BCAAs vs. Leucine

Diet and Nutrition
1

Hey guys,

I’m debating between buying the Biotest BCAA pills or just leucine powder to supplement peri-workout. The BCAA’s have “an amino acid ratio of 1.0 to 1.80 to 1.20, which is the exact ratio found in muscle.”

But the product info on leucine says:

“Whenever we studied the effects of protein, it seemed that one specific amino acid, one specific branched-chain amino acid, was almost entirely responsible for muscle protein synthesis. That means that no matter how little or how much protein you ingested, its muscle-building effects (or lack thereof) were almost entirely controlled by the amount of one specific amino acid you had in your bloodstream. And the name of that specific amino acid? Leucine.”

Also, leucine is cheaper per dose than the BCAA’s. So what I’m wondering is, do you guys think having the amino acid’s in proportion is important, or is leucine really the one that matters? In which case I’d just buy that instead.

Thanks for your input!

2

I say, go with MAG-10 as it’s vastly superior to both, even if you can only afford to use 1 scoop per workout.

3

Since they both have leucine, I don’t think that any noticeable differences will occur.

If you use it peri-workout, then I would just use leucine as (1) it is cheaper per servings and gives more leucine (2) you can throw it in a shake with your protein source (which will have valine and isoleucine in it) and not bother popping 12 pills a workout.