Nutrition Quick Fix – Part 2

In part one of our “Nutrition Quick Fix” series, we addressed carbs.  Too man carbs, even from clean sources, can keep you from achieving your fitness goals.   Hopefully you tabulated your current daily carb intake and adjusted it as recommended in part one.

In part two, I want to tell you about the power of protein.

Protein should be the cornerstone of any well-planned, well thought out fat-loss plan.  Protein is so important for many reasons such as being the most satiating macronutrient, but the most important for fat-loss are:

1. You MUST consume lots of protein (specific to your body of course) to maintain muscle mass as you lean out.  If you’re a woman reading this, you undoubtedly have “I don’t want to get bulky” thoughts running through your head right now.  But for every pound of muscle mass that you lose while trying to lose “weight” instead of “fat” your metabolism drops by about 100 calories per day.  That’s right; go eat some flesh!!
2. It takes twice as many calories to burn a gram of protein than it takes to burn a gram of fat or carbs.

So not only will you be burning more calories indirectly through increased muscle retention and maybe even muscle gain, you will also be burning more calories through digestion.  The former requires quite a bit more effort and training (muscle doesn’t grow on trees folks) while the former is pretty dang easy.  Eat some protein and then sit there.  Or stand there.  Or partake in your favorite past time.  Seriously.

Most of our clients are surprised by the amount of protein that we ask them to consume.  If they trust us and follow the plan they all come back with similar comments, “It’s crazy that you can eat this much food and still lose fat.”  A huge part of the reason you can be full and still lose fat on our nutrition system is because of the large amounts of good, clean protein that you will eat.

A Call to Action:  Add 50g of Quality Protein to your Diet

Do it.  Write down everything that you eat in a day on your current diet set-up (or lack there-of   and then calculate how many grams of protein you’ve consumed.  My guess is less than 100 grams.  By my calculation that’s enough protein only if you weigh 100-120 pounds.  If you weigh more than that as you read this, add 50g of quality protein to your diet.  You will be glad you did.

Ever stronger!!