February 24, 2010

Podcast #83 from https://bengreenfieldfitness.com/2010/02/podcast-episode-83-double-chins-heart-rate-monitors-testosterone-soreness-pre-race-jitters-and-protein/

Introduction: In this podcast episode: double chins, heart rate monitors, soreness, pre-race jitters, protein and more research from the Journal of Strength and Conditioning.

Ben: Hey podcast listeners, a little bit different episode today because if you tune in to the podcast, you’ll notice that already this week we had a podcast. An hour long podcast and the reason for that is because I wanted to do a special midweek update. I interviewed a guy named Darin Steen. We were talking about fat loss lifestyle and some tricks and tips he has for shedding fat. And the conversation was so interesting, and also was an hour long, I decided to split it up from this podcast and put it out there for you all on its own. So, definitely go to the Shownotes for that podcast. Check out Darin, what he’s all about. Listen to our interview. Real cool guy and that is why this week is going to be basically a Q and A with a few special announcements that you aren’t going to want to miss. So, with that, let’s go right ahead and jump in to this week’s podcast.

Before we jump into this week’s Listener Q and A, as promised I wanted to bring you a little bit of news from the February issue of the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research because I thought this would be really relevant to you listeners out there who are into both endurance training and weightlifting. What this study was entitled, was resistance and endurance training on cycling performance – I’m holding the journal in my hand, like those sound effects? Doesn’t it make all so much more real? Anyways, what the researchers did was a systematic review of all the studies out there that have been done so far on specifically cyclists, competitive cyclists and whether weightlifting actually slowed them down or sped them up. What they found in the research was that the studies that showed a decrease in performance among cyclists who were also doing weightlifting were found in studies who added weightlifting to cycling rather than replacing some of the cycling with weightlifting. And so, if you’re adding a bunch of volume to your program and you’re adding that weightlifting volume on top of what you’re already doing, that would not be advisable. However, the authors of this paper advise cyclists to in fact add – or I’m sorry, not add – but replace some of their cycling with resistance training because there were benefits that were found in cyclists who did this. Now specifically, the type of training that the researchers advised cyclists to do that was found to be most effective was high intensity explosive type of training. So what we’re talking about here are sets of anywhere from three up to about six and repetitions in a fairly low rep range. Anywhere from about four up to a maximum of 10 repetitions performed in a very explosive manner. In other words, using about 30 to 40% of what you would be able to lift one time and lifting it very explosively. Now don’t get me wrong, my book Top 12 Resistance Training Routines for Triathletes goes way beyond the boundary of that. You do some muscular endurance training. You do some muscular toning and fiber adding type of training because that book was also written for swimmers and it was written for runners. But when we’re talking about pure cyclists’ power to weight ratio – not putting on too much muscle, getting the most bang for their buck, a high intensity explosive type of resistance training session would be advisable for that. So for you athletes out there who I coach through Pacific Elite Fitness who are cyclists, be looking for a few changes in your program based on this research. I’m actually going to be dialing back some of the resistance training that you’re doing. That’s traditional resistance training and adding in more power and explosive type of reps into your program so you can get very excited about that. Let’s go ahead and move on to this week’s Listener Q and A. I’m going to start with a question from listener Troy. But before I do, remember if you have a question, email [email protected]. Call toll free to 8772099439, or Skype Pacific Fit.

Troy asks: Hey Ben, I have a question about spot reduction. I know people always say that it is a myth. However, I used to be a triathlete, and I was very lean. My workouts consisted of lots of intense workouts.  I switched my focus to marathon running. I still do some intense training, but obviously I focus more on mileage and longer slower workouts. Anyways, as I have switched to marathon training, I have realized that my face is fatter.  I am just as lean as I was when I was triathlon training. I have low body fat and you can see my abs but I have more face fat than ever.  I sort of  have a double chin and I am very self conscious about it.  It doesn’t make sense that someone who is marathon training has this problem.  I see people who rarely workout who don’t have nearly the fat around their neck and face as I do.  I understand this is probably genetic, but is it possible that the type of training that I am doing affects my fat distribution?  If the answer is yes, doesn’t this negate the idea that spot reduction is a myth? Finally, is there any way to reduce the fat around my face. I already have very low body fat, and any more fat reduction would require a great deal of sacrifice and supplements. I was wondering if there are any particular exercise I can do that will target this area. Would adding more intense workouts help?

