If you’re an athlete or fitness enthusiast, then whey protein should be a part of your daily nutrition regimen. Whey protein shakes and bars are proven to enhance the muscle building and fat burning effects of exercise. They also improve performance in workouts and speed up the recovery process afterward. And they may even reduce your chances of getting injured.
Muscles are made up of proteins, primarily. Proteins are responsible for creating most of the structural adaptations that make muscles bigger, stronger, faster, and more fatigue-resistant in response to exercise. By supplementing your diet with whey protein you can accelerate and enhance these beneficial changes in muscle structure.
These benefits of whey protein have been demonstrated in a number of studies, including a study recently published in the International Journal of Sports Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, which looked at the effects of whey protein supplementation on muscle growth in men undertaking a six-week resistance training program. In this study, subjects combining resistance training with whey protein supplementation increased their lean muscle mass and strength significantly more than subjects who completed the same exercise program without supplementation.
Perform Better
Building bigger, stronger muscles will help you perform better in sports. The effects of whey protein supplementation on exercise performance were shown in a recent study from Canada’s McGill University. In this study, researchers looked at the impact of whey protein supplementation on high-intensity exercise performance. Twenty healthy young adults were studied before supplementation and three months after supplementation with either a whey protein supplement or a placebo. Muscular performance was assessed through a maximum-intensity stationary bicycling test. Both peak power and 30-second work capacity increased significantly in the whey protein group, with no change in the placebo group.
In addition to enhancing your exercise performance, building bigger, stronger muscles through whey protein supplementation will also help you shed body fat. Your muscles and your body fat compete for the calories you consume in foods. The more muscle tissue you build, the more your muscles win out in this competition for calories. As a result, your body fat stores essentially “starve” and begin to disappear.
Because whey protein is more effective than other proteins in building muscle tissue, it’s also more effective in reducing body fat. A Canadian study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology compared the effects of whey protein and casein supplementation (casein is another dairy protein) on body composition in young adults engaging in a 30-day resistance-training program. Subjects taking the whey protein supplement improved their body composition significantly more than subjects taking the casein supplement.
Bounce Back Faster
Every hard workout causes microscopic damage to muscle fibers. One of the symptoms of this damage is a type of muscle pain known as DOMS (delayed-onset muscle soreness). The faster your body can repair this damage, and reduce the associated soreness, the better you will be able to perform in your next workout.
Research has shown that consuming whey protein before, during, and immediately after workouts speeds reduces muscle damage and speeds up post-workout muscle repair. In one study from James Madison University, cyclists experienced 83 percent less muscle damage during an exhaustive workout when they consumed a whey protein beverage during the workout. They also performed 29 percent better in a subsequent workout performed 15 hours later. This is powerful evidence that adding whey protein to your daily nutrition regimen will enable you to train harder and more effectively.
Fewer Injuries
In athletes who train hard every day, exercise-related tissue damage can accumulate to the point where it becomes a full-fledged overuse injury. By accelerating the repair of exercise-related tissue damage, whey protein (especially when consumed immediately before, during, and/or after exercise) is able to prevent some cases of overuse injuries such as tendonitis and runner’s knee.
This particular benefit of whey protein was demonstrated in a study from Vanderbilt University that involved Marine recruits as subjects. During boot camp, these subjects were randomly assigned to receive either a recovery supplement containing whey protein or a placebo after physical training each day. By the end of boot camp, those Marines who had received the recovery supplement with whey protein had experienced 37 percent fewer joint and muscle injuries than the Marines in the placebo group.
You Owe It to Yourself
As an athlete or fitness enthusiast, you want to take advantage of every opportunity to improve your performance and get better results from your training. Whey protein products such as Permalean protein bars and shakes are an opportunity that’s too good to miss. They will help you build bigger, stronger muscles, shed excess body fat, perform better in workouts, recover faster after workouts, and suffer fewer injuries.
