Is "High Protein" Just Another Fad Diet? | Ep 466

Is high protein just another fad diet?

Learn about the 3 criteria that define a fad, how protein performs against each one, the research on lean mass and strength training, the mechanisms behind protein's thermic effect and satiety, and why the case gets stronger for adults over 40.

This episode covers the fad diet framework, research updates on protein and muscle building, the thermic effect on your metabolism and the satiety research that gives protein an advantage over carbs and fat, findings on muscle protein synthesis, and thedata on lean mass and body composition when postmenopausal women lose fat.

Plus the protein leverage mechanism behind menopausal weight gain and a 3-question test for evaluating any nutrition trend you see on social media or TikTok.

Get the Protein Day Builder, the tool that maps out a full day of meals hitting your protein target based on your schedule, dietary preferences, and the foods you eat every week.

Don't forget: the Fitness Lab app is 20% off through Friday, May 8. AI-powered nutrition and training coaching for adults over 40: witsandweights.com/app

Timestamps

0:00 - High protein fad narrative
3:25 - What defines a fad diet
4:30 - Fad diet examples
5:45 - The (false) link with fat and carb demonization
6:40 - High protein vs. the fad criteria
8:15 - Meta-analyses on protein and lean mass
9:45 - Sustainability and physical activity
11:45 - Hitting your protein target in practice
13:15 - Thermic effect of protein
15:40 - Protein and satiety
17:10 - Muscle protein synthesis and meal distribution
19:45 - Muscle loss and strength after 40
20:45 - Menopause and protein leverage
22:30 - Adequate protein for your goals
24:10 - 3-question fad diet test

Episode Resources

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👥 Join our Facebook community -  For adults over 40 who want to build muscle, lose fat, and stop following bad advice. Weekly Q&A threads, coaching insights, and real chat with other lifters.

