“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations; we fall to the level of our training.” – Archilochus

If you followed the CrossFit Super Regional competitions, you’re probably aware that Julie Foucher sustained an injury to her Achilles tendon. And no doubt, you’ve heard (or read) a lot of opinions on what caused the injury. I find myself at odds with most of these narratives.

“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations; we fall to the level of our training.” – Archilochus

If you followed the CrossFit Super Regional competitions, you’re probably aware that Julie Foucher sustained an injury to her Achilles tendon. And no doubt, you’ve heard (or read) a lot of opinions on what caused the injury. I find myself at odds with most of these narratives.

Julie Foucher fights through emotion during an interview while describing her recent injury.

The Statistics of Foucher’s Training

If you’re unfamiliar with Sabermetrics, it’s the unholy application of statistical mathematics to baseball (itself perhaps slightly less boring than statistical mathematics).

While this is intolerable to all but the most ardent fans of both, the guys at Beyond the Whiteboard have applied this formula to (primarily) CrossFit training, with far less boring results.

So, in this case, we can go back and examine Julie Foucher’s training and see the information compiled for the sessions that led up to Super Regionals.

If we (and by “we,” I mean the guys at Beyond the Whiteboard) examine Foucher’s training in preparation for Super Regionals, we walk away with some interesting statistics:

• Since January 1st, 2015, she has performed 815 workouts.
• For the past three months, 29% of her training has been dedicated to gymnastics-type movements, with box jumps being the least practiced of the group (being included in a mere ten training sessions).
• Very few of her sessions had much carryover onto building the type of structural integrity that we could logically assume would have helped prevent her injury. She actually did more bench pressing than box jumping.

“I’m not surprised when an athlete gets injured doing one of the things they were least prepared to do. You shouldn’t be either.”

This isn’t an indictment of Foucher’s programming, but some further examination is necessary.

She placed third at last year’s CrossFit Games, so we can reasonably expect she would breeze through this year’s Open without issue. The statisticians over at CFG Analysis set her odds at 76% to qualify for the 2015 Games.

Therefore, smart programming would have been geared toward maximum results at the big show, not during either of the qualifying rounds.

It Isn’t About the Box Jumps

We know that box jumps have been included at the Regional level consistently for the past three years (2012-2014), but only once over the three days and never for greater than fifty reps.

Each time, a wrinkle was added, so we didn’t have straight box jumps more than once in those three years, with the other years showcasing burpee box jumps and box jump overs. At the Games level, no form of box jumps has been used since 2012, and even then we saw them as part of a chipper for two sets of ten.

Therefore, a lack of concentration on this movement, which Foucher could reasonably assume would appear one or two times at most, and certainly for less than fifty reps, doesn’t seem particularly unreasonable.

The Difference With CrossFit

I’m sure that by this time, the usual suspects have been dusted off (Zatsiorsky, Siff, Verkhoshansky, etc.) in support of various arguments for or against the box jump as a safe training or competition modality (and here, I’m talking about the discussions happening online).

What often gets lost during debates about injured CrossFit competitors – they are not your average athletes.

The problem with citing these authors is that “box jumps” aren’t generally a high-rep movement in the literature, and the variations (burpee box jumps, etc.) used by CrossFit are certainly not addressed often, if at all.

Equally problematic is the fact that the different evolutions of box jumps each require a different technique, and within that spectrum we find that individual competitors have varying techniques: some step down, some jump down, some do a rebound back up (making it more like a depth jump).

Therefore, the collision with the ground can vary from either being elastic (conserving both momentum, as well as kinetic energy) or inelastic (not preserving kinetic energy).

And throughout a set of box jumps, we’ll often see competitors vary their technique under fatigue – perhaps starting with jumps and falls, using the elastic energy of the stretch shortening cycle, but switching to jumps and step downs, thereby changing the movement to inelastic.

“In the end, we are left with the statistical fact that Julie Foucher was injured performing the gymnastics movement she spent the least time practicing.”

Without getting into the merits of the box jump, or having to defend an entrenched position, I’ll simply say that as a modality for increasing explosive strength, all of the research agrees on efficacy, if not specifics.

Unfortunately, data on its use under extreme fatigue is lacking, as is the data on the various permutations we see being used competitively by CrossFit. And of what one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent (Wittgenstein, yo).

The Source of Foucher’s Injury

In the end, we are left with the statistical fact that Julie Foucher was injured performing the gymnastics movement she spent the least time practicing. This is not surprising.

But as previously discussed, her lack of focus on this exercise made good statistical sense, and for this reason, I’m not convinced her programming was faulty.

Neither am I convinced there is inherent danger in high-rep box jumps, as the data is lacking, and her injury represents a very small percent compared to the athletes who completed the event without similar consequences.

I’m not surprised when an athlete gets injured doing one of the things they were least prepared to do. You shouldn’t be either.

Check out these related articles:

• Julie Foucher’s Achilles Injury – Can Chatter Create Change?
• The Role of Leg Strength in Plyometrics
• Is the Rebound Box Jump Suitable For Everyone?

The post What Julie Foucher’s Training Says About Her Achilles Injury appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

They also make your training less effective.

Before we go too far down the rabbit hole, I’m going to clarify what I mean:

All things being equal, if you’re training and taking a multivitamin/antioxidant product, you’re probably going to be slower and weaker than you would have been if you’d never taken it.

I’m talking about actual strength and speed here, not weird proxy measurements of mTOR and esoteric cofactors like FOX01 (don’t worry if you don’t know what those are). Also, it bears noting that even proxy measurements that are deeply embedded in the process of muscle growth (like myofibrillar protein synthesis,) have recently been shown to lack strong correlative power.¹

Since we have tons of studies on vitamins and exercise, I’ve decided to focus on outcomes that involve tangible results, not a bunch of ridiculous biomarkers. And in the majority of valid (and relevant) medical studies, when examining the effects of vitamins and antioxidants on training adaptations, the most common result (other than nothing at all) is negative.

Studying Common Vitamin Supplements

I’m not the first to say this about these supplements:

…oral doses of antioxidants has received much attention as a noninvasive strategy to prevent or reduce oxidative stress, decrease muscle damage and improve exercise performance. Over 150 articles have been published on this topic…with most studies reporting no effects on exercise-induced muscle damage and performance. Moreover, a growing body of evidence indicates detrimental effects of antioxidant supplementation on the health and performance benefits of exercise training.²

A 2012 article published in Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity examined eleven prior studies on vitamin C and/or E supplementation on physiological adaptations to exercise.³ Two demonstrated negative effects, two were positive, and the rest yielded no results either way.

The two studies showing positive effects were both on rodents. The human studies showing no effects were conducted with (fairly standard) dosages of vitamins C ranging from 500-1,000 mg/day and vitamin E at 400 IU/day, for four to sixteen weeks (basically what you get when you buy a bottle of 100 pills).

“Think of vitamin A as a band, and the vitamers are the members. Remember when the members of KISS each produced their own solo albums? It’s basically the same thing with vitamins.”

In one of the negative studies that contained both a human and rodent division, it was found that the administration of vitamin C can reduce exercise-induced mitochondrial biogenesis.⁴  Increased mitochondrial biogenesis (and density) results in muscles that display greater endurance. By contrast, a bigger, stronger, muscle without the same mitochondrial density will have less endurance (which is why we don’t see the simultaneous record holders in the marathon and squat).

But What About Soreness?

I know, if you take some mega-doses of vitamin C, you’ll be less sore, right? Not necessarily. Even though vitamin C can reduce numerous markers of oxidative stress, it doesn’t always result in less soreness (which, ostensibly, would allow you to train harder).⁵  This is exactly why I mentioned that we weren’t going to be relying on proxy markers of efficacy – because while a ton of studies show that vitamins and antioxidants will reduce this marker or increase that one, those studies say nothing about actually making an athlete bigger, faster, or stronger.

Everything Has a Limit

Finally, there is a saturation point with regard to vitamin C (ascorbic acid). If you down one of those 500mg capsules, it’s basically the same as downing five of them.

Not even a seafaring boat of Pilgrims would need to consume this much vitamin C.

Some studies have even indicated the 500mg dose can cause vitamin C to act as a pro-oxidant (yes, the opposite of an antioxidant), depending on which strands of DNA the scientists have looked at.⁶

The Realities of Training Stimuli

Since we’ve seen a reduction in oxidative stress (provided by vitamin C) accompanied by less of a training adaptation, it stands to reason that many of these studies with so-called positive outcomes (a reduction in catabolic hormones), are actually reporting a potentially counterproductive result.

“The less stress you put on your body (to a point), the less you will force it to adapt.”

Remember, the body responds to the negative stress of training with a positive adaptation (strength, endurance, etc.). The less stress you put on your body (to a point), the less you will force it to adapt. Unfortunately, many scientists have chosen to ignore that fact, and recommended vitamins despite the lack of (or even contrary) evidence.

In the following excerpt, we have authors of a study recommending that endurance athletes use vitamin E – not because it gives a performance benefit, but rather because it prevents a form of oxidative stress:

Supplementation with 100 to 200mg of vitamin E daily can be recommended for all endurance athletes to prevent exercise-induced oxidative damage and to reap the full health benefits of exercise.⁷

But this has nothing to do with performance, even though the recommendation is for endurance athletes. Studies like this one are commonplace, where the authors don’t look at a relevant data point and start with what seems to be a bias that vitamins are good, while anything that indicates stress or damage to the organism is bad. But again, the acute damage we do to the human organism within the context of a training session is different than systemic dietary or environmental damage.

Reactive oxidation is not a mistake, it’s an essential part of the cellular signal process, and especially the process that leads to exercise adaptation and improved health: ^8,9,10,11

…exercise-induced oxidative stress ameliorates insulin resistance and causes an adaptive response promoting endogenous antioxidant defense capacity. Supplementation with antioxidants may preclude these health-promoting effects of exercise in humans.¹⁰

That’s okay, though, because there’s no such thing as vitamin E. Or vitamin C, for that matter.

Entering the Vitamin Matrix

Okay, let’s unpack that statement by defining our terms. A vitamin isn’t a “thing” at all. It’s a group of things. Specifically, vitamin C isn’t a single vitamin, it’s a bunch of chemical compounds called vitamers, each of which is called vitamin C.

If you look at the ingredients panel on a bottle of vitamin C, you’ll likely see something called ascorbic acid. Ascorbic acid is a vitamer and is only one kind of vitamin C. Each vitamer in the vitamin C family has a similar molecular structure such that “vitamin C” doesn’t describe one specific thing, but is a blanket term that covers all of the various ionic compounds (salts) of ascorbate: ascorbic acid, dehydroascorbic acid, calcium ascorbate, and sodium ascorbate.

“You can’t simply remove one vitamer from its group and expect it to produce similar results.”

Generally speaking, when you buy a bottle of vitamin C, it’s ascorbic acid. Dump any (or all) of the aforementioned vitamers into a bottle and it’s going to qualify as vitamin C‏. So, if five different people use five different brands of vitamin C, each of them could be using a different version of ascorbate and a slightly different compound – but all of those compounds will fall under the category of vitamin C.

