Supplement Performance - Ergogenic Aids

Separating Facts from Hypocritical Nonsense

Warning: These statements have not been evaluated by the hypocritical Anti-Ergogenic Camp. This article is intended to diagnose, treat, cure and prevent anti-ergogenic idiotism.

Understanding Ergogenic Aids

The word “ergogenic” is derived from the Greek words “ergo” (meaning work) and “gen” (production of), and is usually defined as “to increase potential for work output.” In sports, various ergogenic aids, or ergogenics, have been used for their ability to boost performance. Listed below are major categories of ergogenics:

                        1. Biomechanical ergogenics (e.g., lightweight racing shoes) are designed to increase energy efficiency.

                        2. Psychological ergogenics (e.g., hypnosis) are designed to enhance psychological processes during sport performance.

                        3. Physiological ergogenics (e.g., blood doping) are designed to augment natural physiological processes to increase physical performance.

                        4. Pharmacological ergogenics (e.g., anabolic steroids) are drugs designed to influence physiological or psychological processes to increase sport performance.

                        5. Nutritional ergogenics (e.g., creatine) refers to dietary manipulations to improve athletic performance.

Legislation regarding nutritional ergogenic products is minimal in most countries, allowing unsupported claims to flourish. However, some nutritional ergogenics offer scientifically documented advantages to the athlete. Some products work by producing a direct ergogenic effect (e.g., creatine, caffeine, bicarbonate). Other products can be used by athletes to meet their nutritional goals (e.g., meal replacements) and as an indirect outcome, these allow them to achieve optimal performance.

This article examines the latest findings on nutritional ergogenics. However, first I will say something about the ethical nonsense surrounding ergogenics in general.

Hypocritical Anti-Ergogenic Camp

The anti-ergogenic propaganda is usually based on the belief that these substances are dangerous to the health of athletes. While it’s true that all pharmacological and most physiological ergogenics have associated hazards, not a single one of them is as hazardous as smoking or excessive drinking. Recently, President Bush stated, “The use of performance-enhancing drugs like steroids in baseball, football and other sports is dangerous, and it sends the

wrong message— that there are shortcuts to accomplishment and that performance is more important than character.”

However, according to Dr. Jay Coakley, a leading sports sociologist at the University of Colorado, “Most athletes do not use performance-enhancing substances because they lack character, intelligence, or sanity... nor do they use them because they are victims of biased and coercive rules… Tougher rules and increased testing have not and will not be effective.” (See his excellent textbook Sport in Society: Issues & Controversies).

It doesn’t make sense to control athletes in ways other people are not controlled. For example, when a 50-year-old man takes growth hormone or testosterone to maintain strength so he can perform a job, why shouldn’t his 30-year-old son do the same thing in the NFL? When a question like this is asked, it remains difficult to define substance abuse in sports.

The anti-doping zealots feel all ergogenics (including legal products such as creatine) should be banned from sports simply because they allow athletes to perform beyond “natural” abilities and give then an “unfair advantage” over opponents. However, what is natural about all the biomechanical, psychological, environmental and technological methods of manipulating athletes’ bodies in today’s high-performance sports? Also, it would be utterly ridiculous to argue that the chemically enhanced professional bodybuilder can perform beyond natural abilities, as there is no such thing as a natural professional bodybuilder. In reality, an ergogenic-free strength-power athlete gives unfair advantage to his opponents!

We pay for sporting events and thus we are entitled to an athlete’s very best. Certainly, we don’t want to watch pathetic athletes who could have done way better if only they had used the ergogenics. As suggested by Dr. Sidney Gendin, a retired professor of philosophy of law from Eastern Michigan University, let’s ban athletes who don’t use ergogenics! Talk of ergogenic performance as unnatural is as ridiculous as complaining about Nike shoes. I was recently “informed” that as a trained sports medicine expert, I should support the anti-ergogenic camp. Hmm… who the heck am I to tell Andy Athlete that he should go to the Olympics unarmed? Or who are you to tell your friend he should not drink a cup of coffee to combat fatigue? In my view, the ethical discussion surrounding ergogenic aids is nothing but hypocritical bullshit. Indeed, ethics is about as subjective as it gets.

World Anti-Doping Code 2003 proudly claims the “Roles and Responsibilities of Athlete Support Personnel [are]… to be knowledgeable of and comply with all anti-doping policies and rules adopted pursuant to the Code and which are applicable to them or the Athletes whom they support.” Further, “To use their influence on Athlete values and behavior to foster anti-doping attitudes.” As I’m apparently some kind of “Athlete Support Person,” the anti-doping zealots are giving me orders and assignments, but last time I checked, they didn’t pay my bills. To use my influence to foster anti-ergogenic attitudes? Okay, here is my message: Use ergogenics or go home. Enough of hypocritical whining!

General Motors and Coca-Cola combined are spending nearly $2 billion dollars to sponsor Olympic sports between 1998 and 2008. Obviously, they

want to promote the belief that enjoyment and pleasure in people’s everyday lives depend on their products. The fact that drinking Coca-Cola and other sugar-containing drinks increases the risk of obesity, heart disease and diabetes no longer mattered to the hypocritical sports officials. Money talks, bullshit walks!

