Weight/Workout Supplements
 

Do you guys first of all workout? Do you use any supplements to help your workout? Have you seen any results of these additional items?

Ya, I work out...I would recommend a dietician and analysis of your food intake. Get recommendations on the proper supplementation from there. If you don't you will have to research and experiment, trial and error, until you figure yourself out.

What is important is regular exercise and a healthy diet...Your body will respond slowly, but before you know it you will be in great shape if you discipline yourself.

Screw the fad diets...High protein, moderate carbs, eat your veggies and drink a lot of water.

Good Whey protein, and a heavily biased protein diet with fat and carb control, and a decent multivitamin, and a well designed workout regimen with a training partner and actually pushing yourself. Lots of Protein and rest too.

a lot of the "performance enhancement" stuff is a hoax. Expensive and doesn't do anything - what does is hard work, and pushing yourself.. Whey should be taken IN ADDITION to a high protein diet. Stick with the basics and most of all, keep at it!

Any increase in activity will net something positive, just start out and get tips at the gym...

If you're talking about lifting, Andro works. I tried Biotest Mag 10 - the liquid kind, not the new pills. It was amazing. Got pretty big fast! Everyone was asking what I was on. Trouble is, when you go off the stuff, you go right back to where you were originally. It was a nice three or four months though.

I think the FDA banned it, so there isn't much left out there. All of the protien powders, "just as good as steroids" products, creatine, aminos etc. are not really worth it. You have to eat a lot, sleep a lot and pile on the plates to get big w/o steroids. I like the free weights rather than the machines.

I use an injectable cocktail based on a recommendation from Marion Jones.

I hate the gym. Hate it. Nonetheless, a couple of years ago I came close to quitting the business world and trying to get on a professional crew for a big boat. So I hit the gym to bulk up a bit; but if I was going to the gym, I was going to maximize the result.

A buddy had been a competitive body builder for 15 years and put together a regimen for me that didn't involve some arcane diet. He recommended creatine w/ ribose (I used EAS' Riboforce HP). I went up a plate a week in everything for 10 weeks (one creatine cycle). It was incredible. Everyone's body is different, so YMMV, but it worked wonders for me. I didn't get huge, but I got strong.

JP

What about the bourbon, smokes and boost diet?

An occasional Bloody Mary for the vegetables is always good.

My brother is a nut. 6'4" 275 solid. Benches like 400 something, dead lifts the equivilent of french cars, etc... I don't get it really but hey. He is a suppliment freak. I forget what he's doing now, but it's all legal and apparently works, I could ask. FWIW he lives at the gym and that's just something my bartender strictly forbades. I also work with him every day and the noxious fumes these suppliments cause his body to emit curl paper and make me see things:) Like I said, I just don't get it.

It's not the ridiculous muscular hypertrophy that makes me laugh. It's the fact that he shaves his armpits and plucks his chest hair. He probably has a Brazilian nutwax. I'm guessing he has "issues."

Brian --
Yes, every day, even those that were "rest days" b/c much of the efficacy of creatine is in helping you rebuild the muscle you tear while you're working out. So it actually helps you more while you're resting than while you're working out (tho' I found I had more energy and could work out longer).

I work for a very large vitamin/nutritional supplement company and I've discussed creatine w/ our marketing and our nutrition depts. Evidently, it's efficacy is due to the fact that your muscle mass retains more water, so can transport fluids/oxygen in and toxins out better. I don't profess to know exactly how/why it works, but it works.

As far as the first week -- no. B/c I didn't add it to an extant gym regimen. I'd just started working out and was taking it "easy" so as not to overexert myself, so the first week or so I was easing into really strenuous workouts. But after the 2nd/3rd week there was a dramatic improvement every week.

Be very careful about anything aerobic while you're in a creatine cycle. If you're "on" creatine and doing anything aerobic or outside/prolonged (cycling, running, even sailing in the sun for long periods) drink as much water as your body will take. It's very easy to dehydrate during a creatine cycle ... it may have something to do w/ what I mentioned earlier about your muscles being supersaturated and not enough water left over for, say, suspending red corpuscles in your blood stream.

If you're getting into a "race" (which sounds aerobic) stop the creatine a week before the race.

I don't know what the dosage was, but on Monday, when I'm back in the office, I'll check the pkgs for you. Or you can google Riboforce HP and see what the dosages are.

Side effects? Well, I've got a pretty stone cold constitution and didn't suffer any serious/chronic side effects. However, many people have some GI discomfort (usually diarrhea) for the first few days of a creatine cycle.

Obviously you have an appreciation for the fact that no substance will make you Mr. Universe by virtue of your sitting on your ass watching TV. Creatine has (for me, anyway) a profound multiplier effect on the results of my exercise efforts. Try it, but as I said earlier, YMMV.

Good luck!

JP