Across the board, when we talk about vitamins, we are actually talking about categories that represent entire groups of vitamers. Vitamin A includes retinol, retinal, alpha-carotene, beta-carotene, gamma-carotene, and beta-cryptoxanthin. All of those chemicals are called vitamin A, but there are significant differences between them.

For example, while retinol can be reversibly changed into retinal, it’s not a two-way street, as retinal does not share that property. Moreover, retinal/retinol are typically consumed via animal sources, while the carotene versions of vitamin A are generally ingested through plant sources. The carotene versions would be more appropriately called pro-vitamin A, as they require enzymatic conversion to end up in their ultimate form (retonic acid). In the retonic acid form, we find that vitamin A performs a role in gene transcription that isn’t found with the unconverted carotene versions.

There is also a specific type of fatty acid attached to retinol/retinal that makes them more susceptible to rancidity. Still, any of these chemicals can accurately be called vitamin A and said to guard against deficiency – despite having highly distinct relative properties.

Results Will Vary

None of those specifics are overly important here, except to illustrate that the thing you thought was a vitamin is actually not a thing at all – it’s a group of things, each of which can have highly distinct properties. This applies across the board to all vitamins Vitamin E is a family of tocopherols (d-alpha, d-beta, d-gamma, and d-delta-tocopherol) and tocotrienols (alpha, beta, gamma, delta tocotrienols).

You can’t simply remove one vitamer from its group and expect it to produce similar results. Think of vitamin A as a band, and the vitamers are the members. Remember when the members of KISS each produced their own solo albums? It’s basically the same thing with vitamins. You might think you’re getting Gene Simmons (or Ace Frehley), but in reality you’re getting Peter Criss (or that other guy).

Top ten albums I wouldn’t buy: “Peter Criss Drums the Christmas Classics”

I’m not picking on vitamin C (or E or A), I’m just using them to illustrate my points. The first of which is that the use of antioxidant vitamins to boost performance is not supported by the literature, and the second of which is that we are taking isolated vitamers out of their natural state and expecting them to produce gold albums (or whatever).

Magical Veggies

So what’s in broccoli that makes it so healthy? The active ingredient in broccoli is…

Broccoli.

It’s the whole thing. Because while we can literally figure out everything that’s in broccoli, we still can’t reproduce that sum by adding up the part, nor can we figure out why it displays the absorption and bioavailability that it does.¹²

Some have proposed that the health benefits of fruit and vegetables are from additive and synergistic combinations of phytochemicals (in a review study with that incredibly descriptive name, actually).¹³ Whether or not that’s true, I can’t come up with a better hypothesis, as it seems fairly obvious that taking isolated vitamers fails to have the same positive outcome as eating vegetables, and in fact, seems to have the opposite effect on health and exercise.

Postscript: I have not investigated any so-called “greens” products or various powdered extracts that claim to provide “full-spectrum” benefits or contain all of the same phytonutrients and absorptive qualities. I might in the future, but for now, I’m going to limit my recommendations to eating five servings of vegetables per day and generally avoiding any supplemental vitamins or antioxidants.

Check out these related articles:

• Shocking Things You Need to Know Before Taking Supplements
• Multilevel Marketing Supplements and CrossFit
• 3 More Things You Need to Know Before Buying Supplements
• What’s New On Breaking Muscle Today

References:

 1. Mitchell CJ, Churchward-Venne, TA, Parise G et al. “Acute post-exercise myofibrillar protein synthesis is not correlated with resistance training-induced muscle hypertrophy in young men.” PLOS One, 9(2): e89431, 2014.

2. Peternelj TT, Coombes JS. “Antioxidant supplementation during exercise training: beneficial or detrimental?”Sports Med. 2011 Dec 1;41(12):1043-69. doi: 10.2165/11594400-000000000-00000.

3. Michalis G. Nikolaidis, Chad M. Kerksick, Manfred Lamprecht, and Steven R. McAnulty “Does Vitamin C and E Supplementation Impair the Favorable Adaptations of Regular Exercise?” Oxid Med Cell Longev. 2012; 2012: 707941. Published online 2012 Aug 13. doi: 10.1155/2012/707941 PMCID: PMC3425865

4. Gomez-Cabrera MC, Domenech E, Romagnoli M, et al. “Oral administration of vitamin C decreases muscle mitochondrial biogenesis and hampers training-induced adaptations in endurance performance.” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2008;87(1):142–149.

5. Bryer SC, Goldfarb AH. “Effect of high dose vitamin C supplementation on muscle soreness, damage, function, and oxidative stress to eccentric exercise.” Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2006 Jun;16(3):270-80.

6. Podmore ID, Griffiths HR, Herbert KE, Mistry N, Mistry P, Lunec J. “Vitamin C exhibits pro-oxidant properties.”Nature. 1998 Apr 9;392(6676):559.

7. Takanami Y, Iwane H, Kawai Y, Shimomitsu T. “Vitamin E supplementation and endurance exercise: are there benefits?” Sports Med. 2000 Feb;29(2):73-83.

8. Bokkon, I. “Recognition of Functional Roles of Free Radicals,” Curr Neuropharmacol. 2012 Dec; 10(4): 287–288. Published online 2012 Dec. doi: 10.2174/157015912804499474 PMCID: PMC3520038

9. Peternelj TT, Coombes JS. “Antioxidant supplementation during exercise training: beneficial or detrimental?” Sports Med. 2011 Dec 1;41(12):1043-69. doi: 10.2165/11594400-000000000-00000.

10. Gomez-Cabrera MC, Salvador-Pascual A, Cabo H, Ferrando B, Viña J. “Redox modulation of mitochondriogenesis in exercise. Does antioxidant supplementation blunt the benefits of exercise training?” Free Radic Biol Med. 2015 Apr 15. pii: S0891-5849(15)00168-9. doi: 10.1016/j.freeradbiomed.2015.04.006. [Epub ahead of print]

11. Michael Ristow, Kim Zarse, Andreas Oberbach, Nora Klöting, Marc Birringer, Michael Kiehntopf, Michael Stumvoll, C. Ronald Kahn, and Matthias Blüher, “Antioxidants prevent health-promoting effects of physical exercise in humans,” Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009 May 26; 106(21): 8665–8670. Published online 2009 May 11. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0903485106 PMCID: PMC2680430

12. Granado F1, Olmedilla B, Herrero C, Pérez-Sacristán B, Blanco I, Blázquez S.

Exp “Bioavailability of carotenoids and tocopherols from broccoli: in vivo and in vitro assessment.” Biol Med (Maywood). 2006 Dec;231(11):1733-8.

13. Liu RH1. “Health benefits of fruit and vegetables are from additive and synergistic combinations of phytochemicals.” Am J Clin Nutr. 2003 Sep;78(3 Suppl):517S-520S.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Your Supplements Are Killing Your Gains appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

You can find carb powders in the aisle of misfit toys at your local supplement store.

Profit margins on high-quality protein are stagnating (if not shrinking), while profit margins on nearly everything else have increased. There is far more profit to be made in carbohydrates than protein, believe it or not.

Why Use Carbohydrate Powders?

If you’re training more than once per day, you should probably be using a high-quality carbohydrate powder. If that training is more than simply two weight-training sessions (i.e. metcon or endurance work), then I’d say it’s even more important. If you’re training once per day, three to five days per week, you need to fully replenish glycogen by the following session, unless you’re specifically going low-carb or you’re fat-adapted. In either of those last two cases, since you’re limiting your daily intake, it’s even more important that you make the best possible carbohydrate choices, and that probably involves a high-quality carb powder.

The Economics of Protein

A few years ago, Gatorade, one of the largest beverage companies in the world decided to start marketing a protein supplement. Overnight, they were buying up more protein than the rest of the market combined. As demand at the commodity level increased, so did price – and it never stopped.

Totally anabolic celebration bath!

Unlike other ingredients, most of the major protein sources (whey and casein) come from a finite source (cows). Before whey became known as the premier anabolic protein, it was a cheap throwaway with limited value to the dairy industry. The supplement industry changed that, and here we are two decades later. And while protein powder is getting harder to turn a profit off, carbs have made a huge comeback.

Herbs and vitamins can be synthesized (for the most part), but generally that’s not true of protein – and in the cases of animal protein, farmers can’t simply plant more. Protein keeps getting more expensive, while carbs have remained consistently priced for the past few years. There’s a ten cent increase here or there because of a drought or whatever, but nothing approaching what we see with protein.

I’m not saying this is a bad thing, because economics can drive innovation, and supplementing carbohydrates (the right kind, in the right way) can have enormous positive impact on athletic performance. But because concentrated or isolated whey basically doesn’t exist except for powder form, and carbs are readily available (yams, potatoes, etc.), there is a huge gap between the number of different protein powders we can purchase at the local store versus the number of carb powders.

Athletes and Supplementation

But the availability of carbohydrate powders has steadily been rising in brick and mortar stores. And while that’s due in part to economics, it’s also because of an increased demand. Fat-adapted athletes are starting to figure out how to incorporate specific carbs into their diet. It’s also because we’ve seen functional fitness competitions becoming more common, and these often require two or three workouts per competition, sometimes on multiple consecutive days or even back to back. Therefore, athletes are doing more daily training sessions and finding carbohydrates necessary in between those sessions, especially throughout a weekend of competing.

“[A]thletes training for a fitness competition, training more than once per day, competing in multiple events throughout a day or weekend … all need carb powders to optimize their performance.” 

Still, the athletes moving into these types of competition aren’t doing so in numbers that overwhelm the market, so another factor in the relative paucity of carbohydrate supplements on the general market, is that the average consumer is a bodybuilder – or what I call a misguided bodybuilder (people who play a real sport, but follow the routines and advice found in bodybuilding magazines). Because low- and no-carb diets quickly became the standard for bodybuilding contest preparation, carbohydrate powders were relegated to the endurance camp, occupying a Lesotho-style territory at the local supplement store, surrounded by huge jugs of protein powders and smaller tubs of pre-workout stimulants.

Carbohydrate drinks have traditionally been the domain of athletes and this is mostly still the case. Watch any marathon and you’ll see people handing out cup after cup of fluorescent-yellow carb drinks. Far more of that stuff is sold each year than anything you’re going to find in the local supplement store, and until they start dumping whey protein on the winning Superbowl coach, that’s unlikely to change.

Bodybuilders Begin to Catch On

But when the days of mega weight-gain powders were gasping their last breaths, bodybuilders started looking for clean carbs to mix with their whey protein, and those powders made inroads. Straight meal replacement powders also took a beating around this time, when it became obvious that a $3/serving pouch of (whatever) could be more economically homebrewed with carb powders and whey proteins.

And while bodybuilders won’t balk at a $100-250 monthly supplement bill, the market we see for endurance athletes is primarily geared towards race-day use. But the preferred supplement customer is the one who buys a product every month, not twice per year. Again, this is economics at play. Nobody is going to compete with the billion-dollar brands that dominate the carb drinks of the endurance (and athletic) world – but they can attempt to make inroads into the far smaller bodybuilding community, where sugary RTD carbs aren’t popular.

