Latest / Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40 / Is "High Protein" Just Another Fad Diet? | Ep 466

Transcript

Is "High Protein" Just Another Fad Diet? | Ep 466 · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:00
  Philip Pape: Chances are you've been prioritizing protein.
• 0:03
  Philip Pape: And yet, because of all the attention on protein, you might hear pushback in the media or on podcasts that, hey, maybe this is another fad, the high protein fad.
• 0:14
  Philip Pape: So I thought it'd be a good idea to show you three specific criteria that define a fad diet and test high protein against all three, and then explain why this backlash confuses commercialization with science.
• 0:28
  Philip Pape: We're going to revisit topics like protein's thermic effect, its satiety impact, the muscle building threshold, and why the case might be even stronger than you think to get plenty of protein if your goal is fat loss, building muscle, and a long, healthy life.
• 0:47
  Philip Pape: Welcome to Wits and Weights, the show that puts a popular piece of fitness advice under the microscope, finds a hidden reason it doesn't work, and gives you the deceptively simple fix that does.
• 0:57
  Philip Pape: I'm your host, certified nutrition coach Philip Pape.
• 1:00
  Philip Pape: And what I see happening now is there is high protein in everything.
• 1:03
  Philip Pape: There's high protein, of course, in protein bars, but there's also protein cereal, protein water.
• 1:08
  Philip Pape: Everything that they that has even a little bit of protein is marketed as high protein.
• 1:13
  Philip Pape: And when something gets super popular like that, there's often a backlash.
• 1:17
  Philip Pape: I've heard it on mainstream media.
• 1:18
  Philip Pape: I've heard it on like news podcasts that aren't even in our space, where you'll see things like, are we obsessed with protein?
• 1:25
  Philip Pape: And is high protein bad for you?
• 1:28
  Philip Pape: Or are we going far beyond what the evidence says you need to have?
• 1:31
  Philip Pape: Or isn't the level you need for protein only this?
• 1:35
  Philip Pape: And why are people, you know, bodybuilders and fitness gurus recommending so much?
• 1:41
  Philip Pape: And so there's this uh skepticism, I'll call it, which I'm always for curiosity and skepticism.
• 1:47
  Philip Pape: But then there this leap of logic where they're connecting, say, the low-fat craze of the 90s to the keto craze of the 2010s, to proteins today, and they're saying, okay, this is just the next trend.
• 1:58
  Philip Pape: And if you are listening to the show, you're probably trying to eat more protein.
• 2:02
  Philip Pape: And what we would call high protein, now that's a whole separate issue because to me, the protein we need is as a percentage of your diet still totally reasonable.
• 2:14
  Philip Pape: It's just people are eating far too little protein.
• 2:16
  Philip Pape: But that's part of what we're getting into today.
• 2:18
  Philip Pape: Because if you're trying to build muscle, if you're trying to lose fat, and then you hear somebody say, Oh, are we getting too much protein?
• 2:24
  Philip Pape: Is that a fad?
• 2:25
  Philip Pape: And you second guess yourself, I want to settle that today.
• 2:28
  Philip Pape: And then stick around to the end of the episode because I'm gonna give you a three-question test that you can apply to any nutrition trend.
• 2:35
  Philip Pape: So for my skeptics out there who are listening and want to know, hey, is this thing real?
• 2:39
  Philip Pape: Let me examine it a little bit more carefully.
• 2:42
  Philip Pape: And when someone starts talking about anything, even if it's seed oils, let's say, you can apply this test.
• 2:48
  Philip Pape: So today in this episode, you are gonna learn the specific characteristics that make something a fad diet, and why the high protein approach really fails every one of those.
• 2:58
  Philip Pape: You're gonna hear research on how protein builds muscle, burns more calories during digestion, reduces hunger, all the fun stuff about protein to reacquaint ourselves if you've already heard this before, or to learn something new and the value of protein, and why, especially adults as we age, over 40, over 50, especially women, a protein or in menopause, need higher protein, not to check a box, but because it is important to your physiology.
• 3:23
  Philip Pape: All right, so first let's define what we are talking about.
• 3:26
  Philip Pape: What makes a fad diet a fad?
• 3:30
  Philip Pape: The British Dietetic Association, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, and multiple research reviews give us a pretty consistent set of characteristics.
• 3:42
  Philip Pape: A fad diet eliminates entire food groups.
