Creatine is a derivative from the amino acids arginine, glycine and methionine and is formed in the liver, kidneys and pancreas. On average a healthy male makes about 2 grams of creatine daily. We also get it from food. Red meat is one of the best sources, but in order to get 4 grams of creatine from food, you’d have to eat nearly five pounds of beef. Eating that much food is impossible for most bodybuilders (not that they don’t try!). That’s why creatine supplementation is essential.

Effervescent creatine is simply creatine citrate and is more soluble in water than creatine monohydrate. However contrary to what this might seem to imply, creatine citrate has been shown to be less effective than creatine monohydrate for size and strength improvements.It is also more expensive! Claims for the instant absorption of serum creatine are false as creatine takes some time to be absorbed. Serum creatine can also not be more concentrated than powdered creatine as claimed, because a powdered form of creatine will be of similar concentration to a solution that comprises creatine powder dissolved in liquid.

Effervescent creatine is simply creatine citrate and is more soluble in water than creatine monohydrate. However contrary to what this might seem to imply, creatine citrate has been shown to be less effective than creatine monohydrate for size and strength improvements.It is also more expensive! Claims for the instant absorption of serum creatine are false as creatine takes some time to be absorbed. Serum creatine can also not be more concentrated than powdered creatine as claimed, because a powdered form of creatine will be of similar concentration to a solution that comprises creatine powder dissolved in liquid.

Creatine enhances performance and appearance by several mechanisms. The primary action of creatine is its ability to donate a phosphate molecule to regenerate ATP (adenosine triphosphate) which fuels brief, intense muscle contractions such as those used in weightlifting, sprinting, rugby and related sports. In a related action creatine also prevents the decrease of glycolytic activity (a biochemical process that produces ATP from sugar) in the muscle with the result that more ATP can be produced. Creatine is a muscle volumizer by virtue of the fact that it packs water into the muscle. When you increase the hydration status of a cell, certain switches are turned on. One of these is protein synthesis. As a cell fills with water, a message is sent telling to grow bigger by making more protein. 70-80% of users experience exceptional results, while the other so-called non-responders will experience limited results.

Creatine enhances performance and appearance by several mechanisms. The primary action of creatine is its ability to donate a phosphate molecule to regenerate ATP (adenosine triphosphate) which fuels brief, intense muscle contractions such as those used in weightlifting, sprinting, rugby and related sports. In a related action creatine also prevents the decrease of glycolytic activity (a biochemical process that produces ATP from sugar) in the muscle with the result that more ATP can be produced. Creatine is a muscle volumizer by virtue of the fact that it packs water into the muscle. When you increase the hydration status of a cell, certain switches are turned on. One of these is protein synthesis. As a cell fills with water, a message is sent telling to grow bigger by making more protein. 70-80% of users experience exceptional results, while the other so-called non-responders will experience limited results.

The French scientist, Chevreul, identified creatine way back in 1835 but the first scientific study on creatine was published in 1926 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry showing that creatine promoted weight gain and nitrogen balance. In 1992 Linford Christie, the only athlete in the field on creatine, won the gold medal in the 100 metres at the Barcelona Olympic Games. However it wasn’t until 1993 when the Scandinavian Journal of medicine, Science and Sports published a study demonstrating that creatine supplementation significantly increased body mass in one week, that worldwide usage took off.

Normal procedure is to load creatine for 5 days (20 grams a day in dosages of 4 x 5 grams) and then to take 5 grams 30 minutes before training and 5 grams 30 minutes after training. On non-training days 5 grams a day is sufficient, preferably in the early morning when insulin levels are high. The purpose behind loading is to get sufficient creatine into the muscle in order for it quickly to make a significant difference to your training intensity. To maximise the uptake and absorption of creatine it is recommended that each 5 gram serving be mixed with 20 or 30 grams of simple sugars, preferably dextrose. If you are mixing creatine with fruit juice, grape is the best. This combination of creatine with simple carbs promotes an insulin release that switches on a creatine carrier in muscle tissue. If you warm your mixture slightly it will increase the solubility of the supplement. It was originally thought that creatine should not be used in conjunction with protein, but latest accepted practise shows that creatine is more effective when taken in conjunction with a protein drink after a training session-this is what top bodybuilders like Mr Olympia, Ronnie Coleman, base their mass gain program on. Used post workout creatine is also rendered more effective when combined with 10 grams of glutamine, the anti-stress/anti-catabolic amino acid which is also a muscle volumizer.

E.J Henriksen, PhD (University of Arizona College of Medicine, Tucson) one of the foremost researchers in the field told Flex magazine that ALA is effective only in enhancing insulin sensitivity in type 2 diabetics. 200 mg of ALA taken in conjunction with dextrose and creatine has not been shown to creatine transport in athletes. The same applies to vanadyl.

Normal practice is to take two weeks off after two months use. It was reported in Molecular Cellular Biochemistry, 184(1-2);427-37, 1998 that chronic creatine supplementation down-regulated the creatine transporter protein which allows creatine into the cell. Cycling your creatine prevents this from becoming a problem.

It takes about a month for creatine levels to decrease to pre-supplementation normal levels. So if you break for less than a month a briefer loading period of 2 or 3 days is appropriate.

Your health will suffer no adverse effects, but you will lose some strength and size and your energy levels will drop. This is the reason why most creatine users consider it an indispensable training aid.

