MOVEMENT AND THOUGHT: Improving the Student in "Student-athlete"

Highlighting Sleep as a beneficial enhancer for successful development in both physical and cognitive skills in my last post brought up a personal experience that I had years ago. Circumstances during my early teaching career steered me into the middle of a fourth grade classroom to take over the teaching duties at mid-year!

During the process of learning what the needs of the students were, I discovered their lack of writing skills even though their reading skills were quite good. To best address this need, I structured a “return to traditional grammar” skills that involved a morning session of diagraming sentences, structuring paragraphs and learning all the “parts of speech” like verbs, adverbs, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, etc.

After a few weeks, I decided to add an afternoon session of “creative writing” so that students would have to transfer their knowledge of “sentence and paragraph structure” learned in the mornings, with actual short stories or essays.

I would read a short story (started with James Thurber’s Carnival) from selected authors and read aloud to the students. Afterwards, I gave them a “theme” based on the type of story I read to them. The students struggled to remember what I read and had a tough time composing their thoughts.

Then, one day after their ONCE WEEKLY P.E. session, I read them a story and gave them a theme for their essay/short story. NOT ONLY did they pay close attention to the story, they wrote furiously for about 25 minutes with INCREDIBLE skill and creative thinking.

So, each day, before this Creative Writing session, I had them go outside to the Quad in the middle of the school, run a lap and then we did a few relay races involving “movement skills” in an up and back (example>>>forwards skipping—backwards skipping, hopping, etc.) manner, then return to the classroom and directly into our 30 minutes of Creative Writing.

Since then, every athlete and/or student I have worked with has heard me say  “THE SPOKEN WORD IS NOT THE WRITTEN WORD!”

You will not believe how many college athletes I woke up to the “secret” that "IN ORDER TO WRITE WELL" (not good), they NEEDED TO READ MORE!!

So, in sharing my early teaching “discovery” about teaching writing, I want to share that I ALSO learned how much physical activity enhanced the ability of the students to “pay attention, focus and then think critically and creatively!

PLEASE READ THE STUDIES/ARTICLES BELOW THAT WILL HOPEFULLY DRIVE HOME THE IMPORTANCE OF DAILY PHYSICAL EDUCATION THAT INVOLVES MOVEMENT WITH MOVEMENT SKILLS as well as adding BOOKS, paper magazines and News Papers to their DAILY reading.

 In addition, I would also suggest reading a variety of writing styles and sources of information in BOOK or Paper form to supplement the “web-based” info.

If your children ARE not getting daily physical skill activity, then push for them to get at least 15 to 20 minutes a day. Remember RECESS?? It used to be about 10-15 minutes of “furious” movement” and “play” before “having” to go back into the classroom. THERE WAS  A REASON for that!

NOW, GO OUT AND JOG FOR 20 min., then READ THE ARTICLES BELOW.

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Why You Remember Less When You Read from a Screen

by Orion D. Jones

August 23, 2014, 11:00 AM

There are undeniable advantages to carrying a whole library on your Kindle or tablet computer but retaining the information you read doesn't seem to be one of them. Recent studies agree that when it comes to recalling information, you're probably ahead to read printed material like bound books, paper journals, and print magazines. In one study that asked Italian college students to read a 28-page story and then place 14 plot events in correct order, Kindle readers performed significantly worse. 

Researchers suggest that we have a more difficult time recalling digital information because it has no permanent physical location:

"Both anecdotally and in published studies, people report that when trying to locate a particular piece of written information they often remember where in the text it appeared. ... 'We might recall that we passed the red farmhouse near the start of the trail before we started climbing uphill through the forest; in a similar way, we remember that we read about Mr. Darcy rebuffing Elizabeth Bennett on the bottom of the left-hand page in one of the earlier chapters.'"

On the other hand, our digital devices never forget. Information that never dies, forever accessible by practically everyone on the planet, poses some interesting problems for a society:

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Motor skills and school performance in children with daily physical education in school - a 9-year intervention study.

Authors

Ericsson I, et al.

Journal:  Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2014 Apr;24(2):273-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-0838.2012.01458.x. Epub 2012 Apr 9.

Abstract:The aim was to study long-term effects on motor skills and school performance of increased physical education (PE). All pupils born 1990-1992 from one school were included in a longitudinal study over nine years. An intervention group (n = 129) achieved daily PE (5 × 45 min/week) and if needed one extra lesson of adapted motor training. The control group (n = 91) had PE two lessons/week. Motor skills were evaluated by the Motor Skills Development as Ground for Learning observation checklist and school achievements by marks in Swedish, English, Mathematics, and PE and proportion of pupils who qualified for upper secondary school.

In school year 9 there were motor skills deficits in 7% of pupils in the intervention group compared to 47% in the control group (P < 0.001),

96% of the pupils in the intervention group compared to 89% in the control group (P < 0.05) qualified for upper secondary school.

The sum of evaluated marks was higher among boys in the intervention group than in the control group (P < 0.05). The sum of marks was also higher in pupils with no motor skills deficit than among pupils with motor skills deficits (P < 0.01),

 as was the proportion of pupils who qualified for upper secondary school (97% vs 81%, P < 0.001).

Daily PE and adapted motor skills training during the compulsory school years is a feasible way to improve not only motor skills but also school performance and the proportion of pupils who qualify for upper secondary school.

© 2012 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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American Teens Are Becoming Even Wimpier Than Before

by Nancy Shute

Pickup basketball may be losing out to computer games.

If you think that teenagers are becoming weaklings, you're right.

Less than half of youths ages 12 to 15 are even close to being aerobically fit, according to data released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That's down from 52 percent of youths in 1999 to 2000, the last time this survey was conducted. It measures "adequate" levels of cardiorespiratory fitness, which children need not only for sports but for good health.

And that was true regardless of a child's race and family income.

Girls were particularly out of shape, with just 34 percent of them having adequate cardiovascular health, compared with 50 percent of boys. But 50 percent isn't so great.

"It's frightening," , an assistant professor at the Dell Children's Medical Center in Austin, tells Shots. Children tend to be less physically active as they become teenagers, Pont says, because there are fewer opportunities for organized sports, and less gym class too.

