Do women need to take protein shakes?

traveller80

Ive been using kettlebells to work out for about a year, but usually not very consistently, as i preferred to go running. Anyway, after reading about the benefits of strength training for women, im going to try do kettlebell work 3 times a week and then go for a run at the weekend.

My question is about whether i should eat more protein. It seems men like to take protein shakes, but im obviously not going to be lifting such heavy weights as men and wouldnt be able (or want to) build a lot of muscle. I just want to get the "toned" look, if you know what i mean:o

So, should i use protein shakes or just try to eat more foods containing protein (i dont eat meat, but i do eat fish, eggs, tofu and dairy). How do i work out how much i need?

Thanks for the advice:)

G86

traveller80 wrote: »

Ive been using kettlebells to work out for about a year, but usually not very consistently, as i preferred to go running. Anyway, after reading about the benefits of strength training for women, im going to try do kettlebell work 3 times a week and then go for a run at the weekend.

My question is about whether i should eat more protein. It seems men like to take protein shakes, but im obviously not going to be lifting such heavy weights as men and wouldnt be able (or want to) build a lot of muscle. I just want to get the "toned" look, if you know what i mean:o

So, should i use protein shakes or just try to eat more foods containing protein (i dont eat meat, but i do eat fish, eggs, tofu and dairy). How do i work out how much i need?

Thanks for the advice:)

There's no reason why you shouldn't be lifting heavy weights. You won't build a lot of muscle, you'll simply get the 'toned' look you're after .


There's nothing magic about protein shakes, they're just a convenient source of protein. If you're getting enough protein in your diet as it is then there's no real need. I'm a veggie and I'd take 2 a day to build up my daily protein intake, but I don't eat eggs etc. so I'm more limited dietwise. Log into fitday and check out how many grams you're getting daily as it is, and you'll know then whether you need to supplement with the shakes or not.

Inspector Coptoor

when doing resistance training, a general bench mark would be to hit 2g of protein for every kg you weigh.

If you were 60kg, then you;d be trying to hit 120g of protein per day.

Milk contains 3.3g of protein per 100ml so 1L of milk a day is 33g.
Tuna contains 27g of protein per 100g so a large tin of John West Tuna would contain about 43g of protein.
a large egg contains about 7g of protein so 3 scrambled eggs gives about 21g of protein.

That would give you 97g of protein, over 75% of your target at 60kg bodyweight.
If you found it hard to eat more than that, then a protein shake, which would have about 24g per 30g serving will help you hit that target.

Supplements are meant to help you hit diertary taregts assuming the diet itself is fairly well dialled in. You shouldnt be relying on them. become more aware of the protein content in food and try to get as much protein as possible from actual food

My opinion would be that a protein shake after each workout you do would be a good place to start and see how you get on.

Glowing

I have a shake every morning before work, purely cos I can't eat food first thing, and like to just have cereal at work (easy option) when my stomach has woken up. It works well for me (and I don't look like Arnie ) I would have a second scoop after training too most days ...

I would always have eggs at the weekend then and forego the morning scoop

Edit: I take the Kinetica Whey Protein, Vanilla flavour (yum!)

traveller80

Thanks for all the replies

G86 wrote: »

There's no reason why you shouldn't be lifting heavy weights. You won't build a lot of muscle, you'll simply get the 'toned' look you're after .

Maybe one day i hope:D...right now my arms are pretty weak and i struggle to get a 8kg kettlebell above my head with one arm.

Also, if you dont mind me asking, being a veggie what kind of protein shake do you use? I would prefer to use a vegetarian one and im unsure if the whey shakes are made using rennet.

Mellor

Most plain whey isn't vegetarian, but not vegan. It's a by product of cheese. So your right to be concerned about rennet. Luckily animal rennet isn't used, my protein.co.uk have vegetarian symbols beside most of their wheys.

Hanley

Not sure how relevant this'll be, but was talking to a mate the other day and she was freaking out about protein, here's a snippet of the mail...

"You said you wanted more protein, he said use whey. He's 100% correct on that. Whey is just protein, it's part of the cheese making process. It's no different to eating a piece of chicken or fish!! It's just more convenient and easier to take in higher quantities in shake form.

Protein in itself will do nothing to increase muscle. It's a combination of excess calories in total and weight training that does it - so don't worry about it in that regard. In fact, if you were to replace 50% of your daily carb intake with protein, even tho they've the same amount of calories, you'd end up burning 20% more as a result due to a metabolic quirk whereby when you eat protein, some of the energy contained in it is used to break it down for energy.

Plus it keeps you feeling fuller for longer and doesn't screw with your insulin and blood sugar levels so you end up with more stable energy levels and not big crashes.

In short - protein good!!

(that's not to say just add it in on top of everytihng else, because like all food it has calories. If you're going to introduce more protein, either in the form of chicken, fish, turkey, whey, whatever, use it to replace something else)
"

G86

traveller80 wrote: »

Thanks for all the replies



Maybe one day i hope:D...right now my arms are pretty weak and i struggle to get a 8kg kettlebell above my head with one arm.

Also, if you dont mind me asking, being a veggie what kind of protein shake do you use? I would prefer to use a vegetarian one and im unsure if the whey shakes are made using rennet.

Hey, I actually use ON (Optimum Nutrition) Soy Protein, but the Whey is suitable for vegetarians also

8kg is great going sure, keep at it!

Kanoe

G86 wrote: »

Hey, I actually use ON (Optimum Nutrition) Soy Protein, but the Whey is suitable for vegetarians also

8kg is great going sure, keep at it!

hey, I've been using a really basic milk and egg protein shake I got in H & B which is grand but I was running low and started looking around for something specifically designed for women so I popped into a local health and fitness store and the muscle bound guy behind the counter informed me that the one and only protein drink available there for women was soy based as women are not able to process whey the same way men do. Is this true and are soy based proteins better for women? (as it happens the stuff was called woman slimming something or other, didn't really appear to have much nutritional value and lacked in vitamins or minerals, just a really basic protein "supplement" so I gave it a miss and went back to the egg and milk one I was using before)

G86

Kanoe wrote: »

hey, I've been using a really basic milk and egg protein shake I got in H & B which is grand but I was running low and started looking around for something specifically designed for women so I popped into a local health and fitness store and the muscle bound guy behind the counter informed me that the one and only protein drink available there for women was soy based as women are not able to process whey the same way men do. Is this true and are soy based proteins better for women? (as it happens the stuff was called woman slimming something or other, didn't really appear to have much nutritional value and lacked in vitamins or minerals, just a really basic protein "supplement" so I gave it a miss and went back to the egg and milk one I was using before)

No, that's total BS, guy doesn't know what he's talking about. There's no difference in protein shakes for men/women!! I'm not big on dairy products , so that's why I go for the soy. It's absolutely nothing to do with my gender!

The only thing I look for in protein shakes, apart from the actual protein content, is the carb content - and that's just because I like to keep an eye on carbs. The ON 100% Whey has 24g protein per scoop and only less than 2g carbs from what I recall. Can't ask for better than that