Myoplex vs. Separate Supplements

**Judah Maccabee** · Posted On: 4/12/2007 5:37pm

Yeah, BCAA is usually more expensive with fewer benefits compared to eating meat, from my understanding.

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Any good research to promote the Ester form over Monohydrate form of creatine?

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Another quality brand of whey protein is ON Whey. Cookies and Cream is good, but you can get the vanilla flavor and make a lot of recipes from John Berardi. ON Whey is pharmaceutical grade protein.

**Teh El Macho** · Posted On: 4/12/2007 7:09pm

Originally Posted by Equipoise

First off, Creatine shouldn't cause bloating at all. The extra Creatine Phosphate in the system allows for ATP to be created quicker for the usage of the muscles during activity. The sheer amount of this that would need to be ingested for any sort of bloating is ridiculous. Along with this BCAA's aren't a necessity if you're eating correctly. It's a bit overkill. Your body is going to create it's own amino's given the correct nutrients. Vitamins are fine. If you want more protein, eat more versus ingesting BCAA's.

That's where I rack my brain. After a week of taking creatine, my stomach just bloats and I get constipated. It maybe a function of my diet, but so far I haven't been able to figure it out. So now I only take creatine 3-4 days max, and only if I'm lifting and doing nothing else.

BTW, well-done red meat, or any type of meat seasoned with vinegars or wines do the exact same crap to my stomach. :icon_scra

Originally Posted by Equipoise

No2 was great the first time I used it. After that, the effects lessened each time.

Yeah, I've seen the same. The talk on the gym has usually been to take it for a few weeks, take a break from it for a few more weeks and restart again. But it's just talk and should be taken with a grain of salt.

**Judah Maccabee** · Posted On: 4/12/2007 7:47pm

Potential reason for bloating due to creatine:

http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=768093

So if there's no way for CEE to work the way it's supposed to, it's crap, right? Well, maybe not. The one advantage that CEE has is that, unlike creatine monohydrate, it's highly soluble in water. Now this sounds frivolous and softcore until you consider that some people experience bloating from regular creatine. One potential reason for this side effect is that people consume undissolved creatine, which could actually pull water into our GI tract and lead to bloating (11).

CEE minimizes this potential by simple virtue of dissolving in water very well. This means that when we drink it, we're drinking a mixed solution rather than water and a bunch of undissolved creatine powder — the latter of which may cause bloating.

To be completely fair, despite the vocal minority who may experience bloating, it's not as common as one might think. In fact, I don't know of a single person who has these effects, and they're virtually non-existent in the scientific literature. Most likely, people hear that creatine causes intramuscular water retention and psychologically transfers this effect to bloating out of sheer misunderstanding.

Citation for the bloating claim:

11. Greenhaff PL. The nutritional biochemistry of creatine. J Nutr Biochem 8:610-618. 1997.

**Equipoise** · Posted On: 4/13/2007 1:00am

Sounds like your stomach is sensitive... AWWWWWW!

The bloating people refer to is the damned stomach cramps that Creatine can cause as stated above.

As for an estered Creatine, the benefits are so much the bloating as it is the higher stabilization and uptake in the body versus CM. IE, advanced formulations of creatine don't get nuked by the Hydrochloric acid in the stomach. So you'll get 75% of the pill you take versus about 30% of each powdered serving that you take.

**LI GUY 1** · Posted On: 4/13/2007 1:42am

I think its cheaper to just take a larger serving of mono than to take a creatine with a "delivery system". It all ends up the same anyways right? As long as you are saturated it works I think.

I hated mono at first (GNC brand). I switched to MICRONIZED mono and it is much better. It dissolves easier.

Try micronized and drink a lot of water if you get cramps or bloating. Also, try drinking room temperature water to allow greater solubility. In cold water it won't dissolve.

Lastly on the BCAA's. I thought it was best to sip on them during a workout? As I understand, free form BCAA bypasses the intestines and is instead metabolized in the muscle tissue itself. Taking them in during training ensures your body is not stripping aminos from muscle for energy. But that could be completely wrong as far as I know.

**Equipoise** · Posted On: 4/13/2007 6:45am

If you can afford the liquid, go for it. Esthered Creatine isn't expensive and read my post above for benefits.

**Quikfeet509** · Posted On: 4/13/2007 10:21am

I do get bloated on mono creatine. I also get phenomenal results on it [read: creatine responder]. This used to be great when I was smaller, but now my arms get so damn pumped I can barely do anything with them - sometimes doing an exercise through full ROM becomes impossible.

It is ridiculous.

**Teh El Macho** · Posted On: 4/13/2007 1:05pm

Originally Posted by Equipoise

Sounds like your stomach is sensitive... AWWWWWW!

The bloating people refer to is the damned stomach cramps that Creatine can cause as stated above.

As for an estered Creatine, the benefits are so much the bloating as it is the higher stabilization and uptake in the body versus CM. IE, advanced formulations of creatine don't get nuked by the Hydrochloric acid in the stomach. So you'll get 75% of the pill you take versus about 30% of each powdered serving that you take.

Yeah, I'm a sensitive guy. :gay:

Creatine is great, it's just that the crampings and constipation can get so bad I have to take only mostly liquids for a day or two (and sometimes I've been forced to take mineral oil). That's how bad it can get (even though I drink at least 12-14 glasses of water a day and oatmeal every breakfast.)

I hate my guts... really.