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Transcript

High protein fad narrative

Philip Pape 0:00

Chances are you've been prioritizing protein. And yet, because of all the attention on protein, you might hear pushback in the media or on podcasts that, hey, maybe this is another fad, the high protein fad. So I thought it'd be a good idea to show you three specific criteria that define a fad diet and test high protein against all three, and then explain why this backlash confuses commercialization with science. We're going to revisit topics like protein's thermic effect, its satiety impact, the muscle building threshold, and why the case might be even stronger than you think to get plenty of protein if your goal is fat loss, building muscle, and a long, healthy life. Welcome to Wits and Weights, the show that puts a popular piece of fitness advice under the microscope, finds a hidden reason it doesn't work, and gives you the deceptively simple fix that does. I'm your host, certified nutrition coach Philip Pape. And what I see happening now is there is high protein in everything. There's high protein, of course, in protein bars, but there's also protein cereal, protein water. Everything that they that has even a little bit of protein is marketed as high protein. And when something gets super popular like that, there's often a backlash. I've heard it on mainstream media. I've heard it on like news podcasts that aren't even in our space, where you'll see things like, are we obsessed with protein? And is high protein bad for you? Or are we going far beyond what the evidence says you need to have? Or isn't the level you need for protein only this? And why are people, you know, bodybuilders and fitness gurus recommending so much? And so there's this uh skepticism, I'll call it, which I'm always for curiosity and skepticism. But then there this leap of logic where they're connecting, say, the low-fat craze of the 90s to the keto craze of the 2010s, to proteins today, and they're saying, okay, this is just the next trend. And if you are listening to the show, you're probably trying to eat more protein. And what we would call high protein, now that's a whole separate issue because to me, the protein we need is as a percentage of your diet still totally reasonable. It's just people are eating far too little protein. But that's part of what we're getting into today. Because if you're trying to build muscle, if you're trying to lose fat, and then you hear somebody say, Oh, are we getting too much protein? Is that a fad? And you second guess yourself, I want to settle that today. And then stick around to the end of the episode because I'm gonna give you a three-question test that you can apply to any nutrition trend. So for my skeptics out there who are listening and want to know, hey, is this thing real? Let me examine it a little bit more carefully. And when someone starts talking about anything, even if it's seed oils, let's say, you can apply this test. So today in this episode, you are gonna learn the specific characteristics that make something a fad diet, and why the high protein approach really fails every one of those. You're gonna hear research on how protein builds muscle, burns more calories during digestion, reduces hunger, all the fun stuff about protein to reacquaint ourselves if you've already heard this before, or to learn something new and the value of protein, and why, especially adults as we age, over 40, over 50, especially women, a protein or in menopause, need higher protein, not to check a box, but because it is important to your physiology. All right, so first let's define what we are talking about. What makes a fad diet a fad? The British Dietetic Association, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, and multiple research reviews give us a pretty consistent set of characteristics. A fad diet eliminates entire food groups. And it often relies on a single magic food or a super food or sometimes a supplement. It promises rapid results from some sort of hack or trick of your metabolism, and it is based often on anecdotes and testimonials as opposed to peer-reviewed research. It often involves selling you something proprietary, a special method, a special program, a special approach. And it's unsustainable long-term and often ignores physical activity. In other words, it's in a vacuum as hey, this diet solves everything. So I know I just threw a lot at you, but I want you to think of some real world examples that'll make this concrete. So we have the HCG diet. This is you're effectively injecting a pregnancy hormone and you're eating only 500 calories a day. There was a meta-analysis of 24 studies, found zero evidence that this does anything for weight loss. And it sold for something like over$1,000 a month. Then we have the blood type diet. This is Peter D'Amano's book, sold over 7 million copies, I believe. And there was a study in 2014, University of Toronto, over 1,400 participants. Again, no evidence that supports the diet. Same thing with the cabbage soup diet, the grapefruit diet, the cotton ball diet. That is a real thing, the cotton ball diet. And they're all based on this single magic item approach. And they're all nutritionally inadequate, often lead to malnutrition, they're all unsustainable, and many times they just simply don't work. And even if they work, it's in the short term at a severe cost with all these other things. So if you look at the historical pattern, I think history is worth understanding here, like they say, so you don't repeat it. In the 80s, in the 90s, the villain was fat. If