Category: Training

The Benefits of Implementing Creatine

Why is Creatine Important?

Michael Jeffrey, MS, CSCS

Supplementation and how to implement those supplements into a diet and training regimen are topics that I get asked about on a weekly basis. Specifically I am usually asked “Do I need supplements?” and “What supplements should I be taking?” These questions are usually asked because most people think that supplements are the only way to obtain your health, wellness, and athletic goals, which is far from the truth. Supplements are a good tool to help you reach your goals, but I will always tell you that real food should always be your main priority. For example, if you are having trouble meeting your daily protein intake, then a protein powder might be a useful supplement for you. There are just a lot of unregulated supplements, so you must do the research on everything that is going into your body.
With that being said the one supplement I will always suggest for athletes and the general fitness population is creatine. For increased performance during high intensity exercise and improved lean muscle mass creatine is hands down one of the best supplements you can take. It is not only a cheap (10-20$), but it is also a natural substance that is found in the beef, chicken, and fish that we eat. Even though creatine can be found in the meats we are eating, it is unlikely that you are getting enough creatine through your diet so supplementation is essential.

What is Creatine?

Creatine is a natural substance in our body that turns into creatine phosphate which helps to make ATP (energy source and fuel for our workouts).

How Does Creatine Work?

Once the creatine is in our body it will drive the muscle contractions to fuel the ATP which is what gives us our energy during exercise. Using creatine supplementation will increase our phosphocreatine stores helping our body to produce more ATP. With more ATP you will have more energy during those high intensity workouts.

The Benefits of Using Creatine

• Your muscles will recover faster and you will see increases in lean muscle mass and overall strength. This is attributed to the new proteins in your body and an increase in muscle building hormones.
• Your energy will be increased during those high intensity workouts due to a larger number of ATP.
• Your body will see less cellular damage and an overall reduction in inflammation to help reduce the duration of your muscle soreness.
• Your cardiovascular system will be more efficient during exercise, thus improving power, endurance, and performance.
• Some studies have shown improved brain function because creatine will help the brain utilize ATP for energy helping with memory and overall daily function.
• Creatine can help to stop brain cell death to help fight against Alzheimer’s disease and strokes.
• Supplementing creatine daily can stop the reduction of Dopamine in the brain to help protect against Parkionson’s disease.

How Should I Take Creatine?

As I stated earlier creatine is a substance that can be found in food, but it would be very difficult to get the sufficient amount of creatine you would need just from your diet. The daily recommended dose of creatine is about 5 grams per day which would be the equivalent of 3 pounds of chicken. This does not mean you need to cut back on your protein intake, but you should be taking 5 grams every single day to see the benefits.
If you do choose to take creatine you have to make sure that you are drinking 8 to 10 cups of water per day, or you may see some adverse side effects. Creatine will cause the muscles to draw water from the rest of your body so you want to stay hydrated to avoid dehydration and to help the body process the creatine. Your muscles will hold on to this water possibly causing weight gain which is completely normal when taking this supplement.

Do I Need to Load Creatine?

Over the years there have been mixed results when it comes to studies on a loading phase with creatine. Basically when you perform a loading phase with creatine you will take 20-25 grams per day for a week before maintaining with 5 grams per day. The idea behind this is to saturate the muscles with creatine so only a small dosage is needed after a week. This loading phase can be performed if you choose, but the research is still mixed if the loading phase is really necessary.

In Conclusion

After reading this blog hopefully many of you can see how beneficial this supplement really is. I can personally tell you that after using creatine I not only saw an improved performance in the gym, but increased strength levels as well. With all the expensive supplements that the fitness industry is trying to sell why not try something that is inexpensive and proven to work. I am not saying that this is the key to reaching all of your goals whether that be athletic performance or general fitness, but it is a great tool to add to the tool box.

With all of this being said creatine is a substance that should not be abused. It should be taken as prescribed above or you will see some adverse side effects.

