Originally Posted by
Carbonfiberboy
The fly in the ointment there is that not everyone is "most people." How about those who never eat animal products or those who never eat mammals or dinosaurs like my wife and I for the past 50+ years? I think this forum has put adequate negatively on the SAD over the years. The average American diet is rather on the deadly side, both in terms of health and planetary welfare. I don't think we should encourage athletes to eat that way and my guess is that actually few do.
This was the podcast I was referring to earlier
The reason I know my protein intake in detail is simply because I’m using the ZOE app to track my nutrition.
The daily target range the app sets for my personal protein consumption is 80-130g (I weigh 80 kg, so 1-1.6g per kg).
I eat a healthy balanced diet of approx 2500 Calories per day and without any special thought about protein I get an average of 113g protein per day. So smack in the middle of the target range. It looks like the Prof in the podcast knows what he is talking about.
I eat very little meat, just a little chicken and fish once or twice per week. I do eat dairy in moderation. The rest comes from plants. I take no protein supplements.
I agree about the average American diet being unhealthy. It’s the same here in the UK. But whether we eat healthy or not, it would appear that protein requirements are easily met or exceeded without really trying.
There was another ZOE podcast discussing protein that did mention some elderly people needing to monitor their protein intake if they had a very low appetite. But otherwise if we are eating enough calories to maintain weight then protein will almost certainly be more than enough for our needs.
To be on the safe side I am looking to bump my average protein intake up closer to my 130g upper limit. On many individual days I get well above that level anyway.