we go back to the late 70s, Senator McGovern had dietary guidelines in 1977 that told us to cut fat and eat more carbs. And so that's when the food industry started creating low fat everything. They replaced fat with sugar. And what happened? Well, obesity rates went from 15% in 1980 to over 40% by 2018. So then we swung the other way and we demonized carbs. And this was starting to kind of overlap in like the 90s. That's when I was a teenager. Atkins, Paleo, keto, and even today, like carnivore, right? All these things are very low carb. And we know Atkins went filed for bankruptcy back in 2005, although I still see the brand, so somebody must have bought the brand to slap on these low-carb items. And now you look, you know, people look at protein and they say, all right, it's the same thing. You know, fat had its moment, carbs had its moment, and now protein is having its moment, but it's not a fair comparison. So let's get into it. Let's run the test. Does high protein meet the criteria of a fad diet? So, first of all, does it eliminate food groups? It actually doesn't. You can eat high protein as an omnivore, a vegetarian, a vegan, chicken, Greek yogurt, lentils, tofu, eggs, fish, and you're essentially adding something, you're not removing something. This is a key distinction if you think about it. Cutting out or going low carb or cutting out or going low fat is different than saying, no, just eat more protein. That's a different, it's asymmetrical. So that's one distinction. You're not actually eliminating food groups, right? You don't have to cut out carbs or fat to get more protein. You just have to eat in a more balanced way. The second criteria does it rely on a one magic or super food or small groups of food? No, absolutely not. Protein is just a macro. There's no single sort protein source that's really superior. Any high-quality protein works. Plant-based, animal-based, it all works. The mechanism is the nutrient, not something proprietary or special food. The next question is: does it promise rapid results from some sort of hack or trick of the metabolism? Again, no. The recommendation to eat adequate protein for what your body needs alongside resistance training is actually the opposite of a trick or a quick fix because it requires effort, behavior change, consistency. You have to do hard things like resistance training alongside it. So if anything, it's the it's very hard to sell something like high protein from that context. The next question is: is it based on anecdotes and testimonials, or is it based on peer-reviewed research? And here's a very, very clear distinction we have that does not support low carb and low fat. We have tons and tons of studies. But if I were to pick one, there's the 2018 meta-analysis by Morton and colleagues, and this was 49 randomized controlled trials over 1,800 participants, people who consumed higher protein while resistance training gained significantly more fat-free mass. I mean, it sounds kind of dumb to say it out loud, especially if you listen to this show for any length of time. Like, duh, eating more protein, you're gonna gain more fat-free mass. That's lean mass, that's muscle tissue, right? More recently, a 2022 meta-analysis by Noones and colleagues expanded that to 74 randomized controlled trials, confirm the same finding. And we see this over and over again. There's the Tagawa study that's been referenced a lot, the dose response back in 2021. And that was over a that was 105 studies, over 5,400 participants. And when we look at the dose response curve, guess what? You gain lean mass with higher protein intake. And it's across a very, very wide range. So a very wide range, there's a lot of flexibility here. So thousands of participants, decades of research definitely passes that test, whereas low carb and low fat actually do not. Is it sustainable? All right. Well, you tell me if you could eat pretty much any food that has protein, is that sustainable? Like you could eat chicken or eggs or yogurt or beans or lentils or any plant that has protein, oats? I mean, it's again kind of a dumb question. Of course, it's sustainable. You're just adding stuff in and you're giving yourself the bounty of foods available in the world that have protein compared to like Optavia, where they're selling you packaged foods or HCG diets, 500 calorie protocol, or the cabbage soup diet. I mean, it's it's insane that we even do any of these things. And I'm raising my hand because I did them too. I did a crazy diet before my wedding to lose a bunch of weight, where I limited my diet to like 12 foods. I don't even remember what they were. My wife thought was crazy, but she loves me and she was super supportive. So she just kind of looked at me askance and left me alone. But it's insane that we do these two things to ourselves. And then the final question here is here is does it ignore physical activity? This is an important one you might not have considered. I mentioned it already, but the idea that, you know, it's not just about food, right? Food is part of a whole kaleidoscope, I'll say, of behaviors, especially your physical activity and how you move your body, because the whole idea is to fuel yourself. So when we recommend protein and higher protein, we're not saying just sit on the couch and eat more protein, because then you just might have more calories and you gain even more fat, right? Just like carbs or fat. Doesn't matter. They're all energy. It's, hey, you got to be resistance training. And we're seeing more and more of the big industry guidelines even match this. And that's why the levels