Ben answers: Great question Troy. The whole idea behind the double chin is that yeah, some of that can be genetics. If you don’t naturally have a strong jaw line, it’s something that you’re probably going to fight al little bit your whole life. Now, in a lot of people who make the switch from one sport to another, not only are you exercising differently in terms of your intensity or your volume, but you’re also working different muscles. And the reason I bring that up is because believe it or not, posture is a huge factor in what the shape of your chin and jaw line actually looks like. Specifically if you tend to slump, if you tend to have shoulders that roll forward, if you tend to have weak what are called scapular retractors or the muscles that kind of pull your muscles back, if you have a weak trapezius – kind of that upper neck muscle – all of that can contribute to you actually having that slumpy look in your chin. So what I would recommend is that you begin to work some of the muscles that maybe you were working when you were a swimmer or when you were cycling, that you’re not getting quite as much stimulus to now as a runner. I would be doing some rowing exercises. I would be doing some pull-ups or some assisted pull-ups. I would be doing shoulder shrugs, pushups that actually require you to keep your shoulder blade still and controlled. Those type of things will help out quite a bit. Like you’re saying, if you’re lean I wouldn’t recommend that you go on some big fat loss problem. I would focus more on the posture. Now the other thing that you could do for your posture is you can actually try a posturing taping method. If you go to www.bengreenfieldfitness.com and do a search for Rock Tape, you’ll hear an interview that I did with a company that actually makes physio tape which is designed to really pull your body into the proper alignment. And if you call Greg over at Rock Tape, I’ll bet that he has a taping method designed specifically for improving posture in the upper back. You can tell him I told you to call, but go to www.rocktape.com or go to www.bengreenfieldfitness.com and do a search for Rock Tape. You’ll hear an interview with Greg. He’s a nice guy. Call him up. Ask him if there’s a taping method that can help improve posture and if you retrain your body to have the correct posture, I guarantee it’ll make some differences in your jaw line and the appearance of your face. As far as more swelling, that is in the neck and area where there is quite a bit of lymph fluid. If that fluid isn’t circulating quite as much because of the type of training that you’re doing, that could be an issue but because you’re still exercising and because you’re doing the type of bumping up and down I’m guessing including some intensity, doing running – your lymph fluid is probably circulating just fine. Obviously the final straw would be to look into something like liposuction or a laser lipo or any of those more extreme fat loss techniques. But I would work on the posture and the supporting muscles of your face first. So, great question.

Kevin asks: You recently aired an episode about your testosterone levels. You mentioned that yours was 46 and you increased it to the lower 70s with supplementation. My questions. I had blood work done last month and my testosterone levels were 345. My doctor advised that the range is between 200 and 750. Why do I have a 345 number and you a 46? My exam was via blood and yours saliva, but I would think we’d still use the same testosterone scale. No?

Ben answers: Actually to answer your question Kevin, saliva and serum which is basically what the blood test would be – those are totally different scales. And Dr. Cohen explained this in the podcast that we did about testosterone. That was podcast number 80. You can go back and find it at www.bengreenfieldfitness.com. But your salivatory testosterone levels are a picture of not your total testosterone, but what would be referred to as your bio-available testosterone. Because there aren’t as high a level of binding protein in your saliva so you’re actually able to see the testosterone that’s able to be active. Okay? The serum or the blood test doesn’t give you that. So yeah, you’re going to have a higher total testosterone when you test your serum levels but that gives you no clue as to how much of that serum is actually active. Now, if you’re looking at one single total testosterone level test via blood, you actually can’t tell much based on that. So it’s important for you to know that your estradiol levels and your cortisol levels or your T to E and T to C ratios are a lot more important than the total testosterone. So for example, if your body fat is a little high, and your estrogen levels have gone up a little bit, that would cause that T to E ratio to go down. Or if you’re not recovering properly in your training and you’re getting amped up cortisol levels, then your T to C ratio would also go down. And that’s actually something that you see quite a bit in endurance athletes. So the idea is that you could if you were doing a blood test look at the hormone levels, but you’d want to look at the ratios more than you would want to look at the total levels. Now, I would highly recommend as far as increasing your testosterone, just go back and listen to that episode that I did with Dr. Cohen because he tells you exactly how to do it. Now, I personally take vitamin D. I take amino acids and I take the testosterone supplement that Dr. Cohen sends me to take and I take it exactly how he tells me to take it, and I feel fantastic when I do it. As a matter of fact, I dropped them a line the other day because I realized that because I changed up to a different formulation that they were sending me for testosterone, I actually started half dosing and I was noticing an effect right away. I mean everything from sexually to physically to mentally. As soon as I fixed that dosage and went back up, felt fantastic. So, those would be the people to contact. Give Bioletics a call, hook up with them and they’ll take care of you.

