The Supplement Scam

Thanks so much to everyone for all the positive responses to yesterdays post. I will try to share more of them this week but here is one that I thought you might find interesting:


Jason- so you think all the research about post-workout nutrition is fabricated. Awful lot of evidence out there for over twenty years. Not sure where this idea is leading.

Do you think most people get enough essential fat? The fish oil thing is fabricated
also? Lots of studies.

How about glucosamine, again a lot of evidence. It seems to have stood the test of
time.

Is there an underlying thought process here?

Thanks

Michael



Mike,
It's all BS. I am lucky enough to know tons of the biggest and strongest guys in the
world. I have trained tons of athletes who were inhumanly big and strong and fast. Not to sound cocky, but I, myself am fairly strong and fast and routinely outlift people who outweigh me by 50lbs or more. No one believes in that crap. And if they did use all that garbage do you think that they would actually be bigger or stronger? Of course not. Post workout nutrition is the biggest scam of all time. Yes, you replenish glycogen faster, blunt cortisol levels, blah, blah, blah. Who cares? It doesn't matter nor does it make the least bit difference in the REAL WORLD. If you read the studies you can force a placebo effect on yourself and think it all works and matters. It doesn't. If I have a Gatorade and pizza and my twin brother drinks some pre-made fancy post workout shake for 16 wks straight it will make absolutely no difference at all. It doesn't matter because unless you are training three times per day you don't need to worry about the fastest acting shake under the sun.

See some people believe everything they read. I believe nothing I read. I only want to hear from people who have tons of real world evidence that they have actually seen
supplements do anything with themselves or their hundreds of clients. You can set up
studies to prove anything. Studies are usually worth the paper they are printed on.

Another reason I hate post workout drinks is because I hate ingesting unhealthy processed chemical crap like that. I keep my unhealthy intake to beer, weed and fried food. I don't need to throw in 60 packs of aspartame and all kinds of other crap on top of it on a regular basis. Food always was, still is and always will be better than supplements.

Fish oil is great. Do people get enough EFA's? No. Should they eat more salmon? Yes. If they don't, I have no problem with fish oil. In fact I like it. I was just trying to make a point and as you know I always do so in an in your face fashion.

With glucosamine you kind of missed the point of the article. I was talking about performance enhancement, thus I will not even discuss glucosamine as it doesn't enter into the equation here at all.

I just prefer to get everything I need through a good, well rounded organic diet. Nobody can argue that that isn't better than whacking down buckets of pills and chemicals all day. In fact, as a health and fitness professional I think its negligent for me to recommend aspartame and all kinds of other fake shit to people. I would rather tell them to eat fruits and veggies and lean protein and nuts and drink beer on the weekends if they like. They will be much better off.

Like I said, supplements suck.