we give you are far above the RDA. And when I hear the like mainstream media talking about this and they don't even mention resistance training, it's crazy to me because then it implies that there is this corner of the protein world that is like a fad diet, but it's because you're just focusing on the food itself and you're getting obsessed with that, but then you're not resistance training. So I'd say high protein, again, quote unquote high, because most people aren't even eating more than you know 20 or 30% of their diet from protein when it gets up to sufficient levels. It fails all these criteria of a fad diet. Every single one, every single one. The argument that it's a fad relies on the only observation that you could possibly stand on that is, oh, it's popular. It's popular and everybody's talking about it. So we're gonna play the contrarian and we're gonna bash it on, you know, podcasts, and then people are gonna question it. Okay. So I I thought it was important to talk about this. And if if we're confirming what you already suspected, and your question is less about the why, okay, Philip, I get it. I get it, but more about how do I actually hit my target. I actually built a tool for that. Um, and I haven't talked about it in and of itself, but it's called the protein day builder. You enter your daily protein target, and then things like how many meals you want, and what your lifestyle and eating preferences are and your dietary preferences. And then it maps out a full day of meals that hit your numbers. So, of course, you can use ChatGPT or AI for something like this, but this is all pre-designed specifically for this purpose based on the evidence, based on the right numbers and all that. So it's kind of like creating a meal plan on the fly, but very flexible. You can keep hitting the button and update it over and over again. Uh, and then you can lock in your meals and have other ones rebuild around them. So it's pretty cool. It's actually part of Eat More Lift Heavy, which I've talked about before, but I want to make it available on its own. So if you go to witsandwaist.com slash protein dash tool, witsandwaist.com slash protein dash tool, protein tool, I'll drop the link in the show notes and you can go if you want to get a copy of it by itself. Okay, so we've established high protein doesn't fit the high high fad profile. You're probably not too surprised about that. But if you are, I'm glad you found this podcast. I want to go further. I want to go further. I don't think it's enough to just say that. I want to show you why the science behind protein is qualitatively different from like the the fad diet bubble, let's call it. And there's three specific mechanisms that are measurable, that are reproducible physiological effects. And they're really powerful. They're so powerful that a lot of people I work with, a lot of women, especially over 40, who simply increase the amount of protein they eat, start having a tremendous amount of results and progress in other areas like their metabolism and their body fat distribution and everything else, their energy and so on, especially when it part of balanced meals that also include fiber and sufficient fats and carbs, right? This is the thing. They all go together. So the first one is the thermic effect. I still, I'm still on the fence about whether this is overrated or underrated. So hear me out. Your body burns energy digesting food. Makes sense, right? But not all foods cost the same to process food, that food in your body. And so we call this the thermic effect. Thermic meaning heat heat energy. So fat has a thermic effect of close to zero. Carbohydrates are about five to 10%, and protein is 20 to 30%. Now that's percentage of calories. That's the percentage of the calories that you eat of that macro get burned in the process of processing that macro. So again, fat zero, carbohydrates five to 10, protein is 20 to 30%. And that's a big difference. If you start to scale that up and you you figure you eat 800 calories from protein, your body is gonna burn 160 to 240 of those calories just processing the protein. Right. Now that's 200 grams of protein. You may be eating less than that, but I'm just giving you round numbers. But the same 800 calories from fat, where you know, protein bur can burn 160 to 240. The fat's gonna burn like 24 calories at most. And we've seen this on in studies as well. There is a West WesterTerp 2004 paper you can look up and a 2024 review by Servanini or Seravini, I'm sorry, that's a TZ seravini and colleagues in Metabolism Open that also confirmed these ranges of the thermic effect. And it declined, it seems to decline a little bit with age. So older adults produce about 6.4% total diet-induced thermogenesis compared to 7.3%. It's a small difference, but it also is another reason to just keep cranking up that protein as we get older for the most part. So that's an important one right there. Number two is satiety, fullness. Protein reduces hunger more effectively than any other macro. So we've got two big wins here, right? We've got the thermic effect, and now we have satiety. There's a 2005 study about 20 years ago by Wagel and colleagues. And they took participants from 15% to 30% protein in their diet, but they kept carbs constant. And no one was told to eat less. Calorie intake dropped by about 441 calories per day spontaneously in the participants who increased their protein. And then they lost about five kilograms, which is over 10 pounds. That's like what, 12 pounds or something, over 12 weeks without trying. I say without trying, but I mean they