It is one thing to see studies, done only on animals, but it’s a completely different story
when studies are performed on humans, better yet – on athletes…
I am going to introduce you to a study, recently conducted in the College of New Jersey (Hoffman J, Ratamess N, Kang J, Mangine G, Faigenbaum A, Stout J.).
These researchers used for their experiment 33 football players for a period of 10 days. The purpose of this experiment was to establish if there is any difference in the athlete’s
performance when supplementing with Creatine only or with Creatine + Beta-Alanine.
Side note: Beta-Alanine is the only beta- amino acid in nature (the rest of them are alpha-).
Its functions in the body are to act on a cellular level to increase the levels of Carnosine -
a compound, directly involved in the ATP and Nitric Oxide production.
More on that in another issue. Back to what I was saying…
So, the researchers split the athletes in three smaller groups. The first group they gave a
placebo (ineffective substance), the second supplemented with Creatine only, and the third
with a Creatine and Beta-Alanine combination.
They wanted to see what the changes would be on these several parameters: power, strength, changes in body composition and changes in the endocrine system production (the hormones, being released in the body).
After the 10-week study the scientists compiled the data and concluded:
- Strength increased significantly in the Creatine and Creatine + Beta-Alanine groups.
- Resting testosterone concentrations were elevated in the Creatine group.
But..
- The Creatine + Beta-Alanine group was the one that showed the greatest shift in lean body mass and percentage body fat, or change in the body composition.
What does all this mean?
While Creatine supplementation is great for strength increase, and we all know that already, Creatine and Beta-Alanine might be even better as this combination has proven to be effective even for lean body mass increase AND for fat loss.
Keep in mind I’m just sharing with you what the researchers in this university
discovered WHILE EXPERIMENTING WITH ATHLETES (HUMANS).
I haven’t tried this combination myself just yet, and I’m not able to speak from my own
experience.
If you want to go ahead and try this stack make sure to send me a note in a month or two
to let me know how this worked for you.
Ivan Nikolov is a former Top 5 Natural Bodybuilder, entrepreneur and health enthusiast. Ivan is an engineer by education, but his real passions are the human metabolism and how it is influenced by the environment. Most specifically, Ivan studies how nutritional stimuli affect our health in a positive and negative way. Ivan is also a fan of pushing the boundaries of the physical abilities of his body. He likes to perform exercises and training routines that have real application in day-to-day life. The emphasis is on core strength, coordination and the ability to handle his own body weight with ease. Lastly, Ivan is hungry for success and furthering of his personal development. He has had his own specialty healthy bakery for three years. He currently bolgs on health topics, attends Toastmasters Intl. public speaking meetings, reads a lot, develops functional foods recipes. Another area of development for Ivan is training his brain in critical thinking and reasoning.
