Creatine Monohydrate is a natural compound which is found in your body. It provides you with energy to perform the extreme exercise. This includes all kinds of exercise including running and weight training. Additionally, it is found in the majority of meats and fish, however, in fairly small quantities. Creatine is essential as it plays a pivotal part in generating energy for your body.
Adenosine TriPhosphate (ATP) which is the energy source used by your body is particularly needed when performing intense exercise. Generally, your body has sufficient creatine to produce about 10 seconds of energy worth. This is why you cannot train at maximum intensity for a very long time. Supplementing it extends this time, which in turn improves your performance. Creatine is also the most pursued sports supplement not only in Australia but in the entire world. It accounts for around 10% of the entire supplement market sales.
How Does Creatine Monohydrate Work?
Creatine possesses many reported and also proven benefits. For bodybuilders, it increases strength allowing for heavier lifts which leads to larger muscles. During the first 5 to 10 days of creatine supplementation, creatine will draw water into muscle tissue. This can lead to very quick gains in muscle size. This can also cause an increase of up to 3kg of weight. The effect reverses after creatine supplementation has been stopped. However, by this point, new muscle tissue should have also grown which will stay.
Therefore, there are advantages and disadvantages to using this supplement. For that reason, it is important to understand the full story before committing to using any kind of supplement.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Creatine Monohydrate
Advantages
- Helps to boost performance in weight lifting and all kinds of heavy physical training.
- Creatine is a natural supplement which is found in the body and in different foods.
- Can boost energy, improve performance, and hasten recovery times from intense workouts.
- Creatine has also been shown to promote lean muscle mass.
- It speeds up the body’s process of fat burning.
- It does not have any caloric value
- No adverse side effects
Disadvantages
- For some people, other forms of creatine are more effective than the original creatine monohydrate
- The most effective way to use creatine is a process called “loading,” which some people find inconvenient.
- While there are no adverse side effects by itself, combining creatine with other supplements can be a bad idea.
- It’s not a good idea to pre-mix well ahead of time.
The advantages of using creatine monohydrate to help gain energy help muscle growth, and burn fat definitely outweigh any negatives. There are no harmful physical side effects. However, this is as long as the creatine is not mixed with other less safe supplements.
The Ingredients
Creatine alone does not have any other ingredients. Nonetheless, you can purchase “designer creatine” in which it is combined with other substances. When purchasing creatine you may find it labelled as “creatine monohydrate”, “creatine” or “micronised creatine monohydrate”. All of these are the same product if you buy from a reputable brand. You may also see it branded as “Creapure” and as the name suggests this is an exceptionally pure type. It is very vigorously tested and can be trusted to be of the highest quality.
Directions for Use
This supplement can be used either consistently or cycled. Actually, a few people prefer to take creatine for about 6 weeks. Later, they take a 1 to 2-week break in the notion that the body ‘gets used’ to the creatine. It can be shocked into more growth by doing this. Other people simply choose a dosage of creatine, typically 5 to 10g daily, and use it continuously.
Which is The Best Method?
There is slight evidence to which approach is more effective, although you can conserve some money through cycling creatine. In addition to these methods, some individuals employ a “loading” phase having higher dosages. They do this either at the beginning of their cycle or when they begin using it. This is done especially so as to saturate their muscles. But, this leads to muscles becoming fuller faster than it is necessary. If you need pretty fast results, then loading with about 20 to 30g for approximately one week can be sufficient.
In conclusion, while creatine appears to have a bad reputation, this reputation is undeserved. Usually, it comes mostly due to the stories that sensationalised what happened when creatine was added with non-natural and somewhat potentially hazardous supplements such as Ephedera. By itself, creatine is a quality and safe supplement that can give a tremendous boost to any workout regimen.
