supplementation

It is the first day of 2014 and with every new year people make good resolutions – from doing more sports, to eating healthier or quit smoking. The most common one may be to finally lose weight. Well... I am not a nutritionist nor is this a blog that shall help you get into shape. It´s enough when I do this and write about it. But I started a little ´experiment´ approximately two months ago and which I am going to write about today.

If you are training martial arts or another sport competitively you automatically get introduced to supplements. The list of the effects the manufacturers promise is even longer than the list of supposedly magic potions on the nutrition market. Since I've had the idea of studying sport science in my head for a couple of years now, and compete in MMA, I have a huge interest and desire to understand how the performance of an athlete is linked to his or her nutrition.

Thousands of scientific papers and doctoral dissertations were published on this topic; and for those of you who have ever entered a fitness center know that there are twice as many opinions on each of these topics. During the last couple of years, every now and again, I read dietary guides, threads in bodybuilding communities, listened to people who studied sports science and read advices of famous fighters, coaches and also scientific papers as well as summaries of studies.

Because of this diversity of way more qualified sources available, I don´t want to give advice of what you should eat or give an scientific prove why it works what I do (or why I believe that it works the way I'm doing it). Instead, I´ll simply share my experiences with you.

For me, it was always surpising how much certain studies can contradict each other – basically, science suspects a lot about how our body works, but actually knows little. The newer, more complicated or more promising a supplement is, the more different the opinions on the question of it´s effectiveness. After searching for the holy grail of ´right nutrition´ for a while, I decided to change my tactic: Instead of trying to find the ´truth,´ I want to get as much as possible out of all the different theories and put together what I think sounds reasonable and is more or less well investigated.

Personally I am a person who believes in the power of nature. I always prefer natural medicine before chemical ones. My experience has shown me that this works well for me. Basically, you can´t get any better nutrition than eating fresh, unprocessed foods. So before paying for expensive supplements, my nutrition has to be perfect already. Thus I try to eat a wide variety of foods, avoiding fast food and artificials foods, flavour enhancers. In addition, I prefer rice instead of noodles and avoid industrial sugar.

And the tuning?
I started to take supplements two months ago, because the circumstances are perfect right now: My nutrition is really, really good,,I train two times a day and my body can rest a lot – no energy is ´wasted´ on school or work. So, if supplements have a positive effect, than it´s the perfect time to try some.

My nutriton selection is basic: Whey protein, a protein complex, fish oil and BCAA´s.

I´ll give a short comprehension of why I take them – this is not a complete explanation of how these supplements effect the body or what their task is. It´s more an overview: The internet is filled with information abouth these supplements.

The proteins

If there is one thing that science knows about nutrition, then it is the fact that mucles are built by taking proteins. How much protein you need daily is controversial. Nonetheless, studies showed that, especially right after training, the consumption of whey protein (the fastest absorbed protein), leads to better regeneration and strenght growth. The process of regeneration starts faster and your muscles are repaired sooner and more effectively.
I have two shakes daily: both are taken right after each training sessions. Additionally I eat a banana in order to prevent the body from using the proteins to get energy . Instead, the body should use the carbohydrates given to it by the banana.

Furthermore I have a shake with different kinds of proteins right before I go to bed so there is no gap in supplies during the most important recovery phase, the sleep.

The fish oil capsules

The problem is that I don´t cook myself here (I don´t even have a kitchen in my flat) and so it´s impossible to get enough Omega 3 fatty acids. But these are really important for the body, inter alia for the absorbtion of vitamins, and should be part of every diet. You find them for example in fat fish, walnutoil or linseed oil. But fat fish is not a part of typical Thai cuisine and the oils are really expensive. So having fish oil capsules daily is the easiest and cheapest way.

Fish oil is simply a necessary part of a balanced diet.

The BCAA´s

BCAA is definitely the most controversial part of my diet. Studies that investigated the advantage athletes have after taking BCAA´s before and after training contradict each other because, one factor being that, it is too difficult to meassure the effects. But it is believed that BCAA´s protect the muscles from being used as a source of energy during long workouts, what leads to enhanced recovery.
First, I was sceptic but eventually I decided to take BCAA´s because of the overwhelming amount of positive reviews from different sources online. Give it a chance.


So what is the result after two months of good nutrtion + a basic supplementation? I didn´t grow huge muscles or become really bulk, nor did I suffer any negative effects. But what definitely increased is the effectiveness of my recovery process. I have less aching muscles and recover way faster after having a day off.
The supplements didn´t turn my training world up side down and they are definitely not magic potions.But combined with a natural, healthy nutrition they definitely help achieve your athletic goals.

As you see, the explanation of the effects of each supplements is really short – I thought about making them longer, but I don´t want to start a discussion about the effect, or non-effect, of certain supplements. Nonetheless, I wanted to share my experience.

I will go on taking supplements and maybe have a break to see if I feel a difference then again. To prove twice to myself that it works... or even answer the question tconcerning he necessity of supplements.

But so far, I am content with the effect they have on my recoveryprocess. I will write again about my little experiment in a few months.