Chapter One

1. What Proteins Are and What They Do

The Holy Bible is a spiritual treatise on the creation of the earth, life, and man. If I were to write a takeoff on that in terms of human biochemistry, it would be “In the beginning was the word, and the word was ‘amino.’”

I don’t intend for the above quote to be sacrilegious—I’m referring to “the beginning” in a biological sense. Whether you are an evolutionist or creationist, the truth is, amino acids were the beginning, as they are the building blocks of life. Whether by accident or through creation, somehow, they were formed. Amino acids were then assembled into the first proteins that were most likely enzymes. Enzymes facilitate chemical reactions to occur faster and specifically, and once they came into existence, they allowed for the manufacture of proteins; which allowed for the creation of more complex cells and organisms—essentially, the human body. In fact, the word protein is derived from the Greek word proteus, which means “primary.”

Our bodies are incredibly complicated organisms made up of more than 100 trillion cells and at least fifty thousand different proteins. The average cell is a very complex, independent living thing with an internal chemical reaction rate of about two thousand times per second. Think about that for a minute! If you hired a computer wizard and asked him to design a program like the human body, it would have to coordinate 100,000,000,000,000 (trillion) cells with reaction rates at two thousand times per second, where every cell had to be in sync with every other one—each would have to be aware of what the other was doing at every moment. It would also have to be completely adaptable to cold and heat, whether on top of a mountain or at the bottom of the ocean. It would need to function while awake, asleep, running, wounded, or sitting still. It would have to control hormones, salt balance, cellular energy production, growth, repair, and on and on. There is no computer or computer maven that could possibly design this! If you think that molecules could achieve this by a series of accidents over the millennia, think again. This system is a result of the miracle of creation and life. The level of activity and coordination in the human body is impossible for us to comprehend!

Daily Stressors of Life

Our bodies undergo wear and tear on a daily basis due to chemical and traumatic stress—these attack and cause damage to the protein structure. Each cell must constantly repair proteins and other vital components to maintain its integrity. For example, during triathlon season, I train for my next event. I’ll run for eighty minutes in ninety-degree heat, and then swim in the ocean for forty-five. Those environments and stressors are hostile to individual cells. The body has to deal with heat, sweating, energy production, salt balance, and hormonal support. That effort also causes a great deal of structural trauma and micro-tearing of my muscles and ligaments. If someone is protein malnourished, they could never handle that stress. They could overheat, feel dizzy, not sweat enough to cool their body, cramp, or get weak and faint. They might have GI stress with nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea, or even suffer a heart attack. Their muscles and ligaments might be sore for days, or they will deal with exhaustion.

These consequences don’t just pertain to athletes. Other stressors coming from a boss, work deadlines, or an antagonistic spouse or children can cause similar cellular trauma. Medications of every variety are also huge sources of chemical stress in the body, because all medicines are toxins and cause cellular injury. If people work in an environment with pollutants, chemicals, pesticides, and eat and drink them, that is also part of the equation. There is no escaping any of this in our current life, and in order to live—and for sure to thrive—the body must deal with what is thrown at it, and at the heart of that is protein metabolism.

Protein Malnourishment

My definition of protein malnourishment is having inadequate levels of serum essential amino acids to accomplish normalization of the body’s protein requirements. A former patient of mine was very protein malnourished, and if she so much as lifted a book from a table, her arm would be sore for weeks! She had to be extremely careful with everything she did because her body broke down, wouldn’t repair itself, or repaired very slowly. Hers was a rare and interesting case, because it wasn’t like she was living in Africa—she lived in the United States and ate what appeared to be a good diet.

I also see many patients who have been diagnosed with multiple chemical sensitivities. These people are super sensitive to smells, perfumes, or any odor. Many can’t have anything even touch their skin except for organic cotton or silk—synthetic fabrics make them break out in rashes, and they are hypersensitive to mold or pollens. It’s a miserable existence. All of these patients are protein malnourished.

I also see many patients with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome. All of them are protein malnourished.

All depressed people and people with anxiety are protein malnourished.

All osteoporotic patients are protein malnourished.

All patients with cancer are protein malnourished.

All patients with autoimmune diseases like Lupus and Rheumatoid Arthritis are protein malnourished.

All patients with sleep disorders are protein malnourished.

All Parkinson’s patients are protein malnourished.

All Alzheimer’s Dementia patients are protein malnourished.

Protein malnourishment is pervasive and is rarely looked for by medical doctors. It is treatable and can facilitate improvement in any of the above conditions. Keep in mind that essential amino acids are not the only nutrients the body needs; vitamins, minerals and essential fats at optimum levels are also necessary. When we treat a patient, we look for all deficiencies and work to replenish them. This is the first step of the secret to helping the chronically ill recover. The second step is dependent on the first; we must fix the deficiencies before we can get the accumulated toxins out of the body and complete the recovery process.

Amino-focused Nutrition

To give an example that contrasts from the ones above, but to further make the point, another patient of mine was one of the medical personnel for all of Lance Armstrong’s pro cycling teams, during his now-tainted run of Tour de France victories. The team budgets were large enough to provide riders with everything they needed, including a traveling chef who made high-energy meals for them throughout the three-week race. The chef, along with the team doctors, did everything they could to improve the riders’ nutrition-related performance and bring home a win.

As you can imagine, by the end of the Tour, the riders are broken down, tired, and in pain. After all, they fought through twenty-one intense, four or five hour rides on bikes at high altitudes. During one race season, the top-tier riders took Perfect Amino in large doses in addition to their regular diet. At the end of the Tour, their physician told me those riders weren’t beaten down; they actually left the race in better shape than when they started. Their extraordinary daily recovery and increased strength makes it evident that if you give the body what it needs, especially essential amino acids in the right quantities, it can efficiently heal from maximum-trauma events.

It’s common for patients who compete in triathlons or marathons to come down with a cold within a week after a race, because the body has limited resources for repair. It has a choice to make following such trauma, and it will usually prioritize healing of the heart, muscles, tendons, and ligaments ahead of the immune system. When intense skeletal repair is required, the immune system is depleted of its resources and will become weak. This leads to the onset of an upper respiratory infection or sometimes worse. However, if athletes load up on Perfect Amino a couple of days before and after an event, they usually won’t come down with a cold. This is because there are enough essential amino acids to suffice for skeletal recovery and immune protection. I have validated this many times in my training and racing and with many other athletes that I work or train with.

The recovery needs of an athlete also apply to someone who has heart bypass surgery, or gets hit by a car: there is a high level of trauma and the body needs optimal protein nutrition to heal. If you provide the right kinds of amino acids, repair and healing will happen much faster.

My personal recovery time during training is greatly influenced by an adequate, amino acid-based diet. I have a very full schedule with training and my professional life, and many people ask how I’m able to do it—I get up at 5:20 a.m. and go to bed at 11:30 p.m. The answer is simple: I know how the body works and how to provide the nutrition it needs to perform and respond at...