Is this really necessary? Are supplements really better than eating whole foods? Why worry about taking in nutrients during the workout? Wouldn’t what you eat before still be digesting?
[quote]oso0690 wrote:
Is this really necessary? Are supplements really better than eating whole foods? Why worry about taking in nutrients during the workout? Wouldn’t what you eat before still be digesting?[/quote]
Necessary no. Improved and better? Yes. Time and time again, people that have used peri workout supplements have noted improved workouts, recovery, progress and feel better during their workouts.
Pick up some supplements and try it for a month.
[quote]oso0690 wrote:
Is this really necessary?[/quote]
I’d say it’s “necessary” when thinking on a good-better-best scale. For maximal performance and results, it’s good to kinda-sorta care about what and when you eat; it’s better to pay a bit of actual attention to what and when you eat, especially around workouts; it’s best to intentionally and strategically use specific nutrients in order to have effective training sessions and to efficiently recover from those sessions.
Some supplements are, because of the reasons listed in that article and this one:
Because of all the reasons listed in the article.
Yes, and that’s the problem, which is what the article explained. Not to sound too jerky, but did you, like, not read the thing or did you just not get it?
Good-better-best makes sense, but I did read the article and to be fair, it says stuff like this:
“Pre-workout nutrition and during-workout nutrition are the most important things you can do to make any kind of progress in the gym.”
Which is a big statement, and one not consistent with my experience. I’ve been using Plazma and MAG-10 consistently for over a year now and obviously see some benefit if I keep buying it, but do I think it’s the most important aspect of my progress in that time? Not at all.
And the question can be asked: how big a factor is it, really? Versus eating a normal meal 2-3 hours before a workout and drinking a basic whey protein shake 30 min - 1 hour after, as I did for many years, and many lifters making great progress have done for generations.
How much greater progress can one realistically expect as a result of “correct” peri-workout nutrition? A 5% increase? 10%? More? When you have headlines like John Meadows saying he built more muscle in 3 months with Plazma than in 4 years without… it implies a 1600% increase in rate of muscle gain. Are reasonable people expected to believe this?
I love T-Nation and have spent a lot of money on Biotest supplements but the hyperbole does get a bit tiresome… and actually damages the site’s credibility.
You can’t predict the results from the nutrition alone
Just try 1 or 2 months without plazma, as a try. That’s what I’m gonna do, and that’s what I always do when I implement specific PWO nutrition. I did it with gainers, then with whey, then with bcaa, peptides, and now giving plazma a shot.
[quote]craze9 wrote:
Good-better-best makes sense, but I did read the article and to be fair, it says stuff like this:
“Pre-workout nutrition and during-workout nutrition are the most important things you can do to make any kind of progress in the gym.”
Which is a big statement, and one not consistent with my experience. I’ve been using Plazma and MAG-10 consistently for over a year now and obviously see some benefit if I keep buying it, but do I think it’s the most important aspect of my progress in that time? Not at all.
And the question can be asked: how big a factor is it, really? Versus eating a normal meal 2-3 hours before a workout and drinking a basic whey protein shake 30 min - 1 hour after, as I did for many years, and many lifters making great progress have done for generations.
How much greater progress can one realistically expect as a result of “correct” peri-workout nutrition? A 5% increase? 10%? More? When you have headlines like John Meadows saying he built more muscle in 3 months with Plazma than in 4 years without… it implies a 1600% increase in rate of muscle gain. Are reasonable people expected to believe this?
I love T-Nation and have spent a lot of money on Biotest supplements but the hyperbole does get a bit tiresome… and actually damages the site’s credibility. [/quote]
sad but true
I have been a bit of pro-supplement freak for years. I have always rationalised it by stating this is my interest; I’ve made a choice and budget, so that’s what I will do. However, I always manage my expectations by simply remembering the great physiques of yesterday, where a lot of average Joes became anything but average through hard work and simple nutrition.
As a writer (not of great writing talent, but have worked at it professionally anyway) myself I have to work quite hard to be sure that I’m saying what I mean to communicate without creating possible readings that will have some concluding things I didn’t mean to say.
