Creatine? supps?

[arms]

What is the best way to take creatine? I know you have to load on it, just after anyone else's advice and expericences. Also i have noticed a number of people saying that you dont need supplements.Surely something like tribulis and zma does help raise you're test,or am i wasting my money.

[Growth]

Creatine yes, zma, quite good, tribulus, not so sure.

If i buy creatine its usually just creatine mono, i never go for kre-alkylen?? or ones like that, i have purchased zma and trib before, i think if your zinc / mag deficient then get one.

[waldo]

Tribulus will increase the amount of leutinizing hormone produced by your pituitary gland, which in turn asks your testes to produce more testosterone. ZMA supplements will help support testosterone.

The supplement thing is a toughie. Some work for some, and not for others. A lot of BBs will just ingest the protein like it's going out of fashion, and consider the rest out there a waste of money. Some products are. A lot of people I've spoken to swear by Biotest Tribex (tribulus and Avena Sativa), but say other Tribulus products have done nothing for them.

As for creatine, it supplements the primay energy pathway, the Phosphocreatine Energy system. When you load on it, and continue to take it over a period of time, it will help give you more explosive power. It will also provide a volumising effect, in that it will encourage water into your muscles, thereby increasing the pump you get when lifting, and give you a more 'full' appearance. It can help with recovery as well.

[Tammy]

My opinion is that if you don't eat much red meat then you will see more effect from taking creatine, this is especially true in vegetarian or semi vege athletes. I've taken it and I'm not convinced on its effects in women, due to all the things that happen over the course of a month to our bodies, but I know other females who have seen great gains from using creatine. The only thing I got from creatine was feeling extremely bloated. Couldn't live without my ZMA I sure notice a slump in energy levels if I forget to take it or run out for a couple of days. But then a lot of it is in ones head and how much you think it is going to work (pacebo effect) everyone is different

[deegee]

I have got results from creatine before but unfortunatly not as great as some. ZMA I have found to do nothing, as I take a multi vit, I probably do not get deficient in zinc etc.

I believe tribulus boosts my test levels if they are low as I feel better when taking it, I have also found after taking PH's that whilst taking trib amongst other things my blood levels have returned to normal how much this can be attributed to trib I dont know. As for boosting tet beyond my normal range I dont think it does this.

[muffinman]

i use kre-alkalyn now being you dont need to load up on it like ordinary creatine, and with creatine mono you have to have breaks from it, eg 6 weeks using then 4 weeks off, other wise it can cause some harm to kidneys, how true and to what effect i dont know.

[bulking]

No need to cycle creatine and it will NOT harm your kidneys.

CEE is a better option than mono

[muffinman]

actually you do need to cylce creatine and it can cause harm if it builds up, but hey go for it !

have done a week of kre-alkalyn and the results have been very good, increase in reps to start with and now strength starting to increase, energy very high as well.

[jono]

i just use regular old monohydrate. you dont need to cycle it. muffinman, if you have any studies to back up what your saying.. post them.

[Growth]

actually you do need to cylce creatine and it can cause harm if it builds up

How does it build up? Ive never herd of this before, id be interested to learn more about it though. I always thought your body couldnt store it, that is why you had to take it everyday.

[muffinman]

you dont need to look far to find out the effects of creatine, good and bad, just do a search on the web, every athlete ive spoken to has said to cylce it, some guys say you dont need to, from personal experience and from talking to guys who train full time from cyclists to bb have said to cylce it. like any supplement you cant just shovel it down,

i have always cycled it but now use kre-alkalyn, and it is in our body naturally, our liver produces it and it is in some foods.

a useful site is bodybuildingforyou.com have a read about creatine monohydrate, its a good site with alot of good info on heaps of products,

it pays to research before you use any supplement.

[Mossley]

Just wanted to post a helpful website that suggests cycling creatine will give you maximum benefits.

http://www.bodybuildingforyou.com/creat ... ne-use.htm

This website suggests that if you don't cycle creatine your body will get used to it and your gains will suffer. As we already naturally produce a small amount anyway I can see how this would be true. It's like anything, eventually your body will stop responding, so I guess you don't have to cycle creatine, but if you are paying for a supplement you might as well use it to it's full potential.

Also - after a week and a half of taking Kre-Alkalyn as a trial I noticed it's benefits for the first time last night. I was struggling to explain the feeling it gave me, but the above website summed it up.

"When you exercise intensely, you'll notice the 'screeching pain' (due to lactic acid build up) won't bother you nearly as much!"

I did find that I just had this explosive energy that came from nowhere. Unfortunately I'm still doing lighter weights to give the shoulder a bit of time, but I was pushing out more reps on that same weight than last week, and I felt like my weights session could go on for a lot longer than usual. The burn from the lactic acid was minimised so much that I didn't give up when it burnt too much, but only after my muscles just physically couldn't lift anymore.

I'd recommend it so far anyway. Just takes a bit of getting used to the extra water retention, but I'll put up with that if I can train like that every night!

The real test will be tonight when I do Shoulders. These always burn the most for me.......

[Growth]

Interesting read. Like i said before i never belived in cycling it. The man at the nutrition shop, who is a bber reckons you should. 8 weeks on and a couple off then back on. Alot of people seem to recommend cycling it so i guess it must have its merits. I find creatine doesnt really make a hell of alot of difference for me.. perhaps i get enough from meat

[muffinman]

your body probably has become used to it, try 6 weeks on 4 weeks off to give yourself a good rest from it ,it will be a shock for your muscles on the 4 weeks off and when you go back on should feel the difference in the end of the 1st week. there will be no where near enough in food to give you the buzz and extra strength as if on creatine.

i find i feel slightly buzzed up in a kinda energetic way, the results have been unbelievably awesome compared to being off it.

its hard to explain, its a bit of a spaced out feeling but in the sense like you could run for 10 miles and still want more, and off course the extra weight you can lift is more than enough motivation to challenge yourself to go heavier the next week.

