Welcome to the Wits and Weights Podcast. I'm your host, Philip Pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self-mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition, and upgrading your body composition. We'll uncover science-backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle, and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry so you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in. Wits and weights community, this is the very first mini episode of the Wits and Waits podcast. I'm calling these short episodes Quick Wits because I needed a clever name to distinguish these from longer episodes, and because this is the Wits and Weights podcast after all. I plan to release these Quick Wits episodes in the middle of the week to give you a very short, actionable strategy in less than three to five minutes. In these mini episodes, my intent is to give you practical advice on fitness, training, and mindset based on my everyday experience with clients that you can implement right away. If you enjoy these extra episodes, or if you have feedback on how to make them better, just send me a message on IG at Wits and Waits or hit me up in the free Wits and Waits Facebook community. As always, those links are also in the show notes. Okay, let's get into today's quick wits mini episode. Which whey protein should you use? Isolate, concentrate, or hydrolyzed? All right, so we're just gonna break these down. The first one, whey protein isolate. This is the purest type of protein powder. It's 90% plus protein by weight. It's absorbed rapidly, it peaks in your blood in about 30 to 90 minutes. It also has a high level of leucine, which is, as we know, the amino acid that directly stimulates muscle protein synthesis. It's about 11 to 10 or 11% of it. It's also very low in byproducts like lactose, fat, and carbs. So it's easy to digest for most people. And so this is excellent for an anytime whey protein, especially post-workout or whenever you just need a quick hit of protein. Then there's whey protein concentrate. It's a little bit less pure by weight, 70 to 85% protein. It's absorbed a little bit more slowly in about two hours, which is a little bit slower than isolate. It contains higher levels of glutamine, algebraic acids, growth factors that might support muscle growth, but again, this is all uh we're in the optimization realm. The higher lactose can help with replenishment of glycogen stores post-workout. And I think it's a little bit more affordable per gram of protein compared to isolate. But again, you're getting those other things that come along with it. And then there's hydrolyzed whey. Now, they the claim is that this is pre-digested because of how it's produced using hydrolysis, where they break the larger proteins into peptides and it does it's absorbed supposedly very fast, you know, 15 to 30 minutes. But uh a lot of this, these claims are not supported by the science, and it has a very bitter aftertaste, so it's usually uh covered up by sweeteners, natural or otherwise when you purchase it. And I also think it's more expensive. Um, so I'm generally not even going to recommend hydrolyzed whey for the most part and stick with the whey protein, isolate and concentrate. Now, the last thing I wanted to throw in here was casein protein, which isn't whey. It's um uh it comes from milk, but it's a different type of protein. The digestion time is a lot slower, five to seven hours, and it's considered anti-catabolic. It increases muscle uh or decreases muscle protein breakdown. And there have always been claims that this is the kind of protein you take, um, you know, like when you go to bed, before you go to bed. So it digests slower throughout the night and increases muscle protein synthesis. The problem is again, there's not much of a difference between that and the other types if you simply get enough of your protein from whatever source you want and distribute it throughout the day. So, in summary, whey isolate is the purest form. It's ideal for right after workouts, get those muscles fed. It's very readily available. And then whey concentrate digests a little bit slower. It retains some of the growth factors in whey, um, but it isn't as pure as whey isolate. Hydrolyzed whey is supposedly predigested, so it can be digested faster, but it doesn't taste great. It can be more expensive. I would just avoid it. And then casein is a slower digesting protein that's about 80% of the protein you find in milk. Um, but the whole claims about taking it before bed and all that, which I used to do, I'm not really sold on that anymore. It really depends on how many of these proteins you want to keep around in the house. So the bottom line is the simple approach is go with simple whey protein, isolate. Or if you want to optimize a little bit more, have some concentrate line around, or buy a combination of the two and just avoid hydrolyzed altogether. Look for a high-quality supplement that is minimally processed with as few ingredients as you can get away with for the taste. Um, I use both first form and optimum nutrition. So first form is probably a lot higher quality, it's a little more expensive, optimum nutrition is a little more, you know, mass-produced, but it's still considered uh decent quality. Uh I am a first form affiliate. So if you want to support me, use my link firstform.com/slash wits and weights, or click the link in my show notes. Okay, that's it for the first quick wits mini episode. Hopefully I made it as quick as you expected. And I want you to go ahead and subscribe to the show and your podcast app right now. Subscribe to Wits and Weights so you can catch the next full episode 117 this Friday titled Starting Strength, The Novice Effect, and Barba Lifts with Cody Anino. And I'll catch you next time here on the Wits and Weights podcast. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Wits and Weights. If you found value in today's episode and know someone else who's looking to level up their wits or weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them. And make sure to hit the follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode. Until then, stay strong.