Not that it’s a particularly great example, but one I remember seeing myself raked over the coals on again and again just from Google searches turning these things up, once I wrote that 'trenbolone acetate does not have special fat burning properties."
Now what I meant was this: Other authors were claiming that the acetate ester itself, not the steroid but the ester, had, quote, special fat burning properties. This is not so. I think most would agree on this today: trenbolone enanthate is comparably popular to trenbolone acetate as a cutting steroid.
But, I should have predicted, many read this as being me saying that trenbolone isn’t much of a choice for a cutting cycle. Not what I meant. I failed to predict other possible readings, just having in mind my own thought. I still do this all the time but manage to catch it most of the time I hope. My wife also helps with proofreading now. She finds things I didn’t mean all the time.
The above things that are objected to would indeed be completely wrong if applied to all circumstances and indeed to very many circumstances. Many absolutely can be put on a great program and make great gains without any particular supplementation. Any reading that it’s impossible for that to happen I doubt, just as opinion, could be what the authors meant because they appear knowledgeable.
It depends on who you work with. Most guys at a more advanced level, who already say 3 years ago were doing quite well and have been training consistently and well since, are not gaining for example 3 lb of muscle a month, or adding 5% strength every month. If they did they’d have added 100 lb of muscle since then, and would have increased their strength by more than 5 times (5% raised to the 36th power, over 36 months.) Nope. We know that more advanced guys are often up only say 3 lb in a year, and if their lifts went up 5% in the year that may be a good year. Track some powerlifters’ careers and that will be seen to be true.
In such instances it can be absolutely true that improving workout nutrition can be the only natural way found to make a fast major improvement.
I would disagree completely that John Meadows could not have made the improvement he says he did, or could not reasonably have been at a quite slow rate of gain prior to that, thus making the relative improvement possible.
I would agree completely with a disagreement of a reading that no lifter can make fast gains without it.
Thanks for your thoughtful response, Bill.
I wasn’t intending to imply that John Meadows is lying, in his claim. I’m happy to give him the benefit of the doubt that when he says he added more muscle in 3 months than in the previous 4-5 years, it’s true.
But, if it is true, it is due to a very specific context that has a lot to do with factors beyond the use of Plazma itself. I.e., an advanced bodybuilder who presumably added relatively little muscle in those 4-5 years (less than 3 lbs / year?), or who was returning to a previously-established muslce/bodyweight set point (muscle memory), or some other factors that allowed for such rapid gains in 3 months relative to 4-5 years. He was also, presumably, using gear and other supplements beyond just Plazma. And that is a context which I’d assume is quite different from that of the average lifter for whom the Plazma ads/hype is targeted.
In other words, the IMPLICATION of the ad is still that it increased muscle building by 1600%. And even if true in the case of Meadows for 3 months, it’s an exaggerated and unrealistic expectation to set for the average consumer of Plazma. It’s like Jared Fogle losing 100 lbs by eating Subway sandwiches… it may be true in his case, but does that mean it’s accurate to use his case to advertise Subway as a weight loss miracle?
Anyway, perhaps I’m being overly critical, but I do find articles like the one linked above irritating in terms of some of the claims made. And that’s coming from someone who uses Biotest Peri-Workout nutrition.
I know the fitness industry is full of exaggerated claims, misinformation, and unrealistic expectations, but I hold T-Nation to a higher standard than the rest of the fitness industry.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a promotional article by a supplement company where they added disclaimers that many people can get great gains without using their product. It could exist, I could easily have missed such a thing since by no means do I read everything out there or anything like it, but in 23 years of lifting, I’ve never seen it.
I see your point, but as an expectation, I don’t know where it would ever be fulfilled.
I would say the contrary really: Biotest is the only company I know of where people are routinely advised, on the company forums, that given their situation they do not need a given product made by the company, even where the person seems pretty keen on using it and brings it up themselves. What other supplement company does that? Perhaps some also do, but if so it’s rare.