[Ash]

I've had good results in the past on Creatine Mono but have had even better results on the NFS Kre-Alkalyn. I like the fact that I can use a much lower amount of Kre-Alkalyn and still get good results. I also don't bother to load on the Kre-Alkalyn.

Personally I prefer to cycle my creatine and try go for 6 weeks on/3 weeks off. I am a vegetarian, so maybe that explains why it's worked so well for me? I would like to try CEE, maybe once my current bottle of Kre-Alkalyn is finished.

As for Tribulus, I've had a similar experience to the one Waldo mentioned, brilliant results on Biotest's Tribex but average to zero results on other brands.

[jono]

by eating a lot of read meat you can get a lot of creatine.. creatine is not some magic super supplement.. rely less on stuff like creatine .. more on food and you will get better results

[Ash]

rely less on stuff like creatine .. more on food and you will get better results

I agree 100%! I think that unless your diet is really good, you're pretty much wasting your money on supplements in general. Every time my diet is sorted, I make progress. When I don't eat enough, or have long gaps during the day where I don't eat - then I just don't get anywhere at gym - regardless of how much creatine, tribulus, L-glutamine etc. I take.

If you're eating like a bodybuilder all the time, then the supplements may make a difference.

[Growth]

I think that unless your diet is really good, you're pretty much wasting your money on supplements in general.

thats why theyre called supplements funnily enough, they are really only to supplement what you are lacking from your diet. If diet is spot on you shouldnt need many if any supplements.

[Ash]

thats why theyre called supplements funnily enough, they are really only to supplement what you are lacking from your diet. If diet is spot on you shouldnt need many if any supplements.

Excellent point. I wonder how many bodybuilders realize that? Looking at some of the BB forums out there, the focus is often more on supplements than on nutrition or training. Lots of people are looking for the "magic bullet" I suppose.

I know I've been guilty of relying on supplements instead of just eating properly and a few of my friends have done the same. These days I focus on my diet first and at least I know that anything else I am taking has a reasonable chance of being effective.

[Pseudonym]

Ash - I don't want to hijack this thread, but I'm interested in how you find bodybuilding as a vegetarian? I think most bodybuilders couldn't comprehend life without meat, so I'd love to hear how you do it. Start a new topic, and tell us, would you?

BTW, I think a vege's diet would certainly benefit from creatine supplements, so it doesn't surprise me at all that you see a big difference.

Growth - I find the only times I really notice creatine's effects are when I've been off it for a while. Longer than just 4 weeks, I'm talking 3-4 months or more. My guess is this is an indication that your body DOES adjust to creatine supplementation. Perhaps try it after a longer rest-period?

[muffinman]

the only magic supplement is steroids, i find it strange that someone would not get very good results on creatine, unless they are not using it properly, i can almost gaurantee no one would eat the amount of red meat that i do, i always have high energy at the gym but creatine takes it way beyond the next level.

[Growth]

Growth - I find the only times I really notice creatine's effects are when I've been off it for a while. Longer than just 4 weeks, I'm talking 3-4 months or more. My guess is this is an indication that your body DOES adjust to creatine supplementation. Perhaps try it after a longer rest-period?

Hmmm. Well i always seem to see on the label that one of the benifits on regular creatine intake is that creatine stores will get larger, ie youll be able to hold more creatine, perhaps after a couple of months on it your creatine stores have increased somewhat and you may need to up the intake from say 5g to 10g a day....just a thought.

It would be good if someone could find it in a medical journal that you need to cycle creatine, it love to see the data.

[Growth]

the only magic supplement is steroids, i find it strange that someone would not get very good results on creatine, unless they are not using it properly, i can almost gaurantee no one would eat the amount of red meat that i do, i always have high energy at the gym but creatine takes it way beyond the next level.

From what ive read you dont have to eat a hell of alot of meat to get 5g of creatine. I did a bit of searching and found most sites said that to get 5g of creatine you would have to consume only 2.5lbs of steak, roughly 1kg. Its not hard to eat a couple of 500g steaks a day. I did find alot of the nutritional sites were blowing the amount of steak you needed to get 5g way over what non-biased sites were saying, some were saying 10-20 steaks a day.

Im not saying creatine doesnt "take you way beyond the next level" but perhaps a small part is psycological. Ive seen studies where people were given a supplement, and some were give a placebo, and the people taking the placebo performed better than the people on the supplement.

If you are eating massive amounts of red meat then in reality your creatine stores would be full and you would just be pissing out the supplemented creatine.

[Mossley]

Growth - just found a web page posted by a guy called Ray Sahelian, he had an MD and this shows his studies on the effects of Creatine, both good and bad

http://www.raysahelian.com/creatine.html

[Ash]

From what ive read you dont have to eat a hell of alot of meat to get 5g of creatine. I did a bit of searching and found most sites said that to get 5g of creatine you would have to consume only 2.5lbs of steak, roughly 1kg. Its not hard to eat a couple of 500g steaks a day.

People eat a kilo of steak a day? It's been years since I knew what a kilo of steak cost but that sounds expensive not to mention a 500gram steak is quite a chunk of meat. I think I'll stick to my bottle of while powder thanks :grin: