Creatine

[Mighty Thor]

I'm starting to workout hard again since my wife has been out of the hospital for 4 months now. She's couching me again in my training and she trains along with me too. It's been great.

Went to Walmart and bought some vitamins, protein bars, and creatine for 14 bucks. Can't beat that. Haven't taken Creatine for almost 10 years, because the last time I took them my kidneys hurt, but I think the Creatine supplements today have gotten better and I don't anything at all. Just a good workout with a lot of energy.

[CaseyW]

Re: Creatine

Creatine basically takes your body water and surrounds the muscles your working to get more out of your work out. You really don't need it unless your wanting to get bigger and stronger. If your looking to tone up it probably isnt the best. But it is a lot safer now if you don't overdue it and keep hydrated.

[Mighty Thor]

Re: Creatine

Creatine basically takes your body water and surrounds the muscles your working to get more out of your work out. You really don't need it unless your wanting to get bigger and stronger. If your looking to tone up it probably isnt the best. But it is a lot safer now if you don't overdue it and keep hydrated.

Bigger and stronger is what I want.

[1997Canadian3.8]

Re: Creatine

I'm starting to workout hard again since my wife has been out of the hospital for 4 months now. She's couching me again in my training and she trains along with me too. It's been great.

Went to Walmart and bought some vitamins, protein bars, and creatine for 14 bucks. Can't beat that. Haven't taken Creatine for almost 10 years, because the last time I took them my kidneys hurt, but I think the Creatine supplements today have gotten better and I don't anything at all. Just a good workout with a lot of energy.

I would personally never buy any supplements from Walmart..... I buy everything from either GNC or EDGE nutrition.

Depending on your needs, Creatine is usually pretty useless. Its complicated but essentially it adds water molecules to your muscle molecules, so its not actual size.....

Just be cautious of what you're taking!

[unvmyrs]

Re: Creatine

Just be sure you work out as much as you can cuz if you don't creatine will give you man boobs.

[1997Canadian3.8]

Re: Creatine

Just be sure you work out as much as you can cuz if you don't creatine will give you man boobs.

I'm sorry but that's the worst advice I've ever heard haha

Over working out can be just as bad as undertraining...

[CaseyW]

Re: Creatine

Creatine with a good protien will definatly do it. Just can't overdue it or you will end up putting on weight you don't want.

[skimphish]

Re: Creatine

Im an exercise science guy, and creatine really isnt all that great. It will make you look bigger because it attracts more water to your muscles, but once you stop taking it you can kiss all that "build" goodbye.

Honestly to me most protein supplements are useless. The only time I see a need for them is if you cannot take in enough protein through a regular diet. Peanut butter is a great source of protein. It does have carbs in it, but its a good ratio of carbs to protein. I always eat about 4-6 servings of peanut butter after a workout and have a glass of chocolate milk. Thats 40+ grams of protein right there. Then having a healthy lunch and dinner will easily put you at your required protein intake. You know what happens to too much protein? It gets pissed out.

Figure out your require protein intake and just have a healthy diet. Eat "good carbs," avoid "bad carbs," and eat lots of fish. Salmon is one of the highest protein yielding foods per ounce, and its quite tasty. :D

Just my 2 cents. Ive taken a lot of sports nutrition classes and have read quite a few studies on this stuff, and all in all I find protein supplements to be jokes. A well balanced diet will yield better results.

[stevethepirate]

Re: Creatine

I started taking creatine but stopped fairly quickly, I was just feeling fairly bloated and gross taking it (could have just been in my mind).

I stuck with Animal Pak vitamins and protein (both supplement and basic dietary), figure thats a decent balance.

[Shodown]

Re: Creatine

Just be sure you work out as much as you can cuz if you don't creatine will give you man boobs.

Its not a steroid

[Docta]

Re: Creatine

Creatine destroys your liver and kidneys... If you take too much. My brother's body is really messed up from it. His college baseball coach put him on meal supplements and creatine, 4x a day workouts, and now he has to take a bunch of meds to fix his body. I'd be wary.

[Mighty Thor]

Re: Creatine

Just be sure you work out as much as you can cuz if you don't creatine will give you man boobs.

Steriods is the one that gives you man boobs because of the hampering of your own natural testosterone. In the gym we call that "B*tch's T*ts."

Creatine is only effective for high intensity trainers. There's a lot of science to back this up. If you are doing light to moderate weight training it's not going to work that effectively, but if you are doing high intensity where the set is taken to momentary muscular failure it works.

This is do to the breakdown of myotin in your muscles and creatine adds to that repair during recuperation. There was a research done on 2 types of runners: Marathon and Sprinters. Creatine did nothing for marathon runners, but for Sprinters they've experience a 5-7% improvement. The same thing goes for 3 types of trainers: those who train to lean down by HVT (high volume training), those who do medium (MVT) and those who do HIT (high intensity trainers) Creatine works great for HIT trainers.

I stopped using them because I was taking the pure form of creatine and mixing it with cranberry juice. This was when Creatine was still new in the market. What made my kidneys hurt was the loading phase, where I am taking 4-5x's the recommended dose for 2 weeks. I did gain strength and mass and when I stopped taking it my strength and mass didn't go down at all. I have everything written down on my journal and this is one of the things I noted.

The clients I've trained thru HIT experienced the same thing. They didn't retain water sub****enously, but the water went to their muscles. Increasing tissue volume which enchanced their training capacity.

[ssms5411]

Re: Creatine

I use to take creatine , but found out after about 2 months it starts to wear off since the body adjusts to it. The body creates its own creatine so after awhile it will adapt, so I found out use it for 2 months then stop and then after 2-3 months use it again, worked pretty well, this was back when I was 23-24. When I was 30 in the PD academy I use something like creatine (don't remember the name) and found it work well. I did go from 250lbs to alittle over 315lbS on the bench and 240+ on military,curls 210 and dumb bells 65lbs, all free weights and gained 3 sec. on my 1.5 mile run on the final PT test. Also gained 40 LBS in weight. It payedd off though on the red man suit guy coming ater me I threw him around when trying to get him to comply. LOL

[unvmyrs]

Re: Creatine

Naw, I know its not steroids. I didn't literally mean you'd develop C cups, I just meant moreorless that its easy to put on a lot of weight as some others said if you don't have a good creatine:workout ratio. I stopped taking that stuff. The only stuff I use is Cellmass Recovery and the animal packs. The recovery stuff is weird though cuz it makes me feel high after I take it lol.

[stevethepirate]

Re: Creatine

Thor, I'm pretty sure the loading phase doesn't have to be that intense. Everything I have seen says that it is more like 10 days of the higher end of the recommended dose. Thats with the standard Creatine Monohydrate.