Protein (Part 3)

protein, supplement, whey, powder, shaker

Before read Part 3, be sure you read Part 1  and Part 2 .

Protein supplements

In training program, there is always a nutritional plan because to build muscle lifting weights isn’t enough. The good quantity of protein in relation to your bodyweight is an extremely important element. But as you’ve noticed, it’s difficult to eat enough protein without eating too much fat. Protein supplements are a solution.

Protein supplements can increase protein intake without increasing the fat’s amount in your body and ease protein intake several times a day. Eating several times a day is essential for a bodybuilder and having tips to make it easier is appreciated.

There is an incredible variety of protein supplements and they really have a dessert’s taste. What’s interesting is that they’re more and more rich in nutrients with vitamins and minerals and in macronutrients with proteins and carbohydrates. Find a protein supplement that meets your nutritional needs and tastes can be a help in your nutritional plan.

whey, protein, supplement, glass, milk, egg, soy, shaker, powder

As there is an incredible amount of protein supplement, there are several things to check to help you choose. First, reading the label is important because there are some that really contain too much carbohydrate. It’s good to know that carbohydrate improve the conversion of food protein to muscle protein but an excess of carbohydrate creates an excess of calories which prevents your body from easily burning fat. Therefore, it’s necessary to count the number of carbohydrate on the label.

Second, protein supplement that is consumed pure, without a meal or without carbohydrate, isn’t metabolized effectively. Research shows that for the protein to be used for protein synthesis, it must be consumed with calories, especially those from carbohydrate. Otherwise protein and used as energy production.

On the other hand, if you’re on a low carbohydrate diet and you increase your protein intake for energy (to compensate the lack of carbohydrates), it may be a good idea.

Third, the protein source of protein supplements comes from 3 foods :

  • Milk protein (whey, milk protein concentrate and caseinate)
  • Egg protein
  • Soy protein

All these proteins are of high quality. For the moment, no scientific studies show that there is one protein better than the other. Protein supplements made from milk and eggs are the most popular among bodybuilders. Soy protein has a specificity because it can reduce serum cholesterol rate in some people. This may be advisable for people with cholesterol problems but it’s careful because it’s possible to find a lot of GMOs in soy.

It’s important to remember that protein supplements aren’t created to be the only source of food protein. A balanced diet consisting of whole foods is essential for a healthy diet and building muscles.




SLAP Tears

slap tear anatomy shoulder


SLAP is an acronym for superior labrum anterior to posterior. The labrum is a rim of tissue that adds depth to the bony socket of the shoulder. The superior or « top » portion or the labrum is important and frequently injured because the biceps attaches to this region.


SLAP tears happens because of physical activity with repetitive overhead movements or physical shock. Tears created because of overhead movements are common among athletes as basball pitchers or tennis players. Tears created due to physical shocks are often a fall on a hand stretched with the arm over the head or fall directly on the shoulder.


slap tear anatomy shoulder

SLAP tears are very difficult to diagnose only with a physical exam because of different shoulder problems. Using a MRI with or without contrast helps a lot.


The first step is to do a nonsurgical treatment. While the SLAP tear likely will not heal, a study confirmed that many have improvement of symptoms and function. If nonsurgical treatment (such as physical therapy) isn’t successful, surgery is being considered.

Surgery is usually done arthroscopically and involves reattaching the torn labrum to the top of the cavity. Generally, bone anchors loaded with sutures are inserted into the top of the cavity. The sutures are passed through the torn area of the labrum. The sutures are tied, which brings the torn labrum to the bone.


Although it’s difficult to avoir acute SLAP tears, it’s possible to prevent chronic tears, especially with athletes who make overhead movements, maintaining balance in the shoulder.

Exercices that strengthen the muscles around the shoulder blades and exercises that stretch posterior shoulders are recommended to reduce the risk of SLAP chronic tears.




Manage Your Amino Acids

amino acids





amino acids table

Essential amino acids

Here are the 8 amino acids :



Isoleucine, Leucine and Valine are BCAA (amino acids star)







This amino acid increases alertness.

Tryptophane (amino acids star)


Nonessential amino acids

Here are the 12 amino acids :


This amino acid helps recovery and growth.

Arginine (amino acids star)


Glutamine (amino acids star)


Aspartic acid


Gutamic acid




Ornithine (amino acids star)





This amino acid protects your joint.


This amino acid increases your energy, your memory and focus.


This amino acid increases your energy, focus and endurance.



