dinsdag 2 december 2014

Food for (vegetarian) climbers part 2: proteins

In my previous post on this topic - that I wrote so long ago you've probably already forgotten about it - I described my suspicion that my diet lacked some proteins and creatine to support my body going through the trainings I do. Without wanting to break with my principled decision to strongly reduce meat consumption, I decided to supplement some (whey) proteins and (synthesized) creatine for a little while and see for the results. To disentangle between the effects of both of them, I started supplementing protein a month before starting with creatine. In the following I'll focus on the importance of proteins and why different body types will have different needs. In the third (and final) post of this series I'll discuss creatine and the gains I got from supplementing it.


Protein 101
Most of us know that proteins (or 'amino acids') are the stuff that builds muscles. They are however the building blocks of much more - hairs, nails, bones, skin, most of our bodies actually. Not to mention the role they play in membranes and all kinds chemical processes in our bodies. There are 20 different amino acids that we need. Out of them 9 are 'essential', the other 11 can be synthesized in the body. Protein sources that contain adequate amounts of the 9 essential amino acids are commonly referred to as 'complete' proteins.

During a workout, muscles get damaged. The damage needs to be repaired afterwards and this is where proteins come in: they literally are the building blocks we need to repair our muscles. With the right intensity and number of repetitions of the exercise, muscles will even grow in this process (called 'hypertrophy'). It's the aim of strength athletes, whereas endurance athletes will generally stay quite far away from this exercise regimen. Too light exercise (anything aerobic) will change the vascular structure in muscles to enhance blood flow, but it won't promote excessive muscular protein synthesis. Too heavy exercise (something you can do for 1-3 repetitions) will mostly encourage neurological adaptations for better muscles recruitment. But somewhere in between, at an intensity you can sustain for about 6-8 repetitions, is the hotspot for muscle growth. Logically, training in this regimen will induce the highest protein need during the recovery process. Anyone engaging in athletic activity will increase his or her protein need, but strength athletes significantly more than endurance athletes.

Now let's step back for a second and remember my first post on this topic in which I 'claimed' that rock climbing is not an endurance activity. Apart from the implications on the metabolic needs on which I focussed in the first post, this also means that training for climbing includes a strong strength component. It's no coincidence that according to most advice any training program should include a lot of bouldering, whether you are a boulderer or not. Unless you are doing a threshold bouldering session or maximum effort campus exercises (both aim for neurological adaptations), you will either be in the hypertrophy range (if the exercises are hard enough) or at least beating up your muscles big time. So supplying your body the time and nutrients (proteins!) to recover from this assault is recommendable: alternatively you're just breaking down muscles. A little side note here is that the muscles that are driven to failure here are probably in the forearms. They are not the biggest muscle groups in our bodies and don't require as much protein as for example the back muscles. If you include a few sets of pull ups, push ups or other supplemental exercises in your workout however, you are pushing big muscles groups to get bigger.

Proteins: not only in meat...
So hard training climbers will have a relatively high protein need. Agree? Let me start debunking this: it's a myth that vegetarian food is per definition low in proteins. Of course if you're a lazy eater it's easy to omit the necessary proteins (and iron, and vitamins B for that matter). But hey, also non-veggie lazy eaters will consume a lot of crap and fail to include important nutrients. Some lucky individuals have a natural tendency to eat healthy and well balanced. But most of us - like me - have to think about we put in our mouths, resist a craving every once in a while and opt something that better fits the athletic demands we put on our bodies instead. Veggie or not. Although meat, chicken and fish are the common protein bombs that many athletes resort to, there are plenty of possibilities that fit in a vegetarian or even vegan diet as well. Dairy products are good sources of complete proteins and  combinations of nuts, legumes and grains can make for a complete set of proteins as well.

There are plenty of natural sources of protein and there is no direct need to supplement them. But finding clean, healthy sources of complete protein and include them in your diet without overdoing on carbohydrates particularly will require some commitment and won't be cheap. Protein supplements can be an easy quick fix for an otherwise good diet that lacks just that extra bit of proteins for periods of heavy exercise. Whey protein (a residue from the process of making cheese from milk) is an excellent source of complete proteins. Vegans could consider soy protein instead. That said, protein powders are (highly) processed and may be harder for the body to use than proteins obtained from clean whole foods. There are quite a few low quality powders out there, some with toxic levels of heavy metals. If the powder has been processed at high temperatures, the protein molecules will be denaturalized and much harder to digest. Pay attention to this when buying a supplement. Then again, most meat or fish you can get in a supermarket is highly processed as well and probably has many more health deteriorating effects than a high quality protein powder. Trying to use as many clean, unprocessed, natural sources of whole proteins as possible in your diet should be your aim. Use powders to supplement, not to replace.


Chris Sharmas and Adam Ondras
As I briefly mention in the introduction to this post, different body types have different protein needs. Let me take a black and white approach here and divide the climbing community in two groups: the wiry, light Adam Ondras and the muscular, heavy Chris Sharmas. Of course there's a lot in between, but for the sake of the argument let's simplify things a bit. In the end, both the Adam Ondras and the Chris Sharmas strive for a high strength to weight ratio and enough (power) endurance to get them to the top of their route. The Adam Ondras may rely a bit more on endurance and their ability to hold on to super small intermediary holds and the Chris Sharmas may rely a bit more on power and their ability to throw themselves from big hold to big hold, but in the end a similar set of skills should get them up the same routes. They'll have totally different bodies doing this though and consequently they will have different nutritional needs as well. The Chris Sharmas need to carry more weight up with bigger muscles and will need more energy (even in a rest state a more muscular body consumes more energy!). They'll have bigger muscles to regenerate after training and will need more nutrients to facilitate this.


Spot the differences...

You can't choose whether you'll be in the Sharma group or in the Ondra camp: genetics did that for you (it has a lot to do with the balance between slow twitch and fast twitch muscle fibers, which is mostly genetically determined and different for all of us). Most strong climbers happen to be in the Ondra group: it seems to be a favorable body composition for climbing. But I am in the Sharma group: when I train I build up muscle mass and become heavy and strong. So if you are a climber, statistically the odds are that you have a lower protein need than I do.

But how much protein do we need? Is there a guideline? Obviously, we need enough to recover from our training. Getting too muscular and heavy is not desirable though, but that's something you should target primarily in the way you train and not in the way you eat. In my view your eating behavior should always support your training behavior. In other sports strength athletes often live by the rule of consuming 1.4 to 1.8 grams of protein per kg of body weight. Some claim that much less is more than enough and that many athletes overdo their protein intake. It is even said that too much protein can be hard on the kidneys and liver, but there's no scientific evidence to back this up. Although science has repeatedly shown positive effects on performance and muscle regeneration when athletes supplement additional proteins, it fails to give anything more than a rough guideline about how much exactly is needed. To discover what works for you, you simply have to try and learn through trial and error.

I'll give you another reason not to overdo it though: there's energy in proteins as well. Our bodies extract about 4 kCal from every gram of protein, which is about the same as from a gram of carbohydrates. Consuming a 20 gram portion of proteins yields as much energy as eating 20 grams of sugar! I'd strongly advice against counting calories for anyone, but just bear in mind that eating more protein than you need will eventually build body fat, not muscle. Don't overdo it. On the bright side: protein also dulls hunger (quite contrary to many carbs, such as sugar) and may end up making you lighter simply by killing your appetite and saving you the occasional sugar craving.


To be continued...
In the end, even in exactly the same training regimen every individual body will have different nutritional needs. How much protein exactly you need is something for you to find out by trial and error. I've decided to experiment a bit and increased my protein consumption by about 25 grams per day. It immediately affected how my body responded to training: I recovered faster and quickly (within a month) saw a more defined musculature on my body without gaining weight (which I like to interpret as a gain in muscle mass and a reduction of body fat). I'll play a bit more with the amount and timing of supplementation, but I feel like sticking to it at least during strength and power oriented training phases. In the next (and final) post of this series I'll write about creatine supplementation. It might take a while again, but stay tuned!

Geen opmerkingen:

Een reactie posten