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The Effects of Creatine on the Body

Aside from the noticable gain in muscle mass and strength what are the effects of creatine on your body? What is happening to make you stronger and bigger when you take creatine? Will creatine help you add 5, 10 or even 15 pounds of lean muscle mass?

These are different questions with different answers. First lets look at why creatine makes you stronger.

Creatine helps to provide energy for our muscles. When a muscle contracts the first 10 seconds or so is fueled by adenosine-triphosphate (ATP). ATP is very efficient at fueling the muscles for quick and explosive movements, such as weight lifting. After 10 seconds the muscle has exhausted its supply of ATP and more is needed. That is where creatine comes in.

The body stores its creatine as creatine phosphate. The creatine phosphate is able to give up its phosphate molecule to adenosine-diphosphate (ADP) to create more ATP. If you have more creatine phosphate available then you can increase the rate of ATP synthesis as well as the amount of ATP synthesized. Studies have shown that supplementing with creatine can increase the amount of creatine phosphate in the muscles up to 20%. It allows you muscles to do a greater amount of work for a longer time. For you and me this means heavier weights and more reps. And that means increased muscle hypertrophy, which brings us to why creatine makes us bigger.

Actually, creatine increases the bodies size and weight through two ways. The first I have already mentioned. Because creatine allows us to lift heavier and longer we stimulate more muscle fibers and thus gain muscle mass from that route. But there is more.

Creatine also causes the muscles to hold water. Not like the water retention that makes you look smooth, but instead it pulls water into the spaces between your muscles cells. This makes the muscles fuller and bigger and also increases muscle mass and weight. Over the longer term studies indicate that the increase in muscle mass is more than just water. One possibility that seems to have merit is that the increased pressure in the muscle stimulates protein synthesis. That’s how our muscles grow. There are also studies that show an increase in the positive nitrogen balance which would also lead to increased protein synthesis and a decrease in protein breakdown.

There is no need to worry about side effects with creatine.

There is also no need to cycle creatine or stop using it. Nor does it become necessary to increase your dose. If you do choose to stop you will likely experience a small drop in weight as some water leaves you muscles. You may also lose some strength, but there is no reason to expect that you will lose any of your muscle mass.

In closing let me remind you that it is not the creatine that causes your increase in strength and size. The creatine just makes that possible. It is your hard work, intensity and dedication to your workouts that will cause you to grow. There is no replacement for this so just get out there, lift big and grow!

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  5. What Is A Good Creatine Level?

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