Carbs and Performance

This is also due in part to what bodybuilders discovered early on, but was later confirmed by science: very-low carb diets are great for losing weight, but not for performance. You can retain muscle (or even gain it) while restricting carbohydrates, but performance invariably suffers. A pair of studies funded in part through a grant from The Atkins Foundation confirmed that while subjects could lose a considerable amount of fat, and even gain muscle, the ability to perform high-intensity exercise will suffer (as measured by kilojoules/kilogram of body mass).^1,2

Courtesy of “Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab.” 2003 Dec;13(4):466-78. Endurance capacity and high-intensity exercise performance responses to a high fat diet. Fleming J. et al.

High intensity exercise (or HIIT) as a fat-loss modality was first popularized by Shawn Phillips in the ’90s, and within a few years, it was one of the dominant forms of cardio in bodybuilding (not entirely surprising, as it dethroned ass-numbing hours on the stationary bike). As a result, it’s no surprise that researchers investigating low-carbohydrate diets would examine body composition as well as high-intensity performance. These studies were done only a few years after low-carb became de rigueur and Shawn’s HIIT article was published in Muscle Media.

That same magazine also introduced us to the first major carbohydrate evolution: Vitargo. My exposure to Vitargo was a 1997 EAS product called Myoplex Mass. I was a Myoplex user back then and (as you may have guessed) an avid reader of Muscle Media, the EAS-owned bodybuilding magazine where it was advertised. This is how most Americans likely heard of the product, which is patented and owned by a foreign company.

By 1999, there was some interesting data emerging on something called highly branched cyclic dextrin (HBCD), and a study was published where mice were able to swim slightly longer with the consumption of HBCD compared with regular glucose. But this happened not when given prior to exercise, and not when given thirty minutes after starting, only when administered after ten minutes of beginning exercise (basically when it’s useless because nobody bonks after ten minutes).

Exhaustion was deemed when the mouse was unable to surface for a full seven seconds – greater than seven seconds would typically result in death. (Of course, surviving the test also resulted in death, as the mice were decapitated for blood samples and data collection.) Compared to glucose, HBCD produced similar endurance results, despite providing less of a spike in blood sugar and a more stable energy platform.³

“I’m not saying this is a bad thing … supplementing carbohydrates (the right kind, in the right way) can have enormous positive impact on athletic performance.” 

After that first study, the research gets, well, weird. Athletes look to supplements to enhance their performance, and the subsequent studies on HBCD drew conclusions based on efficacy related to immunoendocrine responses and perceived exertion, which are great, but are not performance.^4,5 These proxy measurements are of little use to athletes when the end result is zero performance increase – but they have served well in producing glossy charts and advertisements that put HBCD into the hands of bodybuilders.

It’s also worth noting that while the authors of the first HBCD paper speculate about the rapid gastric emptying of the carb, subsequent research shows it to hang around in the stomach longer than some other (far cheaper) carbs.^6,7 In fact, tested against both maltodextrin and glucose, HBCD doesn’t do anything special for rate of perceived exertion and produces no additional blood glucose.⁷

Not a single study on this product gives me any reason to think it’s going to improve performance at all, and certainly nothing makes me believe it’ll do better than stuff that costs far less. The only thing I can say about this product is it’s the first one I’ve seen that includes post-consumption data on how much burping and farting the test subjects owned up to:

Courtesy of H. Takii et al, “A Sports Drink Based on Highly Branched Cyclic Dextrin Generates Few Gastrointestinal Disorders in Untrained Men During Bicycle Exercise.” Food Sci. Technol. Res., 10 (4), 428-431, 2004.

Highly Branched Cyclic Dextrin:

• Has not been shown to increase performance in humans when tested against other carbohydrates
• Does not increase blood glucose better than any of the sports drinks it was tested against
• Empties from the stomach slower than maltodextrin, but faster than glucose
• Shows no benefit to performance above other carbohydrates drinks during exercise in humans
• Shows no benefit to rate of perceived exertion during exercise, when tested against other sports drinks in humans
• A one specific time point (of multiple that were tested), in one study, in rodents, showed a performance increase

Waxy Maize Hits the Market

A few years after the initial data on HBCD was published, we saw waxy maize make it’s first appearance on the market. Here’s how that happened in one representative instance that could serve as a placeholder for how it occurred across half a dozen companies at roughly the same time, with perhaps slightly different wrinkles:

Just as Vitargo was a major evolution in carbohydrates, the first major carb devolution was an attempt to copy it. One of EAS’ sales reps who became familiar with Vitargo during his time at the company (when it was extracted through a patented process from potato starch) went on to found his own company and license Vitargo for use with creatine – but this version happened to be produced using waxy maize as the source material. Waxy maize is a form of corn, but it’s different than the kind you’d see at the local farmer’s market, or being eaten by Michael Jackson as he reads Facebook comments.

“The key is to supply adequate energy for the task at hand … You don’t get extra credit for finishing a race with really high glycogen levels.”

In December 2006, the company in question lost the rights to the product, and launched a competing one, which was simply waxy maize without having undergone the chemical alterations that made it into Vitargo. This fact inspired other companies to market regular waxy maize and make identical claims to Vitargo (which has also been made with barley and various other starches). This is emblematic of how waxy maize got its start on the market and was a form of logic followed by several companies both before and after.

That same year, another company, All American EFX, claims to have released a waxy maize product called Karbo-Lyn, stating on their website, “In 2006, All American Pharmaceutical released Karbo-Lyn, the new patent pending waxy maize type product that is revolutionizing the athletic world.” That write-up gifts us with a mind-boggling 78 references. Out of those 78 references, 55 of them are never actually cited in the text of the article, and almost none are relevant to the shaggy dog they’ve got posing as a scientific article.

Oddly, when I last checked the Karbo-Lyn label (which for some reason, lacks the hyphen in the name found on the website), it didn’t contain any waxy maize at all, unless they’re simply calling it corn, but has added potato and rice, which would make it rather light of the ingredient they claim is revolutionizing the athletic world. Still, I’m pretty sure this stuff is (or contains some) waxy maize.

Breaking down 200 calories of mystery carb.

Data on this particular brand of waxy maize is a bit sketchy because in 2007 and again in 2009, the highly prestigious Bioceutical Research and Development Laboratory (which is owned by the same company as Karbo-Lyn) made public their studies on the product. Both studies failed to be published in any journal and neither was peer-reviewed nor double-blind. There was no recorded performance data in either study, no objective measure of any relevant parameters, and the number of test subjects was far below statistical significance.

Also, both studies were written on a cocktail napkin.

In crayon.

Alright, those last two lines were possibly not true, but the ones before were (except in some meta way where the whole study is a joke). Whether or not there’s any waxy maize in Karbo-Lyn (with or without the hyphen), it’s in a lot of other products and for a variety of reasons. It has been used as a starting material for various engineered carbs like Vitargo, Superstarch, and HBCD, which all have vastly different properties due to the chemical alterations they’ve undergone.

Confusing waxy maize for something that has been made with it, or thinking everything made with waxy maize is similar, is like confusing a bagel with a doughnut because they’re both made with flour. Also, with carbohydrates, even if you’re eating them au natural, like with rice, the way you prepare it can not only change the flavor and texture, but can reduce the calories and change the regular starch into a resistant starch (which makes it act more like a fiber). So while Product X might be waxy maize and Product Y might be made from waxy maize, this tells us little about Product Y.

Market Stagnation and a New Study

Very little of note happened in the carbohydrate market for the years after waxy maize dropped. It remained and remains a popular carbohydrate in the bodybuilding world. Maltodextrin remained dirt-cheap and the go-to carb source for half the supplement world. It’s really not very good because it spikes blood sugar badly, followed by a rapid dip, which makes it a relatively horrible choice if you’re going to use a carb powder as it typically results in a crash or fatigue (although because it sucks so badly, it makes a great carb to use in studies when you want).

If only spelling “carb” with a “k” is all it takes to invent an effective supplement.

Then in 2010, a study was published on something called Superstarch (funded by UCAN, the parent company of the product).⁸ This particular starch has been modified through a heat/moisture treatment, utilized to modify carbohydrates to more readily be stored as glycogen in children with glycogen storage disease (inability to convert glycogen to glucose in the liver).^9,10

Nobody cared about the study. I mean literally nobody. Then we found out, prior to the 2012 Super Bowl, that the New England Patriots had been using it (and probably deflating balls, video taping their opponents play calls, and a bunch of other stuff). We found this out when low-carb guru Dr. Jeff Volek began touting the likely performance benefits of the stuff in Men’s Health:

This more sustained fuel flow has many advantages such as promoting greater use of fat and potentially sparing muscle glycogen…Most sports like football, basketball, tennis, and hockey, require short bursts of high intensity effort that draw on glycogen…So anything that spares their use could translate into performance gains.

A low-carb guru promoting a carb! It must be pretty awesome, right? Sadly, Dr. Volek himself performed the 2010 study on Superstarch, and there were absolutely no performance gains. Zero. Wait, did you get that last part? Because I’ll say it again for the people in the cheap seats.

Superstarch has been shown in a published, peer-reviewed study not to improve performance by the same person who subsequently opined that its use could translate into performance gains. It also produced one of the most tremendous dips in blood sugar (below baseline) I’ve ever seen.

Here’s how that study went down:

Nine healthy male cyclists participated in a double-blind randomized crossover study – except for the relatively small sample size, this is almost the gold standard of research. Competitive cyclists rode at a predetermined workload amounting to 70% of their VO2 peak. After 150min of steady-state exercise, the workload was increased to require cycling at their individual 100% VO2 peak until they could no longer maintain a minimum pedal cadence of 50 revolutions/min or the subjects’ power output decreased to a point greater than 10% below the prescribed workload.⁸

So, basically this is like a race situation, where you would be cycling along at a steady pace, and then you make a move for first and have to battle it out. Even though there is some logic behind this product, it didn’t outperform the active control (maltodextrin). But because nobody reads studies, it has been widely promoted as a performance-enhancing carb to athletes. And yes, I’ve heard all of the (implausible) excuses, that it works in this situation or that situation or it works in fat-adapted athletes or this one guy with a podcast (who also happens to sell it). The science is the science, and it works (or doesn’t) the same way whether you believe it or not.

Quoting directly from the study:

• “…tests revealed that there was no difference between the HMS and MAL trials…” (Remember: the HMS was UCAN’s not-so-Superstarch and the MAL is regular old . 40c/lb maltodextrin)
• “There were no differences in serum cortisol AUC values between trials…”
• “There were no significant differences between trials with regard to ratings of perceived exertion at each respective time point…”
• “There were no significant differences between trials with regard to CHO oxidation rates, fat oxidation rates…during the 150-min exercise bout.”
• “…there were no statistical differences in the glucose and/or AUC values during the exercise bout…”
• “Cyclists in the present investigation exhibited similar time-to-exhaustion values during both conditions during the 100% VO2peak sprint that immediately followed the 150-min submaximal bout.”

