SuppVersity - Nutrition and Exercise Science for Everyone

Don't forget that meat and dairy are not the only good sources of protein in your diet. In fact, even vegan athletes can - albeit with some effort - follow a diet that's so high in protein that traditionalists would say it may put your kidney and liver on the line - plant protein, or not... Guest post by Alex Leaf ( leaf-nutrition.com ) - There is a pervasive myth among vegans and health professionals alike that a high-protein diet is harmful, particularly for the kidneys. This is despite the World Health Organization official report on protein stating that "the most widely quoted potential problems relate to renal function and damage, but as discus-sed above the evidence for such claims in otherwise healthy individuals does not stand up to scrutiny" (WHO. 2016). Still, the vast majority of protein safety data that we have is with intakes less than 2.0 g/kg bodyweight. And for most people, that is all the data we need, because most people don’t eat more than the...

Sometimes lab values are deceiving - specifically if allegedly pathological elevations of kidney, liver and (heart) muscle enzmes are a perfectly physiological reaction to exercise.  You already know reason #1. The heavily increased creatine kinase (CK) levels I've discussed in a previous article at length  may look exactly as if you were about to have a kidney failure. In fact, the CK-levels can be elevated more than 100-fold after an intense workout (Pettersson. 2008). Accordingly, Mougios, et al. (2007) attempted to develop revised reference values for athletes in their 2007 study. The scientists' test revealed that CK levels of >1000 IU/L in male and 513 IU/L in female athletes would be better cut off levels for athletes who are still training than the regular upper limit of <208 IU/L. If you want to avoid muscle damage, you may try  BFR and hypoxia training . BFR, Cortisol & GH Responses BFR - Where are we now? Hypoxia + HIIT = Win? ...