Current Drug Testing Programs Suck

Contrary to popular belief supported by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the World Anti-Doping Agency, doping testing is very controversial, at least scientifically speaking. For example, there are no scientifically valid methods for detecting the use of testosterone, growth hormone, EPO, etc. It was the philosophy of the IOC that no competitor should be accused or convicted of doping unless the test results are absolutely certain, i.e., “innocent until proven guilty.” Today, however, the philosophy is “guilty until proven innocent!”

When the IOC people are told that current testing programs suck donkey balls, they call for better tests— 100 percent effective and accurate. Ain’t gonna happen. If the IOC would spend the money required for the relatively effective testing, they will have no money left to sponsor events! The reality is that the peer-reviewed scientific data for many doping tests are not available in quantity sufficient to withstand legal challenge.

Dr. Sergei Portugalov, who was responsible for the ergogenic preparation of several Soviet national teams over a 15-year period, told the Sportekspress Zhurnal, a leading Russian sport monthly, “Basically, the question of a drug test’s results has no meaning whatsoever… If a test is negative it only means that the pharmacological preparation was done correctly. If it is positive, then the coach is an idiot.” Even the anti-ergogenic zealot David Cowan of the Drugs Control Centre at King’s College in London admits, “We may only be catching 10 percent of those using the [testosterone].” However, I believe they may be catching less than one percent.

As pointed out by Drs. Angela Schneider and Robert Butcher in Doping in Elite Sport (Human Kinetics, 2001), the Privacy Commissioner of Canada argued that in seeking permission for random, unannounced out-of-competition doping testing, the government would be breaking its own rules established in the Privacy Act and in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (Charter). The publication titled “Drug Testing and Privacy” published by the Privacy Commissioner states: “Random mandatory drug testing of athletes would be found to violate sections 7 or 8, or both, of the Charter. On almost all counts, random mandatory testing of athletes would fail to measure up. Thus, not only would such a program fail to comply with the Charter, it would, if conducted by Sport Canada, be a violation of the Privacy Act.”

Recently, inadvertent doping through dietary supplement use has emerged as a concern for athletes who participate in competitions governed by an anti-doping code. Indeed, some studies have reported the undeclared presence of banned ingredients such as prohormones in the bargain basement brands (but certainly not in the major brands.

Although sports supplements have been publicly blamed for a number of cases of positive nandrolone tests, it should be noted that “norsteroids have been known for decades as not only xenobiotics [chemical compounds that are foreign to a living organism], but also obligatory endogenous [produced within body] intermediates in the biosynthesis of estrogens from androgens in all species, man included” (Eur J Appl Physiol, 2004;92:1-12). Of course, the anti-ergogenic camp didn’t remember to tell this fact to the mainstream media. Alternatively, they don’t have clue.

MD = No Bullshit!

The leading sports psychologists feel the key here is to be informative and accurate regarding both the positive and negative effects of various ergogenics. And that’s exactly what we do: Muscular Development provides only scientifically based, no-bullshit information on ergogenics in bodybuilding and other sports.

Although MD certainly does not condone any form of illegal ergogenic use, it’s crystal clear that the “scare tactics” don’t work. For example, Dr. Linn Goldberg and colleagues performed a randomized, controlled study to assess an approach that stressed only the negative effects of anabolic steroids. After the intervention, no change in knowledge, attitudes or intentions was observed. In fact, there was a trend toward increased desire to use anabolic steroids among those who received this bullshit scare approach!

Consequently, hypocritical bullshitting is not our way to do business. For example, if the ingestion of Deca increases muscle hypertrophy, we will report it as such. Similarly, if ephedra triggers high blood pressure in some athletes, we will report it as such. Probably the most ridiculous pseudoscientific horror stories about ergogenics come form the university “textbook” called Understanding Nutrition (Wadsworth, 2002), which proudly claims that the side effects of anabolic steroid use include dizziness, drowsiness, mouth and tongue soreness, breathing difficulty, nausea, vomiting, bloody diarrhea, kidney stones, blood clots, septic shock, permanent shrinkage of testes, excessive and painful erections, delayed recovery times, seizure-like movements, cramps, tremors, fatigue, etc.

Just wondering why the heck most elite athletes use anabolic steroids if they cause “delayed recovery times” and “fatigue.” Maybe it has something to do with these “excessive erections.” Seriously, anyone who claims with a straight face that anabolic steroids cause tongue soreness lacks basic knowledge of human biology. Do these well meaning yet misinformed authors really believe their utterly ridiculous scare tactics actually decrease abuse of anabolic steroids? Whatever the case, I have one tip for these authors: Read the related scientific studies and report them as such, or shut up.

Amazingly, this “textbook” also tells us that “protein supplements are expensive, less completely digested than protein-rich foods, and when used as replacements for such foods, are often downright dangerous.” Of course, that’s nothing but a bunch of pseudoscientific bullshit. Unfortunately, the propagandists don’t give a crap about the facts.