So what’s going? Maltodextrin sucks and Superstarch seems to have some kind of logic behind it. The problem is that it’s logical but not physiological.*

Carbohydrates and Performance

The key is to supply adequate energy for the task at hand. So let’s say you can run a four-minute mile, with optimal fueling. If you eat a ton of carbs beforehand, you’re not going to run a 3:45 mile because if you’ve got adequate energy stores, adding more fuel doesn’t help. It’s like pouring more gas into an engine that’s already full (car nerds: save me your headshaking and cap-locked comments about turbochargers and superchargers). If you’ve topped yourself off, relative to the task at hand (i.e. enough energy to complete it), adding more carbs past the ideal level won’t help. You don’t get extra credit for finishing a race with really high glycogen levels.

“Because nobody reads studies, [Superstarch] has been widely promoted as a performance-enhancing carb to athletes.” 

Whatever the task is, when we’re using carbs as our fuel source, or at least part of our fuel source, we want enough to perform at our maximal level – to take advantage of whatever training adaptations we’ve managed to secure. At that point, extra fuel is no longer a rate-limiting factor. It’s not the thing keeping us from running a faster mile. Extra carbs before your training session aren’t going to help you bench more, either, unless you were already operating at a deficiency.

Where Do We Go From Here?

So we’re back to where we started – athletes training for a fitness competition, athletes training more than once per day, athletes competing in multiple events throughout a day or weekend – they all need carb powders to optimize their performance. Over the past few years, these types of competitions (and athletes) are becoming almost exponentially more commonplace, and they’re realizing they perform better when they’re using a carb supplement. So don’t be surprised if you see a few more rows of carbohydrate powder at the local supplement store, as practicality and economics converge.

*I think I stole that saying from someone, probably Mike Nelson.

Check out these related articles:

• Why It’s Time to Regulate the Supplement Industry
• How Do We Know If Supplements Work?
• 10 Things I Know About Protein That You Don’t
• What’s New On Breaking Muscle Today

References:

1. JS Volek, et al. “Body composition and hormonal responses to a carbohydrate-restricted diet.” Metabolism. 2002 Jul;51(7):864-70.

2. J Fleming, et al. “Endurance capacity and high-intensity exercise performance responses to a high fat diet. ” Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2003 Dec;13(4):466-78.

3. H Takii, et al. “Enhancement of swimming endurance in mice by highly branched cyclic dextrin.” I. 1999 Dec;63(12):2045-52

4. T. Furuyashiki, et al. “Effects of ingesting highly branched cyclic dextrin during endurance exercise on rating of perceived exertion and blood components associated with energy metabolism.” Biosci Biotechnol Biochem. 2014;78(12):2117-9. doi: 10.1080/09168451.2014.943654

5. K. Suzuki, et al. “Effect of a sports drink based on highly-branched cyclic dextrin on cytokine responses to exhaustive endurance exercise.” Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2014 Oct;54(5):622-30.

6. H Takii, et al. “Fluids Containing a Highly Branched Cyclic Dextrin Influence the Gastric Emptying Rate,” Int J Sports Med 2005; 26: 314-319.

7. H. Takii et al, “A Sports Drink Based on Highly Branched Cyclic Dextrin Generates Few Gastrointestinal Disorders in Untrained Men During Bicycle Exercise.” Food Sci. Technol. Res., 10 (4), 428-431, 2004

8. Roberts MD, et al. “Ingestion of a high-molecular-weight hydrothermally modified waxy maize starch alters metabolic responses to prolonged exercise in trained cyclists,” Nutrition (2010), doi:10.1016/j.nut.2010.07.008

9. K Bhattacharya, et al. “A novel starch for the treatment of glycogen storage diseases.” J Inherit Metab Dis 2007;30:350–7.

10. CE Correia, et al. “Use of modified cornstarch therapy to extend fasting in glycogen storage disease types Ia and Ib.” Am J Clin Nutr 20 08;88: 1272–6.

Photo 1 courtesy of Shutterstock.

Photo 6 courtesy of Eva’s Supplement Store, NYC.

The post Carb Powders and the Strange World of Supplement Economics appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

If your tape wrinkles during application, it’s going to create a pressure point that gets progressively worse throughout wearing; Eventually it becomes painful and a compensatory motor pattern emerges. The same can be said for taping just about any body part, and there are a ton of ways you can tape someone that will decrease their performance.

But can taping actually increase performance?

RELATED: Effects of Ankle Taping on Performance and Safety

Types of Taping and Types of Outcome

Probably not with the (usually) white tape that you apply after pre-wrap – the stuff you’ll find in the medkit of your kindly high-school athletic trainer. I use this stuff all the time.

But that’s not the only kind of tape I have in my kit. There’s also a type of self-adherent tape, which only sticks to itself and not to skin or hair (it’s normally used on horses, rugby players, and other animals). That’s good for taping a head (normally to cover a bleeding wound) or any area that’s inappropriate for pre-wrap plus tape. These kinds of tape don’t improve performance above baseline (although there’s a lot to be said for limiting the amount of blood you allow to escape from your head).

With taping, we’re talking about a desired outcome that falls into three categories:

1. Pain Relief – Something hurts and you tape the area to make it hurt less
2. Use – A part of you is injured and you plan on using it anyway
3. Performance – Nothing hurts and you’re trying to get an ergogenic effect

Scenario number one is usually covered with number two, in varying percentages. This is why people have used athletic tape for the past fifty years. Now there’s kinesiology tape – this is the stuff that everyone at the 2014 CrossFit Games was wearing. By everyone, I mean mostly the people not competing.

“The rigidity has a stiffening effect of your own muscle around the ankle, and that, kids, is how tape actually works.”

I got stuck on a line behind a couple of obvious firebreathers discussing the merits of the tape, and although their discussion approached poetry-slam levels of pretentiousness, it made me want to investigate further. Does this stuff actually work?

How Taping Actually Works

When I tape an ankle injury with the white stuff, I know exactly how it’s working. When you first tape an ankle, the restrictive nature of the tape will limit movement and keep the injury from extending past its injured range of motion. The tape does this primarily through proprioceptive awareness. Or rather, your body does this because it is made aware of its limited mobility through feeling the tape.

As for the tape itself, by the end of a typical football game (or whatever), it’s sustained so many micro-tears that it’s not providing any stability on its own – but because your nervous system senses its presence, it still has an effect (though obviously less than when it was first applied). The rigidity has a stiffening effect of your own muscle around the ankle, and that, kids, is how tape actually works (c’mon, you didn’t think that a piece of cloth tape would be strong enough to hold your joint in place, right?).

RELATED: The Science Behind Why “I Think I Can” Actually Works

That’s what tape does – alters your muscle recruitment pattern through increased proprioception and CNS awareness to provide more stability to the injured area. So if we can alter the way our muscles fire with regular white tape, it’s not a huge leap to think we can figure out a way to get some performance gains out of the stuff.

Look at the Science Behind the Practice

Still, we’ve seen tons of top-flight athletes using Kinesiology Tape, and that’s more than enough evidence for it to start trending among weekend warriors. But just because an Olympic gold medalist uses something, doesn’t mean it actually works. Since I used up the Breathe Right analogy in my last article, I’m going to use this one:

See the dude pictured above? He’s running a marathon in the 1908 Olympics, and he crossed the finish line first. The thing he’s holding in his right hand is a wedge of cork, which runners believed would allow you to flex your hand muscles while you ran, without straining them, and somehow this would make you faster and able to concentrate harder.

He had also just drunk a bit of strychnine (yes, the poison). Again, thinking it would help him run faster. Again, this is why I don’t trust athletes 100% when it comes to the things they do and believe will help them perform better. So I generally look to the science behind the practice.

What the Studies Say About Taping for Performance

What I’d really like to tell you at this point, is that I found hundreds of studies where people strapped on a bunch of kinesiology tape and started crushing their PRs and that it was all rigorously documented by scientists, in studies not funded by the companies who manufacture the tape. That kind of evidence doesn’t exist.

“The findings would seem to indicate that the positive effects some claim to get from using kinesiology tape may be a placebo effect.”

Very little has been written on the topic of taping for increased performance. Data is so scarce that I’d be willing to accept a less than robust body of work. I’d be happy with one great piece and another couple good works (think Chuck Palahniuk), or one great piece and maybe one other decent piece (think Cormac McCarthy). I’d even be happy with a single widely regarded work (J.D. Salinger, God, etc.).

But here’s what I got instead:

• …after wearing [kinesiology tape] for an extended amount of time, proprioceptive deficits were improved¹
• …[kinesiology tape] decreases the rate of medial loading in MTSS [medial tibial stress syndrome] patients…²
• Facilitatory taping… enhanced the activity of the underlying muscle… inhibitory taping application did not produce significant results³
• …kinesiology tape may have limited potential to reduce pain in individuals with musculoskeletal injury; however, depending on the conditions, the reduction in pain may not be clinically meaningful⁴
• … application of kinesiology tape decreases fatigue-induced joint repositioning error⁵
• …tactile stimulation in the form of Kinesiology tape inhibits the decline of both strength and electromyography⁶
• …tape may improve static restraint in the ankle joint without altering peak motion or dynamic postural control⁷
• …for a majority there were no statistically significant differences found in both the study group and control group⁸
• …greater mean muscle activity was found when ankles were taped with nonelastic tape compared to no tape…[kinesiology] Tape had no significant effect on mean or maximum muscle activity…⁹

I’m sort of convinced that kinesiology tape can be useful for performance, because there were some encouraging results in a few studies, but I doubt most people are using it correctly. As usual, there’s a fine line between being a trend jumper and being on the cutting edge. Sure, you were eating paleo ten years ago and got your first pair of minimalist running shoes in 2006, but there’s a Soloflex, a Thighmaster, and a Shakeweight in your basement.

Perhaps the best study I reviewed was one where thirty healthy participants performed isokinetic testing under three taping conditions: true facilitative kinesiology tape, sham tape, and no tape. Participants were blindfolded for the tests, so they didn’t know which tape was being applied. There were no differences in their peak torque, total work, or time to peak torque in any of the three taping conditions. The findings would seem to indicate that the positive effects some claim to get from using kinesiology tape may be a placebo effect.

RELATED: Kinesio Taping: Does it Work?

Summary

Is that the worst thing in the world? If your bench press goes up by twenty pounds, do you care if it was a placebo gain? I don’t. Twenty pounds is twenty pounds. But here, the science isn’t telling us we’ll put twenty pounds on our bench press. It’s telling us that there are potential structural and neurological effects to be had from the tape, but more research is clearly needed.

I have no problem with athletes using whatever they think is going to help their performance, so if you like this stuff, by all means, use it. It’s not going to hurt your performance. I’m just not totally convinced that it’s going to help you, either.

References:

1. Simon J. et al. “The effect of kinesio tape on force sense in people with functional ankle instability.” Clin J Sport Med. 2014 Jul;24(4):289-94. doi: 10.1097/JSM.0000000000000030.

2. Griebert MC. et al. “Lower-leg Kinesio tape reduces rate of loading in participants with medial tibial stress syndrome.” Phys Ther Sport. 2014 Jan 29. pii: S1466-853X(14)00002-9. doi: 10.1016/j.ptsp.2014.01.001. [Epub ahead of print]

3. Gusella, A. et al. “Kinesiologic taping and muscular activity: a myofascial hypothesis and a randomised, blinded trial on healthy individuals.”  J Bodyw Mov Ther. 2014 Jul;18(3):405-11. doi: 10.1016/j.jbmt.2013.11.007. Epub 2013 Nov 8. 