• 3:46
  Philip Pape: And it often relies on a single magic food or a super food or sometimes a supplement.
• 3:52
  Philip Pape: It promises rapid results from some sort of hack or trick of your metabolism, and it is based often on anecdotes and testimonials as opposed to peer-reviewed research.
• 4:05
  Philip Pape: It often involves selling you something proprietary, a special method, a special program, a special approach.
• 4:13
  Philip Pape: And it's unsustainable long-term and often ignores physical activity.
• 4:18
  Philip Pape: In other words, it's in a vacuum as hey, this diet solves everything.
• 4:23
  Philip Pape: So I know I just threw a lot at you, but I want you to think of some real world examples that'll make this concrete.
• 4:28
  Philip Pape: So we have the HCG diet.
• 4:31
  Philip Pape: This is you're effectively injecting a pregnancy hormone and you're eating only 500 calories a day.
• 4:38
  Philip Pape: There was a meta-analysis of 24 studies, found zero evidence that this does anything for weight loss.
• 4:44
  Philip Pape: And it sold for something like over$1,000 a month.
• 4:47
  Philip Pape: Then we have the blood type diet.
• 4:49
  Philip Pape: This is Peter D'Amano's book, sold over 7 million copies, I believe.
• 4:52
  Philip Pape: And there was a study in 2014, University of Toronto, over 1,400 participants.
• 4:57
  Philip Pape: Again, no evidence that supports the diet.
• 4:59
  Philip Pape: Same thing with the cabbage soup diet, the grapefruit diet, the cotton ball diet.
• 5:03
  Philip Pape: That is a real thing, the cotton ball diet.
• 5:06
  Philip Pape: And they're all based on this single magic item approach.
• 5:10
  Philip Pape: And they're all nutritionally inadequate, often lead to malnutrition, they're all unsustainable, and many times they just simply don't work.
• 5:17
  Philip Pape: And even if they work, it's in the short term at a severe cost with all these other things.
• 5:22
  Philip Pape: So if you look at the historical pattern, I think history is worth understanding here, like they say, so you don't repeat it.
• 5:28
  Philip Pape: In the 80s, in the 90s, the villain was fat.
• 5:33
  Philip Pape: If we go back to the late 70s, Senator McGovern had dietary guidelines in 1977 that told us to cut fat and eat more carbs.
• 5:42
  Philip Pape: And so that's when the food industry started creating low fat everything.
• 5:46
  Philip Pape: They replaced fat with sugar.
• 5:47
  Philip Pape: And what happened?
• 5:48
  Philip Pape: Well, obesity rates went from 15% in 1980 to over 40% by 2018.
• 5:54
  Philip Pape: So then we swung the other way and we demonized carbs.
• 5:58
  Philip Pape: And this was starting to kind of overlap in like the 90s.
• 6:00
  Philip Pape: That's when I was a teenager.
• 6:02
  Philip Pape: Atkins, Paleo, keto, and even today, like carnivore, right?
• 6:07
  Philip Pape: All these things are very low carb.
• 6:09
  Philip Pape: And we know Atkins went filed for bankruptcy back in 2005, although I still see the brand, so somebody must have bought the brand to slap on these low-carb items.
• 6:17
  Philip Pape: And now you look, you know, people look at protein and they say, all right, it's the same thing.
• 6:21
  Philip Pape: You know, fat had its moment, carbs had its moment, and now protein is having its moment, but it's not a fair comparison.
• 6:29
  Philip Pape: So let's get into it.
• 6:30
  Philip Pape: Let's run the test.
• 6:31
  Philip Pape: Does high protein meet the criteria of a fad diet?
• 6:34
  Philip Pape: So, first of all, does it eliminate food groups?
• 6:37
  Philip Pape: It actually doesn't.
• 6:38
  Philip Pape: You can eat high protein as an omnivore, a vegetarian, a vegan, chicken, Greek yogurt, lentils, tofu, eggs, fish, and you're essentially adding something, you're not removing something.
• 6:50
  Philip Pape: This is a key distinction if you think about it.
• 6:53
  Philip Pape: Cutting out or going low carb or cutting out or going low fat is different than saying, no, just eat more protein.
• 6:58
  Philip Pape: That's a different, it's asymmetrical.
• 7:01
  Philip Pape: So that's one distinction.
• 7:03
  Philip Pape: You're not actually eliminating food groups, right?