Lorenzo asks: Can you get low testosterone from being hit in the head, too many concussions? My doc said that it is a possibility and that it can disrupt your pituitary gland.  If the answer is yes, what can you do about controlling it?

Ben answers: That is a great question. So basically there is a good correlation between your pituitary gland and the amount of testosterone that you produce because these are all closely interrelated parts of your endocrine system. So you’ve got your hypothalamus which is one part of that system, and that secretes something called gonadotropin releasing hormone. And that gonadotropin releasing hormone causes your pituitary to release a couple of things, specifically something called – in females FSH and LH. And in males, specifically we’re talking about the LH… is the part that will prompt your testes to produce testosterone. So if we have something going on in that chain that’s not acting correctly, in this case the pituitary possibly not producing what it’s supposed to produce – yeah that can affect the formation of testosterone. Interestingly, it can also affect the manufacture of sperm and so a concussion can definitely lead to a disruption in the pituitary gland and so, we would expect to see something like a drop in testosterone if you’re not producing FSH and LH as you normally should. Now, that all being said – I know I sounded really smart right then, but that is where my level of knowledge comes to a screeching halt, Lorenzo. I’m not an endocrinologist. I do not prescribe hormones. In terms of actually doing something like increasing your FSH or your LH levels or helping the pituitary to function more properly, you know who I will call. I’m going to drop his name again. The only guy on the planet who I know of who knows everything there is to know about testosterone and that would be Dr. Cohen again, over at Bioletics. So, I’m not meaning this to be one big commercial for that company, but give him a call and he would be the guy to talk to about correcting FSH or LH levels. So great question. Ultimately the answer to your question would be yes, that could be affecting your testosterone levels but in terms of fixing the FSH, LH go to a doctor and go to that doctor specifically. He’d be the guy to go to.

Elsa asks: I started my strength training a few days ago but it really made my muscle sore and it takes me a few days to recover. Is it that my workout is too intense and too long? Or is that normal? Do all lean people feel a bit sore in their muscles all the time?

Ben answers: Well, the answer is yes. Not just lean people but anybody that starts strength training that hasn’t been strength training is going to feel sore. When you strength train, the actual forces or the loads that you’re lifting pull against your muscles. You get micro tears in your muscle fibers. You get inflammation that pours into those muscle fibers to repair them. You get calcium leakage. Lactic acid isn’t as much of a problem, that’s more of a myth. Lactic acid is usually cleared out of your system within a few minutes, but the inflammation and the calcium leakage can both cause a little bit of nerve pressure, they can cause some swelling. They can cause a little bit of pain and that’s normal. So as far as recovery – we’ve talked about recovery on this show a lot. Everything from ice to branch chain amino acids to protolytic enzymes to using a foam roller to stretching to massage. Go to the Web site, do a search for “recovery.” But ultimately the answer to your question, yes you’re going to feel sore and you can expect to feel that type of soreness for at least six to eight weeks when first starting a program. After that point, the soreness begins to subside and your muscles begin to be able to bounce back a little bit more quickly. You experience an increase in the size and the number of those fibers. So you’re essentially able to fight against the weights a little bit better. So great question.

Next I’m going to play a running question from Listener Eddie.

