Micronutrients & recovery
Post-exercise supplementation with whey protein (0.9 g/kg/day) significantly reduces serum creatine kinase and myoglobin levels compared to water in untrained males following intense eccentric exercise, whereas pea protein does not significantly reduce these biomarkers.
If you are untrained and do intense eccentric exercise (like a heavy leg day or downhill running), taking whey protein (about 0.9g per kg of body weight daily, split into 3 doses) for 5 days may help lower markers of muscle damage (like CK) compared to not taking protein. However, this did not reduce soreness or improve strength/power recovery in this study. Pea protein did not show the same biomarker benefits as whey in this specific trial.
Whey protein supplementation significantly attenuated post-exercise blood levels for biomarkers of muscle damage compared to water-only, with large effect sizes for creatine kinase and myoglobin during the fourth and fifth days of recovery (Cohen’s d > 0.80); pea protein versus water supplementation had an intermediate non-significant effect (Cohen’s d < 0.50)
Why this rating
Randomized, double-blind, parallel-group design with a large sample size (n=92) and rigorous eccentric exercise protocol.
Source
Effects of Whey and Pea Protein Supplementation on Post-Eccentric Exercise Muscle Damage: A Randomized Trial
David C. Nieman et al. · Nutrients · 2020
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