do carbs effect protien nitrogen balance

[nclifter6feet6]

i believe somewhat that if you take 1 gram per pound of protien in LEAN body mass your at a fairly stable nitrogen balance. well in least my case that is. which means i dont loose any muscle when just taking this amount of protien with low carbs(50gramsof carbs or less). and nore do i fee like i gain any more muscle if i increase it to 1.5 grams of protien per LEAN body mass, i feel that extra protien might as well be carbs because i have kept dieting logs in the past and traded protien for carbs and kept calories the same(instead of 300 grams of protien and 300 grams of carbs when i was bulking i traded the ratios too 200 grams of protien and 400 grams of carbs and got basically the same results if not better with more carbs, training may also be a factor in results im not positve) and got the SAME results when i was bulking. im not speaking for everyone so dont flame this is just in my past dieting logs.

so i was wondering on a more carb restricted diet like say person number one takes 200 grams of protien and 50 grams of carbs and comparing it to something like person number 2 takes 200 grams of protien and 400 grams of carbs. now the question is which person will have the better nitrogen balance in protien or will it be the same? if you know the answer could you state a reference? in my opionion i would think it would be the same because for me i dont loose muscle when dieting i feel i retain most of it or stay the same, especially when i train with low reps, my strenght may go down slightly when dieting because my body isnt as hydrated with carbs and carbs hold water when im bulking. because i know when your muscles are fully hydrated you are about 10 percent stronger as appossed to having your muscle depleted. but of course person number 2 would get much bigger with all the extra calories and carbs

 

[nclifter6feet6]

also if carbs effect protien nitrogen balance . if carbs increase your nitrogen then that could mean you could eat even less protien and more carbs. this would sound great for cycling carbs and protein

 

[plornive]

At a certain level of protein intake, carbohydrates begin to increase nitrogen balance nearly as well as protein gram for gram. Blood glucose increases insulin, and protein increases glucagon. When there is an excess of glucagon, the liver begins converting amino acids to glucose through a process called gluconeogenesis. When insulin is high enough, less gluconeogenesis occurs. Gluconeogenesis always leads to less nitrogen retention, but it is a necessary process when on a diet. Any kind of caloric deficit will cause at least some gluconeogenesis to occur. The trick is to optimize the amount of carbohydrate and protein you ingest to strike a balance between two factors:
1. nitrogen balance: gluconeogenesis decreases nitrogen balance
2. fat metabolism: if carbohydrate intake and thus insulin is too high, fat metabolism is hindered

A good stretegy is to ingest a small amount of liquid carbohydrate during a workout. Insulin is somewhat disabled during exercise, so fat burning can occur. At the same time, I believe that the carbs will prevent too much gluconeogenesis. It might be a good idea to ingest a very small amount of protein simultaneously, but I'm not sure.

I think Par's article on avantlabs.com about pre and post workout nutrition would have some insight on this.

Another little fact is that no matter what, a high percentage of protein will be converted to blood glucose no matter what you do --- something like 50-60% of it in fact. The 150g figure assumes gluconeogenesis of 50-60% of ingested protein, I believe. Also, slowly digesting protein is MUCH less likely to be converted to glucose. A good example is casein --- cottage cheese.

 

[Lumberg]

Great info plor.

JC