Amino acid derivatives


L-Carnitine (star)


Citrulline Malate (amino acids star)


Choline and Inositol


amino acids food source

amino acids food source bcaa

If you don’t read my article about protein, click here.




Trick To Have Really More Energy



Often, during the day, we have a loss of energy. There is a trick I learned at my first karate class when I was 6 years old- At each class our Sensei (teacher) taught us how to breathe. There are 2 types of breaths :

Breathing with the upper body

This is the breathing that most people do. We can recognize a person who breathes from the top of the body because the shoulders rise with each inhalation . This type of breathing is not good because it reduces your performance, your well-being and your energy.

Diaphragmatic (abdominal ) breathing

diaphragmatic breathing

It’s diaphragm breathing. For simplicity, it’s abdominal breathing. This type of deep breathing calm down immediately, improves your well-being, increases your performances and your energy.

Here are some scientific studies on the beneficial effects of diaphragmatic breathing because the list is long. Scientific study Aa , Bb , Cc , Dd , Ee . It’s this type of breathing that is taught for fighting sports, singing, meditation, yoga, public speaking, etc.

Try during these next days to identify what type of breathing you do. You can put a reminder on your smartphone because it’s a test to be done over several days. The principle is that every time you realize that you’re breathing from top, made deep breaths to do the diaphragmatic (abdominal) breathing. You’ll quickly notice that you feel much better after that with a better state of mind.

The idea is that you’re more used to breathing with the diaphragm to have more energy in the day.




Manage Your Protein

protein food


I write this article about nutrition because when I started to seriously lift weights to build muscles, I didn’t know what to eat. There was a lot of people around me with impressive bodies but their muscle weren’t visible. So the problem I had was that when I ate too much, I had a big belly with swollen skin because of water. And when I ate a little, I didn’t have the energy to train in the gym.

Speaking with a bodybuilder, he explained me the basics of nutrition to have an athlete’s body or bodybuilder’s body but he told me that I should always continue to learn new scientific studies to be up to date.

To build good quality muscle, you have to eat healthy foods. These healthy foods are in the form of protein carbohydrate and lipids. The reason why it’s necessary to eat protein is because muscle is protein. If you cut your arm in 2 parts and you analyze inside, you’ll see that the muscle is made of protein, which means that the muscle is meat.

Here are the main sources of protein :

  • Beef

  • Chicken

  • Egg

  • Fish

  • Dairy products

  • Soy

  • Lentil

The nutritional quality source of these foods depends on whether they’re organic or not.

Protein is amino acids. Human body is composed of 80% amino acids. Your muscles, your skin, your bones, your hair are composed of amino acids. Each amino acid has an important role in the body. There are several amino acids like BCAA, glutamine, arginine, etc. I will write an article about amino acids.

To build muscle in our body, we need BCAA, especially leucine. Leucine’s role is to stimulate the synthesis of the protein that is responsible for muscle growth.


protein healthy food plate

There are variations in protein consumption because each is different, each has a different goal and each has a different level of training (beginner, intermediate and advanced). Advanced level people are people who do amateur or pro competitions. There is the bulking phase and cutting phase.

We will use an example with a person who weighs 85kg.


To bulk, you consume 1.5 to 2.5 gr per kg of bodyweight. For a beginner, it will be 1.5gr of protein. So the weight (85kg) multiply after 1.5gr then 1.5 x 85 = 127.5 gr of protein per day. For an advanced, it will be 2.5gr of protein. So 2.5 x 85 = 212.5 gr of protein per day.


To cut, you consume 2 to 2.7 gr per kg of bodyweight. We lightly increase proteins and lipids to compensate for the reduction of carbohydrates to avoid losing too much muscle mass. For a beginner, it will be 2gr of protein. So the weight (85kg) multiply after 2 gr then 2 x 85 = 170 gr of protein per day. For an advanced, it will be 2.7gr of protein. So 2.7 x 85 = 229.5gr of protein per day.

With these results, you’ll organize 3-5 meals a day with about 30-35 gr of protein per meal. But beware, these meals should be balanced against carbohydrate and lipids.




Feed Your Brain Is Important

feed brain




Good food for the brain





Check the book’s quality









Proteins And Kideys


I watched a Jamcore DZ’s video  and I learned a lot of stuff.

When I started to train in a gym. I often asked myself this question : « How much protein do I have to eat at each meal ? ». I asked this question to people in the gym and I had several different answers. For example, someone told me that if I ate too much protein, it could destroy my kidneys or that whey (shaker) was better protein than protein from food (chicken, beef, eggs, etc).

