if you're over 60 just maintaining your muscle mass can be challenging and building muscle can often feel impossible the good news is it is possible to build muscle after 60 if you do the right things in this video I'll share one vital thing that you need to do to build muscle after 60 so what is that one thing well you may think that it's exercise and while exercise and resistance training are important if you're not fueling your body properly all of your time and effort spent exercising may not help when you do resistance training you actually break down your muscles which means you get temporarily weaker but that provides a stimulus for your body to build new muscle and in order to do that you need protein proteins are made up of amino acids which are the building blocks of your muscles and if you try to build a building without the raw materials you're destined to fail so in the rest of this video I'll explain how much protein you need when to eat it and what types of protein are best because not all protein sources are equal so let's dive in first of all how much protein do you need to eat per day the recommended dietary allowance or RDA for adults is 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day or 0.36 grams per pound of body weight per day for a 150 pound person that amounts to 54 grams of protein per day as a minimum to avoid becoming deficient but older adults become less responsive to protein intake than their younger counterparts which means you need to eat more protein to get the same muscle building effect so experts recommend that older adults eat 1.2 to 2.0 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day or 0.54 to 0.91 grams per pound of body weight per day for 150 pound person that amounts to 81 to 136 grams of protein per day for reference 1 ounce of meat contains roughly 7 gram of protein so you need to eat 12 to 20 ounces of meat throughout the day in order to meet your protein requirements if you were to get all of your protein from meat now we'll discuss other protein sources in a minute but first let's talk about when to eat your protein you could theoretically eat a 16 ounce steak for dinner and meet your protein requirements for the day however ever Studies have shown that maximal protein synthesis occurs with around 15 grams of essential amino acids which is roughly 35 grams of total protein eating less than that at one time results in less protein synthesis but eating more doesn't contribute to any further protein synthesis for that reason it's best to spread your protein intake evenly throughout the day rather than concentrating it at dinner if you eat 35 gram of protein times three meals per day that would be 105 gram of protein which may be sufficient for a 150 PB person however if you need more than that you can get another 30 to 35 grams by adding a protein shake or other protein Rich snack so now what foods are rich in protein well the most obvious sources are animal proteins such as meat poultry fish eggs and dairy you can also get protein from plant sources like beans lentils whole grains nuts and seeds but not all protein sources are equal plant proteins are considered incomplete proteins meaning that they don't have all nine essential amino acids that your bodies need conversely animal proteins are complete proteins meaning they do contain all nine amino acids so if you're going to get your protein from plant sources you need to mix and match different sources to make sure that you're getting all the amino acids that you need now there are some exceptions to that rule some plant sources are complete proteins and those include soy quinoa amarinth buckwheat EMP seeds chia seeds and spirulina but also keep in mind that plant proteins tend to have more carbohydrates and overall calor per gram of protein than do animal sources for that reason in order to increase your protein intake while keeping your overall calorie count in check the best sources are lean meats lowfat or nonfat dairy or eggs or egg whites now if you can't meet your daily protein requirements from food alone it is okay to use a protein supplement but you need to check and make sure that the supplement you're taking doesn't have a lot of excessive added calories from sugar or fat also keep in mind that the supplement industry is unregulated so you need to buy from a brand that you trust I'll put a link to the protein supplement that I use personally down in the description below now additionally when you increase your protein intake you also need to make sure that you're drinking enough water to help your kidneys flush out any extra nitrogenous waste and by increasing your prot Rin getting enough sleep and maintaining your current level of physical activity you can likely ward off muscle loss however to actually build muscle you need to expose your body to new levels of resistance that it's not used to handling to learn resistance training exercises for people over 50 check out this video over here but before you go if you found this video helpful make sure to give it a like And subscribe to our channel so you can get notified of our future vide thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video