• 7:05
  Philip Pape: You don't have to cut out carbs or fat to get more protein.
• 7:08
  Philip Pape: You just have to eat in a more balanced way.
• 7:10
  Philip Pape: The second criteria does it rely on a one magic or super food or small groups of food?
• 7:16
  Philip Pape: No, absolutely not.
• 7:17
  Philip Pape: Protein is just a macro.
• 7:18
  Philip Pape: There's no single sort protein source that's really superior.
• 7:21
  Philip Pape: Any high-quality protein works.
• 7:23
  Philip Pape: Plant-based, animal-based, it all works.
• 7:26
  Philip Pape: The mechanism is the nutrient, not something proprietary or special food.
• 7:31
  Philip Pape: The next question is: does it promise rapid results from some sort of hack or trick of the metabolism?
• 7:38
  Philip Pape: Again, no.
• 7:39
  Philip Pape: The recommendation to eat adequate protein for what your body needs alongside resistance training is actually the opposite of a trick or a quick fix because it requires effort, behavior change, consistency.
• 7:54
  Philip Pape: You have to do hard things like resistance training alongside it.
• 7:57
  Philip Pape: So if anything, it's the it's very hard to sell something like high protein from that context.
• 8:03
  Philip Pape: The next question is: is it based on anecdotes and testimonials, or is it based on peer-reviewed research?
• 8:09
  Philip Pape: And here's a very, very clear distinction we have that does not support low carb and low fat.
• 8:16
  Philip Pape: We have tons and tons of studies.
• 8:18
  Philip Pape: But if I were to pick one, there's the 2018 meta-analysis by Morton and colleagues, and this was 49 randomized controlled trials over 1,800 participants, people who consumed higher protein while resistance training gained significantly more fat-free mass.
• 8:34
  Philip Pape: I mean, it sounds kind of dumb to say it out loud, especially if you listen to this show for any length of time.
• 8:38
  Philip Pape: Like, duh, eating more protein, you're gonna gain more fat-free mass.
• 8:41
  Philip Pape: That's lean mass, that's muscle tissue, right?
• 8:44
  Philip Pape: More recently, a 2022 meta-analysis by Noones and colleagues expanded that to 74 randomized controlled trials, confirm the same finding.
• 8:53
  Philip Pape: And we see this over and over again.
• 8:54
  Philip Pape: There's the Tagawa study that's been referenced a lot, the dose response back in 2021.
• 9:00
  Philip Pape: And that was over a that was 105 studies, over 5,400 participants.
• 9:06
  Philip Pape: And when we look at the dose response curve, guess what?
• 9:09
  Philip Pape: You gain lean mass with higher protein intake.
• 9:12
  Philip Pape: And it's across a very, very wide range.
• 9:14
  Philip Pape: So a very wide range, there's a lot of flexibility here.
• 9:16
  Philip Pape: So thousands of participants, decades of research definitely passes that test, whereas low carb and low fat actually do not.
• 9:23
  Philip Pape: Is it sustainable?
• 9:25
  Philip Pape: All right.
• 9:25
  Philip Pape: Well, you tell me if you could eat pretty much any food that has protein, is that sustainable?
• 9:29
  Philip Pape: Like you could eat chicken or eggs or yogurt or beans or lentils or any plant that has protein, oats?
• 9:35
  Philip Pape: I mean, it's again kind of a dumb question.
• 9:37
  Philip Pape: Of course, it's sustainable.
• 9:38
  Philip Pape: You're just adding stuff in and you're giving yourself the bounty of foods available in the world that have protein compared to like Optavia, where they're selling you packaged foods or HCG diets, 500 calorie protocol, or the cabbage soup diet.
• 9:52
  Philip Pape: I mean, it's it's insane that we even do any of these things.
• 9:55
  Philip Pape: And I'm raising my hand because I did them too.
• 9:58
  Philip Pape: I did a crazy diet before my wedding to lose a bunch of weight, where I limited my diet to like 12 foods.
• 10:03
  Philip Pape: I don't even remember what they were.
• 10:04
  Philip Pape: My wife thought was crazy, but she loves me and she was super supportive.
• 10:07
  Philip Pape: So she just kind of looked at me askance and left me alone.
• 10:10
  Philip Pape: But it's insane that we do these two things to ourselves.
• 10:14
  Philip Pape: And then the final question here is here is does it ignore physical activity?
