The Raw Eggs For Bodybuilding Myth
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Do you drink raw eggs believing they give you an advantage in your workout efforts? Unfortunately it’s a myth providing zero benefit and you might as well stop this disgusting practice.
The Italian Stallion
I believe that the entire thing about drinking raw eggs for bodybuilding, strength and muscles turned popular with Rocky, the 1976 boxing movie. In it, the main character at one point goes for his early morning run, comes back home, breaks four or five raw eggs into a glass, stirs and gulps the whole shebang down in one go.
We can only assume that for some people “oh, I saw it in the movie and the guy was huge and cool” is a good enough reason to do the same in reality. But metabolically, drinking raw eggs works worse for you than cooked eggs:
The bit about the cooked egg protein being easier to digest you can read in this nifty piece of research. For some background info on salmonella and eggs, check the CDC’s in-depth article about the subject, and the Mayo Clinic for a recommendation about eggs and cholesterol.
Just The Egg Whites, Ma’am!
Now what about throwing away the yolk and just using the egg whites? Doesn’t that have fewer calories while also saying bye-bye to all that freaking cholesterol?
Yes, both are true. But you’ll also be throwing away 1/3 of the six grams of protein coming in an egg, as 2 g are in the yolk. Therefore, to get 30 g of protein, you’d need the whites of about 7 eggs. In the long run that is an expensive hobby when compared to other protein sources (beans, milk, protein powders etc.).
What About The “Biological Value”?
What you’ll often hear thrown around about egg protein being superior is that it has a high “biological value”. The BV is a number that shows how much of a protein you eat your body can use for its own purposes – in working out that is of course the process of building muscle mass.
For eggs that number is often stated as “100”, which sounds good. However, BV numbers are calculated under strict laboratory conditions that have little to do with real life. Depending on the rest of what you eat, your age, health and weight, your “personal” BV for eggs can be much lower than for, say, the protein in lentils.
Me Tarzan, You Raw Egg!
Let’s recap: seeing something in a movie doesn’t mean it has any basis in reality. You don’t believe in 300 ft. gorillas abducting luscious blondes onto skyscrapers either, do you? Please say no.
Eggs are a complete protein source, meaning they come with all essential amino acids. They also have vitamins and minerals, but making them your main protein source in your workout nutrition provides little to no advantage and is quite expensive.
Picture courtesy of Daniel Novta.
9 Comments
Interesting post. Glad to hear there is no advantage to eating eggs raw. I always thought it was uck!
Even if it was the healthiest thing to do in the world, I doubt that could drink something that basically looks like yellow slime 😉
Raw eggs
Cons:
– Yuck
– Avidin screws vitamin absorbtion
– Salmonella
– More difficult to digest
Pros:
– Some boscientists swear upon them for no specified reason
– Some hormonal teenagers think they’re ubercool so eating/drinking them makes you ubermanly
– During the cooking process some of the fat gets oxidized
Hmmm, hard choice
Oh yes, indeed! That will take me time to decide! 😉
When I was In middle school, my chemistry teacher thought me this, she quoted the tragic “tradition” among some mothers to pour raw eggs on their children chocolate milk thinking that made it more nutritious.
I have found an eggs white & beans taco to be a nice round breakfast.
Hm, I may just try that! 🙂
People have been eating raw eggs for thousands of years. Do you honestly think Rocky started it? Do yourself a favor and read few articles on suppversity.com so you can see some examples of responsible and logical health/science writing. Your lazy writing should embarrass you. Did you even read ONE actual study? Or are you just blindly regurgitating what other people say, except with less eloquence and useful information? Tell me, how are you not ashamed of yourself to base your “health” article around the idea that we shouldn’t do what Rocky does? Do you actually know anything about eggs and/or cholesterol? Give me one reason to not think you’re a total hack.
Do you mean stuff like
Numbers of Salmonella enteritidis in the contents of naturally contaminated hens’ eggs
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2271858/pdf/epidinfect00027-0066.pdf
Risk factors for Salmonella Enteritidis and Typhimurium (DT104 and non-DT104) infections in The Netherlands: predominant roles for raw eggs in Enteritidis and sandboxes in Typhimurium infections
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2870426/
A Nosocomial Outbreak of Salmonella enteritidis Infection Due to the Consumption of Raw Eggs
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199008093230607
Human Biotin Deficiency A Case History of Biotin Deficiency Induced by Raw Egg Consumption in a Cirrhotic Patient
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/21/2/173.full.pdf
Biotin deficiency syndrome in pigs fed desiccated egg white
http://www.journalofanimalscience.org/content/5/2/219.full.pdf
?
Do yourself a favour, STFU until you finish high school. If you manage to.
Let me understand this. Your first argument is that because something has been done for “thousands of years” it has to be valuable. Your second argument is that I didn’t read any studies about this, despite posting a link to a relevant one, while you have none. Your third argument, if we may call it that, is attacking me.
I’ll leave it to readers whose position is more valuable.