Strong and Fit: Lose Fat, Build Muscle

Something Vince Delmonte said in one of the No-Nonsense Muscle Building videos has kind of stuck with me. It goes kind of like this:

We can't always perfectly control our diet.  You may go out with your friends, for example, and they all want pizza.  But you should at least control what is coming into your own kitchen!

It's kind of lame if we say we want to get in better shape but we load up our own refrigerators and cabinets with junk.  Whatever we put in our kitchen will eventually get eaten.

Just think about it--plan things carefully next time you go to the grocery store. 

NOTE: For those interested in weight loss, Vince has a program called Your Six Pack Quest.

Congratulations, Saints! Here's an interview with Drew Brees.

The supplement industry brings us another hyped-up product: Hyper Gain.  The website has "The Case Against Creatine" in bold letters, explaining why Hyper Gain is supposedly better. 

The website claims creatine monohydrate rapidly converts to creatinine, a waste product:

Now, Let me ask you something.  How would creatine do any good if it had a 100% conversion rate to creatinine (a waste product)?  How would we end up with all these studies showing the efficacy of creatine monohydrate supplementation? You can also see my review of Kre-Alkalyn and Creatine-Ethyl-Ester to understand why I'm so skeptical about any new "super-creatine" formula.

The website also shows some of Hyper Gain's ingredients:
Let's look at a few of them:

*I've already explained why I'm very skeptical of Kre-Alkalyn. 

*I've already reviewed tribulus terrestris (short version: waste of money).

*Alpha lipoic acid is an antioxidant.  It also appears to help with blood sugar and insulin sensitivity, but these benefits seem to come with much higher doses than what I see in this product.

In other words, I'm not impressed with this formula. 

Now let's look at one of the studies I downloaded from the Hyper Gain website:

Results: The Creatine Monohydrate group showed an average increase over baseline of 8.39% for the snatch, clean, jerk, high snatch, back squat. The Kre-Alkalyn group showed an average increase over baseline of 10.76%.  By comparison, the average increase in total lifts for the Kre-Alkalyn group in the snatch, clean, jerk, high snatch, back squat was 28.25% over the Creatine Monohydrate group.

Additionally, the Kre-Alkalyn group appeared to be healthy without any side effects from daily Kre-Alkalyn administration.  No significant changes in body weight for either the Creatine Monohydrate group or the Kre-Alkalyn group were noted.

Here are my questions:

*If creatine monohydrate (CM) converts to creatinine as this website claims, how did the CM group make any gains?

*How did they come to the 28.25% figure?  I'll admit I'm not a math nerd, but I just don't get it. 

Now let's look at the price:

Close to 50 bucks a month including shipping.  You can get 1,000 grams of creatine monohydrate for about half that price.

Conclusion: based on what I see, I just don't think this supplement is worth 50 dollars a month--Kre-Alkalyn is less effective than regular Creatine Monohydrate, and the other ingredients are not worthwhile.

NOTE: If you really want to gain muscle, invest in a decent program like Vince DelMonte's No-Nonsense Bodybuilding. This program cuts through the supplement hype and gives you a real training/nutrition regimen. 

Spend your money wisely invest in solid training information--not supplement hype. 

UFC 109 Relentless