• 10:18
  Philip Pape: This is an important one you might not have considered.
• 10:20
  Philip Pape: I mentioned it already, but the idea that, you know, it's not just about food, right?
• 10:26
  Philip Pape: Food is part of a whole kaleidoscope, I'll say, of behaviors, especially your physical activity and how you move your body, because the whole idea is to fuel yourself.
• 10:36
  Philip Pape: So when we recommend protein and higher protein, we're not saying just sit on the couch and eat more protein, because then you just might have more calories and you gain even more fat, right?
• 10:44
  Philip Pape: Just like carbs or fat.
• 10:46
  Philip Pape: Doesn't matter.
• 10:46
  Philip Pape: They're all energy.
• 10:47
  Philip Pape: It's, hey, you got to be resistance training.
• 10:49
  Philip Pape: And we're seeing more and more of the big industry guidelines even match this.
• 10:54
  Philip Pape: And that's why the levels we give you are far above the RDA.
• 10:58
  Philip Pape: And when I hear the like mainstream media talking about this and they don't even mention resistance training, it's crazy to me because then it implies that there is this corner of the protein world that is like a fad diet, but it's because you're just focusing on the food itself and you're getting obsessed with that, but then you're not resistance training.
• 11:15
  Philip Pape: So I'd say high protein, again, quote unquote high, because most people aren't even eating more than you know 20 or 30% of their diet from protein when it gets up to sufficient levels.
• 11:27
  Philip Pape: It fails all these criteria of a fad diet.
• 11:30
  Philip Pape: Every single one, every single one.
• 11:32
  Philip Pape: The argument that it's a fad relies on the only observation that you could possibly stand on that is, oh, it's popular.
• 11:38
  Philip Pape: It's popular and everybody's talking about it.
• 11:40
  Philip Pape: So we're gonna play the contrarian and we're gonna bash it on, you know, podcasts, and then people are gonna question it.
• 11:46
  Philip Pape: Okay.
• 11:47
  Philip Pape: So I I thought it was important to talk about this.
• 11:49
  Philip Pape: And if if we're confirming what you already suspected, and your question is less about the why, okay, Philip, I get it.
• 11:56
  Philip Pape: I get it, but more about how do I actually hit my target.
• 11:59
  Philip Pape: I actually built a tool for that.
• 12:02
  Philip Pape: Um, and I haven't talked about it in and of itself, but it's called the protein day builder.
• 12:06
  Philip Pape: You enter your daily protein target, and then things like how many meals you want, and what your lifestyle and eating preferences are and your dietary preferences.
• 12:15
  Philip Pape: And then it maps out a full day of meals that hit your numbers.
• 12:18
  Philip Pape: So, of course, you can use ChatGPT or AI for something like this, but this is all pre-designed specifically for this purpose based on the evidence, based on the right numbers and all that.
• 12:27
  Philip Pape: So it's kind of like creating a meal plan on the fly, but very flexible.
• 12:30
  Philip Pape: You can keep hitting the button and update it over and over again.
• 12:32
  Philip Pape: Uh, and then you can lock in your meals and have other ones rebuild around them.
• 12:36
  Philip Pape: So it's pretty cool.
• 12:36
  Philip Pape: It's actually part of Eat More Lift Heavy, which I've talked about before, but I want to make it available on its own.
• 12:42
  Philip Pape: So if you go to witsandwaist.com slash protein dash tool, witsandwaist.com slash protein dash tool, protein tool, I'll drop the link in the show notes and you can go if you want to get a copy of it by itself.
• 12:55
  Philip Pape: Okay, so we've established high protein doesn't fit the high high fad profile.
• 13:00
  Philip Pape: You're probably not too surprised about that.
• 13:01
  Philip Pape: But if you are, I'm glad you found this podcast.
• 13:04
  Philip Pape: I want to go further.
• 13:05
  Philip Pape: I want to go further.
• 13:06
  Philip Pape: I don't think it's enough to just say that.
• 13:07
  Philip Pape: I want to show you why the science behind protein is qualitatively different from like the the fad diet bubble, let's call it.
• 13:18
  Philip Pape: And there's three specific mechanisms that are measurable, that are reproducible physiological effects.
• 13:24
  Philip Pape: And they're really powerful.