4. Montalvo, AM., et al. “Effect of kinesiology taping on pain in individuals with musculoskeletal injuries: systematic review and meta-analysis.”Phys Sportsmed. 2014 May;42(2):48-57. doi: 10.3810/psm.2014.05.2057.

5. Konishi Y. “Tactile stimulation with kinesiology tape alleviates muscle weakness attributable to attenuation of Ia afferents.” Sci Med Sport. 2013 Jan;16(1):45-8. doi: 10.1016/j.jsams.2012.04.007. Epub 2012 Jun 6. 

6. Fayson SD., et al. “The effects of ankle Kinesio taping on ankle stiffness and dynamic balance.” Res Sports Med. 2013;21(3):204-16. doi: 10.1080/15438627.2013.792083.13. 

7. Briem, K. “Effects of Kinesio Tape Compared With Nonelastic Sports Tape and the Untaped Ankle During a Sudden Inversion Perturbation in Male Athletes.” Journal of Orthopaedic & Sports Physical Therapy. Volume 41, Issue 5.

8. Ptak A., et al. “The influence of short-term kinesiology taping on force-velocity parameters of the rectus abdominis muscle.” J Back Musculoskelet Rehabil. 2013;26(3):291-7. doi: 10.3233/BMR-130382. 

9. Han, JT., et al. “Effects of kinesiology taping on repositioning error of the knee joint after quadriceps muscle fatigue.” Phys Ther Sci. 2014 Jun;26(6):921-3. doi: 10.1589/jpts.26.921.

10. Poona, K.Y., et al.”Kinesiology tape does not facilitate muscle performance: A deceptive controlled trial.” Manual Therapy. DOI: 10.1016/j.math.2014.07.013. Epub 2014 Jun 19

Photos 1 & 3 courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Kinesio Taping for Performance: How It Really Works appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Over the past few decades, various methods of replicating the benefits of living a mile above sea level have been attempted, ranging from hyperbaric sleeping chambers, to low-oxygen tents, to portable hypoxic machines. If you’re not a professional athlete, most of these methods will be fairly inaccessible to you. But a hypoxic mask might be within your budget (they retail for under $100). But before we get too far into the mask idea, let’s talk about why masks have been around since 2009 and most people are only hearing about it now, in 2014.

Victor Conte and Your Training Mask

The idea of wearing a hypoxic mask got off to a rocky start when the first widely available version was introduced by Victor Conte, of BALCO fame. It looked similar to a dirty bar rag with face straps (while Conte’s reputation in the athletic world is also similar to a dirty bar rag, face straps optional). Conte was notorious for introducing products with supposed science behind them that were later proven to do nothing, or at least very little.

When he first introduced ZMA (zinc magnesium aspartate) to the sporting world, it was done by claiming that it was the secret to his athletes’ success, which we later found out was actually steroids. He even showed us a study that proved its efficacy, which he co-authored, and which was published in a reputable medical journal. Of course, we later found out it was a highly dubious online pay-to-publish journal.¹

Subsequent independent studies showed ZMA supplements to provide little-to-no performance effect in athletes.^2,3 So strikes one and two against this product, at least in terms of reaching mainstream commercial viability, were the fact that it looked absurd and was introduced by a snake-oil salesman.

The BS About Breathe Right

So, what about athlete testimonials regarding hypoxic masks and the people who swear that Conte’s mask has helped them? Glad I asked.

Remember Breathe Right strips? They looked like little pieces of tape that went over the bridge of the nose and were supposed to increase airflow and therefore oxygen uptake. Everyone in the NFL, NHL, and half the other major sports leagues wore them for a season and swore the strips helped them perform better. But they didn’t actually perform better. Nobody recorded significant improvements in any statistic their leagues track that could be attributed to the strips.

Moreover, studies not funded and/or performed by the Breathe Right company failed to show any benefit to the strips whatsoever:

• There were no effects on ventilation (rate at which air passes in and out of the lungs) or oxygen consumption⁴
• There were no significant differences in peak oxygen consumption or peak workload with and without the nasal strips⁵
• No difference between the strip and a piece of tape⁶
• No difference in post-exercise recovery⁷
• No difference for perceived exertion and perceived breathing effort during sprints⁸

Right. So that’s why we only saw athletes wearing them for a season. Plus, they looked stupid. The original hypoxic masks also looked stupid. The new ones make you look like Bane, sans Sean Connery voice. We’ve seen numerous athletes training in them already, but are they a fad like the nose tape? And what does the research say?

The Problems With Most of the Research

It’s important to note that there isn’t a tremendous body of literature on hypoxic training. In addition, the vast majority of existing research was done by having subjects exercise in a room that simulated atmospheric hypoxia (translation: the air didn’t have as much oxygen).

Other tests had subjects strap a mask to their faces with a huge oxygen regulator attached by a tube to the other end (so they couldn’t do much moving around). Those tests were typically limited to treadmill running or stationary cycling. The masks that we see being sold, well, if they work like training at altitude or in one of these special hypoxic rooms, then we can expect them to have the same effects.

Looking over the available research, here are some of the more relevant studies I found:

• Hypoxic sprint interval training (thirty-second sprints with four minutes of rest, progressing from four to seven over six sessions) showed no advantage with simulated hypoxia. But this study (six sessions total) seems too short to draw any conclusions.
• A six-week study demonstrated that sprint interval training in hypoxia upregulated muscle phosphofructokinase activity and the anaerobic threshold more than sprint interval training in normoxia, but still did not enhance endurance exercise performance.⁹ I believe this was also probably too short. I’m not saying a performance benefit with simulated hypoxia is certain, but if it’s showing improved adaptations over normoxia after six weeks, it’s not a huge leap to believe it could happen.
• However, a different study showed that hypoxic conditions combined with sprint training has the ability to stimulate glycolyitic enzyme ability, which would obviously impart a training adaptation if the effect were high enough.¹⁰
• Sprint training at hypoxia equivalent to 2,400m (five sets of three-minute work intervals) showed trends towards improving some areas. Rating of perceived exertion was higher and changes in bicarbonate levels and EPO trended towards possible improvement over normoxic conditions, but changes in 20m sprint time trended lower.¹¹
• And yet another interval training study, this time in cyclists, found no differences with hypoxic training, either by performance or measurement of monocarboxylate lactate transporter expression.¹²
• In addition, fat oxidation was shown in one study to be slightly diminished (which can be a good thing, if we’re looking for endurance and increased substrate efficiency), and had no additive effect on maximal measures of oxygen uptake (VO2peak) or time trial performance (measured under normoxia).¹³

Obviously, the results of acute hypoxic exercise are vastly different than what we see with long-term hypoxic living conditions, as we’d have with the United States Olympic teams, and even those studies have been all over the map with results. Still, with studies, the modality isn’t the sole determinant of success (and I feel that most of the training protocols in these studies were awful). We also need to examine the parameters being used to measure results.

Put another way, the Westside Conjugate Method is great for increasing leg strength, but if we measured leg strength by having Westsiders run marathons…well, you get the idea. The metrics are just as important as rest of the protocol. And I believe both the training protocols and performance metrics have thus far been inadequate to accurately describe the adaptations possible with acute hypoxic training.

An Interesting Study on Hypoxic Training

Let’s look at a study that showed some reasonable improvements. The study that meets most of my criteria was performed at the Japan Institute of Sports Sciences.¹⁴ This study used a hypoxic room versus a normoxic room, and had subjects perform eight weeks of resistance training on nonconsecutive days for sixteen sessions in total.

The hypoxic group was exposed to hypoxic conditions from ten minutes before and thirty minutes after the exercise session (vastly different than other protocols). (To the d-bags who wear hypoxic masks to the gym and take them off between sets to talk: you’re doing it wrong.) To investigate acute responses, the subjects were exposed to these conditions from thirty minutes prior to sixty minutes after, on the first and last days.

The resistance exercises consisted of two consecutive exercises (free?weight bench?press and bilateral leg?press using weight?stack machine), each with ten repetitions for five sets at 70% of the subjects’ one?repetition maximum (1RM) with a ninety second rest.

Strength and size gains were equal for both groups. During the training, levels of plasma oxygen were lower in the hypoxic group (obviously, as they were breathing less oxygen when the tests were taken) but growth hormone levels were significantly higher. The capillary-to-fiber ratio increased more in the oxygen-deprived lifters and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) levels were also higher. Meaning, the hypoxic group was producing more blood cells and better able to restore oxygen supply to tissues when blood circulation wasn’t high enough for the body’s demand.

Therefore, it’s not surprising that local muscular endurance was increased more in the hypoxic group as compared to the normoxic one. It also provides insight into another study that suggested a health benefit from regular short-term hypoxic training, namely the reduction of arterial stiffness and prevention of arteriosclerosis compared to training performed at a similar exercise intensity (under regular, non-hypoxic, conditions).¹⁵

My Conclusion on Training Masks

Which brings us back to hypoxic masks and how to use them. Recent meta-analysis indicates that high-intensity, short-term, and intermittent training is likely the most beneficial way to benefit from hypoxic training.¹⁶ If the masks being sold today can simulate the conditions seen in the study above, then there’s a good chance we’ll see someone figure out how to best use them (obviously the “just wear them when you train” protocol is going to be hit and miss at best).

Some form of brief HIIT seems to work best. I’d add that based on the Japanese study, wearing the mask before and after training is going to be essential for maximal results (and for an awesome ride to and from the gym!).

References:

1. L.R. Brilla and V. Conte, “Effects of a Novel Zinc-Magnesium Formulation on Hormones and Strength,” Journal of Exercise Physiology, Volume 3 Number 4 October 2000.

2. Wilborn, Colin D; Kerksick, Chad M; Campbell, Bill I; Taylor, Lem W; Marcello, Brandon M; Rasmussen, Christopher J; Greenwood, Mike C; Almada, Anthony; Kreider, Richard B (2004) and Koehler, K; Parr, M K; Geyer, H; Mester, J; Schänzer, W, “Effects of Zinc Magnesium Aspartate (ZMA) Supplementation on Training Adaptations and Markers of Anabolism and Catabolism,” Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition 2007(2): 12–20. doi:10.1186/1550-2783-1-2-12. PMC 2129161. PMID 18500945.

3. K Koehler, MK Parr, H Geyer, J Mester, W Schanzer, “Serum testosterone and urinary excretion of steroid hormone metabolites after administration of a high-dose zinc supplement,” European Journal of Clinical Nutrition 63 (1): 65–70. doi:10.1038/sj.ejcn.1602899. PMID 17882141.

4. White, M. D. and Cabanac, M., “Physical dilatation of the nostrils lowers the thermal strain of exercising humans,” European Journal of Applied Physiology, (1995)70, 200-206.

