[sportmom]

Hi everyone, as mentioned yesterday in the check-in thread, I'm re-looking at everything this month, maybe bumping cardio up to 45 minutes for the next couple of weeks and examining my eating as well. I'm about 207 now, 5'6" and do 30 min of cardio 6x/wk, wl 3x/wk for avg 45 mins, and otherwise am pretty sedentary (when I'm not vacuuming lamps and sweeping the garage ). I'm shooting for 1800 cals a day, based on what result I got doing the long math formula from BMR, and about 80-100 grams of protein a day. Actually, the protein is challenging bc if I'm drinking my smoothies, there's no problem with getting 100. But as cold as it is, they are are not on my list. I know I should try adding it to my oatmeal and other things, but what is the minimum amt of protein grams you would advise with the amount of lifting I'm doing?

Does this sound right? Would you adjust any way?

[northernbelle]

80-100 grams of protein per day sounds good. Unless you are a body builder, you don't need an exhorbitant amount of protein. I vary from 70 (on a bad day) to 110 (on a good day), with an average of about 90.

I was drinking a protein drink every week day, but I'm cutting back on that because too many gives me the runs. I haven't noticed any difference in my lifting because of that.

Just make sure your main meals include good sources of protein.

Some tricks I use are: throw some soy protein powder into the pancake mix (my husband still likes his pancakes, so that's our Sunday breakfast), use lots of egg whites, have a boiled egg for evening snack a couple of times a week, use an extra chicken breast in a stir fry, eat some meat for lunch sandwich.

Hope this helps...

[sportmom]

Thanks Belle, that's helpful. In my normal eating plan for today, I was struggling to get up to 50 without any supplementing, and that was with a pb lunch and chicken dinner. I will have to make sure I have some black eyed peas and brown rice as well. Maybe throw some garbanzos into a salad today.....

[Meg]

Fran, you're looking to build muscle, right? If so, I'd say your protein is a little low. A general rule of thumb you hear is one gram per pound of either body weight or lean body mass and I think you'd fall short either way. Anne in Maintainers reprinted an interesting table from The Complete Guide to Sports Nutrition by Monique Ryan:

Sedentary adult: 0.4 g/lb body weight (or about 60 g/day for a 150 lb person)
Endurance athletes, moderate training: 0.45 g/lb
Endurance athletes, heavy training: 0.5-0.75 g/lb
Endurance athletes, very intense training: 0.8-0.9 g/lb
Strength training athletes, experienced: 0.5-0.7 g/lb
Strength training athletes, novice: 0.8 g/lb
Athlete restricting calories (all of us probably): 0.8-0.9 g/lb
Teenagers (growing): 0.8-0.9 g/lb
Maximum recommended: 1 g/lb

Are you eating a la BFL, protein + carb? If so, you should be getting about 25g of protein (3 oz of chicken breast for example) per each of your six mini-meals, totaling 150 grams or so per day.

PB is primarily a fat source since about 80% of its calories come from fat. I don't think you're going to find much protein in rice, garbanzos, and peas - they're primarily carb sources. Your good protein sources are going to be lean meats, poultry, fish and seafood, egg whites, and cottage cheese. It's too cold for me to be drinking protein shakes too!

As for calories ... are you losing at 1800? It would be high for me when I was at your weight, but if it's working for you, no reason to change.

[JerseyGirl69]

Can someone clarify this: I've heard contrasting theories, so which is it, that the protein should be based on your current weight or your desired weight?