But given the nation's obesity epidemic, teenagers need to be more active, not less, says Pont, who was not involved in the "This may result in our childhood obesity epidemic getting worse; "The increase in childhood obesity may have peaked, according to released last year by the CDC, at least in very young children. Even if that's true, Pont says, "the place they're stabilizing is still a horrible place to be." As medical director for the Austin Independent School District,

Pont has been active in making the point that adding physical activity to the school day actually improves standardized test scores and reduces behavior problems. But many school districts haven't gotten that message.

"I can't sit in a chair for eight hours a day and be functional," he notes. And neither, he adds, can teenagers.

Less than half of youths ages 12 to 15 have an adequate level of aerobic fitness, down from 65 percent a decade ago.

CDC/NCHS, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and NHANES National Youth Fitness Survey

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Just 12 minutes of aerobic exercise can boost low-income college students’ academic performance. The effect is large enough to close the achievement gap.
Ever seen a teacher or camp counselor make the whole class do jumping jacks before beginning a lesson? It wasn’t just a ploy to exhaust the kids hyped up on Pixy Stix.
A 2012 study showing the academic benefits of short spurts of aerobic exercise for low-income kids sparked a movement among primary schools to add more exercise to the school day.
The results were so convincing that study co-author Michele Tine, a researcher at Dartmouth College, decided to test the same intervention on college-age students. The most recent paper, published this week in Frontiers in Psychology, showed that just 12 minutes of aerobic exercise could increase attention and reading comprehension for all students. Most importantly, the effect was so strong for low-income students that the exercise effectively closed the pre-existing gap between scores of low-income and high-income students.
In the new study, 85 participants aged 17 to 21 were separated into high-income (above 175 percent of the federal poverty line) and low-income (below 133 percent) groups. They were randomly assigned to experimental or control conditions.

While the pre-test indicated that low-income students lagged behind high-income students in attention scores, low-income students’ scores improved so much after exercise that the gap was effectively erased.

 

The experimental group jogged in place for 12 minutes while staying within their individual target heart rate range. The control group sat and watched a 12-minute video about the benefits of exercise.
The study measured students’ selective visual attention (SVA), or the ability to focus on visual targets while ignoring irrelevant stimuli. It’s well established that SVA is essential to academic learning. Students took SVA tests before the exercise or video, immediately afterward, and 45 minutes after that.

All participants who exercised saw significant improvement in SVA scores from pre-test to post-test, while control group scores held steady. The exercise group sustained their high scores even after 45 minutes—a common duration for high school and college courses, Tine notes. The findings extended to reading comprehension scores, as well.
While the pre-test indicated that low-income students lagged behind high-income students in SVA, low-income students’ scores improved so much after exercise that the gap was effectively erased.

So why did exercise have a much larger effect on low-income students? One theory is that low-income students simply had more room to improve. Tine hypothesizes that chronic stress was a major factor. Chronic stress and aerobic exercise both affect the same physiological systems, and the chronic stress of poverty has been shown to affect cognitive processes. Students who reported higher chronic stress levels saw greater SVA score improvement than those who reported less chronic stress. And, unsurprisingly, low-income students tended to have higher chronic stress than high-income students.

This study represents a significant breakthrough for educators trying to improve outcomes for low-income college students—the intervention is brief enough and cheap enough to be realistically implemented.

Twelve minutes of exercise could not only keep college students awake during lecture and help them burn off last night’s Cup o’ Noodles, it could also shrink the persistent achievement gap that plagues American education.

Recipe for Success in School and Sports

In my last post I hoped to provide some “safe” recommendations for supplementation of an athlete’s diet, IF THE DIET WAS FOUND TO BE DEFICIENT IN SOME NUTRIENTS! I hope I got across the importance that supplementation, like strength, speed, power, skill, endurance, etc. SHOULD always be based upon “individual” NEEDS of each athlete WITH careful analysis of an individual’s diet and sport/exercise needs.

Adding information from all the past posts allows us to now explore the ingredients necessary for, a successful, thorough and well-balanced Long-Term Athlete Development Plan (LTADP).

 I spent many of the first posts on FMS and AMSC skills and their importance to building the foundational movements that most successfully transfer to a variety, if not all, competitive sports.

So, we can start our ingredient list with SKILLS.  By using progressive activities that require movements that involve acceleration, deceleration, pushing, pulling, resisting and overcoming, starting, stopping, change of direction, jumping and landing, we WILL develop STRENGTH, SPEED, SUPPLENESS, STAMINA to enhance Skill performance in a variety of sports skills.

Attention to BOTH adoption and consistent application of a well-balanced Diet IS A MUST in order to meet optimal physical development and daily energy requirements.

Time Management that emphasizes academic development work through adoption of consistent, daily study time-blocks is OF EQUAL importance in developing THE STUDENT-ATHLETE. These study times need to be planned for KEY times of the day that best insure optimal concentration and focus that targets academic work loads that represent all the various subjects in the student’s current academic schedule.

Development of optimal Sleep habits/patterns MAY BE, in spite of my recent posts, the MOST NEGLECTED of all the ingredients NEEDED for optimal physical, mental, emotional, academic and social growth and maturation. This holds true from early childhood and pre-adolescent to adolescent stages in the lives of student-athletes. Sleep may even INCREASE in importance FOR SERIOUS ATHLETES from late teens into Adulthood.

So, let’s make a list of the BENEFITS OF OPTIMUM LEVELS OF SLEEP for all children and especially “developing athletes” participating in a wide variety of sports throughout the school year.

                        BENEFITS OF SLEEP

1)   During sleep, the highest levels of growth hormones (significantly the anabolic hormones responsible for skeletal muscle growth/maintenance).

2)   Sleep has been proven to have both psychological and physiological restorative effects.

3)   Sleep is a critical ingredient of an athlete’s adaptation to training as well as recovery, preparation and regeneration for training.

4)   Sleep is also a critical regulator of Central Nervous System and Cognitive functions (especially for academic thought processes).

