creatine and resluts

[Balls of Steel]

I have been on it for about two weeks now. I went from 163ish to 169-170. I am gathering that most of this is water retention, but I have noticed no size gains while on it. I dont look any bigger than before and none of my lifts have gone up noticabley.

Could I be one of those people who doesn't respond to creatine or should I give it more time? Or is my 7lb weight gain evidence that I am receptive to creatine? IM just wondering so I dont go wasting my money if It has no effect on me.

Thanks

 

[foreverblast2]

what? i don't get this.. you've gained 7 lbs and you wonder if creatine is useful for you? if you arne't receptive to it how the heck did you gain the 7 lbs.. of course you should keep using it... maybe it is water retention, but that's one of the functions creatine serve, so that's an indication that it works for you... it might not look like much on you in the mirror, but considering 7lbs is a very small percentage of your body weight, of course you wouldn't see a big jump in appearence..

john

 

[riskybizz007]

John... you took the words right out of my mouth.

 

[Guinness]

Not that I necessarily disagree with either of you, risky and foreverblast, but without knowing more about his diet habits over this period and FX on body composition, it's pretty hard to say for sure how effective the creatine has been...if he gained 4 pounds of body fat and 3 pounds of water, I'd say that the creatine isn't helping much...

I don't know a ton about creatine, but from the research I've done, it's probably gonna have a cell volumizing and water retention affect on just about everyone...but whether or not he's able to push himself harder in the gym is where he'd really be able to tell whether creatine is working for him, and from his comments, it doesn't sound like it is...Now of course, it could be the brand of creatine he's using or his cycling methodology, or a score of other factors, but my point is that a 7 lbs increase alone is not evidence of effectiveness.

In general, people on supps, need to understand how to control and measure the factors that could affect their bodily changes if they are trying to measure the efficacy of a given supplement. Too many times with these reports, people give only partial information about what they are doing, or they haven't established baselines, or controlled for certain factors, so it's really, really hard for us to determine whether or not things are working for them. I'm not saying everyone has to be a research scientist here, but you should probably have a basic understanding of research design and measurement if you are going to "experiment" on yourself with these supps. Otherwise, there is no real way to determine whether these things are having the reported effects on you that they claim.

Ok, I'm off my soapbox for now.....gotta go log some more shit in my 1-ad cycle diary...

 

[gymtime]

Patience grasshopper. Give it a month at least.

 

[Balls of Steel]

My bulking diet has always been solid, and I am using the pro-lab, which i heard was the best. I will give it more time. I had been stuck at 163 for a while, so maybe it is working, it is unlikey that I would just put 7lbs of fat on over such a short period of time. I will give it more time and see how my lifts progress.

 

[Balls of Steel]

BTW, I am using 5g a day (postworkout). If my lifts dont progress any further, do you guys think i should go with 10g? I didn't go through the loading phase either, i started at 5g a day.

 

[gymtime]

Good boy. Remember, creatine is a supplement not gear. You gotta give it more time and don't expect miracle gains. Yes, you'll gain a lot of water, but that will go away within days after you go off it leaving you with mostly muscle gains (assuming your diet is sound).

Let's say after 8 weeks you've put on 14lbs. Say you lose half of that in water shortly after you go off it. You've added seven pounds of (mostly) muscle in 8 weeks. Not too bad for a supp.

 

[gymtime]

Yes, go with 10 a day, but no more.

 

[ENDRO]

I have used creatine many times and my lifts really didnt go up, but my recovery time was shortened and my reps increased. stick with the 5-grams a day and give it some more time.