Let's look at some self evident facts. If we randomly select an un-athletic individual and modified his diet, dramatically increasing the amount of protein, will his muscles begin to grow, until he becomes an athletic marvel? What do you think?

An athlete's training is vitally important to stimulate increases in athletic performance, and only then, when the body is making these adaptations, does the body require protein to do this.

But is protein all that the body requires? Even a superficial look at a list of food nutrients and their function will tell us that many nutrients are essential to protein synthesis in the body. This means that without all the nutrients present, the body can't use protein efficiently, or at all.

Let's take a closer look at the history of the knowledge of food nutrients. When vitamins were first discovered, they were the rage. What were marketed as vitamin supplements were actually highly refined isolated food nutrients, advertised as nutritional insurance to insure that you get all the vitamins and nutrients your body needs.

Then, years later, phytochemicals in foods were discovered, and nutritional supplements started including these. People pay top dollar for vitamin and mineral supplements that are actually missing nutrients that are found in in whole, natural foods. Scientists have stated that there are over 1300 chemical compounds in just an apple alone. What's next to be discovered? The solution to getting all the nutrients you need is simply stated in three words: whole, natural foods.

What type of protein is best, and how much? If we look at the at the animal kingdom, we see that each animal is uniquely adapted to its food supply to grow and thrive. The tiger eats meats, while the bull eats grass, so its obvious that adequate protein exists in both food sources, while it's the type of animal that uses these food sources that makes the difference.

So the real question then is what type of protein are humans suited for: animal, plant, or a combination (omnivore)? The answer comes in 3 areas of study. Physiologically, when we compare the physical characteristics of humans to classes of animals, we see that humans share the most traits with the fruit eating animals - primates and anthropoids.

Migration studies of humans show that people who have lived in a culture eating a plant based diet, who then move to a new culture eating an animal based diet show clear evidence of an increase in disease related to the new animal based diet.

Performance studies show that athletes on a plant based diet excel over those on an animal based diet. Reports on increased endurance, recovery, and an overall feeling of increased wellness and mental clarity are common.

It's tempting to give in to the many advertisements we're bombarded with. Ads offering a short cut to increased athletic performance if only we buy their product. Can we buy success? Or is the answer a combination of hard work in our training, properly applied, along with a knowledge of nutrition involving whole natural plant foods? Nature has an incredible track record of success, over thousands, if not millions of generations. I encourage you to work with nature and uncover her secrets, mimic her, rather than try to re-create all her wonder in less than one generation. And remember these three words: whole, natural foods.