What You Don't Know About Workout

Supplements
by TC Luoma | 09/19/13

Tags:
Diet Strategy
Bodybuilding

Here's what you need to know...

1.

For improved body composition, recovery, performance and

muscle growth, when you consume nutrients is just as important as what
nutrients you consume.
2.
The traditional bodybuilder rice-and-tilapia type meal two hours
before a workout results in lowered insulin when you need it most:
workout time.
3.
With the right workout nutrition, insulin will shuttle amino acids and
glucose straight into the muscle cells when your body's the most insulinsensitive.
4.
Workout nutrition prevents the catabolic hormone production that
occurs during intense workout sessions.

Advanced Nutrition
There have been big advances in muscle-building nutrition and
supplementation over the years, but the one thing that supersedes all
others in terms of effectiveness is our knowledge of the importance of
timing.
When you consume certain nutrients is as important as what nutrients
you consume in terms of everything from muscle size, body comp,
recovery, performance, and strength.
T Nation has talked about it for years: To get the greatest gains from
training, you need to consume the precise compounds to fully fuel,
reload, and rebuild muscle. This is best done immediately prior to,
during, and immediately after training peri-workout.
There's an enormous amount of research on workout nutrition, and you
can find articles and books giving a passing nod to the concept. But few
have actually explained what happens when you consume a certain
combination of nutrients before, during, and after training.
If they did, then maybe more people would get it, and there'd be a whole
new era of weight training where people were actually making significant
and steadfast progress.
If you're not using supplementation now, you'll want to by the time you
finish this article assuming your thinking abides by logic.

If You Don't Understand Workout Supplementation

Here's what happens...
In years past, old school lifters would eat a protein and carb-filled meal
about an hour or two before a workout.
They'd kick back and digest while their bodies would go to work breaking
down food so it could be absorbed by the villi of their intestine. That's
where the nutrients would then move into capillary tributaries that serve
the blood vessels.
Then the recently digested nutrients would piggyback onto the hormone
insulin, which rises every time food is eaten. Together, they'd ride the

currents until they reached other capillaries that led directly to muscle
cells.
The insulin would then present the various amino acids and glucose
molecules to the muscle cells. The lifter, now fortified with nutrition,
would head to the gym and begin his workout.

During the Workout

Unfortunately, insulin levels, elevated after the pre-workout meal an hour
or two ago, have by this time likely fallen to baseline levels. As a result,
the glycogen and glucose that muscles rely on quickly starts to drop
during the first few sets.
The hormone glucagon then begins to raise its opportunistic head. The
hormone is an insulin antagonist, meaning it works against insulin, in a
sense. It starts to rob muscles of amino acids so it can convert them to
the glucose that the muscles need for fuel.
Simultaneously, levels of other catabolic hormones, like epinephrine and
cortisol, begin to rise.
Epinephrine, in its search for glucose, has started to rob the liver of
glycogen. Cortisol starts thieving energy. But cortisol doesn't
discriminate. It takes energy from wherever it can: fat, carbs, or from the
building blocks of muscle itself, protein.
The harder the workout, the greater this breakdown of protein for fuel.
Add that loss of protein to the damage incurred by the workout in the
form of torn muscle and rampant free radicals.

While anabolic hormones like testosterone, growth hormone, and IGF-1

make their appearance during a workout, any increases are relatively
small and transient. They often drop below baseline levels after a
workout. True, they'll do some repair work in the hours in-between, but
the workout period itself is primetime when it comes to muscle growth.
It's too bad insulin, often regarded as the most anabolic hormone, is now
in short supply in our hypothetical scenario. Insulin is exactly what would
offset the collective efforts of all the workout-induced catabolic
hormones.
But unfortunately, insulin levels were already at baseline or below
baseline by the time our lifter arrived at the gym. Even if insulin levels
were still high by the time he began training, they wouldn't have much to
transport since he swallowed his last bit of protein an hour or
twobefore his workout began!
Muscle cells are the most sensitive to insulin during and after a workout.
As a result, very few, if any, nutrients would be stored as fat during the
workout period. But this sensitivity starts to fall as the post-workout
minutes pass.

Post-Workout
By the time our lifter drags his energy-depleted butt home an hour later
and blends up a protein shake, his muscle cells are almost deaf, dumb,
and blind to any rise in insulin from the shake he's ingesting. As a result,
insulin can carry amino acids and glycogen to the muscle cells' doors,
but they won't hear and they won't answer.
Homeless, many of the glucose molecules get stored as glycogen or fat.
And while it's doubtful any protein would be stored as fat, much of it
would end up in the liver, which is kind of a purgatory for unused amino
acids.

