Protein, Muscle Mass and Weight Loss

I need to lose approximately 22kg.

Now, I understand that muscle loss is inevitable and I cannot avoid it.

However, I believe that protein is used as energy that comes from muscle, which causes the muscle loss, therefore protein supplements or high protein diets help to minimize muscle loss while losing weight (hopefully fat)

My question is this:

I have never used supplements in the past, am I on the right track, in that it would be helpful to use protein supplements while dieting to help maintain as much muscle as I can?

Additionally, what kind of quantities should I be consuming?

 

How much do you weigh now and what is your rough body fat %?

 

I weight 96kg atm, BMI is approximately 28.

6ft tall.

No idea what body fat % is

 

Protein supplements tend to come packaged with quite high calorie counts, mainly because they are typically used by people trying to gain, not lose, weight.

Forget about supplements - they're expensive and they wont make that much of a difference. Instead, just make sure you have a complementary diet/workout plan in place. Make sure that on your rest days, you eat a lot less, whilst on your big workout days, you take in a lot of protein. That way, you should minimise your muscle loss.

 

I have had a read through this thread.

http://www.martialartsplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=44335

If possible, could somebody confirm my findings.

at 96kg, 182cm tall, and age 27, Running once per week, training once per week.

I got a maintenance calorie figure at 2326

Men: BMR = 66 + (13.7 X wt in kg) + (5 X ht in cm) - (6.8 X age in years)

Activity Multiplier *Sedentary = BMR X 1.2 (little or no exercise, desk job)
*Lightly active = BMR X 1.375 (light exercise/sports 1-3 days/wk)
*Moderately active = BMR X 1.55 (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/wk)
*Very active = BMR X 1.725 (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days/wk)
*Extremely active = BMR X 1.9 (hard daily exercise/sports & physical job or 2X day training, i.e. marathon, contest etc.)

3500 calories is equal to 1lb, since I hope to lose 1kg per week (is this too much?) I would need to consume

((2326*7)-7000)/7 = 1326 calories per day to lose approximately 1kg per week, is this too fast?

alternatively
((2236*7)-3500/7 = 1826 calories per day to lose approximately 0.6kg per week.

Are my figures correct, and is it true that my eating last few days of 1500 to 1700 is too little and will cause my weight loss to reduce?

(Damn this is so complicated) lol.

All help is of course very much appreciated.

 

What are you wanting to lose 22kg for?

 

I think those numbers are a little low.

I'd expect your maintenance to be more like 3000 kcal at that weight.

 

Because it was pretty much my weight 6 years ago before life happened

It would also be nice to get back in to competitive combat sports, like I did back in late teens through to early 20s.

75kg puts me at a BMI of 22, so that is my target, which admittedly is a year of hard work away, but solid foundations and hard targets have always been the way to get results.

 

Correct, just re-did it at 2904 with Light exercise 1-3 times per week. Which is 40 mins running for 5k and 1 hour MT per week.

This gives me 2404 calories per day to lose 0.5kg per week. Or 1904 to lose 1kg per week.

Is 1kg per week too much?

 

No. You could lose 1kg a day if you were more extreme.

 

Does this weight loss not come via muscle loss rather than fat loss?

I am carrying a considerable amount of fat, in the usual man fat places, where my chin basically merges into my neck, with the normal man belly.

 

I think that would be water weight etc mostly, though honestly I could not say. I've never delved that deeply into the subject. I just run and skip everyday and eat sensibly, on top of training. I lose 1kg a week easily without even trying. I generally cut the carbs out of my diet as much as possible.

 

First time I have delved into it too. I grew up with the opinion that I would never need to diet. How wrong was I :bang:

 

6ft tall and you want to weigh 75kgs - That's well into 'ectomorphic' territory. What is your natural build (somatype) ?

If you're not naturally Ectomorphic - Skinny Distance Runner Type Build, then you'll whittle down to really low bodyfat and that could be detrimental for the longer term.

Really as a normalish guy I'd expect you to weigh at least 180 pounds (84 kgs or so) at 6 ft tall.