Strength Training for Distance Runners

Proper strength training is an essential component if you want to get the most out of your ability as a runner. Running in conjunction with strength training will not only make you a more efficient runner, but it will also help prevent injury. The following article will debunk some myths when it comes to strength training for running, and help give you an idea of what you need to do to help improve your running:

5 Common Myths About Strength Training for Distance Runners

 

Interval Training

Why Interval Training Is Superior

By: Michael Jeffrey, MS CSCS

What is interval training?

Interval training is a form of conditioning that utilizes specific work-to-rest ratios. This method increases the storage and delivery of energy for physical activity in an individual, also known as metabolic conditioning.

How do I interval train?

Interval training sessions are performed by doing a bout of exercise for a specific period of time followed by a period of rest to allow the body to recover. The length of the rest period will be dictated by the conditioning of the individual and the intensity of the work period.
What are the benefits of interval training?
Generally when people do cardio or conditioning they either implement interval training or steady state activities (walking or jogging for extended periods of time). Both will lead to positive health changes, but interval training is far more efficient and beneficial when it comes to achieving your fitness goals.
A popular form of interval training is called a tabata, which is a type of high intensity work out. During a tabata an individual will utilize movements that can include bodyweight, medicine ball, and moderate plyometrics. These movements will be performed for a total of 4 minutes using a work to rest ratio of 20 to 10. This just means that you will perform the movement using intervals of 20 seconds with 10 seconds of rest in between. You can choose to do multiple bouts of 4 minutes, but that will depend on the conditioning of the indinvidual. Generally this is for more advanced athletes, and a high level of fitness is needed to complete this type of circuit.

Why is this superior to aerobic training?

1. Improved VO2 max and Anaerobic capacities
• Studies have shown that short high intensity workouts can improve your cardiovascular adaptations more than steady state running, along with improving your anaerobic capacities which will be more related to sprinting.

2. More Time Efficient
• You can see more improved health qualities by doing short high intensity workout lasting under ten minutes. Running can be tedious and hard on the joints with less of an overall benefit.

3. Easy to Individualize
• You can choose your own work to rest ratios based off your own conditioning level. If you are an advanced athlete with a high level of conditioning you can choose to use work to rest ratios that are around 1:1. If you are a beginner with a lower level of conditioning you can start off with a work to rest ratio of 1:3 and work your way up to 1:1.

4. Burn More Calories
• The spike in your metabolism will be much higher after a bout of high intensity interval training compared to steady state running. This means that your total calories burned will be much higher performing high intensity work that takes much less time.

5. Movement Variety
• A beginner can use a bike or a rowing machine to do intervals until they have achieved a fitness level to do more complex movements.

Sample 1:2 Work to Rest Interval Circuit
• Squat Jumps: 20s
• Rest: 40s
• Split Squat Jumps: 20s
• Rest:40s
• Med Ball Slams: 20s
• Rest: 40s
• Bodyweight Squats: 20s
• Rest: 40s
• Push Up: 20s
• Rest 40s
Perform this circuit 5 times through resting a minute between each circuit.

 

 

 

 

 

The Key to Being Fast

The following article written by Michael Boyle stresses the importance of the first 10 yards when it comes to being a faster athlete.

Does It All Come Down to the First Ten Yards?

Michael Boyle www.strengthcoach.com

I have always been a ten yard dash proponent. When we test speed, regardless of sport we test the ten yard dash. In fact, I wrote an article previously that questioned whether we really ever tested speed in most team sports. If we choose to be specific, what we really evaluate with tests like the 40 yard dash is acceleration. The best sprinters in the world accelerate for up to sixty meters. That means that each ten yard split continues to get lower up to sixty meters in a world-class sprint race. A forty yard dash is a test of acceleration ability, not speed if we want to get our physics right.