Metabolically, the lifter's body has gone to hell but it hasn't come back.
Glycogen levels remain depressed, catabolic hormones remain elevated,
and the rate of protein breakdown exceeds the rate of protein synthesis.
So the net effect of this supposedly conscientious workout is probably
little or no anabolic stimulus or resultant muscle growth, and possibly
even some storage of fat in the post-workout meal.
Muscle strength might still increase, though, as strength is often largely a
response to neurological stimuli. But if hypertrophy and a better body
composition are the goals, the lifter is pretty much out of luck.
Let's contrast the above with what would happen if the lifter knew
something about modern day, science-backed workout supplementation.

If You Do Understand Workout Supplementation

Here's what happens...
The lifter consumes nutrients about 45 minutes to an hour before a
workout but it's comprised of about 40 to 50 grams of easily digested
functional carbohydrates and about 35 to 40 grams of unique di- and
tripeptides that are absorbed directly into the bloodstream to set up his
metabolic machinery. For example, he eats a Finibar Competition
Bar and drinks a Mag-10.
Insulin levels surge and amino acids and glucose are carried to muscle
cells to prime the pump.
Fifteen minutes before the workout, the lifter ingests another 35 to 40
grams of a special functional carbohydrate blend and another 15 to 20
grams of quick-acting protein. For example, Plazma.
Again, this is to make sure that the body's most anabolic hormone,
insulin, is flowing at peak capacities and that there are plenty of glucose
molecules and amino acids for insulin to carry to hard-working muscle
cells.
If the lifter wants to further enhance the anabolic effects of insulin, he'd
also ingest cyanin 3-glucoside (Indigo-3G) at this time. Indigo-3G
increases insulin sensitivity in muscle cells (not fat cells), thus enhancing
glucose and protein transport, so all the good stuff you get with insulin is
amplified and translates to bigger pumps, faster strength gains, and
enhanced work capacity and recovery.

During the Workout

During the workout the lifter continues to sip Plazma. By now, even
during what would normally be the most metabolically devastating part of
the workout, his insulin levels are high, as is his insulin sensitivity.

His blood flow has increased, his pump is mind blowing, and insulin
molecules are loaded down with amino acids and glucose like Santa's
sleigh, and they're greedily being accepted by muscle cells.
With all that insulin surging through the body, cortisol levels remain low,
and the glycogen or amino acid-robbing effects of it don't amount to
anything. Likewise, free radical production is kept to a manageable
minimum.
Protein breakdown is extremely low. The carbs, still being regularly
ingested, are fueling the ATP/creatine phosphate system, ensuring
higher reps and more intense muscle contractions. Fat is also being
oxidized at a much higher rate than would otherwise be possible, and
this fat oxidation continues even after the workout.

Post-Workout
The still-pumped lifter drives home -- even though he feels he probably
could have kept on lifting until they shut the lights out and locked the
doors -- and fixes himself another small protein drink. A serving or
pulse of Mag-10 fits perfectly here.
Muscle cells are extremely sensitive to still-high insulin levels and the
just-introduced di- and tripeptides are quickly shuttled off to still greedy
muscle cells. Cortisol levels, normally elevated after a workout, have
been beaten down and shamed.
The net result of this approach: A lifter who gave his (or her) muscles
every advantage.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

The anabolic environment he created is perfect for muscle growth

and recovery.
Protein synthesis is at a sustained high.
Catabolic hormones are low.
Fat oxidation ensues. It's furnace-like.
Free radicals are minimized.
ATP and creatine levels have been fully reestablished.
If you were to actually weigh his muscles, they'd be much heavier,
percentage wise, than they would be if you followed the traditional
approach.
This lifter has done everything to stack the muscle-building cards in his
favor and he'll be rewarded with significant additional muscle growth and
improved body composition. Furthermore, he probably won't be sore or
fatigued the next day so that he can train just as hard again.
That's quite a difference from the traditional approach the first
hypothetical lifter used.

There are few things as indisputable in the strength game as proper

workout supplementation. It's perfect logic and beyond that, it's perfect
science.
What you do the rest of the day is up to you, but give your workout
supplementation the attention it deserves and you will absolutely make
the progress that's eluded you in the past.