Does Creatine help you build muscle?!


Question: Just wondering if creatine actually helps with muscle developement? If so, what type or blend is best?


Answers: Just wondering if creatine actually helps with muscle developement? If so, what type or blend is best?

During exercise the muscle's primary fuel, ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate), loses a phosphate group and becomes ADP (Adenosine Diphosphate). Creatine, when present in the muscle in sufficient amounts donates a phosphate group to ADP and it rapidly retransforms to ATP which is the immediately available to the muscle to be used a fuel for exercise. ATP is the primary source of fuel for muscular exercise. It is used before sugars (carbohydrates) and before fats.

my husband and brother tried it. They said it does nothing and really isn't that good for you.

The muscles of your body resemble the pulp of a whole orange. Break a segment of an orange and you will see fluid-filled pulp fibers. If the pulp dehydrates, the individual pieces of pulp shrink. The segment of orange will shrink in size. If you submerge it to clean water, the pulp will plump up again and the segment will enlarge.

Creatine helps each muscle fiber to retain water. This plumps them up and makes the muscle appear larger. In order for creatine to be effective, you must drink lots of water, especially after your workout. Creatine will NOT be effective if you do not provide your muscles with the water they need to plump up.

Creatine and water will only work IF you work out hard and give your muscles a good pump. If after your workout your muscles are not hard and tired, you did not workout sufficiently.

Yes it does - the other person who explained what creatine is and does is right....and because of that; you have more fuel available for explosive power lasting up to about 10-15 seconds. this is roughly what you do for a single decent weightlifting set. So in other words, creatine gives you greater strength gains by powering the muscles for exactly that kind of movement. This allows you to lift heavier weights and therefore build more muscle.

But on its own...no. Creatine is not anabolic, its just a very specialised fuel source. I would say any good strength or power or mass gain programme should include it though - it rocks!

As for brand or type...just plain old creatine monohydrate is fine. Contrary to popular myth it is just about 100% absorbed and highly effective.

Hope this helps :)

Adam hit the nail on the head. Another thing that creatine does that he didn't mention is that creatine helps muscles maintain fluids. This will give you a pretty good pump and can help you lift more weight, due to the fact that there's a lot of readily available "food" for your muscles, right there.

I take a non-blended creatine monohydrate on a six-week cycle (six on, six off). I make sure to never go over 2 grams per day. Studies have shown that 3 grams per day is a safe value, and I just cut it a little lower to be safer... I weigh 250 and 2g/day is plenty for me. YMMV...

If you're not lifting, I don't recommend taking creatine. It's use as a performance enhancing supplement is controversial and taking too much has been proven to cause hypertension through too much water retention. People can also have dehydration issues caused by the kidneys not breaking it down properly.





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