What’s Creatine and Why Bother with It?
There are literally hundreds of supplements on the market. They range from being effective to “meh” to pure snake oil. It can be tough for you to know which ones work and which don’t. Fortunately, you’re about to learn about the one that you probably should be taking because it actually works and works well. So let’s take a good hard look at creatine.
So what is this stuff and why bother with it? To get that answer, you first need to know a bit of biology. Relax, I’ll spare you the lame powerpoint. When your muscles contract, which they need to for you to move, they get the energy to do it from a compound called ATP (adenosine triphosphate.) Think of it as being a main Lego with three smaller Legos attached. The smaller Legos are the phosphates and there are three of them (hence, triphosphate.) The energy for your muscles comes from breaking off one of the phosphates. Just like how the energy to drive your car comes from breaking gasoline molecules apart. The difference is that your body, unlike a car, is a bloody miracle of nature and puts its gasoline back together so it can be used again.
You might be wondering, then, how does your body put it all back together? It’s got three main ways it can do that. One is by using oxygen to break fats to put ATP back together again. As long as you’ve got the fuel, you can keep using this system. This is your aerobic system. The second uses simple sugars to put the ATP back together. It’s much faster, but it usually runs out of fuel after a couple of minutes. It’s the one that makes you “feel the burn.” The last one is for all-out efforts. Think sprinting from a lion, throwing a knockout punch or kick combo, or lifting the heaviest thing you possibly can. Really high intensity, but short duration. This system is the fastest of all, but it runs out of fuel after about 10-20 seconds. And that fuel is creatine-phosphate.
This is where taking creatine comes in. Taking creatine increases your body’s stores of creatine-phosphate, which gives you a bigger gas tank of that fuel. How much bigger? If we’re talking about lifting weights, you’ll be able to squeeze out an extra rep or two. You might be thinking “That’s it? Why bother?” Do bother because if over time you’re doing all those extra reps, you’re getting all those extra results as well. This of it as compound interest in your muscle-building bank account.
Great, so creatine is going to help you get bigger and stronger. But which one do you take and how do you use it? There are about a hundred different kinds. The one that’s been shown to be the most effective consistently is creatine monohydrate. Want some good news? This is also the cheapest one. And since, like how table salt is table salt no matter what brand, it’s all the same bunch of atoms, so it doesn’t matter which you get. As for how much to take, most of the time it’s about five grams (one scoop) per day. Some brands will tell you about a loading period where you take 20g per day for the first week. You can do this if you really want to, but for some people it’ll cause gastric distress. Unless you’re in a serious rush, I don’t see any reason to bother with the loading period.
Lastly, you’ve probably heard that creatine has some nasty side effects. Let’s take a look at the top three and see how much truth there is to them.
Creatine will also not make you turn violet, Violet.
Water retention. This one is actually somewhat true. When you start taking creatine, there’s a good chance you’ll gain up to about five pounds in water weight. Most people only gain a pound or two, though. The good news is that this water is going to be almost entirely in your muscles, so it’s not going to make you look like Violet from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Instead, it’ll make the muscles look slightly fuller, if you even notice an effect at all.
Bad for your kidneys. One of the markers for poor kidney health is an increase in something called creatinine (not to be confused with creatine) in your urine. It’s important to remember, though, that just because a marker went up doesn’t necessarily mean the end is nigh. If you catch a whiff of smoke in the house, it doesn’t necessarily mean the house is burning. It could just be your culinarily inept partner trying to cook dinner. Yes, taking in creatine will probably slightly increase creatinine in your urine. However, that’s only because the creatine itself gets broken down into creatinine and passed. It’s kind of like how excess vitamins get peed out. Your kidneys are, in all likelihood, fine.
GI distress. Some people report having diarrhea or bloating when taking creatine. However, almost all of them are the people who were on the 20g loading period. This is one reason why I don’t see the point in it. When taken at regular doses (five grams per day) creatine doesn’t tend to cause gastric distress.
Of all the supplements out there, this one has been studied the most and has been deemed very safe and effective. It’s cheap, easy to use, and actually does what it says it does. To me, it only makes sense to use it if you’re an athlete or just love working out and being active. That said, if your diet is crap, your training is inconsistent, and you skip out on sleep, all the supplements in the world, even creatine, are a waste of money. Remember, once you’ve got the big basics down, then you can start thinking of supplements.