Eddie asks: Ben, this is Eddie from Wisconsin. I purchased your Triathlon Dominator series and I’m going to be starting it soon in preparation for Ironman Arizona, my first Ironman. My question is very similar to one just covered but my situation’s a little different. I’d like your take and your feedback about running a competitive marathon nine weeks before my Ironman. I’m turning 40 this year and I really have a desire to run my local marathon. Here’s where my situation is a little different. I come from a running background. I’m 5’9, 150 pounds and in my younger days my best was a 2:19. And last year with minimal training I ran 2:43 at Boston. I understand the mental and physical requirements of the marathon and believe I can recover. I would like your take on how you think this would negatively affect my marathon. I coach myself and others in running for quite a long time. My basic idea is to slightly modify the Dominator running workout to fit my plan. On a separate note, I really appreciate your approach to training. Many people who call themselves a coach miss the mental and nutritional aspects of athletics. You seem to have a great philosophy. I really like it. The last thing, when you’re ready to put together a Running Dominator series, like you’ve mentioned, I’d be happy to be a sounding board. Take care.

Ben answers: Alright, Eddie. First of all, to answer the last part of your question, the Marathon Dominator program is in the works. That will be available to those of you out there who are runners, who want what a lot of the Triathlon Dominator has to offer. By the way you may have noticed that the name of the Triathlon Dominator plan changed just a bit. I actually was contacted by a CEO of Challenge Corporation who requested that I consider changing the CEO part of that. They nicely requested. So I did. Anyways to move on to your question about running a marathon nine weeks prior to an Ironman. Now if you think about this just real generally, yeah you’re going to be recovered from that marathon by the time that your Ironman triathlon rolls around. So that’s not a concern to me. The concern to me is how much training you’re going to miss during Ironman. When I create an Ironman training plan, the final eight weeks leading up to the race are the most difficult weeks of the entire training program. Now I want you to consider the fact that – and I know you understand the recovery implications of a marathon – but I want you to consider that your marathon is going to take two to three weeks to recover from, especially if you’re as good a runner as you say you are… that means you’re able to push your body a little harder and you’re able to bring it to a zone a lot of people don’t get to during a marathon. Now, we take nine weeks, we add… let’s even be conservative and add two weeks of recovery and light training to that; that gives you seven weeks prior to your Ironman to build into your Ironman. So, if you want to have your cake and eat it too and do the marathon and do the Ironman, you’re going to not have as high quality a build leading up to your Ironman and you won’t have as good a day on that day. This is the tough part for me as a coach. I have to tell athletes “no” a lot or I have to tell them “Yeah, you could do this but you’re going to have a crappy race if you do.” It really is just the truth of it. You’re going to have a tough time if you do this. Now that being said, you could go out there and do a long training day in the marathon. You could go out, you could stay at your anaerobic threshold minus 20 beats, okay? So the point at which your legs start to burn and you start to breathe hard – subtract 20 beats from that. That’s sort of a safe aerobics zone. If you’re experienced and you have that volume in your legs, you could go out and do that and you could probably be recovered within six to eight days and be ready to go on. So if you’re just going out there to chill with some friends and make it a scenic challenge, that’d be okay. But if you race the thing, there are going to be some implications for your Ironman triathlon down the road. So I’d be real careful.

Wendy asks: My husband is downhill ski racing in a week or so and he is working with some pre-race jitters already. He has worked and trained so hard and I would love to see him have some tools to deal with all the junk that gets in your head. Do you have any suggestions for pre-race poopiness? Thanks Ben.

Ben answers: I can tell you exactly what I do Wendy, and what I’ve found to be very effective and that is visualization and breathing techniques. First of all, for that week leading up to that race, I would recommend that your husband begin visualizing as much as possible even if every night he’s doing it. And what I mean by that is he closes his eyes and in this case it’s for a downhill ski race, so he pictures himself gliding freely and easily through the snow, carving all this turns beautifully, being relaxed the entire time, playing through the course in his head and using strong mental imagery techniques to see himself succeeding, smiling at the end of that run. And if he can repeat that two or three times through his head every night leading up – you’d be surprised. I don’t want to get all mystic and kooky on you – but you’d be surprised actually at the degree to which that can help you and almost fool your brain into believing that it’s going to succeed and it’s going to do so easily. In addition to that, I would recommend that he focus on his breathing techniques. You can use something like 4-7-8 breathing which means you breathe in for a four count, you hold for a seven count and you breathe out for an eight count. All that breath is what’s called a yoga style of breathing where it almost feels like you’re breathing from deep within your stomach and your belly button rather than just your throat. So initiate that breath from the back of your throat. Make it deep. Feel a lot of that oxygen coming in and that’s a great relaxation technique that you can use during and prior to visualization and you can also do that before the race, in the car while you’re driving there, so on and so forth. So visualization and breathing, those are two techniques that I use that help me out quite a bit and kind of settle down that sympathetic nervous system, fight or flight response. So great question.