                        PROBLEMS WITH LACK OF SLEEP

1)   Sleep deprivation reduces anabolic (tissue building) hormone levels AND increases catabolic (tissue degrading) hormone concentrations.

2)   Lack of sleep inhibits restoration after training by increasing inflammation and sympathetic nervous system activity (resulting in higher heart rate & blood pressure levels among other factors) which lead to impaired strength and power outputs, muscle glycogen replenishment AND impaired COGNITIVE performance (critical for daily academic development).

3)   Sleep deprivation can also result in loss of high-level sport skill and a decrease in motivation necessary for training.

IT SHOULD BE NOTED THAT FOLLOWING A SHORTENED NIGHT’S SLEEP, COGNITIVE AND MOTOR SKILL PERFORMANCE CAN BE ENHANCED WITH THE ADDITION OF A SHORT NAP!

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DIRECTLY BELOW IS AN ENTERTAINING AND VALUABLE TWITTER CONVERSATION BETWEEN TWO WELL KNOWN “LEARNING” and “SPORT” INVESTIGATORS…..ENJOY When Genius Slept!!!!

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When Genius Slept

 

@DanielCoyle definitely! bonus: study isn't intentionally range-restricted based on napping, so data on sleep may actually be meaningful!

.@DavidEpstein @DanielCoyle Sleep is #1 legal performance enhancer for both mind and body.

@DanielCoyle I always think best way to get athletes to sleep more would be to show them what happens to HGH when they sleep!

.@DavidEpstein Dr. Ferrari knew all about sleep/HGH. He once told @DanielCoyle "What are they going to do next? Ban naps?"

 “@TheRaceRadio: @DavidEpstein @DanielCoyle Sleep is #1 legal performance enhancer for both mind and body.”

reminds me of entirely overlooked data pt from so-called 10,000-hours study: top performers slept 5.4 more hrs/week vs bottom

Brilliance, it seems, is the product of a well-rested mind, not artistic all-nighters.

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Please access the articles attached to the end of this post as well as under SPECIFIC TOPIC PAGES in the column to the right of this post: Articles #2 and #6.

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Sleep or swim? Early-morning training severely restricts the amount of sleep obtained by elite swimmers.

Authors

Sargent C, et al. Eur J Sport Sci. 2014;14 Suppl 1:S310-5. doi: 10.1080/17461391.2012.696711. Epub 2012 Jul 6.

Abstract

Good sleep is essential for optimal performance, yet few studies have examined the sleep/wake behavior of elite athletes. The aim of this study was to assess the impact of early-morning training on the amount of sleep obtained by world-class swimmers at the Australian Institute for Sport.

Sleep in Elite Athletes and Nutritional Interventions to Enhance Sleep

 By Shona L. Halson AIS, May 3, 2014 online

Sleep has numerous important physiological and cognitive functions that may be particularly important to elite athletes. Recent evidence, as well as anecdotal information, suggests that athletes may experience a reduced quality and /or quantity of sleep. Sleep deprivation can have significant effects on athletic performance, especially submaximal, prolonged exercise. Comprised sleep my also influence learning, memory, cognition, pain perception, immunity and inflammation. Furthermore, changes in glucose metabolism and neuroendocrine function as a result of chronic, partial sleep deprivation may result in alterations in carbohydrate metabolism, appetite, food-intake and protein synthesis. These factors can ultimately have a negative influence on an athlete’s nutritional, metabolic and endocrine status and hence potentially reduce athletic performance. Research has identified a number of neurotransmitters associated with the sleep-wake cycle. Some neurotransmitters are contained in carbohydrates, turkey and some herbs (valerian and melatonin supplements) and MAY be of value in inducing sleep.

            Below is the abstract of the study done by the authors above from the AIS.

On nights that preceded training days, participants went to bed at 22:05 h (s=00:52), arose at 05:48 h (s=00:24) and obtained 5.4 h (s=1.3) of sleep. On nights that preceded rest days, participants went to bed at 00:32 h (s=01:29), arose at 09:47 h (s=01:47) and obtained 7.1 h (s=1.2) of sleep. Mixed model analyses revealed that on nights prior to training days, bedtimes and get-up times were significantly earlier (p<0.001), time spent in bed was significantly shorter (p<0.001) and the amount of sleep obtained was significantly less (p<0.001), than on nights prior to rest days. These results indicate that early-morning training sessions severely restrict the amount of sleep obtained by elite athletes. Given that chronic sleep restriction of <6 h per night can impair psychological and physiological functioning, it is possible that early-morning schedules actually limit the effectiveness of training.

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BELOW IS AN ARTICLE BY ALEX HUTCHINSON that breaks down the above study with some USEFUL INSIGHTS.

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How Do Morning Workouts Affect Sleep?

It's not just the night before that matters.

By

Alex Hutchinson

Published

April 28, 2014

Ever wondered how morning workouts affect your sleep? A new study in the European Journal of Sport Science, from researchers in Australia (including Shona Halson, the head of recovery at the Australian Institute of Sport) tackles this question. The study was fairly straightforward: they simply strapped wrist-worn sleep monitors on a training group of seven elite swimmers during a 14-day period of intense training. On 12 of those days, the swimmers had 6:00 a.m. workouts scheduled; the other two days were rest days. Here's what the data looked like on average:click on underlined info below to access link for chart to be described!

Description: sleep_in_swimmers_0

The white bars are overnight sleep; the black bars are workouts (usually twice a day); and the grey bars are afternoon naps. What jumps out, not surprisingly, is that the swimmers got less sleep when they had early workouts -- way less sleep, in fact. The numbers are pretty stark: they spent 7.7 hours in bed before training days, and 9.3 hours in bed before rest days. But that's not the whole story: according to their sleep monitors, they actually only slept for 5.4 hours before training days, compared to 7.1 hours before rest days. That's because they took longer to get to sleep on those nights (41 minutes versus 32 minutes), and spent more time awake in bed. That's at least in part because they were making an effort to get to bed earlier before training days, which makes it harder to get to sleep. It may also have to do with anxiety and stress about the upcoming workouts.