I think you also ask yourself this type of questions so I will help you understand better.

Firstly, everyone knows that protein is very used in fitness and bodybuilding. You can find protein in food or as a dietary supplement such as whey, casein and amino acids. Protein are composed of amino acids.


1) How much daily protein is recommended for someone who doesn’t do fitness  ?

It’s 0.8 grams (gr) of protein per kilogram (kg) of body weight or 0.36 grams per pound. For this article, I will use the unit of mesure kilograms (kg).

I will take the example of Jamo who is a former professional bodybuilder who continues to train. Jamo weighs 95kg. 95kg at 0.8gr per kilo of bodyweight gives as a result that Jamo eats 76gr of protein per meal. Jamo want to keep his bodybuilder body without steroids. For this, he must eat several times a day and that makes a total of 360gr per day.

2) With sport, do these recommendations change ?

Yes, because a sedentary person will use more of his/her body, which means that this person will use more his/her muscles. The meals content changes with the sport and the type of sport. If we compare a person who is doing fitness and a person doing marathons, we see that the meals are different.

A person doing marathons needs to eat more carbohydrates than protein to have endurance. A person who does fitness/bodybuilding need to eat more protein than carbohydrates for muscles rebuilding and muscle growth.

3) Depending on the intensity, do these recommendations change ?

Depending on the intensity, the answer is yes and no. It also depends on the muscle mass. When a person is doing a really intensive workout, the most important marcro is carbohydrate.

An increase of protein is necessary when a person decreases carbohydrates to be shredded. Increase protein helps maintain muscle mass.

4) With age, these recommendations change ?


With the latest scientific studies, we learned that proteins need to be increased with age. When a person start to become old, that person loses muscle mass naturally (and it’s normal). It’s for this reason that it’s important to play sport to maintain muscle mass. And to help to maintain this muscle mass, it’s necessary to increase protein.

This a scientific study about it, click here

5) Consume a large amount of protein destroys kidneys ?

The answer is yes and no. In a case where a person has pre-existing kidney problems before playing sport, it’s important to see a nephrologist (kidney specialist) or a doctor. For people who have healthy kidneys, proteins don’t destoy the kidneys. Kidneys are the most detoxifiying organs of the human body and we (human being) have been created to eat meat. The human being is made to eat a lot of meat. Until now, no study has shown that the protein destory kidneys, except for people with pre-exiting kidney problems.

Here is a scientific study on the effects of high protein intake on the kidneys, click here . This study shows that is a myth and a lie.

6) Assimilation and MPS (mass protein synthesis)

Assimilation is when you eat protein. A part of the protein you eat will be assimilated for protein synthesis. Everything else, your body will assimilate because your body is made of 80% amino acids, so these proteins will be used for your skin, your hair, your eyes, your organs. Absolutely all the protein that you eat will be absorbed by your body, nothing is thrown away. There is no protein in you pee.

The goal of protein synthesis is to repair or eliminate damaged proteins and to build new proteins that are copies of the original. New proteins are stronger, denser and more resistant to stress. Muscle Protein Synthesis (MPS) is the reconstruction of muscle caused by stress placed on the body. This can be an injury (muscle tear) or because you intentionally damage a muscle (lifting weights creating micro tears in muscles). MPS process activated right after micro tears and can last up to 48 hours on a damaged site before being repaired.

A part of protein you eat is used for protein synthesis, which will create the state of hypertrophy with hormones. Protein synthesis doesn’t buid muscle, it’s muscle protein synthesis (MPS).

I just read again my text and I see that it’s a bit difficult to understand (for me too ?!?). To make it simpler, protein synthesis repairs your skin, your hair, your eyes, your organs and create the state of hypertrophy. Muscle protein synthesis repair only your muscles.

Here is a scientific study on nutrition and muscle protein synthesis, click here .

7) Liquid and solid protein

Liquid proteins are whey and casein (shaker). Solid proteins are chicken, beef eggs, etc. The diffrence is that the body assimilates liquid proteins faster than solid proteins. The problem is that the quality of liquid proteins is 75% bad on the market, so it’s up to you to study ingredients (as for food in supermarkets) to find the best quality possible. I wrote an article on this subject, click here

8) Number of grams of protein per meal

  • For men, it’s about 30-35gr of protein per meal. For women, it’s about 20-25gr of protein per meal.
  • For older men, it’s about 35-40gr per meal. For older women, it’s about 25-30gr per meal.

Here is an interesting study for women. Eating a large amount of protein has harmful effects on the bones. Click here .