There are anecdotal reports that indicate that creatine can cause gastro- intestinal distress. This can be avoided by consuming sufficient water with your creatine. If you take in insufficient water your body will try to dissolve creatine osmotically by transferring water from your tissues and blood into your intestine. This can cause bloating and cramps. A tip which seems help is to flavour your creatine/dextrose with a cold drink mix. One should also avoid taking creatine just prior to a training session since exercise increases motility of the GI tract. Coarse creatine is also a factor. Within the past few years manufacturers of high grade creatine have begun to micropulverise it to very fine granules, and this has also helped resolve the problem of GI distress to a large degree. Effervescent creatine is supposed to be easier for sensitve stomachs to handle. However my personal experience has been the opposite, and effervescent creatine is 10 times more expensive than creatine monohydrate.

Yes. Creatine ingestion may exarcerbate any degree of dehydration so it advisable that creatine users increase their usual intake of water. Drink even more if you are sweating a lot as result of heat or training exertion.

Creatine is safe, natural and legal. It is the legitimate anabolic of supplements. R B Kreider of the Department of Human Movement Sciences and Education at the university of Memphis, Tennessee, USA is most probably the world’s leading authority on creatine. He states that concerns about possible side effects emanate from unsubstantiated anecdotal reports and that comments regarding side effects of creatine usage should be based on factual evidence and not speculation. Most concerns centre on the kidneys but two reports on the effects of creatine function on kidney function (Poortmans, European Journal of Applied Physiology 76:566-67, 1997 and Balsom, unpublished 1993- a year long study!-) found that creatine had no observable effect on either liver or kidney function. The latest study in this connection was presented by Dr. Kerry Kuehl at the Oregan Health Sciences University in Portland and presented at the 2000 annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine. The study lasted 12 weeks and indicated very clearly that creatine does not adversely affect kidney function in healthy individuals. Another study by D.L. Mayhew in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise 32(5):S37-S367, May 2000 run on 23 football players at Truman State University, Kirksville, Missouri found that creatine consumed in dosages of 5-20 grams per day for up to four years had no impact on blood tests. No research has found high blood pressure as result of creatine usage, and studies have found that creatine supplementation may even reduce the risk of heart disease by improving blood lipids (Earnest, Almada & Mitchell, 1998; Kreider et al., 1998).

Yes, there is the benefit provided by the acquisition of increased size and strength, which while it would of course be the specific aim of a sportsman like a rugby front row forward, is becoming ever more relevant to just about all sportsmen today, with the exception of perhaps only jockeys. Mary Pierce and Penny Heyns are examples of top woman tennis players and swimmers who took creatine to improve their power. Perhaps even more relevant to improved sporting performance is creatine’s muscular energy enhancement of type 2 muscle fibres, which play the main role in the brief, intense muscular contractions that anaerobic activity entails. Sports that rely on short bursts of activity are in the majority, and tend to be the most popular. Examples are rugby, soccer, cricket, tennis, hockey, basketball, waterpolo and all short distance running, swimming and cycling sprint events. Some important recent research includes: Scientists from the Department of physiology at the University of Bergen, Norway conducted a single blind test on 18 sprinters. 9 consumed 20 grams of creatine and 20 grams of glucose a day, and 9 consumed 40 grams of glucose a day. The dosage was split into four portions. The sprinters in the creatine supplementation group reduced their 100 metre sprint times by on average .13 seconds and their total times for 6 x 60 metre sprints by .53 seconds. There was no improvement in the placebo group. Scand J Med Sports. Apr; 11(2):96-102, 2001 The Department of Human Movement, University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia investigated whether oral creatine loading could enhance single and repeated short cycle sprint performance. Two groups of subjects ( 11 in a group), randomly assigned to either a creatine or a placebo group were used in a double blind study. The creatine group recorded significantly greater scores than the placebo group in total work (kJ) completed over 6 sprints, and peak power (W).Aust J Sci Med Sport 1995 Sep;27(3):56-61 Spanish researchers examined a group of 19 national level players from Athletic Club de Bilbao, one of Europe’s leading soccer teams. One group received 20 grams of creatine per day for 6 days, while the other group received a placebo. Players supplementing with creatine demonstrated a consistently faster performance during both 5 and 15 metre sprints, translating into significant improvements on the pitch. The research team concluded that "these improvements could have a great impact on a player’s performance during actual competitive soccer match-play" Medicine and Science in Sports & Exercise, 32, 518-525 (2000)

There has not been much research done in this field because creatine is not considered a primary energy substrate for endurance-type activity, and because of the increase in weight creatine brings about. However, it has been found that while at low intensity only a small amount of ATP production comes from creatine phosphate, an increase in intensity (i.e. a sprint attack) within an endurance cycling or canoeing race, for example, can severely deplete creatine phosphate levels and thus justify creatine supplementation. Researchers at Louisiana State University also found that creatine supplementation can help endurance athletes by boosting lactate threshold (LT) for efforts lasting 12 minutes or more. In a study on 28 cyclists to exhaustion on an exercise bike the LT level was lifted by 14% when having loaded creatine for a week as opposed to no creatine supplementation. This is as a result of strength increases bringing about the need to recruit fewer muscle fibres. Whether this evidence can be linked with improvements in race times is at this stage not clear, but it does look promising. Perhaps you should give it a try.