5. Trocchio, M., Wimer, J. W., Parkman, A. W., and Fisher, J., “Oxygenation and exercise performance-enhancing effects attributed to the Breathe Right nasal dilator.” Journal of Athletic Training, (1995): 211-214.

6. Huffman, M. S., Huffman, M. T., Brown, D. D., Quindry, J. C., and Thomas, D. Q. (1996). Exercise responses using Breathe Right external nasal dilator. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 28(5), S70.

7. Quindry, J. C., Brown, D. D., Huffman, M. S., Huffman, M. T., and Thomas, D. Q., “Exercise recovery responses using the Breathe Right nasal dilator,” Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, (1996): 28(5), S70.

8. Papanek, P. E., Young, C. C., Kellner, N. A., Lachacz, J. G., and Spirado, A., “The effects of an external nasal dilator (Breathe Right) on anaerobic sprint performance,” Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, (1996): 28(5), S182.

9. Richardson AJ, Gibson OR., “Simulated hypoxia does not further improve aerobic capacity during sprint interval training,” J Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2014 Jul 16. [Epub ahead of print] PMID: 25028984

10. Puype J1, Van Proeyen K, Raymackers JM, Deldicque L, Hespel P., “Sprint interval training in hypoxia stimulates glycolytic enzyme activity,” Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2013 Nov;45(11):2166-74. doi: 10.1249/MSS.0b013e31829734ae.

11. Buchheit M, Kuitunen S, Voss SC, Williams BK, Mendez-Villanueva A, Bourdon PC, “Physiological strain associated with high-intensity hypoxic intervals in highly trained young runners,”  J Strength Cond Res. 2012 Jan;26(1):94-105. Doi: 10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182184fcb.

12. Millet G, Bentley DJ, Roels B, Mc Naughton LR, Mercier J, Cameron-Smith D. “Effects of intermittent training on anaerobic performance and MCT transporters in athletes,” PLoS One. 2014 May 5;9(5):e95092. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0095092. ECollection 2014.

13. Robach P1, Bonne T, Flück D, Bürgi S, Toigo M, Jacobs RA, Lundby C. “Hypoxic Training: Effect on Mitochondrial Function and Aerobic Performance in Hypoxia,” Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2014 Mar 26.

15. Michihiro Kon, Nao Ohiwa, Akiko Honda, Takeo Matsubayashi, Tatsuaki Ikeda, Takayuki Akimoto, Yasuhiro Suzuki, Yuichi Hirano, Aaron P. Russell “Effects of systemic hypoxia on human muscular adaptations to resistance exercise training,” Physiological Reports Published 6 June 2014 Vol. 2 no. e12033DOI: 10.14814/phy2.12033

16. B. Shi, T Watanabe, S. Shin, T. Yabumoto, M. Takemura, T. Matsuoka. “Effect of hypoxic training on inflammatory and metabolic risk factors: a crossover study in healthy subjects,” Physiol Rep. 2014 Jan 13;2(1):e00198. doi: 10.1002/phy2.198. ECollection 2014.

17. McLean BD, Gore CJ, Kemp J. “Application of ‘live low-train high’ for enhancing normoxic exercise performance in team sport athletes,” Sports Med. 2014 Sep;44(9):1275-87. doi: 10.1007/s40279-014-0204-8.

Photo 1 courtesy of Shutterstock.

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Let’s Get Politics Out of the Way

I’d been following the politics associated with the new fitness league for the months leading up to the premier, and was aware that CrossFit HQ had issued an edict forcing their staff to choose between employment with them and competing in GRID. I had also become aware that the major supplement sponsor to CrossFit had began a campaign of persuading their sponsored athletes to stay away from GRID – and when that failed, they outright threatened athletes with loss of sponsorship or worse. I’ve no stomach for the latter, and it should suffice to say that this company ought to be more concerned with RICO than GRID.

GRID at the Garden

Madison Square Garden is sacred ground in the world of sports. The National Basketball Association and National Hockey League have both held their championships here. It’s where Joe Lewis was TKOd by Rocky Marciano and where Muhammad Ali had his first fight after refusing to enter the draft, followed by his victory over Joe Frazier. In the world of sports, there is no arena that can claim equal footing with Madison Square Garden.

Unfortunately, with a match starting at 7:00pm, rush hour traffic would have to be braved by anyone not already in the city. Here in New York City, rush hour can start as early as 4:00pm, and can end…well, it can end whenever it wants. Sir Ernest Shackleton once turned down a lucrative consulting job in the financial district purportedly because the commute was more than he could endure.

Nonetheless, after a two-hour ride that found us traversing approximately ten miles, I and the owner of CrossFit The Rack (henceforth referred to as Sully) found ourselves at the Garden. With a capacity of just under 20,000 people, it was far from packed. But in the middle of a humid summer, sitting in air conditioning for two hours is indescribably preferable to baking in the sun at the StubHub for half a week (which I did earlier this summer, as well as last).

Most of the crowd was easily identified as belonging to CrossFit boxes from the area, as they sat together in their various tribes. Honestly, this is a good night out for a local box, and while I recognized many of the gyms in attendance and a good deal of the people (I’ve ref’ed at many a local throwdown), I was actually surprised that more boxes didn’t make this a full night out. Perhaps five to ten of the staff and membership of a given box can feasibly make it out to Carson for the CrossFit Games each year (if that), but with GRID, everyone could spare a night to hang out and watch the races with their box-mates.

Having an indoor venue allows for a far better experience to the spectators, in my estimation. Besides climate, there was a four-way Jumbotron suspended from the center of the roof, which provided fans* the ability to see the action in greater detail. Additionally, the data provided by the screens (rep count, current points, placings, etc.) was essential to following the action. In this respect, the digital media on display was as slick and well produced as you’d see at any professional sporting event.

Conspicuously missing were player profiles, which is a staple in most other sports, and while I recognized certain people from past events (CrossFit Games Athletes like Bryan Diaz, former champions like Iceland Annie and Kristan Clever), I’d have liked to see their names, stats, and past accomplishments (think NFL style, where they give you height, weight, and professional accomplishments). I suspect that the relative youth of the league and the desire to not mention the C-word factors heavily into this decision.

(*Just to be clear, I’m not counted in this group, I’m not a fan of competitive exercise under any brand.)

The GRID Competition

The format of the event itself was fast paced. There were a set number of races with different elements to each race, with the first team crossing the finish line winning. Winning a race is worth two points, finishing second is worth one, and not finishing under the time cap is worth zero points. Hence, even after one team wins, the other team is incentivized to keep working. Most events were a photo finish, and I can only remember one where several seconds elapsed between the first and second place.

Some of the events were recognizable like the clean ladder, while others like Echo (which involved repeating the event twice) were exactly what I’d expected based on the name. Others…well, let’s just say that the Women’s Trio got my hopes up, but was totally not what I was expecting. However, Kristan Clever is another great field marshal on the Reign, and you could see a real esprit de corps when she was a third of their trio in the aforementioned event.

The dynamic of team sports is generally far more interesting to me than individual sports, and while the format of team play at the CrossFit Games involves an entire team, the format of GRID brings the team together in its entirety at certain points, trios at others, and co-ed pairs at still others. There is a strategy aspect found in GRID that I believe is lacking in the team competition at the CrossFit Games. In other words, I believe GRID to be far superior to the team competition seen in Carson.

Part of that assessment is the interplay seen on the field. I can’t remember what events Chris Dozios of the LA Reign actually participated in, nor do I know if GRID teams have a captain, but he was the de facto leader. Likewise, you could see the Reign’s intensity go up a notch when Becky Conzelman was in action.

Part of the allure of team sports, besides the cooperative aspect of teamwork being infused with the competitive aspect of sports, is the ability for individuals to express themselves, and make standout plays. Irving Hernandez of the Rhinos managed exactly that, when he finished forty unbroken pull ups, in an event where the Reign was forced to substitute players to hit the same number of repetitions.

Obviously this is where strategy comes into play, as does the draft – because the LA Reign had failed to draft a bodyweight specialist who could compete with Hernandez. He pulled the unbroken pull up trick more than once, and made the bodyweight portions of the races a virtual non-contest. His teammate Elijah Muhammad managed a similar feat with his rope climbs, jumping to a point on the rope that put him four pulls from the top, and even going back to do one for a teammate to insure a fault wasn’t called.

The Drama of the Challenge Flag

Rules were explained (sometimes well, other times not) by our hosts for the evening, Christmas Abbott and some guy with a black hipster fedora. General banter was reminiscent of the movie Dodgeball. Christmas handled most of the on-field interviews, which were conducted primarily during the setup between races, and with a two-hour format, really made the downtime unnoticeable and the transition between events seamless. Some rules, like faults or technicalities, warranted a bit more explanation, while once would have been enough (but apparently wasn’t) to explain that indeed, a chest-to-bar required that the participant’s chest had touched the bar.

Depending on the fault (like a no rep) and where it occurred, a team can finish second without even knowing it. Of course, this may lead to a challenge flag being thrown, and this was one of the brilliant aspects of the night, as Ian Berger approached the GRID with a red flag and a collective cheer rose from the partisan New york crowd. Everyone knew what was going down, as we’ve been conditioned from watching the NFL. It was a brilliant move to rely on known aspects of other sports to make GRID rules instantly accessible to the viewer. Execution of the challenge and instant replay, plus the ensuing do-over/mulligan? Needs work.

Berger, in his artfully askew open collar and devil-may-care five o’clock shadow, strikes me as the guy who would have had an oversized tie knot a few years back, and perhaps a faux hawk. His effort to (vaguely) answer Abbott’s question on his use of the challenge flag elicited a polite smile from her, as he issued a rambling explanation that included the words basketball, bad call, and a warning to the refs to properly count the double unders on the next event, prompting a look from my friend Sully and a “Did you hear that?” His team looked entirely leaderless, especially with Dozier’s Reign standing next to them.

My Conclusion on GRID

I’ve been to most types of New York City/New Jersey professional sporting events (Yankees, Devils, etc.), and the GRID production value was on par with any event I’d care to revisit. The pace is fast and it doesn’t leave you waiting for the next heat or the next gender, or whatever (in my case, waiting to go home). In contrast, sitting through the 2013 rope-climb event at StubHub was a long, drawn-out affair, with multiple heats and genders, and just an awful experience (even though the evening temperature was bearable).

If you dig competitive exercise or fitness competitions, are into local throwdowns, watch or go to the CrossFit Games annually, or even just have a membership at the local box, this is more than worth your time. The season is short, matches are quick and fast paced, and the production value is where it needs to be. I’m guessing the inaugural season is going to be a huge success and the second season will be even better.

Photos 1 courtesy of Anthony Roberts.

All other photos courtesy of the NPGL.

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The Argument for Selling Supplements

There’s (almost) nothing as loathsome to me as trainers who become business gurus. You have to possess an incredible amount of street cred to make that move, and honestly, it’s a turn off to athletes to read the Twitter feed of their coach and see themselves being called “clients.”

Still, for small business owners like CrossFit affiliates, knowing how much additional revenue per visit (i.e. juice bar and t-shirt sales) you can expect from everyone who steps through your doors is a necessary part of the life. Selling nutritional supplements can help…err…supplement your income. But it’s mostly former trainers we find giving everyone else business advice and offering to help by sharing their secret: you should start selling supplements, or rather, start selling the ones they’re going to tell you about.