The funny thing, as the authors of the paper point out, is that these are full-time athletes who have no particular need to train at 6 a.m. -- that's just what swimmers (and rowers and triathletes, among others) do, partly as a legacy from a time when athletes weren't full-time. It seems pretty clear that moving the workouts an hour or two later would help these athletes get more sleep, and probably help them perform better.

So what does that mean for the rest of us? If you've got a job and family, you're probably doing 6:00 a.m. workouts because you have to, not because you want to. The biggest thing that jumps out at me in this data is the later bed times before rest days. If you're going to bed after midnight every weekend, that makes it harder to fall asleep when you need to on the other nights. You're basically going in and out of jet lag once a week. Now, these swimmers were young Aussies with an average of 22.5, so perhaps it's unreasonable to suggest that they should be in bed by 10 p.m. every night! But if you're trying to make early workouts work for you, then I think one of the most effective things you can do is aim for a consistent bedtime even on nights when you don't have an early workout, so that your body gets into a routine where the early wake-up isn't a shock. Is that trade-off worthwhile? That's something only you can decide.

SUPPLEMENTATION ADVICE FOR YOUNG ATHLETES

The last post on Supplements surely elicited “feedback”, more like “fallout” as it may be, depending on the ages of readers and their “sources”.  This additional post will address my “safe” recommendations for supplementation of an athlete’s diet based on the “individual” NEEDS of each athlete.

First, and foremost, let me state again that athletes who have a well-balanced diet, with adequate amounts of quality protein (mix of egg, whey, meats, fish, milk) for their size and sport ‘s training requirements and optimal levels of carbohydrate and fat for fuel and the all bodily systems’ maintenance, DO NOT NEED TO USE PROTEIN SUPPLEMENTS.

Before addressing the other types of supplementation that have been shown to be of value to athletes, I would love to direct your attention to Dr. Mosley’s statement: "Almost every single nutrient imaginable has peer reviewed publications associating it with almost any outcome"---Dr. Michael Mosley, Science Journalist

This brings me to a point that I needed to make in my last post with a more clear and concise recommendation: “critical evaluation of a product’s ingredients label AND manufacturer’s reputation” should precede any purchase and ingestion of a supplement.”

In addition to CRITICALLY READING LABELS FOR INGREDIENTS, the ingredients should be checked by accessing both World and USA Anti-doping Agency lists of banned substances AT>>> http://www.usada.org/substances/prohibited-list/ AT>>> AND http://www.usada.org/substances/prohibited-list/athlete-guide/ http://www.usada.org/substances/prohibited-list/athlete-guide/ BEFORE purchasing and ingesting ANY supplement. 

THE most critical evaluation SHOULD focus on EACH ATHLETE’S dietary intake to ASSESS if there is indeed a lack of Macro or Micronutrients that can be corrected with a simple addition of foods that are high in the nutrients deemed to be lacking in the diet.

There are, however, supplements that have proven to be of benefit to hard training athletes, regardless of how balanced their diet may be. These can be divided into supplements for ENDURANCE ATHLETES and STRENGTH-POWER-SPEED ATHLETES.

                        SUPPLEMENTS FOR ENDURANCE SPORTS

Since ENDURANCE Sport athletes burn incredible amounts of energy on a daily basis, which tend to stress their recovery and regeneration processes in addition to replacing vital nutrients in the quickest and most efficient methods. Regardless of the hundreds of advertisements and wide array of products that are marketed to ENDURANCE athletes, only a limited number of supplements HAVE ENOUGH “QUALITY, PEER-REVEIWED RESEARCH” TO SUPPORT their inclusion in the daily diets of athletes.

These include: 1) Carbohydrate-Electrolyte Solutions, 2) Caffeine and 3) additional Protein and Carbohydrate foods or Carb-Protein bars, powders or drinks for consumption within 1-2 hours post-exercise/training.

In addition, Endurance Sport athletes may wish to use buffering agents for performance enhancement during competition. It is best to try these buffering agents during training before using them in competition. However, consistent use during training is not recommended as the bodies adaptation to training may be comprised if buffering agents are consistently used in training, thus limiting the body’s ability to enhance it’s own buffering capacity through training.

Sodium Bicarbonate and Sodium Citrate and Beta-alanine have proven to be effective and safe buffering agents.  In addition, Beet Juice and leafy green vegetables added to the diet may provide effective raising of nitrogen levels which have been shown to make endurance type activities MORE EFFICIENT (by reducing the oxygen cost of muscle contraction).

            SUPPLEMENTS FOR STRENGTH-POWER-SPEED ATHLETES

Strength-Power-Speed athletes can improve performance with 1) enhancement of strength levels, 2) gain in lean tissue mass and 3) improvements in anaerobic power capacities. Supplements that have proven to be safe and effective for these purposes include creatine, buffering agents (discussed above), caffeine and additional dietary protein.

In my previous post on Supplements, caffeine intake of 1-3 mg/Kg of body weight taken prior to exercise proved to increase work capacity in both ENDURANCE and POWER exercise performance. So-called Energy Drinks, even with caffeine levels that fall within the 1-3 mg/Kg recommendations, should be carefully studied for “other” sources of “stimulants” that are added to caffeine TO PRODUCE A HIGHER STIMULANT EFFECT ON THE Central Nervous and Neuromuscular systems. Many of the combinations of stimulants in Energy Drinks have caused serious heart reactions, muscular tremors, etc. and should be avoided.

Addition dietary Protein, a proven benefit to Power-Strength athletes, may be of value in powder form or additional protein foods added to the diet depending on whether the diet meets the recommended allowances of 1.5-1.8 grams/Kg body wt./ day for Strength-Power sport athletes.

Since creatine was covered in detail with the additional article added to my last post I will only add a few comments here. Creatine is present in sufficient amounts of most red meats and some seafood sources. Therefore, those athletes whose diet contains consistently high intakes of these two sources, may not benefit from creatine supplementation.

