Top 10 Protein Powders

About Top 10 Protein Powders

Quality protein is an important part of daily nutrition, whether you're a bodybuilder or simply looking to optimise health and longevity. Protein contain nine crucial nutrients called essential amino acids (EAAs) as well as a host of other non-essential and conditionally-essential amino acids. Protein powders are easily digestible and are a convenient and delicious way to increase your intake without significantly increasing your calorie intake.

While supplement fads lose popularity fast, protein powder have been popular for decades now. Given their bioavailable and natural amino acid content, these supplements support wellbeing, sports and exercise recovery with great efficacy. Essential amino acids have both structural and functional uses within the body. Given this, they are incorporated into tissues and organs to provide structure while important for enzymatic reactions, neurotransmitters and hormones.

Protein shakes are often taken after exercise to activate the anabolic pathways. This is important, as during exercise our catabolic (breakdown) pathways become active and it is not until a significant source of essential amino acids are consumed that the overall state of the body can be said to be anabolic again. An anabolic state is the ideal biological state to recover from your chosen form of exercise, whether it's long-distance running, powerlifting or gymnastics.

The fact that we become catabolic when exercising might seem counterintuitive, especially if you're a bodybuilder. Any “stressful” event, whether it be minimal sleep, emotional stress or intense exercise causes the release of catabolic hormones such as cortisol. After all, when engaging in extreme physical activity, evolution has primed us to be ready to recover from an injury, as long ago we were probably running from a sabre tooth tiger rather than moving dumbells. To be prepared to recover from potential injury, cortisol mobilises amino acids from muscle, the foundational building blocks of tissue repair.

The human body is always in a state of protein turnover- always breaking down muscle and building muscle at the same time as two separate processes. This can be compared to a house with a bricklayer on one side adding fresh and strong structures to the home, while someone works on demolition on the other side of the house, tearing down old rotten timber. Muscle breakdown is an important process, as we want new fresh muscle fibres to replace the old ones. Stimulating muscle building and taking the body into a state of overall anabolism (where muscle building is greater than muscle degradation) is an important aspect of protein powders. It is the protein powder’s essential amino acid content that stimulates these anabolic pathways.

The Sporty's Health Top 10 Protein Powders Supplements ranking is provides you with a user-generated list of "what’s hot" and intruiging in the world of protein powders. So check out our range to see what’s hot and what’s not. Each protein powder contains detailed contant to help you make the most informed supplement decision.