for me. I have one point where I’m still not 100% clear:
Does 4oz of chicken have enough EAAs to drive MPS for that younger lifter, or are you just referring to the leucine content?
For practical purposes, yes- though future meals may require some additional EAAs too.