However, in my experience with collegiate and high school females (16 years with collegiate female sprinters/hurdlers/throwers/jumpers), I found that the female athletes benefitted to a much greater degree than males. This may have been due to either low intake of red meats and seafood AND/OR lower caloric intakes in general. I HIGHLY recommend creatine supplementation for female Strength-Power-Speed athletes IF taken in the right quantity and at the appropriate time.

Creatine should be taken after workouts with ingestion of a carb-protein liquid (chocolate milk is fine) or mix of carb-protein foods.  My most recent collegiate, female sprinters/hurdlers/throwers used Muscle Milk, as it was easy to transport or have on hand for use directly after workouts and had the appropriate mix of carb to protein ratio. Creatine dose after workouts should be 3-4 grams for sprinters, hurdlers, jumpers and 5-6 grams for throwers (mainly larger body mass types) PER day for 30 DAYS. I advise no creatine supplementation for a week before resuming the above protocol. This washing out period allows for the body’s adaptation process to enhance the enzymatic qualities necessary to utilize creatine quicker and more efficiently (creatine kinase utilization).

The greatest recommendation I can give concerning training and competitive performance enhancement IS TO ADOPT A CONSISTENT AND BALANCED DIET by including 5-7 servings of fruits and vegetables (striving to get as many different, bright colored varieties), 3-5 servings of quality protein sources, 4-6 servings of “unprocessed, unrefined carbohydrate sources and 3 servings of foods high in Omega-6 and Omega-3 Fat sources with a ratio of 1:1 or 2:1 Omega-6 to Omega-3.

You can, of course review my posts on FATS and Carbohydrates for ideas of food sources high in both types of FAT.

Lastly, I wish to WARN against the outrageous claims and unsafe products that ARE available online and in gyms, fitness center vending machines, etc. To aid against all the unsafe and unreliable products that are BEING sold at alarmingly high rates, I am providing a list of web-based resources that you can check that I have found credible.

Remember to always check the WADA and USADA web sites given above first, and then use the list below to further evaluate before buying any supplement. ALSO, AVOID SUPPLEMENTS THAT ARE MANUFACTURED IN CHINA. I buy German Creatine because of it’s reliably high and HPLC tested quality. China has been a consistent source of “tainted” supplements and should be avoided as a source of ANY type of supplement.

Web sites belong to Nutrition or Supplement or Fitness Products SHOULD not be used to evaluate or buy supplements!!! Use those below AFTER CHECKING WADA/USADA sites.

www.nlmj.nih.gov/medlineplus

www.cc.nih.gov/ccc/supplements

www.sportsci.org

www.acsm.org

www.nutrition.org

www.eatright.org

www.ncsa-lift.org

www.ajcn.org

www.dshs-koeln.de

www.jap.physiology.org

www.highwire.stanford.edu

www.jake.med.yale.edu

www.goaskalice.columbia.edu

www.fda.gov

www.nal.usda.gov/fnic

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/quiery.fcgi

 Bottom line; you cannot rely on what others tell you when it comes to putting something into your body…no matter how ripped, cut, massive or impressive they may be.

Diet/Nutrition Part 4: SHOULD ATHLETES USE SUPPLEMENTS?

The past 4 posts on Diet/Nutrition have been concerned with the MACRONUTRIENTS; Proteins, Carbohydrates and Fats. Since an adequate and well-balanced diet will likely provide MICRONUTRIENTS (vitamins and minerals) in sufficient quantities, THIS POST will focus on SUPPLEMENTS.

The use of dietary supplements by athletes is overwhelmingly widespread in sports. Sports Supplements have become a powerful industry making billions of dollars worldwide.  However, the IAAF Nutrition in Sport (2007) Document warns that athletes should NOT expect benefits from MOST of these supplements.

In fact, the reality is that many supplements can either pose serious health risks or “positive drug” test results OR both, due to ingesting larger than recommended doses OR banned ingredients that ARE NOT LISTED as ingredients on the labels.

The vast majority of these types of supplements are marketed with claims that they can reduce body fat levels, build bigger AND stronger muscles FASTER and/or improve performance. These are the supplements that contain ingredients that are either on the banned list and can lead to positive drug tests OR contain ingredients that can lead to serious health risks.  In many cases, these types of ingredients CAN CAUSE BOTH health risk and positive drug test results.

Let me begin my recommendations regarding SUPPLEMENTS that may be of benefit with this statement:

 “SUPPLEMENTS DO NOT COMPENSATE FOR POOR FOOD CHOICES AND INADEQUATE AMOUNTS OF NUTRIENTS AS A RESULT OF POOR EATING HABITS!”

As I mentioned in the recent post on Protein Powders, Protein supplements, protein bars and amino acid preparations are among the most hyped, marketed and purchased sports nutrition products. As also suggested in that post, athletes can easily attain adequate protein for muscle growth and repair from a well balanced diet that contains meat, fish, eggs, etc. and extra protein is seldom required beyond a serving or two of a protein powder that contains a mix of milk, egg, whey proteins WHEN dietary intake DOES fall short.

It should also be made clear that whole proteins found in foods generally have advantages over individual amino acids and amino acid preparations.

IN ADDITION, compounds with muscle building claims such as chromium, born, HMB (hydroxymethylbutyrate), colostrum, etc. HAVE NOT BEEN PROVEN to provide substantial benefits for athletes.

                                                      WHY ATHLETES TAKE SUPPLEMENTS

Athletes generally look to supplements to: 1) promote adaptations to training, 2) increase energy supply, 3) allow for more consistent/intensive training by promoting recovery between training, 4) maintain good health TO REDUCE illness/fatigue that can interrupt training AND/OR speed healing processes for injuries and 5) to enhance competitive performance.

Some supplements aimed at immune system health, such as glutamine, zinc, Echinacea, colostrum, Goldenseal, etc. but there has been NO strong or consistent evidence to support effectiveness of these mineral/herb supplements. AS REPORTED IN THE POST ON CARBOHYDRATES, sound evidence exists that a high carb diet, in TANDEM WITH APPROPRIATE REST AND SLEEP VOLUMES, CAN LOWER STRESS HORMONE LEVELS.

