How/When do you take your creatine?

J

jdreich

New Member
Hi guys,

I plan to start on creatine next week. I read here (I think) that creatine is taken after your wo, and a lot of guys just add it to their regular protein shake (which sounds very easy).

Now, a doctor, which I have lots of faith and confidence (consults with triathletes, sports nutrition, etc), said to me that for creatine "to work" I should have it right after my wo, but with at least 50g of carbohidrates.

Also, he told me that a "loading phase" (I told him about a 4-5 day, 20g/day loading phase) is not necessary, because after 2 weeks, the effect is tha same, regardles of a loading phase.

Questions:

1) How/when do you take your creatine?

2) If it's with carbo, where do you find a natural drink (pre-made) with 50g of carbo? What would you recommend?

3) Do you recommend a loading phase?

Thanks guys,

JD
 
1) In the morning and my pre-wo shake. Most folks seem to take it after their workout but I personally don't think that it matters.

2) Any insulin-spiking carb drink will do the trick. I usually avoid taking 50g carbs at a time so can't say from personal experience but all you're attempting to do is raise your insulin to stimulate uptake when your plasma creatine levels are high. One group recommended waiting 30 minutes after creatine ingestion for carb ingestion in order to best coincide the insulin increase with high plasma creatine levels. I personally think it's more of a pain to do so :) Also, creatine will "work" with or without carbs; it just accumulates in the muscle quicker with concurrent ingestion of carbs.

3) Neutral on this. You can load for only 2 days as long as you do so with the addition of a carb source. After that, 2-5g/day in your post shake or carb drink is fine since you've generally already reached saturation or are close to it. One the other hand, I haven't seen any proof that loading creatine @ 20g/day for 5 days is detrimental so it's more of a "whatever floats your boat" type of thing.
 
Take your creatine about 15 minutes before you train.

Take it with "any" carb source you like, though carbs aren't necessary.

Loading is really your call. I've never really been able to find a solid reason for or against either one.
 
what is the best way of loading?20 g per day for 5 days?is it necessary to maintain after this loading?
 
That works fine.

If you want to keep the elevant creatine levels, you will need to take maintenance levels for ever after. 5g ensures that you stay topped off. You can maintain the majority of the boost with significantly less.

Personally, I take 5g just before workouts, 3x/week.

There's not much need to be frugal, though, as high-quality creatine like HST's is still very affordablee.
 
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