Plus Biotest delivers the infamous 2.3 liter plastic bottle
I didn’t search a lot but thought it looked pretty difficult to find one as is
And here you go, along with the Plazma, boom flavor drops and a huge shaker. Taking into account the free FedEx delivery, that’s not even THAT expensive in the end
/offtopic but anyway who doubts bill Roberts is the man? I don’t care what image T Nation has because of some promotional articles. casual readers and internet users always critic everything anyway
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a promotional article by a supplement company where they added disclaimers that many people can get great gains without using their product. It could exist, I could easily have missed such a thing since by no means do I read everything out there or anything like it, but in 23 years of lifting, I’ve never seen it.
I see your point, but as an expectation, I don’t know where it would ever be fulfilled.
I would say the contrary really: Biotest is the only company I know of where people are routinely advised, on the company forums, that given their situation they do not need a given product made by the company, even where the person seems pretty keen on using it and brings it up themselves. What other supplement company does that? Perhaps some also do, but if so it’s rare.[/quote]
You are right, in terms of perspective on Biotest and the supplement industry overall. Which is why I buy supplements here.
I guess my point is just that I’d prefer for there to be a distinct “separation” between articles and advertising. I don’t mind the Plazma ad banner, but if an article makes claims that I think are based more on selling a product than on making accurate points about training/nutrition, it makes me a little uneasy (and inclined not to take the claims made in the article seriously).
Perhaps it’s unrealistic to expect such a thing, given that this is capitalism and Biotest needs to make money, but I guess I’m a dreamer.
[quote]craze9 wrote:
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a promotional article by a supplement company where they added disclaimers that many people can get great gains without using their product. It could exist, I could easily have missed such a thing since by no means do I read everything out there or anything like it, but in 23 years of lifting, I’ve never seen it.
I see your point, but as an expectation, I don’t know where it would ever be fulfilled.
I would say the contrary really: Biotest is the only company I know of where people are routinely advised, on the company forums, that given their situation they do not need a given product made by the company, even where the person seems pretty keen on using it and brings it up themselves. What other supplement company does that? Perhaps some also do, but if so it’s rare.[/quote]
You are right, in terms of perspective on Biotest and the supplement industry overall. Which is why I buy supplements here.
I guess my point is just that I’d prefer for there to be a distinct “separation” between articles and advertising. I don’t mind the Plazma ad banner, but if an article makes claims that I think are based more on selling a product than on making accurate points about training/nutrition, it makes me a little uneasy (and inclined not to take the claims made in the article seriously).
Perhaps it’s unrealistic to expect such a thing, given that this is capitalism and Biotest needs to make money, but I guess I’m a dreamer.
[/quote]
I agree that there are several articles designed to hype up a Biotest product or products. It’s unfortunate. I just look it over as I would any advertisement on the internet, although their ad’s are at least based in real science and real-life experimentation. I’d like to see the articles be less biased. For instance, the article about changing your body fat set point lists a couple ways besides using C3G, but basically says all the other ways are impossible to achieve and won’t make a big difference anyway.
Further to my earlier post, what I would say about Biotest supplements is that by UK standards they are not that expensive. The issue over here is availability and generally you pay in UK pounds sterling what you would pay in dollars. For me personally that makes regular use supplements like Plazma too expensive. Instead, I recently bought an 8-10 week supply of Indigo 3G on the credit card as a bit of a ‘treat to self’. If I like what I see at the end of that I would consider doing it again.
Being realistic, most people are savvy enough to know dramatic physique altering substances CANNOT be bought from a supplements shop. If you have ever worked out in a decent gym you will soon realise this!
[quote]shralpinist wrote:
I agree that there are several articles designed to hype up a Biotest product or products. It’s unfortunate. I just look it over as I would any advertisement on the internet, although their ad’s are at least based in real science and real-life experimentation. I’d like to see the articles be less biased. For instance, the article about changing your body fat set point lists a couple ways besides using C3G, but basically says all the other ways are impossible to achieve and won’t make a big difference anyway.
[/quote]
Now, as the author of the article, I can say for a fact that it never said or implied any such thing.
Bill, you’re right. My apologies. I got that article mixed up with the article on increasing cellular AMPK.
No problem! 