                                    SUPPLEMENTS THAT HAVE SHOWN BENEFITS FOR ATHLETES IN TRAINING

At this time, creatine, caffeine and certain buffering agents have been shown to improve performance in conjunction with certain training methods/ modes. For instance, creatine has been shown to be of benefit to STRENGTH/POWER/SPEED or ALACTIC training BUT is clearly not of benefit to ENDURANCE ATHLETES. Endurance athletes, along with STRENGTH/POWER/SPEED athletes, CAN benefit from both caffeine and buffering agents for both training and competition uses.

                  CAFFEINE

A small amount of caffeine (1-3mg/kg body wt.) can help performance in prolonged exercise (endurance activities) and may also be helpful in exercise of shorter duration: ex:”a caffeine dose of as little as 2mg/kg of body wt. has been shown to help improve REPEAT sprint capabilities in some studies.” Many studies regarding this BENEFIT FOR REPEAT EXPLOSIVE ACTIVITIES have put forth the theory that is may be a benefit for “well-trained” athletes BUT limited in effect for less-fit athletes.

Such small amounts can be found in common sports drinks, energy drinks, coffee and cola products (including gels). For example, 100mg of caffeine can be obtained from a 12 oz. coffee or 24 oz. cola drink. LARGER doses of coffee ARE NOT MORE EFFECTIVE and CAN HAVE NEGATIVE SIDE-EFFECTS ON SLEEP PATTERNS.

Those who do not normally use caffeine products can experience short-term effects such as ANXIETY and muscular twitching because they are not acclimated to caffeine. IT SHOULD ALWAYS BE USED IN TRAINING ON A TRIAL BASIS BEFORE USING CAFFEINE IN COMPETIONS.

                                    BUFFERING AGENTS

As noted in “GENERATING ANAEROBIC POWER, CHAPTER 14, by Dr. David Martin (High Performance Training for Sports, Joyce & Lewindon),”The two major peripheral limitations to HIGH INTENSITY EXERCISE are likely energy supply (total pool of ATP,adenosine triphosphate and creatine phosphate) and ability to buffer waste products of anaerobic metabolism (accumulation of H+ or hydrogen atoms) which interferes with muscle contraction and production of energy via anaerobic metabolic pathways.”

As discussed above and in the article following this post, creatine can improve skeletal muscles content of high-energy phosphates .

Many other studies have demonstrated that many buffering agents (sodium bicarbonate, sodium citrate and sodium-phosphate) can be used to increase anaerobic capacity, These increases in anaerobic capacity lead directly to the improvement of high-intensity exercise and performance.

Sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), ingested 1-2 hours prior to short, high intensity exercise (30-300 seconds) at a dose of 0.3 gms./kg body wt. can provide performance/exercise benefits via improved anaerobic work capacity. Too large a dose, however, can cause severe gastric-intestinal distress so use in training prior to use in competition is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Beta-alanine, in more recent studies has proven to act as a nutrient AID to improve intracellular buffering capacity and, in certain studies, improve maximum performances lasting between 60-240 seconds. These improvements ARE MOST LIKELY due to the enhancement quality that beta-alanine contributes to the enrichment of intramuscular carnosine levels. Carnosine is an important chemical in the maintenance of the acid-base balance with skeletal muscle.

                                    SLEEP

Although not listed as a supplement, SLEEP is absolutely necessary to all YOUNG CHILDREN, Pre-Adolescent, Adolescent and Adults!

SLEEP is the primary VEHICLE for PERFORMANCE ENHACEMENT of both physical and cognitive performances. SLEEP is WHEN training adaptations, growth and maturation of body systems, muscle- tendon tissue growth, repair and recovery from training stimulus TAKES PLACE. Without adequate amounts of SLEEP, the young athlete may NOT experience GROWTH POTENTIAL, POTENTIAL FOR SUCCESS IN ACADEMIC AND/OR ATHLETIC PERFORMANCES.

In addition to creatine, caffeine, sleep and buffering agents, there are a number of FOODS that have been developed to supply specific formulas of nutrients that supply energy in a form that is quickly and easily digested and absorbed. These FOODS can be valuable to HELP athletes meet energy requirements when everyday foods are not practical to eat prior to training or competition. Examples include: sports gels, sports drinks, sports bars that contain ONLY carbs, protein, fats, vitamins, minerals/electrolytes in gel, solid or liquid forms.

CREATINE INFORMATION

At the conclusion of my post I have included a THOROUGH, INFORMATIVE AND REPUTABLE SOURCE of information on Creatine Supplementation. PART 1, on Theory behind supplementation may not be for most SO, please scroll down to WHY, WHAT AND WHEN’s of proper methods of Creatine Supplementation.

Personally, I have used creatine since 1993 when I was coaching at UC Irvine and developed a protocol for creatine supplementation with my sprint/hurdle/jump athletes. I personally like the long term method of supplementing rather than the 5 Day Loading method. Since the article (Parts 1 & 2) by Kevin Kuhn will COVER everything you need to know, I will not go into the benefits of creatine and the why’s and how’s of supplementing PROPERLY. 
AS A TEASER, BELOW IS KEVIN’S FINAL PARAGRAPH:
So there you have it.  Creatine supplementation is safe, effective, and cheap.  Those three words are very hard to get in the same sentence when talking about a specific supplement, by the way. NOW, READ UP, UNDERSTAND AND APPLY!!!

Creatine and the Theory Behind Supplementation

Kevin Kuhn, M.S.Ed., CSCS

 — 01 May 2012

 

Before we dive into the topic of creatine supplementation, I must allude to the Chinese proverb I used in the first Nutrition for the Power Athlete article:

“He that takes medicine and neglects diet wastes the skill of the physician.”
I just want to open this way because most supplements, like most medicines, are not as effective if the diet is poor. So if you have not yet read the Nutrition for the Power Athlete articles, I encourage you to do so.
The next thing I’d like to bring up before diving into the supplement world is…the bell shaped curve.  If you have ever studied statistics, or even if you haven’t, you have most likely heard of it as it is the most prominent probability distribution used in statistics. Statistics was not my favorite class in undergraduate or graduate school, but I did learn many things that were/are practical and applicable to my life in general, but also my diet and training specifically. Without going into too much detail, and trying to keep things simple and relevant to our topic…the bell shape curve (sometimes called a normal curve) represents a normal distribution, and is an easy way to view how a specific variable or property has an “effect” on a group of people or population. Again, this is by no means a complete explanation of normal distribution, but it will serve our purposes. If you want to learn more, just watch a few videos on YouTube by searching “bell shape curve” or “normal distribution curve.”  Or you can read a stats book…

Creatine and the bell curve: Works for most, then a small percentage of non and super-responders!