• 13:26
  Philip Pape: They're so powerful that a lot of people I work with, a lot of women, especially over 40, who simply increase the amount of protein they eat, start having a tremendous amount of results and progress in other areas like their metabolism and their body fat distribution and everything else, their energy and so on, especially when it part of balanced meals that also include fiber and sufficient fats and carbs, right?
• 13:48
  Philip Pape: This is the thing.
• 13:49
  Philip Pape: They all go together.
• 13:50
  Philip Pape: So the first one is the thermic effect.
• 13:53
  Philip Pape: I still, I'm still on the fence about whether this is overrated or underrated.
• 13:58
  Philip Pape: So hear me out.
• 13:59
  Philip Pape: Your body burns energy digesting food.
• 14:02
  Philip Pape: Makes sense, right?
• 14:03
  Philip Pape: But not all foods cost the same to process food, that food in your body.
• 14:08
  Philip Pape: And so we call this the thermic effect.
• 14:10
  Philip Pape: Thermic meaning heat heat energy.
• 14:12
  Philip Pape: So fat has a thermic effect of close to zero.
• 14:14
  Philip Pape: Carbohydrates are about five to 10%, and protein is 20 to 30%.
• 14:18
  Philip Pape: Now that's percentage of calories.
• 14:20
  Philip Pape: That's the percentage of the calories that you eat of that macro get burned in the process of processing that macro.
• 14:26
  Philip Pape: So again, fat zero, carbohydrates five to 10, protein is 20 to 30%.
• 14:30
  Philip Pape: And that's a big difference.
• 14:32
  Philip Pape: If you start to scale that up and you you figure you eat 800 calories from protein, your body is gonna burn 160 to 240 of those calories just processing the protein.
• 14:43
  Philip Pape: Right.
• 14:44
  Philip Pape: Now that's 200 grams of protein.
• 14:45
  Philip Pape: You may be eating less than that, but I'm just giving you round numbers.
• 14:48
  Philip Pape: But the same 800 calories from fat, where you know, protein bur can burn 160 to 240.
• 14:53
  Philip Pape: The fat's gonna burn like 24 calories at most.
• 14:55
  Philip Pape: And we've seen this on in studies as well.
• 14:59
  Philip Pape: There is a West WesterTerp 2004 paper you can look up and a 2024 review by Servanini or Seravini, I'm sorry, that's a TZ seravini and colleagues in Metabolism Open that also confirmed these ranges of the thermic effect.
• 15:16
  Philip Pape: And it declined, it seems to decline a little bit with age.
• 15:20
  Philip Pape: So older adults produce about 6.4% total diet-induced thermogenesis compared to 7.3%.
• 15:27
  Philip Pape: It's a small difference, but it also is another reason to just keep cranking up that protein as we get older for the most part.
• 15:33
  Philip Pape: So that's an important one right there.
• 15:35
  Philip Pape: Number two is satiety, fullness.
• 15:37
  Philip Pape: Protein reduces hunger more effectively than any other macro.
• 15:40
  Philip Pape: So we've got two big wins here, right?
• 15:42
  Philip Pape: We've got the thermic effect, and now we have satiety.
• 15:45
  Philip Pape: There's a 2005 study about 20 years ago by Wagel and colleagues.
• 15:49
  Philip Pape: And they took participants from 15% to 30% protein in their diet, but they kept carbs constant.
• 15:57
  Philip Pape: And no one was told to eat less.
• 16:00
  Philip Pape: Calorie intake dropped by about 441 calories per day spontaneously in the participants who increased their protein.
• 16:09
  Philip Pape: And then they lost about five kilograms, which is over 10 pounds.
• 16:13
  Philip Pape: That's like what, 12 pounds or something, over 12 weeks without trying.
• 16:18
  Philip Pape: I say without trying, but I mean they increased their protein, and that's all they did.
• 16:22
  Philip Pape: That goes back to my earlier comment about how powerful this can be, right?
• 16:26
  Philip Pape: So that's that's from nothing other than being less hungry.
• 16:30
  Philip Pape: There's a scientist, her name is Heather Lady, L-E-I-D-Y, who has a lab where they looked at high protein breakfasts, like a 35 gram protein breakfast, and showed that it reduces evening snacking and it also changes the brain reward signaling when looked at looked at it on fMRI.
• 16:49
  Philip Pape: And that's compared to a normal 13 gram protein breakfast.
• 16:51
  Philip Pape: And I say normal, I mean a lot of people don't even get that much for breakfast.
