Diet & Supplementation for Muscle Growth | Dr. Andy Galpin & Dr. Andrew Huberman

ANDREW HUBERMAN: I'd like to talk a little bit about nutrition and supplementation as it relates to hypertrophy. Dr Layne Norton, who's been a guest on the Huberman Lab podcast, and we both know. Throughout a number of range related to protein intake on the backdrop of how much protein synthesis can occur by meal across the day, et cetera, a lot of research done there and some important work by him in particular.

And then the value that he threw out was 1. 6 grams per kilogram of body weight being the lower end of the range, up to, I believe it was as high as 2. 4-- maybe even as high as 2.

7-- grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day. That's a pretty broad range, but it's on the higher end of what I think most people think of in terms of protein intake. And then again, some people might already be right there, or maybe even above that value.

Now, of course, this all depends on whether or not people are omnivore, vegan, meat-based, et cetera. We won't even go there. But assuming people are getting enough protein per day, so somewhere in that range, and they are spreading out that protein intake to accommodate the fact that the body can only assimilate a certain amount of protein in any given setting, what do you like to see people ingest, at some point, post-hypertrophy-inducing workout in order to get the protein synthesis advantage, if you will-- ANDY GALPIN: Yeah.

ANDREW HUBERMAN: --that is stimulated by that workout? Earlier you mentioned the post-training feeding window, that in the 90's and probably earlier, people were talking about, oh, within the first 90 minutes you have to get-- ANDY GALPIN: It was 30 minutes for a while, yeah. ANDREW HUBERMAN: --X amount of-- Oh, wow.

Oh, was it? 30 minutes of-- excuse me, a certain number of grams of carbohydrate and protein, et cetera. I think now the understanding is that window is much broader.

And how broad, et cetera, is still a matter of debate. But when somebody is training specifically for hypertrophy, assuming they are getting enough protein from quality sources in their other meals and assuming that their overall macronutrient intake and caloric intake is high enough-- that is they have enough of a caloric surplus that they have the raw materials for hypertrophy-- what do you like to see people ingest, at some point, post-workout, in order to facilitate muscle protein synthesis and recovery? And this could include nutrition and supplementation.

Or if you want to divide those answers out, feel free to do so, of course. ANDY GALPIN: Yeah. OK, great.

So ton of work came out of Don Lehman's lab-- It was actually Layne's mentor, as well as Stu Phillips at McMaster. So a ton of work there. And we can answer a number of things here.

So Layne's numbers that he recommended, also known as about a gram of protein per pound of body weight. It's a great start. Now once you slide below-- ANDREW HUBERMAN: That's per pound, right?

ANDY GALPIN: 1 gram per pound. ANDREW HUBERMAN: Right, and earlier-- ANDY GALPIN: Which is also-- ANDREW HUBERMAN: Just to make sure, because we're changing units here. It was 1.

6 grams per kilogram of body weight, all the way up to, I think it was 2. 4, but maybe as high as 2. 7 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight.

ANDY GALPIN: So 2. 2 in that unit would be the same thing. So 2.

2 grams per kilogram is the same as 1 gram per pound. ANDREW HUBERMAN: Right. ANDY GALPIN: So depending on which-- where you're listening at, to this at, one of those may be easier than the other for you.

If you start getting below that number now you do start running into questions of protein quality, protein type, and protein timing. And this is one of the reasons why I actually fully agree with Layne, is just get that number higher than you think, And then all those other variables don't matter. If that number is low, then you need to start paying attention to a bunch of other stuff.

You've added now complexity to your program, things you've got to pay attention to. Just stay high and it doesn't matter. And so you can just leave a lot of those things off the table.

That seems to be fairly clear in the work of some of those gentlemen I just mentioned. That as long as you get to that total number, the question about timing and types and quality, it seems to matter a lot less. In fact, Stu's recent work in non-animal based proteins really showed that, to be fairly clear, that those are quite effective, assuming total protein intake is high enough.

The amount of leucine and other amino acids in those actual proteins matter less if the total threshold is just super high. So just do that and you're fine. Now the other caveat we have to say here is, timing of macronutrients seems to be somewhat irrelevant for protein but that is not the case for carbohydrates.

So that timing does matter replenishment of muscle glycogen is very specific. And you want to make sure that is around a lot, if you're doing either maintaining training quality or you're sliding into endurance type of work. And so nutrient timing does matter with carbohydrates.

Maybe less so with protein-- and certainly less so with protein, if the total protein ingestion is high enough. So it depends on what we're going after in terms of a training goal and where we want to get with all these things. In general, the way that we like to think about this is if you're doing a strength type of work, where you're truly targeting that, then a one to one post-exercise protein to carbohydrate ratio is generally what we're going to go after.

So this would be something like 35 grams of protein and 35 grams of carbohydrate. It doesn't have to be post. It can be pre, or my favorite is actually mid.

Or post. But somewhere in that range, especially if you're training in the morning and you have not consumed anything prior to your workout. ANDREW HUBERMAN: And that's not necessarily eating in the middle of the workout.

That's drinking calories. ANDY GALPIN: Yeah, it's going to be-- ANDREW HUBERMAN: I, yes, to see someone eating a sandwich in the gym. Although, I'm sure it's happened.

ANDY GALPIN: Yeah. So one to one is that sort of standard number here. If you're going to do sort of more of a really hard conditioning workout, that number slides up to something like three or even four to one, which would be carbohydrate to protein ratio.

So if we want to stay at 35 grams of protein, we're going to go maybe as high as like 100 or 140 grams of carbohydrate, depending on what type of training we're sort of doing. If you're going to do a little bit of a combination, then you-- like a little bit of strength, a little bit of conditioning, and kind of a standard workout, which is probably something that a lot of people will do, then you maybe want to go to something like two to one. So 35 grams of protein, 60, 70 grams of carbohydrate.

And those are kind of just like rough numbers that you can go by. ANDREW HUBERMAN: And for pure hypertrophy training, would you like to see people ingest some carbohydrate post-training? ANDY GALPIN: For pure hypertrophy training, I want to see that-- as many of those nutrients around the training is generally possible.

Now again, I may change my mind when our fasting study comes out. But as it stands now, there is no advantage to not fueling around the training. And there are some known and some other potential advantages to fueling.

So I just see no reason to not do it. In fact, most people are generally going to do better. Now this is not science, this is just my coaching experience.

And this is with our athletes and all of our non-athletes that we've worked with and do work with. They're just going to be better spreading those meals out generally throughout the day. And they're going to be better if they have those nutrients either pre, mid, or post.

And so they're going to get-- even for hypertrophy-- they're going to get something like that three to one ratio of carbs of protein. Personal preference. Some people don't like to eat before they train, some people have to eat before they train, some people can't put in food in their belly immediately after.

Work around that. You can play based on personal preference. But we want that feeling in there because we want to maximize the potential growth.

And we want to just get a jumpstart on recovery because we're going to be training again pretty soon.