Anyway, the basic premise is that an effect of a specific variable will be distributed throughout a group in the shape of a bell curve. This means, for example, that the response to a specific stimuli is not exactly the same for every person in a group. If you think about it like a spectrum, and using creatine as an example, the majority of a group will have some significant response to creatine supplementation, while a small portion will show a non-significant (non-responder) response and another small portion on the opposite end of the spectrum will show a very significant response. If you have ever seen the movie Unbreakable, (spoiler alert!) you’ll understand how Mr. Glass and the main character are both the minority at opposite ends of the human spectrum, with the majority of humans somewhere in between.
Back to the point: even when research shows a supplement to be “effective”, there are, most often, “statistical outliers” that are either not dealt with statistically or are only mentioned in passing.  Since creatine has been studied so heavily, we understand that the majority of people respond quite well to its use…while others seem to show little to no response at all.  All that to say…if you try using it and it doesn’t seem to work, you may have poor quality creatine or you may just be a “non-responder”.  As an example, Eric Cressey explains on his blog that he is a “non-responder” with regard to supplements, specifically mentioning that he does not gain “water-weight” often associated with creatine supplementation.

If you aren’t getting any stronger using creatine, it’s not that it doesn’t work, you might just be a non-responder, or need to buy less shady supplements!

Theoretical premise of Creatine supplementation:
The main theory behind the use of creatine comes down to turning ADP back into ATP. For most body cells, but specifically muscle cells, energy that is immediately available is stored in the form of a high-energy phosphate called ATP (adenosine triphosphate).  Unfortunately (in my opinion) cells store only enough ATP to fuel max effort muscle contraction for a very limited time…like a few seconds.  The process of generating fuel from ATP is called hydrolysis, because water is required for the reaction to occur.  A very simplified version of how ATP serves as energy or fuel is as follows:
An enzyme, called ATPase separates one of the three phosphate bonds on ATP (adenosine triphosphate) which makes available energy for contraction, but also yields a proton, heat, entropy, and an inorganic phosphate.  This reaction turns ATP into ADP (adenosine diphosphate) since the enzyme ATPase broke one the of the phosphate bonds. 

So…
ATP + water (and the enzyme ATPase)  =  ADP + an inorganic phosphate + a hydrogen ion (proton) + heat + entropy + free energy.

A bit of an aside…but this is just another reason water is still the most important “ergogenic aid” out there. Without proper hydration, both this reaction to create energy as well as the ability to dissipate the heat created by this reaction could not occur. Dehydration = limited hydrolysis + over heating.

Water: Is it in you?

To maintain high intensity muscle contraction, the body’s cells act to re-synthesize ATP from ADP and a high energy phosphate. Creatine phosphate (CP, also called phosphocreatine, PCr), which is also stored in very small quantities in muscle (enough for another couple seconds of max effort muscle contraction), is a major player in the reaction that turns ADP back into ATP so that the hydrolysis reaction can occur to release more energy for contraction.    

So…
CP + ADP + a hydrogen ion (proton) = creatine + ATP + heat

So the theory is that ingesting creatine monohydrate will increase cellular levels of CP, which would thenallow for more immediate resynthesis of ADP and ATP and thus improve muscular strength and endurance.

And what do you know?  After 1000+ studies on creatine supplementation, the theory is quite sound and supplementation quite safe.
Though we now understand that creatine supplementation may have performance benefits for most (if not all) athletic activities, the potential benefits for the Power Athlete are quite clear. As I alluded to before, creatine supplementation increases the stored levels of CP (creatine phosphate) in the muscle.  This means energy production for maximal effort activity can be maintained for longer than normal. Creatine supplementation may only allow for the maintenance of maximal sprint speed for a fraction of a second longer than normal, or the ability to complete 1 more rep when weight training, but when these gains are compounded over multiple training sessions, the results will speak for themselves. 
Another way creatine can improve your athletic performance is by allowing more CP to be available for recovery between sets or bouts of a specific exercise or activity. For example, recovery between sets of squats or sprints can occur faster with creatine supplementation, allowing for a reduction in time between training sessions or an increase in the quality of each training session.
That’s all for now…but stay tuned for Creatine Part 2.
In the next article I’ll discuss the What, When, Why, and How of creatine supplementation, along with a few other details that research has brought to light on the topic.
Sources
Balsom, P.D., Soderlund, K., Edblom, B.  (1994).  Creatine in Humans with Special Reference to Creatine Supplementation. Sports Medicine. 18:  268-280.
Krieder, R.B.  (2008).  Sports Applications of Creatine.  In J. Antonio, D. Kalman, J.R. Stout,M. Greenwood, D.S. Willoughby, and G.G. Haff (Eds.), Essentials of Sports Nutrition and Supplements (pp. 417-439). Totowa, New Jersey:  Humana Press
Scott, C.B.  (2008).  Thermodynamics, Biochemistry, and Metabolism.  In J. Antonio, D. Kalman, J.R. Stout, M. Greenwood, D.S. Willoughby, and G.G. Haff (Eds.), Essentials of Sports Nutrition and Supplements (pp. 3-20). Totowa, New  Jersey:  Humana Press

 

