There are many reasons why people would like to gain weight and build muscle mass. For some, the reason is for a stronger and tougher body, so that they can perform better in their respective sports. For others, it’s because they’re too skinny and want to be bigger.

Typically for a guy, looking good means having a bulky muscular body that is ripped. In their quest for weight gain, the use of protein supplements and a high protein diet will help you accomplish this objective of gaining muscle mass.

But how does protein actually help muscle growth? What type of food is protein-rich? What are some of the supplements that can be used to increase your daily protein intake to feed that muscle growth? These are some of the questions we’ll answer in this article.

I’m sure we all remember the balanced diet pyramid diagram from our school days. In the balanced diet pyramid, protein occupies the middle third of the pyramid, which means that in terms of volume of protein product intake, it should be moderate to fulfill the needs of the average person.

Protein serves two main purposes in the body. First, it provides the building blocks in amino acid form for growth and development of the body, in particular the muscles.

Second, protein helps the body to repair damage tissues in the body. For a person performing intense weight training to gain weight and build muscles, protein is more important than for the average person.

When there is exercise at high intensity, not only does stimulation takes place for the muscles to grow bigger, muscles and tissues also suffer from damage and break down. These need to be repaired and protein nutrients provide the materials for this repair work.

In addition to that, muscle growth can only take place when sufficient raw materials (proteins) are available within the body system. For someone on a serious weight-gaining program, the intake of protein must be increase from what is recommended in the old balanced diet pyramid you remember from school.

Most fitness and health experts recommend 1.5 - 2 grams of protein intake for every pound of bodyweight for a person on a weight gaining and muscle building program. If the person weighs 150 pounds, he will have to ensure that he consumes up to 300 grams of protein in a day during his training period.

This average is certainly more than what is recommended for someone on a normal diet. To get this amount of protein, you’ll have to eat a lot of lean meat, fish, eggs, milk and other dairy products.

These sources are high in protein, because they are essentially muscles of animals and fish. Lean beef for example is actually muscles of beef from non fatty regions like the leg and so on where less fat is found. Eggs and milk contain lots of high protein content that promotes muscle repair and growth.

Trying to get all the protein from food can be a challenge. Sometimes, the protein intake from these natural sources has to be supplemented by protein powder to ensure that sufficient amount of protein nutrients are available for growth.

Protein powders are widely available in the market in health food stores and online. These powders are easily mixed into drinks and shakes for easy consumption. But when choosing your protein powder it’s important to avoid products that contain too much sugar and calorie laden. These forms of protein powders can promote fat gain, which is really not what we want.

Your best bet is sticking to protein isolate. It’s more expensive than protein concentrate, but it’s a more pure form of protein and is more easily digestible.

Now you can see why protein is an important food to gain weight. It's necessary to repair muscle fibers that get broken down during high intensity exercise. When you've got enough protein in your diet you allow your muscles to grow back bigger and stronger.

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