increased their protein, and that's all they did. That goes back to my earlier comment about how powerful this can be, right? So that's that's from nothing other than being less hungry. There's a scientist, her name is Heather Lady, L-E-I-D-Y, who has a lab where they looked at high protein breakfasts, like a 35 gram protein breakfast, and showed that it reduces evening snacking and it also changes the brain reward signaling when looked at looked at it on fMRI. And that's compared to a normal 13 gram protein breakfast. And I say normal, I mean a lot of people don't even get that much for breakfast. And we've seen other studies that found that higher protein diets reduce daily hunger as well, reduce your desire to eat, increase fullness, all of it. So it kind of all goes together when it comes to managing your hunger signals. And then number three is of course muscle protein synthesis. That's the big one. I mean, your body is gonna use the amino acids from protein to build and repair your muscle. And there is a dose threshold. Like you need enough leucine. This is a specific amino acid to trigger the pathways that kick off the process. But if you're eating enough protein for the day, you're gonna hit somewhat, you're gonna hit those thresholds. And I always tell people like your first priority is just get your total protein dialed in however you can. And then your next priority is to spread it out. And the spreading out part is a little bit for higher muscle protein synthesis, but that's a that's kind of overblown. The more practical reason is, or yeah, practical it for practical reasons. It's so that you can have the more balanced meals, help with your satiety, and get your protein in in a practical way. That's why primarily I suggest having protein every meal. So, how much are you looking for every meal? Probably at least 20 or 25, ideally 30 to 40 grams. And since you probably need over 100 grams a day, you do the math, three or four meals, 30 to 40 grams. That's how we do the math. Pretty straightforward. And again, you can go grab my tool, wits and weights.com slash protein dash tool, and go purchase that tool if you would like a standalone way to calculate and hit this for yourself. Uh, one last thing, you probably heard that 2023 study by Trommelin and colleagues that looked at the hundred grams of protein, and they saw that eating even a full, that huge amount of protein in one meal could produce a post-exercise response that lasts for many, many hours. So there's not a, oh, you, you know, the rest gets wasted. Like if you eat over 40 grams, you're gonna waste the rest. Well, however many pro however much protein you eat in one dose is going to get used in some way. Like a large bolus, as they call it, especially post-training, can do that. But I would still recommend recognize distributing across meals just for practical purposes. Okay, I want to spend a few minutes on the older population. A lot of you are probably over 40, 50, 60, you know, I myself am 45, because it's even more important the older you get because of the muscle mass decline, because of the need to resistance train and support that. Starting around the age 30, muscle mass declines 3 to 8% per decade. Strength declines even faster, believe it or not, about 1.5% per year between the age of 50 and 60, accelerating to 3% per year after that. This is huge for functionality and for aging. For women, the menopausal transmission, transition, I apologize, tends to amplify these. So postmenopausal women have nearly three times the odds of sarcopenia compared to pre-menopausal women. And we know that there's issues with bone density as well. We see a higher incidence of osteoporosis. Estrogen decline drives reduced growth hormone, reduced IGF-1, increased inflammatory cytokines, accelerates visceral fat accumulation, that's belly fat, menopause belly, we've heard of that, right? And there is even this protein leverage mechanism that we think exists for menopausal weight gain. The idea that increased protein breakdown during menopause gives you a higher appetite through a hormone called FGF21. And so if you don't have enough protein coming in, you're gonna overcompensate by eating other stuff just to get total calories. You're gonna get more fats and carbs and total calories. So a lot of the weight gain women experience during menopause could be partly a protein-seeking behavior that gets misdirected into overconsumption of everything else. Just another reason, whether this is supported long-term or not by the evidence to eat more protein. And then there was the now, take this with a grain of salt, the women's health initiative data, which has its own problems for things like hormone replacement, but we're talking about body fat distribution. And they looked at nearly 4,700 postmenopausal women over a three-year period. And those consuming one and a half grams per kilogram or more lost more visceral fat and more subcutaneous fat and gained lean tissue compared to those at lower intakes. Again, not surprising. Just eat more protein. So I can go on and on about the studies, but protein is not a trend. It's here to stay. I'm glad that more and more people are eating it. And I'm kind of glad that they're putting it in all these foods, to be honest, just to get the attention up, you know, whatever your thought is on processing and ultra-processing, which is its own problem in our Western environment. Now, if you're worried about eating too much protein, I usually tell people there's not really an upper limit unless you already have something like kidney concerns. But the main thing