First thing for you is to moderate (count) the amount of carbs you're ingesting each day. Try starting with 150 grams of carbs per day. Making sure that no more than 40 grams come from fructose.

Gradually you can drop that by 10 grams per week = I.E 150 g's week one, 140 g's week 2 etc.

Stay clear of Wheat, Soda-Pops, Glucose-Fructose Syrup, Sugar etc to start. Eat a piece of protein the size of your palm with each meal. And roughly the same size for greens etc and carbs ("The 3 Palms" Strategy)...

Increase the amount of protein you're eating to 50% of your diet.

Ratio something like this: 50% Protein, 30% Carbs, 20% Fat (You need a certain amount of fat in your diet so refrain from any low fat stupidity).

Refrain from doing any extreme 'fat loss' experiments - Your progress should be gradual and sensible. Aim to get shot of approx 1 to 2 pounds of body fat per week as a rough guide.

I wouldn't cut your calories too much at this time. I'd just increase your physical doings until you reach a point where you burn body fat more efficiently. Part of when you get fat is you become less 'metabolically efficient'. Sort that out first.

Good Luck

 

That is the borderline area of what BMI refers to as overweight still. NHS class 63kg to 85kg as the acceptable weight range for my height.

Thanks for the advice, I worked out my daily calorie intake was varying between 5000 and 6000 calories per day!!!

So I do need a calorie cut of some kind, may be not as extreme as others, last week I had eaten around 1300 calories per week and lost 1kg, this week I am aiming at around 2000calories to lose similar weight, so we will see what happens.

 

bmi is a mass statistics tool that has nothing to do with health or normal parameters along the full range of possible body types (nevermind acceptability which is purely a subjective issue). humans aren't IKEA furniture

i'd say don't worry about the speed at which you lose weight. just keep a deficit going in the long term and the weight loss should come by itself (plus, if you treat it as a "diet" rather than simply changing how you eat and/or what you do, you're likely to stop it as soon as you reach your goal, and that increases your likelihood of rebounding). protein-wise, unless you're doing tons of exercise, you don't need that much, but higher amounts can help reduce your total calorie intake. in any case, eating more protein will help (as for how much, the answer is "more" ).

 

Taking a protein supplement such as a whey protein shake is really mainly for people doing heavy amounts of weight training because whey protein can cause insulin to spike because of it's simpler make up, much like sugar does. Whole food sources of protein are going to help you keep from loosing as much muscle mass during you weight loss and they will also help you burn calories because they are harder to digest than whey protein. The typical recommendation for someone who isn't body building but just trying to be more fit is one gram of protein per pound of lean body mass, not fat. So, you need to figure out how much you weigh and what you fat percentage is, then subtract the fat percentage and that is how much protein you should be eating in grams. You will have to do the conversion from pounds to kilos for your personal program. If you do choose to go with a whey protein, get a blend with more whey isolate that concentrate. May favorite is the Optimum Nutrition Gold Standard Why. This is a very high quality blend and their flavors are amazing, not only better tasting that other protein brands, but actually bordering on delicious. Their Super Rich Chocolate is my favorite.

 

sciencey stuff:if you want to conserve muscle mass then its good idea to activate as many motor units as possible (through weight training or sprinting) and create conditions that allow more or equal protein synthesis than breakdown (higher protein intake than usual)

TLDR; listen to Sokklab.

 

Thanks everybody.

Advice taken from all angles, no protein supplements, just good eating and plenty of exercise.

I have done 2000 calories today (without cakes, biscuits and fizzy drinks) and feels like I have eaten more real food than I have done in a long time.

From next week I will monitor carbs in addition to calories, one step at a time

 

Not quite true. There are a great many protein supplements that contain no more calories then a piece of chicken breast. The problem is, a lot of them, like Syntha 6 and anything you find at Chinamart contain lots of sugar and carbs as well. You need to buy Protein Isolates, you wont find them at Chinamart.

To get good protein supplements you have to shop around and spend a bit. I suggest a custom mix from www.truenutrition.com You can custom mix your own supplement at any size of package you need. You can make them with as much or as little of calories and carbs as you need.

In a nutshell, to get protein supps that are equivalent to a piece of meat you have to spend money.