To be honest, CrossFitters use supplements. They use a lot of total garbage, in my estimation, but that’s not really the point. The point is that you train people who are buying stuff you could sell to them. And everyone at every box I’ve ever spoken with would rather see their coach earning that money than some online retailer or local supplement store.

Obviously I’m pro-supplement. The people who drone on about “just eat right” are depriving themselves of maximal results. It’s beyond our scope here, but I’m confident in my ability to make a good case for dietary supplements being necessary to maximize a training program. I believe boxes should sell supplements because athletes will benefit from them (which benefits the coach, because they make more progress), and because there is a demand (and that money will be going into someone’s pocket, so why not yours).

I believe that selling supplements will help the average box owner by providing an additional low-maintenance revenue stream. But I don’t believe MLM supplements will accomplish this. I’m not going to name names, but let’s just say I’m talking about the big three. You can guess who they are, as they’re literally the three biggest MLM supplement companies in the CrossFit world.

Click To Tweet: Why MLM supplements are a bad deal for CrossFit boxes

What Is an MLM?

Briefly stated, multilevel marketing is when you sell products, you recruit other people to sell them, and then those people recruit people, and so forth. The person who did the initial recruiting will get a percentage of everyone’s sales down the line. Everything sold by someone you recruited or someone they recruited results in a percentage going to you.

It’s easy to understand why this is so appealing from a financial standpoint. Once you’ve recruited enough people, who keep recruiting and selling, you can retire and watch your annual income keep increasing as your sales people keep selling and recruiting.

The whole idea makes sense, because as long as everyone you recruit can come in contact with another person or two, and they can get them to do the same, then we’re talking about exponential growth in a short period of time. Put more simply, it’s the same market force as we would see driving the zombie apocalypse – each person who gets bit becomes a zombie, and bites another, and another, and pretty soon we’re waiting for Daryl and Rick to come save us from The Governor.

So What’s the Problem?

This type of program requires a somewhat aggressive sales pitch, so we often see newly minted MLM salesmen flooding their social media accounts with talk of the great new team they’ve joined and the awesome new products they’ve got. It’s annoying to see that kind of thing on someone’s Facebook page 24/7, and it doesn’t exactly ooze credibility.

Alright, so what’s my issue here? So far there’s really nothing too awful about the whole MLM thing. It’s basically just another small business venture, right? Well, not really.

Trouble comes into paradise when we start looking at the actual revenue being earned by people selling these products – which is nothing. That’s right, most people who sell products for a company that has an MLM structure earn absolutely nothing. Most people who get involved with MLM companies will end up losing money, statistically speaking.

This is true across the board, and anyone who tells you differently is lying. There is a small group of people making good money from these companies and a legion of people who never made a dime (or lost money). Some of the companies in question don’t even track statistics like this (i.e. how many people lose money working with the company), which to me is simply grasping at plausible deniability. If you’d created an amazing platform for generating wealth, you’d be documenting it and telling everyone that X percentage of your sales force is earning six figures (or whatever).

What none of these companies tell you is that they’re selling failure. Most people never earn a dime. They lose money in astonishing amounts. In fact, they lose so much money that the FTC is currently investigating a major MLM company and class actions lawsuits have started to form against them.

This model is particularly bad for box owners, because the majority of potential sales are going to be your existing clients. This means you have little ability to recruit an outside sales force with a reach that extends significantly beyond your own. So the most compelling reason to get involved with an MLM is nullified by the sheer fact that you would be limited by the same factors that make you an attractive salesperson. The upstream salesman who recruited you will earn money from you, but you’ll be unlikely to effectively do the same type of recruiting. The CrossFit affiliate model makes MLM sales particularly unattractive for a box owner because of their homogeneous sphere of influence.

Also, the margins for MLM sales, minus the recruitment factor, aren’t as good (again, painting in broad strokes) when compared to the margins you could get from a reputable distributor on similar products. Why not just sell those products instead of some other brand?

What If You Just Want to Sell, But Not Recruit?

Okay, so you aren’t going to recruit other people to sell this stuff for you, but what’s the problem with carrying the line and earning money that way? The problem is that the products, and I realize that once again I’m painting with broad strokes here, aren’t very good.

I’ve done my research into the offerings from the major MLM companies, and I don’t believe they offer anything unique or innovative to the CrossFit community. Most of the products I examined (basically all of them from all of the major players) are mediocre. Think about it: if your company made the best dietary supplements on the market, why wouldn’t you want to be sold by all of the major retailers? Why would you limit your sales to outlets where there was no competition (i.e. direct sales)?

Even if these products were equivalent to their competition, they have no advertising to speak of. We see dietary supplements marketed everywhere, from the UFC to bodybuilding contests to local fitness throwdowns. But MLM companies are almost completely absent from these venues. I was at the 2013 CrossFit Games and there were exactly zero MLM company booths.

Not a single one of these companies has invested in advertising to your market. So why in the world would you sell a product that doesn’t provide advertising assistance? Consider this: how many times have you witnessed someone asking about one of these products versus how many have you seen one of their salespersons shilling for people to join their team? I’ve never seen someone asking about a product from any of these companies. On the other hand, I can’t remember a single day when I didn’t see someone trying to recruit a new salesperson to his or her MLM team.

Yes, a big name has recently signed with an MLM company. But it’s my opinion that this was a case of necessity, since that athlete’s retirement from individual competition has already been announced and supplement companies don’t sponsor retired athletes. The MLM structure allows this athlete to continue earning money despite retirement. There are many brands that are already established in our community, several of them make decent products, and some are even owned by people who aren’t loathsome asshats. How about you patronize those companies and support the people who support your community?

The brands who invest the most into the CrossFit community, through time spent or sponsorship, are likely to be the ones who sell the greatest amount of products to us and with the greatest ease for a box owner who carries them. Of course advertising factors into this (and I realize that the best products are rarely the most heavily advertised), but you get the idea.

The conclusion is that you’re best served carrying anything but MLM products in your box. Plenty of companies sell direct to boxes, and as a bonus, if you’re regularly making bulk purchases from a supplement company, it’s easier to approach those companies and ask them to sponsor your next event or an athlete you coach, get some free samples, garner some seminar help, etc. These types of relationships with people within the community are going to take you a lot farther than the pipe dream of retiring at 45 while the zombie sales force you recruited continues to infect people.

As a final note, I’m aware that many people who are attempting to earn a living through MLM sales will feel compelled to leave a reply in the comments section of this article promoting their own brand. I’d advise against that.

I was nice enough not to mention your company by name, but you should consider the fact that I’ve worked in the supplement industry for nearly a decade and that I’ve exhaustively researched every major MLM company on the market, as well as pulled all of the lawsuits, studies, and consumer complaints. Should you decide to comment, I will gladly reply with documented facts, specific to your company. Trust me. Don’t do it.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

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And here are ten more things I know about protein that you don’t:

1. Spot Buying

Sometimes a batch of protein gets messed up during processing. Maybe the manufacturers dry it out too much when making it into a powder or they scorch it during the pasteurization process. It’s not ruined, but it’s not what companies are looking to purchase because it generally has several areas where it fails to meet product specs for the company selling it.

In these cases, a phone call is made to a client, and they’re offered a nice discount on the damaged product. This is the kind of stuff that doesn’t make it into emails. It’s still the same amount of (let’s say) casein per gram, it’s just a bit damaged (and likely less bioavailable). Maybe the flavor is off, or whatever.

But you know what isn’t damaged? The price. The company selling it to you isn’t going to knock a few bucks off the retail price just because the protein is lower quality than usual (and especially not when the end customer doesn’t know). This is called spot buying – and it’s very common.

2. Salmon Protein Hydrolysate Is Sludge Made of Organs and Bones

Salmon protein hydrolysate is a nice way to say “waste byproduct of salmon processing.” You’re not getting salmon sashimi in liquid form. You’re getting the stuff that didn’t make it to your local sushi joint – the viscera and bones. This garbage is run through a huge smasher and then hydrolyzed (enzymatically broken down) into salmon sludge, and then turned into powder.

Can it get worse? I’m glad you asked. To date there have been two studies performed on hydrolyzed salmon protein in athletes. One study resulted in zero performance benefit, and in the other it was actually shown to provide minimal benefit over carbohydrate ingestion to lesser-trained athletes, but in trained athletes, it actually decreased their performance.

3. Protein Is Not Amino Acids

I can already feel the venom oozing through the keyboards on this one. About to unleash your unbridled fury in the comments section? Hold that snarky thought for a second. Protein is made up of amino acids, but when we look at a whole protein source, the effects are disparate when measured against the aminos that make it up.

For example, whey protein has been compared with its constituent aminos (i.e. taking the exact amino acid formula of whey protein and comparing it with just those aminos, not from whey). When they were examined head to head, whey protein caused greater increases in the signaling pathway that causes muscle growth and greater post-exercise changes in the mechanisms that regulate endurance adaptations. Even if we take the exact same aminos in the same ratios and amounts, we can’t replicate the effects of the whole protein.

On a side note, it’s a logical fallacy to assume that what is true of a part is also true of the whole, and vice versa. Look it up.

4. Soy Lecithin Doesn’t Matter

Don’t get me wrong, if you’re allergic to soy, then soy lecithin can matter. But most studies show there isn’t enough soy in soy lecithin to elicit an allergic reaction. The actual amount of soy protein in soy lecithin is less than three percent. The amount of soy lecithin in your protein powder is a few hundred milligrams. So take those milligrams and slice off 97%, and that’s the actual amount of soy protein you’re getting per shake. There’s just no way we’ll see a physiological response with a few thousandths of a gram of soy protein.

There’s also an argument that the solvent used to make soy lecithin might still be present after production. In reality, the FDA mandates that a solvent be disclosed on the label if any traces are left in the final product. So unless you see the solvent listed on the label, it’s not there anymore.

5. Your Protein Isn’t Made by CrossFitters; It’s Made by Bodybuilders

This point relates to my prior article where I wrote about most protein coming from the same few places. In the case of companies catering to CrossFit, most of them are bodybuilding companies in disguise.

Pursuit-Rx is actually owned by Dymatize, and was formed after several (apparently unsuccessful) months of trying to break into the market under their own name. Nutriforce Sport is actually the same people as Betancourt Nutrition. Wfit Nutrition is Weider. You get the idea – companies who are too bodybuilder-y couldn’t enter the market with their current brand, so they started spinning off smaller brands who weren’t associated with the bodybuilding world.

I’m sure I’ll get some flack in the industry for this one, but the fact remains that most bodybuilding companies who have gotten a foothold in CrossFit and the emerging cultures (Tough Mudder, Spartan Race, World Series of Exercise), are doing it under a name far removed from the oiled up thong-wearing dorks that constitute their usual customer base.

6. Your Post-Workout Should Actually Be a Pre-Workout Shake

Most studies on post-workout nutrition were conducted on fasted individuals. So these people trained on an empty stomach, and when they consumed their post-workout protein shake, all of the biomarkers for muscle building shot through the roof. Hence, the post-workout “anabolic window” myth was born.