• 16:55
  Philip Pape: And we've seen other studies that found that higher protein diets reduce daily hunger as well, reduce your desire to eat, increase fullness, all of it.
• 17:02
  Philip Pape: So it kind of all goes together when it comes to managing your hunger signals.
• 17:06
  Philip Pape: And then number three is of course muscle protein synthesis.
• 17:09
  Philip Pape: That's the big one.
• 17:09
  Philip Pape: I mean, your body is gonna use the amino acids from protein to build and repair your muscle.
• 17:14
  Philip Pape: And there is a dose threshold.
• 17:17
  Philip Pape: Like you need enough leucine.
• 17:18
  Philip Pape: This is a specific amino acid to trigger the pathways that kick off the process.
• 17:23
  Philip Pape: But if you're eating enough protein for the day, you're gonna hit somewhat, you're gonna hit those thresholds.
• 17:28
  Philip Pape: And I always tell people like your first priority is just get your total protein dialed in however you can.
• 17:34
  Philip Pape: And then your next priority is to spread it out.
• 17:36
  Philip Pape: And the spreading out part is a little bit for higher muscle protein synthesis, but that's a that's kind of overblown.
• 17:43
  Philip Pape: The more practical reason is, or yeah, practical it for practical reasons.
• 17:49
  Philip Pape: It's so that you can have the more balanced meals, help with your satiety, and get your protein in in a practical way.
• 17:56
  Philip Pape: That's why primarily I suggest having protein every meal.
• 18:00
  Philip Pape: So, how much are you looking for every meal?
• 18:02
  Philip Pape: Probably at least 20 or 25, ideally 30 to 40 grams.
• 18:06
  Philip Pape: And since you probably need over 100 grams a day, you do the math, three or four meals, 30 to 40 grams.
• 18:12
  Philip Pape: That's how we do the math.
• 18:13
  Philip Pape: Pretty straightforward.
• 18:14
  Philip Pape: And again, you can go grab my tool, wits and weights.com slash protein dash tool, and go purchase that tool if you would like a standalone way to calculate and hit this for yourself.
• 18:26
  Philip Pape: Uh, one last thing, you probably heard that 2023 study by Trommelin and colleagues that looked at the hundred grams of protein, and they saw that eating even a full, that huge amount of protein in one meal could produce a post-exercise response that lasts for many, many hours.
• 18:41
  Philip Pape: So there's not a, oh, you, you know, the rest gets wasted.
• 18:44
  Philip Pape: Like if you eat over 40 grams, you're gonna waste the rest.
• 18:46
  Philip Pape: Well, however many pro however much protein you eat in one dose is going to get used in some way.
• 18:54
  Philip Pape: Like a large bolus, as they call it, especially post-training, can do that.
• 18:57
  Philip Pape: But I would still recommend recognize distributing across meals just for practical purposes.
• 19:02
  Philip Pape: Okay, I want to spend a few minutes on the older population.
• 19:06
  Philip Pape: A lot of you are probably over 40, 50, 60, you know, I myself am 45, because it's even more important the older you get because of the muscle mass decline, because of the need to resistance train and support that.
• 19:18
  Philip Pape: Starting around the age 30, muscle mass declines 3 to 8% per decade.
• 19:23
  Philip Pape: Strength declines even faster, believe it or not, about 1.5% per year between the age of 50 and 60, accelerating to 3% per year after that.
• 19:33
  Philip Pape: This is huge for functionality and for aging.
• 19:37
  Philip Pape: For women, the menopausal transmission, transition, I apologize, tends to amplify these.
• 19:43
  Philip Pape: So postmenopausal women have nearly three times the odds of sarcopenia compared to pre-menopausal women.
• 19:48
  Philip Pape: And we know that there's issues with bone density as well.
• 19:51
  Philip Pape: We see a higher incidence of osteoporosis.
• 19:53
  Philip Pape: Estrogen decline drives reduced growth hormone, reduced IGF-1, increased inflammatory cytokines, accelerates visceral fat accumulation, that's belly fat, menopause belly, we've heard of that, right?
• 20:05
  Philip Pape: And there is even this protein leverage mechanism that we think exists for menopausal weight gain.
• 20:10
  Philip Pape: The idea that increased protein breakdown during menopause gives you a higher appetite through a hormone called FGF21.
• 20:19
  Philip Pape: And so if you don't have enough protein coming in, you're gonna overcompensate by eating other stuff just to get total calories.
