To supplement or not to supplement....that is the question

Written by top level Personal Trainer Matthew Card

There are many opinions on the use of supplements - "there's no need for them", "there expensive", "You can get all your nutritional needs from food". To a degree I believe some of those opinions to be true, but country to that, supplements certainly have a place in some people's training and diet regime.

So why do I say that... well anyone who wants to achieve a fitness or weight loss goal can do it without supplements - no questions! But let’s look at 2 main areas where supplementation is focused on: Muscle Gain and Weight Loss

Muscle Gain:

So most guys would admit they wouldn’t mind packing on a little more muscle just to look good in the mirror, so maybe a full blown supplementation program isn’t what they require. However if you are looking to put on some serious muscle size and body mass there is no question that you will require some kind of supplement program to aid your training and recovery. If you are training 2-3 time per day as most body builders and athletes do - then to think that they can solely rely on whole foods as there source of fuel is un realistic. To maintain this level of activity and peak performance day to day is stress on the body and they need to take on fuel quickly and efficiently. Your body takes time and energy to breakdown whole foods. Food will also stay in your stomach and small intestines (where 90% of nutrients are extracted) for 2-6 hours where as 200 - 400ml of protein shake would be absorbed by the body in around an hour (depend if you mix with water or milk). Then there's the cost of using solely whole foods - we know for maximum muscle gain you need 1.8g - 2.0g of protein per kg of bodyweight - also that the body can only effectively absorb around 30g of protein per serving. So your eating 6 times per day to keep up with your training - lets say you eat half a breast of chicken per meal (only 84g portion)  that’s 3 whole fillets per day - the average cost for decent chicken is £3.90 for 3 fillets, so that’s 84 fillets and £109.20p per month! I think I'd be sick of chicken by then! Where as a tub of top end quality protein will cost £45 Max, it’ll last you over a month and will also contain BCAA among other things to aid good recovery and growth.

Weight Loss:

My experience with people looking to lose weight is that they either eat too much and don’t exercise or the exercise and don’t eat! Majority of people believe that by 'starving' themselves that they will lose weight - when infact the opposite is true as we all know! Now if someone looking to loose weight who is used to maybe eating 1-2 times per day - then suddenly is expected to start eating 3 meals and 2 snacks per day and exercising, may find this a real challenge - not only physically but mentally - there immediate reaction is "your asking me to eat more to loose weight....your mad!!" In truth we know that it's important for people to eat little and often of the correct macro nutrients ratio to maintain optimum blood sugar levels, to help the metabolism speed up. So a meal replacement is a good option for these people to start to change there nutritional behaviors, then when there body is used to taking on food and is demanding it at the required times, they can then choose whole foods. With those who simply eat too much (and mainly of the wrong things) meal replacements can be a solution to portion control and insight as to how whole food meals should be structured, as I would only recommend a meal replacement supplement that has the correct macro nutrient levels, Low GI and low/0 sugar - otherwise your setting clients up for a fall later on.

There are those who achieve there goal with out supplementation and I know there are those who put achieving there goal partly down to the use of supplementation. IMOHO I think we should all try to adopt a more healthy whole food lifestyle, but I also know that there is a need for supplementation in certain circumstances.

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