is you just don't need so much more protein. If you like more protein, I have a lot of clients who just love to eat their protein, perfectly fine. As long as you can make it work with work and get enough fiber, nutrients, fats, carbs, depending on the goal, it's gonna actually serve you quite well, especially in a fat loss phase. So, in conclusion, the recommendation to eat at, I'm gonna call it adequate protein, not even high protein. Protein, just adequate protein, 0.7 to 1 grams per pound. I didn't even mention the number until now. 0.7 to 1 grams per pound of your body weight. So that's based on your body. It's for your activity level, it's for your age. So probably more if you are more active or you're training, you're trying to build more muscle, you're in fat loss, you're older, et cetera, right? All of this is backed by plenty of studies. It's endorsed by many, many large organizations now: sports nutrition, geriatric nutrition. And it's clear the mechanistic explanations are totally clear for these benefits. So I think we could put to bed that there's any fad kind of cloud over higher protein or what I'll call adequate protein. All right, before we wrap up, remember that three question fad diet test I mentioned earlier. I think is pretty cool to examine things skeptically. I'm going to give it to you in a second. But if this episode gave you something that's helpful, whether the research, the framework, or say the confidence to keep prioritizing protein and hit your protein, I would love it if you just share this with a friend. That's it. That's all I'm asking you to do. Follow the show and share it with a friend, somebody who's wondering about protein. And again, if you want to make sure you're hitting your protein or find a way to do it, uh grab my protein day builder at witsandweights.com slash protein dash tool. The link is in the show notes. Of course, if you're an Eat More Lift Heavy, you already get that tool unlocked as part of the program. And that program, by the way, is at eatmoreliftheavy.com if you want to learn more. All right, here's the quick test you can run on anything that is like a trend or you see on social media. It's three questions. Question one, does it eliminate something? That's it. Does it eliminate something? If if you're told to cut out an entire macro or food group, it's already a red flag. I don't care if it's seed oils. I don't care if it's artificial sweeteners. It's still a red flag. Evidence-based nutrition tends to add and adjust and have some flexibility built in. And oftentimes this fear-mongering of single ingredient things is a red flag because things are not that black and white. And often that restriction leads to binging and overconsuming at the end of the day and then not maintaining your results. So just ask that question because if it doesn't eliminate, that at least means it's probably on better footing. Question two does it require buying something proprietary or secret or special or this is my secret one thing? If the only way to follow the diet is to purchase something, a product, a supplement, a membership, that's just really, really good marketing. That's really good marketing. Whether there's a little bit of science behind it or not, that is good marketing. Now, there could be some very science-grounded practitioners who have programs that you pay for. My my question here is is the thing that they're trying to teach you that works only unlocked for you if you pay something? That's what I'm talking about. Like I don't hide information behind a paywall, right? And if I do, let me know. I haven't I don't hide information behind a paywall. What I like to charge for is helping people and where you see the value of being helped implement that information for you. Like to me, that is that is where that is the value of working with a coach or with a group of people that are expert in this to accelerate your results. That's different from locking the actual information behind a paywall. All right. The principles work, they should be free. Question three is could you do this for at least five years, if not the rest of your life? So this is the sustainability question. If the approach is so extreme or rigid or socially isolating that you think of it as a short-term thing, like a quick fix, or I'm gonna do this just to lose weight, that's a big problem. That is not a sustainable strategy. And if you're like, yeah, but Philip, isn't that the only way to lose fat? No, it's not. The way we lose fat is by scaling things up or down, but still having the balanced meals that hit your protein, they keep you full of the right nutrients that fuel your body, that avoid all of this stress and all of this metabolic dysfunction. And that's the way we want to do it. And if you're like, I don't know how to do that, okay, come join us, eatmoreliftheavy.com. Check it out. That's what we do. And again, that is where I'm not gonna hide information. The information's on this podcast. In fact, if you reach out to me and say, hey, Philip, how do I do XYZ? I'll probably give you an answer and just we'll move on. All right, so if two or more of those are, I guess it's probably a fad. If you could confidently answer in the negative with all of those, it's probably evidence-based. And of course, high protein falls under that category. Until next time, keep using your wits, lifting those weights. And remember, you do not need permission to simply eat enough protein as part of a balanced meal for your goals. Go after it. I'm Philip Pape. I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits and Weights Podcast.