• 20:25
  Philip Pape: You're gonna get more fats and carbs and total calories.
• 20:28
  Philip Pape: So a lot of the weight gain women experience during menopause could be partly a protein-seeking behavior that gets misdirected into overconsumption of everything else.
• 20:37
  Philip Pape: Just another reason, whether this is supported long-term or not by the evidence to eat more protein.
• 20:44
  Philip Pape: And then there was the now, take this with a grain of salt, the women's health initiative data, which has its own problems for things like hormone replacement, but we're talking about body fat distribution.
• 20:55
  Philip Pape: And they looked at nearly 4,700 postmenopausal women over a three-year period.
• 21:00
  Philip Pape: And those consuming one and a half grams per kilogram or more lost more visceral fat and more subcutaneous fat and gained lean tissue compared to those at lower intakes.
• 21:09
  Philip Pape: Again, not surprising.
• 21:11
  Philip Pape: Just eat more protein.
• 21:12
  Philip Pape: So I can go on and on about the studies, but protein is not a trend.
• 21:17
  Philip Pape: It's here to stay.
• 21:18
  Philip Pape: I'm glad that more and more people are eating it.
• 21:20
  Philip Pape: And I'm kind of glad that they're putting it in all these foods, to be honest, just to get the attention up, you know, whatever your thought is on processing and ultra-processing, which is its own problem in our Western environment.
• 21:31
  Philip Pape: Now, if you're worried about eating too much protein, I usually tell people there's not really an upper limit unless you already have something like kidney concerns.
• 21:37
  Philip Pape: But the main thing is you just don't need so much more protein.
• 21:41
  Philip Pape: If you like more protein, I have a lot of clients who just love to eat their protein, perfectly fine.
• 21:45
  Philip Pape: As long as you can make it work with work and get enough fiber, nutrients, fats, carbs, depending on the goal, it's gonna actually serve you quite well, especially in a fat loss phase.
• 21:54
  Philip Pape: So, in conclusion, the recommendation to eat at, I'm gonna call it adequate protein, not even high protein.
• 22:00
  Philip Pape: Protein, just adequate protein, 0.7 to 1 grams per pound.
• 22:03
  Philip Pape: I didn't even mention the number until now.
• 22:05
  Philip Pape: 0.7 to 1 grams per pound of your body weight.
• 22:07
  Philip Pape: So that's based on your body.
• 22:09
  Philip Pape: It's for your activity level, it's for your age.
• 22:11
  Philip Pape: So probably more if you are more active or you're training, you're trying to build more muscle, you're in fat loss, you're older, et cetera, right?
• 22:18
  Philip Pape: All of this is backed by plenty of studies.
• 22:20
  Philip Pape: It's endorsed by many, many large organizations now: sports nutrition, geriatric nutrition.
• 22:24
  Philip Pape: And it's clear the mechanistic explanations are totally clear for these benefits.
• 22:29
  Philip Pape: So I think we could put to bed that there's any fad kind of cloud over higher protein or what I'll call adequate protein.
• 22:36
  Philip Pape: All right, before we wrap up, remember that three question fad diet test I mentioned earlier.
• 22:40
  Philip Pape: I think is pretty cool to examine things skeptically.
• 22:43
  Philip Pape: I'm going to give it to you in a second.
• 22:45
  Philip Pape: But if this episode gave you something that's helpful, whether the research, the framework, or say the confidence to keep prioritizing protein and hit your protein, I would love it if you just share this with a friend.
• 22:56
  Philip Pape: That's it.
• 22:56
  Philip Pape: That's all I'm asking you to do.
• 22:58
  Philip Pape: Follow the show and share it with a friend, somebody who's wondering about protein.
• 23:03
  Philip Pape: And again, if you want to make sure you're hitting your protein or find a way to do it, uh grab my protein day builder at witsandweights.com slash protein dash tool.
• 23:12
  Philip Pape: The link is in the show notes.
• 23:13
  Philip Pape: Of course, if you're an Eat More Lift Heavy, you already get that tool unlocked as part of the program.
• 23:18
  Philip Pape: And that program, by the way, is at eatmoreliftheavy.com if you want to learn more.
• 23:23
  Philip Pape: All right, here's the quick test you can run on anything that is like a trend or you see on social media.
• 23:29
  Philip Pape: It's three questions.
