Protein for Weight Loss
Most people don't realize how important is protein for weight loss. Dieting for them is just eating less, and after months of struggling with calories, they complain about the same flabby belly.
You probably know that losing weight doesn't necessarily mean improving body composition. Muscle loss during dieting is always a concern that may become a big inconvenient if you don't follow at least a decent nutrition and training plan.
It's well known that calorie intake is a moderator of protein requirements, which increase when you consume less food because your body retains less amino acids. (Conversely, more protein is retained when you eat more calories.)
When you are dieting, your body will also use protein to provide energy through a process called gluconeogenesis – the conversion of protein into glucose, which take place in the liver.
The more protein is used for energy, the less will be available for muscle maintenance. As a consequence, when calories are restricted, protein intake should be increased accordingly.
For this reason, overweight, sedentary individuals should increase their protein consumption up to 1.5g/kg (0.7g/lb), which is nearly twice than the Recommended Daily Intake (RDI). This will help them greatly to limit lean body mass losses while dieting.
Along these lines, it should be noted that most studies don't provide obese dieters with enough protein for weight loss, and for this reason their results are not relevant.
Eating more protein for weight loss has also other benefits such as increased fullness, increased calorie expenditure via thermogenesis, and more stable blood glucose levels (which is important because obese subjects are more prone to insulin resistance).
Leaner individuals should also increase their protein intake for two reasons:
The leaner you get, the more your body will tend to save its fat stores, and use muscular tissue instead for energy production.
Even more important is that a sound diet plan should always include weight training in order to maintain or improve body composition (this becomes critical for leaner individuals).
It is currently unknown if weight training causes a need to increase substantially protein intake.
However, although amino acids are not used significantly as a source of energy during strength training, most likely protein requirements go up in order to cover the repairing of damaged tissue and also the synthesis of new contractile proteins.
Some “renowned” fitness experts, such as a HIT aficionado named Dave Durell, speculated that strength athletes need only a tiny amount of extra protein because muscle building is a very slow process.
I should also mention that this guy has written two brochures that sells on his website. Do not, I repeat, do not buy them. It's a fucking ripoff!
And although this is true, we know that most protein is actually used to repair the damaged tissue and not to build extra muscle. Not to mention that when you are in a calorie deficit, realistically, you shouldn't expect any extra muscle mass.
Just how much protein is needed for the fitness-oriented individuals to maintain mass while dieting is currently unknown.
However, we do have enough empiric evidence showing that successful bodybuilders often increased their protein consumption up to even 3.3-4.4g/kg (1.5-2.0g/lb)!
In my opinion there is no need to go over 3.0g/kg (1.4g/lb), assuming a slight calorie deficit. Remember, the leaner you are, the smaller your calorie deficit should be. Otherwise the risk of losing muscle along with fat becomes much greater.
I hope you have now an idea about how important is protein for weight loss. So train smart, eat your protein, set calories according to your leanness, and soon you should be in the best shape of your life.
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