symptoms of inadequate protein intake

A lack of dietry protein creates serious, often fatal problems!
i take it you mean inadequate for hypertrophy ;)
the simple answer is lack of growth! If you are not growing despite using HST priciples, you should have a serious look at your diet.

1)Are you getting enough total daily calories? body mass gain (ie Fat/muscle gain) counts as adequate calories.

It should be noted that a daily calorie intake sufficient to gain body mass will usually contain an adequate amount of protein.

2)If you are gaining fat without much muscle gain and your training (or lack of) is not to blame, then up the protein and reduce carbs/fat.
 
What he said

[b said:
Quote[/b] ])If you are gaining fat without much muscle gain and your training (or lack of) is not to blame, then up the protein and reduce carbs/fat.

So for carbs-protein-fat what should the ratio be if you're trying to lose fat. Aside from reduced calories.

I'm at 35%-33%-32% on average at the moment.
 
Without going into a rant, percentages mean nothing.

If you eat 250g protein, 500g carbs and 100g fat that will give you one % group.

If you eat 250g protein, 400g carbs and 100g fat that would give you a higher % protein diet.

Macronutrients should ultimately be estimated from bodyweight, (except fat because they have never really shown any decent information for that).
Get ~1g/lb protein, get at least 25% daily energy from fats and just use carbs to bulk up the rest. Possibly 4-5g/kg LBM.
 
Right, thats kinda what I was thinking, whether you lower carbs to reduce calories or fat or protein to lose fat it doesn't matter as long as you're under mantainence you trim it off. Though lowering the protein is probably the last thing you wanna do so fat is probably the best and first thing to cut down on.
 
Right. The most extreme effective diet for fat loss is a PSMF -- Protein Sparing Modified Fast. It entails dropping calories to the absolute minimum without losing much lean tissue. This is usually around the 800-1000 calorie mark, and the diet is mostly protein at that point. Fasting studies have found that going below 800 calories does not yield more fat loss -- it just results in more lost muscle tissue.

I've done a short-term PSMF with very good results, but there's no need to go that extreme if you have time to get to your goals. Also, after a radical drop like a PSMF, you have to take care when coming off to avoid a rebound.
 
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