• 23:30
  Philip Pape: Question one, does it eliminate something?
• 23:32
  Philip Pape: That's it.
• 23:33
  Philip Pape: Does it eliminate something?
• 23:34
  Philip Pape: If if you're told to cut out an entire macro or food group, it's already a red flag.
• 23:40
  Philip Pape: I don't care if it's seed oils.
• 23:42
  Philip Pape: I don't care if it's artificial sweeteners.
• 23:44
  Philip Pape: It's still a red flag.
• 23:46
  Philip Pape: Evidence-based nutrition tends to add and adjust and have some flexibility built in.
• 23:50
  Philip Pape: And oftentimes this fear-mongering of single ingredient things is a red flag because things are not that black and white.
• 23:58
  Philip Pape: And often that restriction leads to binging and overconsuming at the end of the day and then not maintaining your results.
• 24:04
  Philip Pape: So just ask that question because if it doesn't eliminate, that at least means it's probably on better footing.
• 24:10
  Philip Pape: Question two does it require buying something proprietary or secret or special or this is my secret one thing?
• 24:20
  Philip Pape: If the only way to follow the diet is to purchase something, a product, a supplement, a membership, that's just really, really good marketing.
• 24:28
  Philip Pape: That's really good marketing.
• 24:29
  Philip Pape: Whether there's a little bit of science behind it or not, that is good marketing.
• 24:32
  Philip Pape: Now, there could be some very science-grounded practitioners who have programs that you pay for.
• 24:41
  Philip Pape: My my question here is is the thing that they're trying to teach you that works only unlocked for you if you pay something?
• 24:49
  Philip Pape: That's what I'm talking about.
• 24:50
  Philip Pape: Like I don't hide information behind a paywall, right?
• 24:52
  Philip Pape: And if I do, let me know.
• 24:53
  Philip Pape: I haven't I don't hide information behind a paywall.
• 24:56
  Philip Pape: What I like to charge for is helping people and where you see the value of being helped implement that information for you.
• 25:04
  Philip Pape: Like to me, that is that is where that is the value of working with a coach or with a group of people that are expert in this to accelerate your results.
• 25:12
  Philip Pape: That's different from locking the actual information behind a paywall.
• 25:16
  Philip Pape: All right.
• 25:16
  Philip Pape: The principles work, they should be free.
• 25:19
  Philip Pape: Question three is could you do this for at least five years, if not the rest of your life?
• 25:24
  Philip Pape: So this is the sustainability question.
• 25:26
  Philip Pape: If the approach is so extreme or rigid or socially isolating that you think of it as a short-term thing, like a quick fix, or I'm gonna do this just to lose weight, that's a big problem.
• 25:37
  Philip Pape: That is not a sustainable strategy.
• 25:38
  Philip Pape: And if you're like, yeah, but Philip, isn't that the only way to lose fat?
• 25:41
  Philip Pape: No, it's not.
• 25:42
  Philip Pape: The way we lose fat is by scaling things up or down, but still having the balanced meals that hit your protein, they keep you full of the right nutrients that fuel your body, that avoid all of this stress and all of this metabolic dysfunction.
• 25:56
  Philip Pape: And that's the way we want to do it.
• 25:58
  Philip Pape: And if you're like, I don't know how to do that, okay, come join us, eatmoreliftheavy.com.
• 26:02
  Philip Pape: Check it out.
• 26:02
  Philip Pape: That's what we do.
• 26:03
  Philip Pape: And again, that is where I'm not gonna hide information.
• 26:06
  Philip Pape: The information's on this podcast.
• 26:07
  Philip Pape: In fact, if you reach out to me and say, hey, Philip, how do I do XYZ?
• 26:10
  Philip Pape: I'll probably give you an answer and just we'll move on.
• 26:12
  Philip Pape: All right, so if two or more of those are, I guess it's probably a fad.
• 26:17
  Philip Pape: If you could confidently answer in the negative with all of those, it's probably evidence-based.
• 26:22
  Philip Pape: And of course, high protein falls under that category.
• 26:25
  Philip Pape: Until next time, keep using your wits, lifting those weights.
• 26:28
  Philip Pape: And remember, you do not need permission to simply eat enough protein as part of a balanced meal for your goals.
• 26:36
  Philip Pape: Go after it.
• 26:37
  Philip Pape: I'm Philip Pape.
• 26:38
  Philip Pape: I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits and Weights Podcast.