You are looking to increase your strength. But remember that for this you must have superior sports performance. How to increase it? Some nutrients help you meet this goal.
If your main physical objective is to increase muscle strength, be clear that you must start by increasing the amount of muscle mass and strengthening the existing one. Remember that recovery plays a fundamental role in this. If you manage to make it optimal, you can enhance your strength.
For this purpose, there is a set of supplements or ergogenic aids, substances that improve energy production and, therefore, performance, explains the Mundo Entrenamiento website.
Creatine
It is a naturally occurring nutrient in the kidneys, pancreas, and liver. It is easy to measure with urine and blood tests to check these organs’ proper functioning, indicating the Medline Plus article.
According to this article by researchers from the Center for Sports Studies, Research, and Medicine (CEIMD) in Spain, creatine improves muscle strength and power and helps to support a greater training load.
But how does it help to have more strength? The transformation process that creatine undergoes in the body is like this: phosphocreatine becomes ATP, which is one of the main sources of energy in the body, explains the Geosalud portal. In this way, it manages to increase lean muscle mass.
BCAAs
Branched-chain amino acids, or BCAAs, are not synthesized in the body but are obtained from food. These are leucine, isoleucine, and valine. They are excellent allies if you want to maintain or increase your muscle mass -which at the same time will make you gain strength- because they prevent catabolism (or loss of muscle mass).
When you subject your body to demanding exercises, it uses carbohydrates and amino acids to produce energy. But if there are not enough energy sources, take the amino acids in the muscles to meet this demand. This causes loss of muscle mass and is preventable with the help of supplements.
Glutamine
Glutamine is the non-essential amino acid that is in the highest percentage in the human body; in fact, it corresponds to 50% of the reserve of free amino acids in skeletal muscle, indicates a review of the literature published in the Nutrición Hospitalaria journal of the Spanish Society of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition. How does it work
? When doing sports training, the levels of this amino acid drop considerably, and it is difficult to replace them. As mentioned, they reach their lowest level approximately 90 minutes after training.
Some benefits of its consumption through optimum nutrition serious mass supplements improves protein synthesis and helps prevention loss of muscle mass:
Decreases muscle pain.
Lower muscle recovery time.
Promotes the elimination of ammonia.
Improves immune function and intestinal health.
B-Alanine
Muscle fatigue is directly related to the decrease in strength in training. To avoid it, B-Alanine can be an excellent ally.
Also known as Beta-alanine, it is a non-essential amino acid; the body can synthesize that. How does it act? During high-intensity exercise, both glucose and glycogen are broken down for energy within the muscles. This process produces hydrogen atoms, accumulating and making the environment more acidic, leading to muscle fatigue.
To compensate, the body synthesizes carnosine (b-alanine and histidine). In this way, it maintains an optimal pH; therefore, the muscles can work harder and for longer periods.
Carnosine also acts as a powerful buffer or shock absorber at the muscular level and improves the sensitivity of calcium at the muscle fiber level, according to the results of a study by academics from Alfonso X El Sabio University and the University of Barcelona.
Proteins
Proteins are molecules composed mainly of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen atoms. They are fundamental, on the one hand, for the construction of the tissues that make up your body, and, on the other, they regulate various biological processes and vital functions.
In the specific case of sports training, proteins facilitate the adaptive response of the muscles, even more so when it comes to strength routines.
However, don’t think that the more protein you eat, the greater your strength will be. Several factors influence this task, says Loreto Pañella, a sports nutritionist at the Sports Health Center of Clínica Santa María, in this interview with the newspaper El Mostrador.
It all depends on how you distribute the daily doses, what type of protein you take, if you combine it with amino acids, what your meals are like, etc.
The specialist adds that muscle anabolism – the process that creates muscle tissue from nutrients – occurs mainly during the 24 hours after training. During this period, changes occur in the physiology of the muscles, which is why they are more receptive to protein intake.
Conclusion
Several additional factors determine your strength level. For example, getting enough rest or eating properly.
However, more than these variables may be needed to meet the level of physical demand that you impose on yourself when doing sports training. For this, food supplements that contain creatine, amino acids, BCAAs, glutamine, b-alanine, or proteins greatly help.
To take the right product for your type of physical demand, you must get proper advice from a specialist who will evaluate your level of sports training, habits, weight, gender, etc., to diagnose and prescribe the correct supplement.