Proteins for bodybuilding: are they essential?
Bodybuilding proteins are protein concentrates extracted from foods such as eggs, soy or milk.
These proteins are then dried (in the same way as milk powder), packaged and sold under a range of different brands.
The question here is whether these proteins are really essential for building muscle, or is it better (and simpler) to fill up on protein straight from your plate?
That’s what we’re going to discover…
Let’s take a look at the different types of protein for bodybuilding
Protein powders used in bodybuilding can be divided into 3 categories:
– whey protein, which is designed to provide the body with an adequate supply of amino acids quickly;
– casein protein, which also supplies amino acids, but much more slowly than whey protein;
– weight gainers, which are carbohydrates that provide the body with the calories it needs.
That said, because they are concentrated products, these bodybuilding supplements contain little fat and carbohydrates (2% and 5-10% respectively).
It’s important to know that these proteins are not products considered “doping”, as they’re just another form of the food you eat every day, and you shouldn’t expect miracles from consuming them, as these protein powders won’t just make you gain muscle.
Are proteins for bodybuilding essential?
If you take enough protein with your meals, protein powders are not essential. In fact, they may even run counter to your goal of building muscle..
You may not realize it, but digesting and assimilating protein costs an enormous amount of calories, and your body may spend too much energy breaking down the protein that in the end the benefit it derives is less than the effort involved in doing so.
A caloric deficit is therefore inevitable.
This is more in line with the objective of a person looking to lose weight, isn’t it?
Protein for muscle building could well be compared to ‘Slim Fast’ type products, as both contain protein powder, and despite this, Slim Fast is used by overweight men and women who want to lose weight.
Another example to illustrate this comparison are high-protein diets such as the famous Dukan diet for slimming, which consists of gorging oneself on proteins to force the body to expend as much energy as possible to burn them.
This effort would then be the best way for the body to draw on its resources by burning fat and muscle to meet the high calorie requirements (necessary to assimilate proteins).
In most cases, therefore, there’s no point in consuming protein powder if you’re new to bodybuilding.
The first thing to do is to take care to feed yourself properly and stimulate your body so that it is naturally able to respond favorably to the effort you put it through.
