Does creatine help or hinder endurance performance...

One of the vital researched dietary supplements in the marketplace is creatine. Creatine mixed with power coaching has been proven to persistently assist people achieve extra muscle mass, power, energy, and muscle perform throughout the lifespan (from adolescents to older adults). The results on endurance efficiency are a lot much less studied, however there’s a rising physique of proof that creatine can profit endurance athletes in important race conditions similar to ending kicks or breakaways (1).

As mentioned in a previous blog creatine is constituted of three amino acids, arginine, glycine, and methionine. Your physique could make its personal creatine inside your liver and pancreas, albeit at a restricted price. Due to this fact, to maintain up with the conventional day by day lack of creatine, we should both ingest creatine containing meals and or complement with creatine. Purple meat, seafood, and hen are all nice sources of dietary creatine; nonetheless, these are all animal meals. If you’re a vegetarian or vegan, you should have decrease quantities of creatine inside your muscle tissues. The excellent news is that additionally, you will be extra conscious of taking a creatine complement (2).

Importantly, even in the event you ingest these creatine containing meals, most individuals who complement with creatine will get ~20% enhance in creatine into their muscle tissues (3). In principle, creatine supplementation gives the muscle with extra phosphocreatine. Phosphocreatine might be damaged down very quickly to resynthesize adenosine triphosphate (ATP), as required to assist intense muscular contractions, similar to sprinting or performing a breakaway in a biking race. Principally, it provides your muscle tissues a larger capability to generate vitality shortly.

Creatine will get transformed into phosphocreatine which is saved vitality and helps excessive depth train. Creatine may affect endurance efficiency in quite a lot of different methods, together with by buffering hydrogen ions and by facilitating glycogen resynthesis. We all know that glycogen shops have to be regular to excessive initially of a marathon or a biking race, that’s as a result of carbohydrates get saved as glycogen and glycogen is the predominate gasoline used throughout endurance occasions (See this weblog about the role of muscle glycogen).

Glycogen could make ATP at a sooner price than fats and makes use of much less oxygen to take action, making it a extra economical gasoline. Apparently, combining creatine with carbohydrates can facilitate glycogen resynthesis and could also be an essential mechanism whereby creatine can additional profit endurance athletes. There may be additionally proof that creatine can cut back oxidative stress and irritation following endurance actions, which can improve acute restoration.

One fascinating research (4), carried out in rats, examined muscle variations utilizing continual low frequency stimulation with and with out creatine. Low frequency electrical alerts had been despatched to the muscle tissues of the rats to evoke a muscle contraction time and again, for 12 hours a day. The sort of experimental mannequin causes a sturdy enhance in mitochondria and oxidative capability however tends to impair the quick twitch fibers. Apparently, the rats that supplemented with creatine had the identical enhance in oxidative capability however preserved their quick twitch traits. These findings have to be replicated in people however counsel that endurance athletes engaged in a high-volume coaching camp or excessive quantity coaching part ought to contemplate creatine to assist keep their quick twitch fibers, that are essential for sprinting or working quick.

It’s important to make use of proof collected from top quality scientific investigations to assist our sport diet choices, nonetheless, it is very important notice that laboratory-based assessments could not completely symbolize what happens in “actual” races. For instance, race dynamics together with modifications in elevation, course design, and rivals pacing methods all would possibly affect how an athlete paces themselves. There are a couple of distinctive research which have tried to shut the hole between conventional regular state laboratory testing and what happens within the discipline. For instance, Engelhardt and colleagues (5) had aggressive triathletes carry out half-hour of train at an depth slightly below lactate threshold adopted by 10 fifteen second sprints earlier than one other bout of sub threshold train. The sort of mannequin allowed the researchers to see if creatine may affect brief sprints immersed in endurance train. They discovered that creatine improved their sprinting energy output by 18%.

One other research (6) performed in well-trained cyclists (~65 mL·kg-1·min-1) examined the consequences of a 120 km time trial interspersed with alternating 1 and 4-km sprints each 10-kms. The authors reported that creatine improved the ultimate 1 and 4-km sprints regardless of not statistically bettering the whole time trial efficiency. The authors instructed that creatine could assist with last breakaway makes an attempt in a biking race. Additionally they examined the affect of physique mass achieve utilizing a time to exhaustion protocol on an 8% incline at 90% of VO2max. The creatine mediated enhance in physique mass had no detrimental impact on hill climbing efficiency. In distinction, utilizing weight bearing (working) regular state train, creatine had a detrimental affect on endurance efficiency. There may be additionally proof that creatine may also help with the ending kick in a race. For instance, in a gaggle of swimmers receiving creatine (10 g/day) for 7 days their last 50-m dash occasions had been sooner in a 400-m race (7).

Total, creatine does seem to play a small helpful function in endurance efficiency, significantly, if the occasions contain modifications in tempo, breakaways, or ending kicks. The creatine mediated achieve in physique mass could also be a consideration for weight bearing sports activities however doesn’t seem to have any detrimental impact in non-weight bearing actions together with biking and swimming. Runners could contemplate creatine dietary supplements when performing excessive quantity coaching or to reinforce power coaching variations.

Fascinated about creatine and athletic efficiency? Watch our webinar recording on The latest on creatine with Scott Forbes, Darren Candow, and Abbie Smith-Ryan.

1. Forbes, S. C., Candow, D. G., Neto, J. H. F., Kennedy, M. D., Forbes, J. L., Machado, M., … Antonio, J. (2023). Creatine supplementation and endurance efficiency: surges and sprints to win the race. Journal of the Worldwide Society of Sports activities Vitamin, 20(1).

2. Burke DG, Chilibeck PD, Parise G, Candow DG, Mahoney D, Tarnopolsky M. Impact of creatine and weight coaching on muscle creatine and efficiency in vegetarians. Med Sci Sports activities Exerc. 2003 Nov;35(11):1946-55.

3. Kreider RB, Kalman DS, Antonio J, Ziegenfuss TN, Wildman R, Collins R, Candow DG, Kleiner SM, Almada AL, Lopez HL. Worldwide Society of Sports activities Vitamin place stand: security and efficacy of creatine supplementation in train, sport, and drugs. J Int Soc Sports activities Nutr. 2017 Jun 13;14:18.

4. Putman CT, Gallo M, Martins KJ, MacLean IM, Jendral MJ, Gordon T, Syrotuik DG, Dixon WT. Creatine loading elevates the intracellular phosphorylation potential and alters adaptive responses of rat fast-twitch muscle to continual low-frequency stimulation. Appl Physiol Nutr Metab. 2015 Jul;40(7):671-82.

5. Engelhardt M, Neumann G, Berbalk A, Reuter I. Creatine supplementation in endurance sports activities. Med Sci Sports activities Exerc. 1998 Jul;30(7):1123-9.

6. Tomcik KA, Digicam DM, Bone JL, Ross ML, Jeacocke NA, Tachtsis B, Senden J, van Loon LJC, Hawley JA, Burke LM. Results of Creatine and Carbohydrate Loading on Biking Time Trial Efficiency. Med Sci Sports activities Exerc. 2018 Jan;50(1):141-150.

7. Anomasiri W, Sanguanrungsirikul S, Saichandee P. Low dose creatine supplementation enhances dash part of 400 meters swimming efficiency. J Med Assoc Thai. 2004 Sep;87 Suppl 2:S228-32.