However, when a post-training shake was compared with a pre-training shake in a randomized study, there were no statistically relevant differences between net muscle protein balance and amino acid uptake. Moreover, if we look a bit deeper into these results, we see that throughout training, blood flow was significantly greater in the pre-workout shake group. We also find that (although not statistically relevant) 50% of the pre-workout group had greater amino acid uptake than anyone in the post-workout group.

7. Your Post-Workout Amino Acids Should Be Pre-Workout Too

Again, when a pre- versus post-workout consumption of an amino/carb drink was studied, amino acid uptake and other markers of anabolism were higher in the pre-workout group. This actually continued far past the workout itself, easily past the time when we’d have expected most people to have another meal.

8. Your L-Glutamine Might Contain Gluten

No only that, but your glutamine peptides almost certainly do. Wheat is a great source of L-glutamine. Because of this, some manufacturers use it to produce their L-glutamine products. Although not as common as it once was, using wheat to produce the much sexier sounding (and expensive) “glutamine peptides” is widespread. Obviously this can be an issue for people who avoid gluten. If you’re using L-glutamine or especially glutamine peptides, check the label to make sure it’s gluten free.

9. Chocolate Milk Can’t Live Up to the Hype

Deep down, even the contrarians who shouted the loudest about how chocolate milk was superior to commercial protein powders must have known how stupid this idea was. Even assuming post-training use only (to justify the sugar content), and figuring on a 20oz glass to get 20 grams of protein, a good protein shake is going to produce far greater results.

But what about the studies? Yeah, what about them? Well, they never looked at a realistic control group, and instead tested chocolate milk as a post-training beverage against carbohydrate + electrolyte powders in drinks or against nothing at all. The only thing those studies could conclude is that protein builds more muscle than carbs. Oh, and these studies were primarily funded by (you guessed it) the people who sell chocolate milk.

10. Your Triple Cheeseburger Is a Waste of Money

Let’s assume you are the sort of person who occasionally enjoys a nice, grass-fed, free range, cheeseburger. Telling the waiter to supersize it and bring you a triple cheeseburger isn’t going to build any additional muscle, even though you’re ingesting three times the protein. This comes from a study where 30 grams of protein (90% lean beef) was compared to 90 grams, and both increased protein synthesis by approximately 50%. If you like your burger supersized, I’ve got no problem with that – but don’t think it’s going to help you build any more muscle.

References:

1. Jason C. Sieglar et al, “The effect of carbohydrate and marine peptide hydrolysate co-ingestion on endurance exercise metabolism and performance,” Journal of International Sports Nutrition 2013; 10: 29.

2. Geir Vegge et al, “Improved cycling performance with ingestion of hydrolyzed marine protein depends on performance level,” Journal of International Sports Nutrition 2012; 9: 14.

3. A. Kanda et al, “Post-exercise whey protein hydrolysate supplementation induces a greater increase in muscle protein synthesis than its constituent amino acid content,” British Journal of Nutrition 2013 Sep 28; 110(6): 981-7.

4. A. Kanda et al, “Post-exercise impact of ingested whey protein hydrolysate on gene expression profiles in rat skeletal muscle: activation of extracellular signal-regulated kinase ½ and hypoxia-inducible factor-1α,” British Journal of Nutrition 2014 Jun; 111(12):2067-78.

5. KD Tipton, “Stimulation of net muscle protein synthesis by whey protein ingestion before and after exercise,” American Journal of Physiology – Endocrinology and Metabolism 2007 Jan; 292(1):E71-6.

6. Kevin D. Tipton et al, “Timing of amino acid-carbohydrate ingestion alters anabolic response of muscle to resistance exercise,” American Journal of Physiology – Endocrinology and Metabolism 2001 Aug: 281:E197-E206.

7. TB Symons et al, “A moderate serving of high-quality protein maximally stimulates skeletal muscle protein synthesis in young and elderly subjects,” Journal of the American Dietetic Association 2009 Sep; 109(9):1582-6.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post 10 MORE Things I Know About Protein That You Don’t appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

1. There’s No Such Thing as Undenatured Whey Protein

Here’s a fact: all whey protein sold in the United States needs to first be pasteurized. Even at the lowest temperature, that means subjecting the whey protein to a level of heat that will cause changes in some of the fractions. This doesn’t mean that the protein is useless or won’t give you all of the benefits you see touted in advertisements and studies. It just means that undenatured is a meaningless concept when we’re talking about whey protein sold legally in the United States. So unless you’re clued into the whey protein black market or some whey protein-selling crime syndicate, you’re not getting undenatured anything.

1.5. If Your Favorite Brand Sells Bioactive Peptides, Find a New Brand

Bioactive whey peptides are protein fractions that cause a measurable biological response in the body. Maybe it’s enhancing the immune system or increasing pumps (for teh gainz). Those peptides come from protein. They come from the protein you buy from that same company.

See, every pound of protein might sell for $5 at the manufacturer level, but it also might contain $10 worth of peptides in 1/10th of the weight. So they strip all of those awesome peptides out, thereby losing .50c from the protein itself, but in the process they earn double the money from the sale of the peptides they removed. You get the completely denatured protein (stripped of every biologically active peptide they could mine), and they sell you back the peptides in another product (or in the same product, claiming that they have “added peptides”).

2. Cold Filtered Whey Is Still Heated

“But my whey can’t be denatured from heat, it’s cold filtered,” I hear someone saying. That’s nice. But cold filtered is the actual filtering process that concentrates the whey into the final percentage of protein (typically +80%). The filtering has nothing to do with the fact that most manufacturers who “cold filter” their whey are still flash pasteurizing it at the highest possible temperature beforehand. Why? Because it only takes fifteen seconds to flash pasteurize whey and it takes fifteen minutes to pasteurize it at the lowest heat levels. So you can produce more whey if you only take 1/60th of the time at this stage of processing.

3. GMO/Grass-Fed Laws Are Stricter Overseas

Oh, so your whey comes from New Zealand, and you’re bragging about it being non-GMO and free range and all that good stuff? Guess what? All whey from New Zealand is going to be non-GMO and free range. Their laws are far stricter than the ones in the good ol’ United States, so it’s a bit redundant to talk about how great your New Zealand whey is when every gram of dairy the country produces is just as good. I lived in Auckland, New Zealand, and I’ve been to the dairy farms, and you’re from Maine, so you’re probably going to have to take my word on this one.

4. No Studies Ever Compared Grass-Fed Whey to Grain-Fed Dairy

Don’t get me wrong, I believe that grass-fed dairy (and beef for that matter) is superior to grain-fed. But there are no direct studies comparing them in athletes or in an exercising population. There is tons of evidence showing grass-fed animals (and their meat products) are healthier, but none on dairy in athletes. It makes a much bigger difference with meat, where the fat content can be radically altered by diet, or even with whole fat milk. But with a good whey protein, we’re talking about a gram of fat per serving. So while I still prefer grass-fed (everything), this is based more on inductive reasoning than hard and fast studies that examine these parameters in athletes.

5. A 100% Hydrolyzed Whey Protein Doesn’t Exist

I’ve seen studies that use thirty to forty percent hydrolyzed whey and spoken to the authors. It’s inedible. The reason for this is the fact that breaking down (hydrolyzing) protein is exactly what happens during the digestive process. Protein that has been 100% broken down will not stay together in any form (think about it, what would a slab of steak look like after your stomach has digested 100% of it – now imagine it as a powder). Those “100% Whey Protein Hydrolysate” jugs you see at the local nutrition chain are actually a lot lower. The “100%” claim comes from the fact that the entire jug contains hydrolyzed whey protein (no other types of protein or whey), and that protein itself has been hydrolyzed 2% (or 5% or whatever). So it’s all (100%) hydrolyzed – but only by a few percent.

6. Your Amino Acids Probably Come From Dead Kittens

Ok, I’m exaggerating – but not by much. The most popular form of amino acid production is through the chemical synthesis of keratin, which requires far fewer steps (and is therefore less costly) than other methods. Keratin is abundantly supplied in hair, nails, claws, and fur. Short of staking out every hair and nail salon in China (where most aminos are sourced), producers instead make them from animals whose pelts are not good enough to use for clothing. So maybe the pelt was damaged in the slaughter process or some other horrific industrial accident. That pelt is worthless as clothing, but can still be used to synthesize leucine (or whatever). I’d estimate 95% of manufacturers are using this process or a similar one, and I’m really good at estimating horrific, awful, stuff like this.

7. Twenty Grams of High-Quality Protein Is Usually Enough

Selling more protein makes the manufacturer more money, and having a huge protein-grams-per-serving count on the label helps them win fans in the bodybuilding community. But nearly every study that looks at a decent protein source, like egg or whey, usually concludes that the additional stimulation of myotropic (muscle building) or recovery factors isn’t greatly enhanced after twenty grams.

8. Worthless Aminos Are Often Substituted for Expensive Proteins

Within the industry this is known as protein spiking. Cheap aminos like glycine are used to pad the protein content of otherwise expensive whey. So if a pound of whey comes in at $6, and a pound of glycine is a $2, maybe two to three grams of the latter are put in the former. Since it’s an amino and not a whole protein, it’s providing those grams at a much lower cost, and doesn’t appear on the label as another protein form, thereby allowing the manufacturer to still (legally) claim “100% whey” or “100% casein.” I know of one brand that uses creatine (technically an amino) to spike their protein, which as a bonus is super-easy to flavor. Their protein is delicious. Now you know why.

9. Twenty Grams of Protein Usually Isn’t

Protein bars are notorious for under-dosing protein and overstating the amount on the label. This is a bit of an open secret in the industry, and although powders are better, they’re still under-dosed in a lot of cases. Naturally, the yummy carbs are the exact opposite – you’ll find far more in the bar than you see on the label.

9.1 Twenty Grams of Protein Usually Isn’t (Part Two)

Hydrolyzed collagen is technically protein. But it doesn’t build much muscle, and it has a biological value of virtually nil. I’m talking about the stuff we’ve been seeing in gels and goops for the past decade (allegedly, there are some recent forms that aren’t useless, however it’s unlikely that your favorite brand is using them). Gels are obviously the worst offender here, but those little protein shots are pretty bad also.

10. Most Protein Comes From the Same Place(s)

If you were to walk the aisles of your local supplement retailer, you’d see dozens of different brands of protein. But if you were to see the actual manufacturers of the protein itself (the people all of those brands are buying it from), you’d see far fewer companies. There are probably ten major players in the field of powdered protein, and that’s being generous. They’re not just huge; they own other companies that we think are huge.

Glanbia, for example, produces a lion’s share of the dairy products in Ireland. They’re a billion-dollar company, they own BSN as well as Optimum Nutrition, and they do contract manufacturing for tons of other companies, both big and small (well, medium). So, when you see Brand X Casein and the store house brand and BSN and ON, all sitting next to each other, there’s actually a good chance that the protein in the jugs is identical. And Glanbia is the manufacturer behind the most popular protein brand(s) in the CrossFit world, if we’re keeping score at home.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

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