Sondra asks: I am fairly new to your podcast. I love the information that you have made available. I am also a member of your Body Transformation Club and look forward to what you have in store starting in March. I have started taking MSM a little over two weeks ago. This week I have noticed a splotchy rash that seems to be getting progressively worse.  I first noticed it on my arm but now it is pretty much everywhere.  Is this a common reaction to MSM that will subside or should I stop doing it?

Ben answers: Okay, so the idea behind MSM is that’s actually an organic sulfur containing nutrient. It actually occurs in the environment, naturally occurs in the human body and it’s something that people will take for everything from soreness to performance to anti-inflammation to recovery. And believe it or not, there’s not a lot of research out there that gives the exact mechanism behind why MSM works. But basically it’s just a sulfur. Sulfur is abundant in your connective tissue. It’s something that occurs naturally in your body and MSM is primarily made up of sulfur. So the idea that you could have an allergy to sulfur is actually kind of a misconception. Anytime you have an allergy, it’s because your body is reacting to protein that it is forming an anti-body against. Because there’s no protein component to MSM, if somebody says that they’re allergic to sulfur, usually that means they’re allergic or they’re sensitive to sulfur containing substances. Usually that’s going to be something like a sulfa antibiotic, the sulfites that you find in wine or food. Sometimes the foods that have a high sulfur content like broccoli or cauliflower. But that reaction is different than the type of reaction that someone would have to MSM. So, I would hazard a guess that it’s not an allergic reaction that you’re having. The more likely scenario is that because MSM is a powerful detoxifying agent, is that you’re actually getting a rash because of the freeing up of toxins whether from within your fat cells or that might be being stored in your body somewhere. But because sulfur works in a way that kind of almost opens up the cell membrane and increases cellular activity, you could be seeing kind of a clean up effect going on within your body. I’ve had people go through that when they do colon cleanses, when they take something like the EnerPrime supplement, when they take greens, whenever the body starts to spit out some of the nasty stuff that’s inside it. So I would hazard a guess that that’s the idea. Now I’m not a medical adviser. I’m not prescribing you MSM. I’m not saying there wouldn’t be something going on where you’re having a bad allergy to MSM or not an allergy but a bad reaction to MSM, but in my opinion I would consider a rash to be something that you could get and would get when you take something like this and not an allergy. So as far as discontinuing the MSM or continuing to take it… if all it is is a rash and you can put up with that… typically when I see people going on a high fat loss program, doing a cleanse, whatever, rashes usually subside within four to six weeks. So if you can put up with that, it’s probably not going to be that big of an issue.

Patrick has a call in question.

Patrick asks: Hey Ben, this is Patrick from just outside of Nashville, Tennessee. And I’m calling because I have a question about heart rate monitors on the bike. I did a just two hour easy ride today in really nice weather here. But we had about a 15 mile an hour wind today. I noticed a couple times when I’m riding into a headwind or going down a hill, my heart rate would spike to 200, 215 – even got as high as 245 beats per minute. I know my heart is not beating at 250 beats a minute while I’m doing my easy aerobic ride, but I have noticed that my heart rate monitor – I use the Garman 305 – I’ve noticed that kind of comes and goes, where it’ll spike real high for a little while when I’m dealing with a little bit of wind and it’ll go back down to where it normally is. I’m just wondering if you know any practical ways of getting that down, having the heart rate monitor accurately measure your heart rate. Because if that happens during the race, obviously having it on me doesn’t really do me any good. Thanks a lot Ben.