The recent New Scientist editorial soundly titled “Sport, Lies and Steroids” stated: “This magazine believes that people should be given credible and accurate information about drugs, not propaganda fostered by drug peddlers or people who oppose their use. That applies to supposed performance-enhancing drugs as much as it does to Prozac and Ecstasy. Ignorance is no answer.” We certainly agree.

OK, now it’s time to discuss the latest findings on nutritional ergogenics. However, you certainly won’t find scare tactics!

Protein Review

The purpose of a recent review by Dr. Jay Hoffman and Michael Falvo was to analyze different types of protein (J Sports Sci & Med, 2004;3:118-130). As pointed out by the authors, there is some evidence suggesting that a high animal protein diet can cause greater muscle growth than a high vegetable protein diet. Further, the authors compared different types of whey protein and suggested that whey protein isolates “often contain proteins that have become denatured due to the manufacturing process… compared to whey isolates, whey concentrate typically contains more biologically active components and proteins that make them a very attractive supplement for the athlete.” However, I have to disagree with this contention. For example, cross-flow microfiltered (CFM) whey isolate has the highest level of undenatured protein available (about 99 percent).

Finally, the authors concluded that high protein intake has no adverse effects. In fact, the reduced bodyweight associated with high-protein diets is protective against diseases.

Post-Exercise Carb-Protein Drinks

A paper by Dr. John Ivy summarized the effects of post-workout carb and protein supplementation on glycogen and muscle protein synthesis (J Sports Sci & Med, 2004;3:131-138). There is evidence showing that muscle glycogen synthesis is most rapid if high glycemic carbs are consumed immediately following exercise. Also, activation of muscle protein synthesis by amino acids is also most responsive immediately following exercise. So, you need to take in both carbs and proteins immediately after resistance exercise.

Antioxidants May Lessen Muscle Functional Deficits

Dr. A. Shafaf and co-workers at the University of Limerick in Ireland examined the effectiveness of vitamins C and E on symptoms of muscle damage (Eur J Appl Physiol, 2004, Aug. 7, Epub ahead of print). Twelve male volunteers were randomly assigned to either treatment or control groups. The treatment group received 500 milligrams of vitamin C and 1,200 international units (IU) of alpha-tocopherol (vitamin E) daily and the control group received glucose placebo for 37 days.

After 30 days of treatment, volunteers performed 300 maximal eccentric contractions of the knee extensor muscles of one leg. The results indicated that eccentric contractile torque and work during the bout declined significantly in both groups, but this decline was smaller in the vitamin-supplemented group.

Thus, although more research is needed, this study suggests that prior supplementation with dietary antioxidants lessens muscle functional deficits subsequent to eccentric muscle contraction. However, both groups experienced similar muscle soreness and swelling after exercise.

Creatine is Safe

The aim of the recent study by Dr. H Schoder and colleagues was to investigate the long-term effects of creatine monohydrate supplementation on clinical parameters related to health. Eighteen professional basketball players of the first Spanish Basketball League participated in this longitudinal study published in the respected European Journal of Nutrition (2004 Aug. 11, Epub ahead of print).

The subjects ingested five grams of creatine daily during three competition seasons. Blood samples were collected five times during each of the three official competition seasons of the first National Basketball League. The authors concluded, “Supplementation with creatine did not alter clinical indices related to hepatic [liver] or renal [kidney] pathology or muscle injury.” In fact, the recent study by Dr. R. Santos and co-workers at the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil revealed that creatine supplementation reduced cell damage and inflammation after exhaustive intense exercise (Life Sci, 2004;75:1917-1924).

New Nutritional Ergogenics Book

Recently, Drs. Ira Wolinsky and Judy Driskell published a comprehensive academic text on nutritional ergogenics (Nutritional Ergogenic Aids, CRC Press, 2004). This excellent reference discusses more than 20 nutritional ergogenics and provides specific guidelines for safe use of the products most widely used. The key take-home messages were the following:

                        • Although arginine has been demonstrated to be valuable in specific clinical applications, there is no solid evidence showing that it improves body composition. Nevertheless, arginine does have beneficial functions (hormone stimulation, immune regulation, nitric oxide synthesis, etc.).

                        • Aspartate may have potential as an ergogenic under certain conditions, but more research is clearly needed.

                        • There is evidence that branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) supplementation decreases muscle protein breakdown. Also, BCAAs provided prior to and/or during prolonged exercise might inhibit the decrease in blood glutamine levels, which in turn is linked to increased incidence of sickness of athletes. Thus, it appears BCAAs may be of benefit to serious gym rats, especially during a cutting diet.

                        • Carnitine does not seem to provide an ergogenic or fat loss benefit. However, carnitine salts improve performance in persons with heart diseases.

                        • Certainly, creatine can increase lean body mass, power, torque, strength and repetitive, short-term anaerobic exercise performance. Suggestions