The only athletes who actually ever run a forty yard dash are my NFL Combine or Pro Day athletes. Even these athletes only run the forty at the actual workouts. We never run a forty in training. In fact, over eighty percent of our training is done for ten yards, working to increase power and decrease steps. Less than twenty percent is done for 15-20 yards. In fact in over twenty years of training athletes for the NFL Combine I have never had an athlete run a forty yard dash prior to being tested by a pro scout. In spite of this, or perhaps because of this, my athletes have routinely tested well at the NFL Combine. Numerous years we have had the fastest athlete at a given position. My hesitance to run a forty prior to the Combine or the Pro day was based on a simple concept. If you are injured you can’t run the forty on the day that really matters. In the NFL evaluation process injuries at the wrong time can be career killers.

One problem arises in this process. Athletes want to know what they will run in the 40. In order to increase the ability to project 40 yard dash times from ten yard dash times I have been closely studying the segmental breakdowns of the forty yard dash from past NFL Combines to see if there was discernable pattern. I analyzed the data to see if there was a consistent formula that could be applied. The results were surprising.

It is important to clarify that initially the ten yard dash was the focus of our training primarily because the most frequent injury seen in athletes doing Combine or Pro Day prep work is a hamstring strain. In fact hamstring strains are the most consistent injury problem seen in sprinters. These hamstring strains are almost always the result of running repeat forty yard dashes in preparation for the testing. Curiously enough I have never seen a strain occur in a ten yard dash. The 10 yd dash is a great test that is close to100% safe. However, athletes being evaluated still need to run the 40 or in the case of baseball, the sixty.

In addition to the obvious injury prevention/ reduction/ avoidance angle, we have always concentrated on the 10 yard dash for the simple reason that the first ten yard segment, the start if you will, is the easiest area to improve. The first ten yard segment, although equal in length to each following ten yard segment takes more than 1.5 times as long to run. This may seem obvious as this is the “zero to sixty phase” of the vaunted forty yard dash. However to really understand the significance it is important to look at some data.

Below is a comparison of two athletes from the 2003 NFL Combine in the forty yard dash. Athlete 1 is 188 lbs. and ran a very respectable 4.59 in the forty yard dash. Athlete 2 is 236 lbs. and ran a 4.70, also a respectable time for a 236 lb athlete. The data gets significantly more interesting when broken down into ten yard segments:

Athlete 1: 10 yard (1.59) 10-20 (1.06) 20 yard (2.65) 20-40 (1.94) 40 yard 4.59

Athlete 2: 10 yard (1.70) 10-20 (1.05) 20 yard (2.75) 20-40 (1.95) 40 yard 4.70

When looking at the data one thing immediately jumps out. Both athletes ran from 10-20, 20-40 and 10-40 in nearly identical times. In fact athlete 1 obtained the entire differential in the times ( .11) during the first ten yard segment. Athlete 1 may in fact not be faster, he simply accelerates better. His “speed” is no greater, however his initial acceleration is significantly better. This graphically demonstrates how critical the initial rate of acceleration was in the race. Athlete 1 obviously has less inertia to overcome and as a result accelerates faster but, this faster initial acceleration corresponds exactly to the difference in forty yard dash times.

Two important things to note. One, this definitely reinforces my feeling about the importance of the start and of the first ten yard segment. Two, the result reinforces the importance of strength development in improving forty yard dash performance.

Many of you will say that this is a generalization. In fact, it is a generalization based on common sense. Smaller athletes with exceptional acceleration have run as low as 2.8 from 10-40 while exceptionally large athletes ( 300+) were show to run a high as 3.4. However these were extreme cases. In general to estimate 40 yd dash times from 10 yard dash times you can do the following:

For athletes under 200 lbs. assume a low of 2.8 seconds and a high of 3.0 seconds added to the 10 time.

For athletes from 200-250 you can add 3.0 to 3.2 seconds to the 10

For athletes 250-350 you can add 3.0 to 3.4 seconds to the 10.

In any case, the data clearly shows that working on the initial ten yard segment of the forty yard dash is both the safest and the fastest route to lowering your forty time.