Balance IntrAmino

[eLm0]

Hey check out Balance's new IntrAmino intra-workout drink. It's a pretty solid formula that comes in grape and watermelon flavour.

The formula is pretty straightforward: 8g of BCAAs (2:1:1 ratio), 3.7g of Glutamine, added B vitamins.

I've been smashing it back during my workouts, I reckon it's good stuff - But I work for Balance, so you be the judge.

Let me know what you guys think...

 

[Skeletor]

Do they have samples? 

[jimmybro1]

Does it have artificial flavouring , dyes and  sweetners ? 

 

Trying to avoid these things 

[Terrymundo]

2:1:1 isn't amazing. 

[eLm0]

15 hours ago, Skeletor said:

Do they have samples? 

 

Sorry bro, not at the moment, only in tubs for now

 

12 hours ago, jimmybro1 said:

Does it have artificial flavouring , dyes and  sweetners ? 

 

Trying to avoid these things 

 

Natural Grape and Watermelon flavours (not artificial). No artificial colours (dyes). But there is Sucralose which is an artificial sweetener but generally better tolerated than some other similar sweeteners

 

12 hours ago, Terrymundo said:

2:1:1 isn't amazing. 

 

Why do you say that? Almost all of the clinical trials on BCAAs which resulted in tangible gains were based on this ratio. In fact, they've even evaluated Leucine directly (= infinity:1:1 ratio) against 2:1:1 BCAAs and the 2:1:1 came out superior. Check out this study: http://www.jissn.com/content/5/S1/P21

[Pseudonym]

Why is the ratio important? Usually supplementation is all about making sure you have a sufficient quantity of something, so your body's not trying to function on a deficit. How does the ratio fit in?

 

Also, is the perfect ratio actually relevant in real life, when you're also eating BCAAs from a multitude of other sources - which presumably are not themselves in perfect ratio?

[eLm0]

On 1/29/2016 at 2:27 PM, Pseudonym said:

Why is the ratio important? Usually supplementation is all about making sure you have a sufficient quantity of something, so your body's not trying to function on a deficit. How does the ratio fit in?

 

Also, is the perfect ratio actually relevant in real life, when you're also eating BCAAs from a multitude of other sources - which presumably are not themselves in perfect ratio?

 

The ratio is important simply because there are 3 amino acids that make up the BCAAs and have to exist in some form of ratio to each other. 2:1:1 was established some time ago as a beneficial ratio because this is the natural ratio in muscle protein.

However, a lot of studies on Leucine have shown that this particular amino acid is able to induce muscle protein synthesis... Based on this, higher ratio lecuine formulas such as 4:1:1, 8:1:1 etc. have been made in an attempt to promote this MPS.

The intention of such formulations are good but there are a number of flaws - 10 g of 8:1:1 will give you 8g Leucine, 1g each of Valine and Isoleucine, whereas 10g of a 2:1:1 formula will give you 5g of Leucine and 2.5g each of Valine and Isoleucine. - so this would assume that Leucine alone is superior to BCAAs when the study I shard in the post above shows this is not the case.

Leucine is good but not the sole ingredient responsible for gains - Isoleucine and Valine do have benefits:

- Isoleucine has been shown to have an independent fat burning mechanism

- Valine competitively competes with tryptophan for uptake into the brain. During exercise tryptophan gets taken up into the brain and converted to serotonin (which gets converted to melatonin) - and this makes you sleepy. Valine can help to counteract this by competing with tryptophan and slowing its uptake rate and in theory make you less tired during exercise.

 

 

[Pseudonym]

3 hours ago, eLm0 said:

2:1:1 was established some time ago as a beneficial ratio because this is the natural ratio in muscle protein.

And so is the same ratio found in the meat we eat too?

 

I guess what I'm asking is, presumably the ratio in the rest of our diet fluctuates, depending on what we eat. So does the "perfect" ratio in a supplement matter if you're deficient in one element?

[eLm0]

16 hours ago, Pseudonym said:

And so is the same ratio found in the meat we eat too?

 

I guess what I'm asking is, presumably the ratio in the rest of our diet fluctuates, depending on what we eat. So does the "perfect" ratio in a supplement matter if you're deficient in one element?

 

There is no 'perfect ratio' as it would be impractical to control this in normal life. It's just that these ratios in BCAA supplements were studied and shown to have x effect, so we know that we can achieve x effect from supplementing with this ratio. It would be hard to be deficient in any particular amino acid as long as you get enough protein.

 

There is no study (that I know of) which compares intra-workout chicken wings to BCAAs so we can't explicitly say what is best, but you can see below that salmon has a near 2:1:1 ratio whereas buffalo is 1.5:1:1.

Note: Roo = kangaroo 

 

[Pseudonym]

Next time I see someone eating chicken wings during his workout, I shall call him a noob, and suggest he try intra-workout salmon instead. 

 

That's interesting. Cheers Elm0.