Ben answers: Yeah man, that’s a tough question. I’ve had that happen with some of the athletes that I coach. It seems that it happens more often with the Garman devices. Not that it’s Garman, but it seems like that’s the device that it happens the most with. A couple of fixes that can help a little bit, and this is kind of the no-brainer – make sure you actually have good conductants between your chest and the strap rather than just using sweat or water, you can actually get a conducting gel. The same thing that physical therapists use for ultrasound and you can find that anywhere. Just Google “conducting gel.” And put that on the strap and make sure that that’s there between your chest and your heart rate monitor. Make sure you don’t have any other electrical devices going, whatever… powertap, GPS device… anything else that’s running outside that heart rate monitor that might be affecting the signal and then finally really get in tune with your body and understand how your body feels at all those different heart rates, so that if you do have to go heart rate free during a race or you do realize that your heart rate monitor isn’t working properly during a race, you’re still able to tune into your body. So make sure that you do some testing and that you know… my legs are burning, I’m breathing hard, I’m above threshold, rather than just relying on the alarm on your heart rate monitor to tell you that.

Then you had another question.

Patrick asks: Hey Ben, this is Patrick from Tennessee again. I got another question for you. This one is about amino acid supplementation. Through the NatureAminos or the amino acid supplement from Bioletics… I take NatureAminos and I like it, I think it helps my recovery. But today was my re-feeding day so I was eating… I’m eating a lot more protein. I just finished a giant burrito with black beans and rice and chicken and cheese and sour cream. It was awesome. But all I got to say is I’m taking in a lot more protein immediately post-workout then I normally do, and I was wondering in situations like that, would you still recommend taking the amino acid supplements or do you think the extra protein, the extra calories do that for me? Thanks a lot Ben. Take it easy.

Ben answers: Alright, great question Patrick and the idea behind taking something like NatureAminos – Master Amino Pattern – or taking the amino acid powder from Bioletics would not be for it to replace the proteins that you’re getting from real food. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of getting as much protein as possible from real food sources. But the idea is that those supplements would be considered basically like a secret weapon for athletes who want to get as much protein absorption as possible. Most of the proteins that you get from regular real food nutrition, have a real low of what’s called net nitrogen utilization, meaning the amount of that protein that’s actually used falls anywhere from 15 to 30% whereas a concentrated amino acid source like the one that you’re talking about could get you almost up to 100% of that nitrogen utilization. So you wouldn’t want to think about it being necessarily an alternative to whole food, but it would be something to enhance the ability of your body to recover that much quicker. You’re still going to recover just fine if you power down some chicken and brown rice after a workout. But if you add something like the NatureAminos or the branch chain amino acid to it, that means that you are going to be giving amino acids, which are going to serve as the muscle repair building blocks that much quicker to your muscles. The other important thing is when we’re talking about the essential amino acids. If you happen to be deficient in those, if you happen to be the type of person who has to eat tons and tons of protein to even get close to what you actually need, having a concentrated source of those is nice. When I did my testing for amino acids, I was a little bit low. That’s why I take a concentrated amino acid source. So the idea is not that it replaces the real food in your diet. It is just what it’s called – a supplement – and it’s something you would take in addition to as just another little weapon in your toolbox.

Richard asks: Do you see any benefits of hemp protein over whey protein? I have recently switched to hemp and I find I get far less bloating.

Ben answers: Well, whenever you get bloating after consuming a substance, a lot of times that means it’s because it’s sitting in your stomach fermenting undigested and in the case of whey, it could mean that your body isn’t producing the digestive enzymes necessary to break down and assimilate whey. It could mean that you have a whey intolerance or a whey allergy. That’s something that’s common, especially in animal derived proteins. It would suggest that that may be the case based on the fact that you’re doing just fine with the hemp protein. So, the difference between the two would be that hemp is also going to give you some of those essential fats. So it’s a great protein source. As far as the actual utilization of the protein in hemp versus the protein in whey, a few things that you want to look into are the actual amount of and ratio of the amino acids and when you look at a whole protein like an animal protein, most of the time it’s going to have a little bit higher of what’s called a biological value and a little bit better amino acid profile for something like helping a muscle to repair and recover. Now for you, if you’re not doing well with the whey proteins then you may need to do the hemp protein. It’s going to have a little bit lower protein content. It’s going to have a little bit lower amino acid content, so I would recommend that you make sure you’re getting something like, whatever – fish, lean beef, taking recoveries or an essential amino acid source, getting high quality aminos in addition to that hemp – vegetables proteins are always going to be difficult for us athletes to use just because we break down muscle so much, sometimes you need muscle to build muscle. I know there’s a lot of vegetarians and vegans that may be up in arms about that, but from a convenient standpoint, meat comes in pretty handy. Now personally I eat meat about three times a week, and I do fine with that. I’ll have a huge piece of fish. I’ll get some lean beef every now and again and I’m not including eggs and whey when I say that’s how often I do meat. I also do eggs. I also do whey protein. Rice protein, pea protein, hemp protein – a lot better for people who have allergies or intolerances. But it is a little bit inferior to something like a whey based protein.

Now your other question is do you think it is possible to overdose or stress your liver and kidneys with too much protein?  I tend to use protein only after exercise and a little in my breakfast porridge as it keeps me satiated for longer.  As long as I drink plenty of water, how much is too much?

That’s a great question as well. Again I’m not doling out medical advice here, Richard, but most of the people that I work with can do pretty well with anything from about 0.7 to 1.0 grams of protein per pound of body weight. I personally in my own training and in working with my clients for either fat loss or performance, don’t tend to see a huge advantage going above that 1.0 grams per pound of body weight, but you do get some people – like I know some of the CrossFit, powerlifting, bodybuilding crowd, some of the paleo diet crowd – they get up above that to up around 1.2, 1.4 grams per pound. I’m not saying that would overload your liver and kidneys with the nitrogen and ammonia breakdown byproducts of protein but I just haven’t seen much of a benefit of doing a lot more than 1 gram per pound in the athletes and the clients that I work with. Ultimately I think that it comes down to biological individuality. I would start at around 0.8 grams per pound and kind of work your way up from there and just see how your body feels. If you tend to get a lot of stomach aches, if you tend to feel kind of blah, if you just feel that you’re overloaded and what would be called ketogenic from just too much protein, not enough glycogen intake – that’d be where you’d back it down a little bit and adjust the ratios a bit. Right around 1 gram per pound seems to work pretty well. So great question and we’ve got one more call-in… more of a comment than a question.

Steve says: Hey Ben, it’s Steve in Pennsylvania. I bought your Triathlon Dominator package and I’m into the ninth, tenth week of it and getting ready to do my next round of tests, but I thought before I did that that I’d give you some info on my last round of tests from the first base phase. I actually improved my swim… my T pace by four seconds, and I improved my lactic threshold heart rate by 8 beats on the bike and on the run, and just to give you an example of what I’m pacing at… I took 24 seconds off my per mile pace at my aerobic heart beat level. The results of this and improvements are dramatic using that Triathlon Dominator plan for triathlon training. So I’m looking forward to the upcoming tests and I’ll give you a call and I’ll give you updates on that as well. I’ll talk to you soon Ben. Have a great day.

Ben says: Thanks Steve. I always appreciate the comments and whether you have a comment or a testimonial or a question or whatever, you can go to www.skype.com and you can leave a message for me. My user name is Pacific Fit. You can also call toll free to 8772099439. Hey if you’re a triathlete, make sure you check out the Coeur d’Alene training camp that I’m teaching from May 16 up through around May 19 and make sure that you also check out the Body Transformation Club on the Shownotes to this podcast episode, episode number 83 and finally listen in to the mid-week special update this week that we did with Darin Steen, again on fat loss and the fat loss lifestyle. Hey leave a ranking in iTunes, that always helps out quite a bit. Improves the chances that I can get cool people on this show, because I can tell them to go over to iTunes and look at our ranking. So the more you guys give us high rankings and leave comments, the better. So until next time, this is Ben Greenfield signing out from www.bengreenfieldfitness.com. Have a great week.

For personal nutrition, fitness  or triathlon consulting, supplements, books or DVD’s from Ben Greenfield, please visit Pacific Elite Fitness at http://www.pacificfit.net