Protein shakes have become increasingly popular over recent years among athletes, fitness freaks, and casual exercisers alike. But this leaves many with two specific questions:
A) What are their benefits and how do they work?
B) Are protein shakes healthy, or are they unsafe?
The short answers are that they help you build muscle, and yes, they are largely safe–when used in moderation. But if you’re reading this article you must be interested in more specifics than that, so let’s take a closer look at both questions.
A) Protein shakes work by delivering concentrated doses of easy-to-digest protein to your body’s muscles right when they need it most. Generally speaking, the muscles of the human body are most ready to absorb protein right after a workout (within 45 minutes to an hour after resistance training). But it’s difficult for most people to effectively deliver that nutrition right after working out, either because they’re at a gym or haven’t prepared a meal beforehand to eat right away, or simply because their diets don’t involve many high-protein, low-fat foods in large quantities.
Protein shakes are beneficial to these people because in the case of protein powders they are easy to make (just add liquid), or in the case of premixed shakes they can just pop one open and drink it before hopping in the shower. Neither option takes more than a minute, and both deliver a concentrated dose of protein for quick nutritional absorption into the muscles, allowing them to recover stronger than before.
Also note that most protein shakes are low in fat or fat-free. This is important because your body has a specific order in which it will digest different types of nutrition, and in that order it will always digest fat before protein. This is good for when you’re working out–it ensures that you burn fat instead of muscle–but it also means you have to be careful to take in as little fat as possible with your post-workout shake because the protein is what needs to be absorbed by your muscles in that magic 45-to-60-minute window.
Which leaves us with the second question:
B) Are protein shakes healthy? While many people are afraid to take protein shakes because they know that too much protein can damage their kidneys, what they don’t realize is that there are easy ways to combat that risk. By simply monitoring your protein intake (if you’re working out regularly, it should be about 1.6 grams of protein per kilogram of your body weight) you can avoid going far overboard, and by drinking plenty of water you can ensure that your kidneys have enough liquid to flush excess protein from your system instead of allowing renal failure.
Additionally, in the cases in which people do get kidney failure from consuming too much protein, it is from a prolonged, chronic overingestion of the nutrient–not just an occasional protein shake here and there. So do use nutritional statements from food packaging to monitor your intake from time to time to make sure you’re on track, and drink plenty of water. If you follow these steps and drink a shake after each workout, you’ll be building muscle that much faster and toning your body like a real athlete.
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