                  Creatine Part 2.
Now that the theory of supplementation is out of the way, we can dive into some specific questions.  The Why, What, When, and How of creatine supplementation are rarely, if at all, addressed correctly and appropriately on a supplement label.  Luckily for those of us who care about what we put into our pie-holes, research has answers to these questions.
The “Why” of supplementation:
So what are the benefits?
Well…even though brand new research shows that maximal effort activity may not be limited by how fast the body can resynthesize ATP, but by fatigue due to other neuromuscular mechanisms, creatine supplementation still improves performance.  Did you catch that?  We still don’t know exactly what causes maximal effort fatigue…but we do know creatine improves performance.
But it doesn’t just improve performance.  It statistically and significantly improves performance.  In fact, reviews of literature on creatine studies that measure exercise performance show the average gain in performance from supplementation to be around 10% to 15%.  To break that down just a little, single effort sprint performance has been shown to improve by 1% to 5% and repeated sprint performance has been shown to improve by 5% to 15%. That could be the difference between a million dollar contract…and well, no contract.  I’m just saying…
Back to reality.
We know the body only stores a limited amount of Creatine Phosphate and free creatine, which make up the creatine pool.  A 150 lb. person stores about 120 grams in the creatine pool, two-thirds being CP and one-third being free creatine.  To replenish used or depleted creatine and maintain the creatine pool, the body can do two things:

1. Utilize creatine that is found in the diet
2. Synthesize its own creatine from the amino acids glycine, arginine, and methionine.

We also know that a normal diet typically provides enough creatine and/or amino acids from protein to maintain the creatine pool.
Question:
If you could increase the total creatine pool, and thus the CP stored in muscle, would you?

Lets say, for example, that you are a vegetarian. Research has shown that individuals maintaining a vegetarian diet have lower than normal levels of stored CP. Now lets say that you have a creatine synthesis deficiency and you can’t maintain a normal creatine pool. Or, maybe you just want to increase your creatine pool above normal levels to maximize athletic performance. Whatever the case may be, all are great reasons to supplement with creatine.

Study after study on creatine monohydrate supplementation have shown that the total creatine pool (about 120 grams) can be increased up to 160 grams, though even slight increases in the creatine pool have been correlated to improved performance measures. So the potential benefits, summarized by the ISSN (International Society of Sports Nutrition) are:

• “increased muscle mass and strength”
• “increased single and repetitive sprint performance”
• “enhanced glycogen synthesis”
• “possible enhancement of aerobic capacity via greater shuttling of ATP from mitochondria and buffering of acidity”
• “increased work capacity”
• “enhanced recovery”
• “greater training tolerance”

If you are not interested by any of these potential benefits…you can stop reading this now.
To sum this portion up.  Creatine supplementation improves performance.  Bottom line.
The “What” of supplementation:
The “what” in this context deals with the specific type of creatine.
When it is all said and done, good old Creatine Monohydrate is still the best stuff out there.  Though many, many, many supplement companies disagree with this statement (especially those selling creatine serum or creatine ethyl ester), no data to date has shown any other type of creatine to be any more effective at increasing creatine uptake than creatine monohydrate powder.  In fact, some studies have even shown creatine serum to have no effect at all on muscle creatine uptake.  Though many supplement companies have made claims that their type of creatine allows for greater muscle uptake, better absorption in the gut and blood stream, and less breakdown in the stomach, (when compared to creatine monohydrate) research has yet to show any of these to be true.  So if you walk into GNC and pull all the creatine supplements off the shelves…the one that costs the cheapest (but is still pharmaceutical grade) is probably the one that works the best.  Along those lines, the three main producers of creatine are labs in Germany, United States, and China.  The United States International Trade Commission has collected data from independent lab testing, and places German and American creatine at the top of the list since more contaminants have been found in Chinese sources.  If the product says it is pharmaceutical grade creatine monohydrate and is manufactured in a lab facility that is both continually inspected by a 3rd party and maintains either FDA or the respecting countries’ governmental guidelines, you probably have a solid product.
The “When” of supplementation:
Though many creatine product labels have a specific “time” for when you should take your creatine (immediately before training, 30 minutes before training, immediately upon waking, immediately after training, etc.), research shows that muscle uptake of creatine is directly related to insulin levels.  For this reason, many protocols suggest ingestion of creatine with a meal.  The increase in insulin levels due to ingestion of carbohydrates and protein or amino acids post training has been shown to increase protein synthesis and muscle glycogen “refueling.”  So to get the most bang for your buck the ISSN explains: “Because insulin levels enhance creatine uptake, ingestion of creatine after exercise with a carbohydrate and/or protein supplement may be an effective way to increase and/or maintain muscle creatine stores.”  So holding off to supplement until immediately after you train seems to be the best option.

Creatine Supplementation: Best done immediately post-workout to help harness the power of insulin!

The “How” of supplementation:
As far as the “how” part of supplementation goes, there are 3 main protocols.
The most commonly used protocol (Loading/Maintenance) in supplementation studies involves a “loading” phase (usually 5-7 days) in which creatine is ingested at .3g/kg/day.  The total is usually spread out in smaller chunks throughout the day in 5-ish gram increments.  So for a 150 lb. person:
.3 x (150/2.2) = about 20 grams/day or 5 grams of creatine monohydrate taken 4 times throughout the day.
After the “loading” phase of 5-7 days, muscle creatine levels are maintained by taking 3-5 grams of creatine monohydrate per day.  This protocol is used most often since muscle creatine stores may reach full capacity (an increase of 10%-40%) after 2-3 days of supplementing.
Another protocol (Low-dose) involves supplementing 3 to 6 grams of creatine monohydrate per day.  Though 3 grams per day for 28 days has been shown to fully “saturate” muscle creatine stores, it increases these stores in a slower and steady manner.
The third most common protocol (High-dose) involves supplementing .3g/kg/day during training.  This is used least often since muscle creatine stores are maxed out within a few days and only a fraction of the dose is needed to keep muscle creatine levels at maximum.  Save your money.
Some protocols also take advantage of cycling periods of creatine supplementation.  Since it takes about 4 to 6 weeks for the elevated creatine store level to return the pre supplementation level, you don’t really have to take creatine everyday of training.  This type of cycling is theorized to increase the naturally occurring level of muscle creatine over time, or at least maintain them.  In contrast to cycling, some researchers are now suggesting treating creatine supplementation they way we treat nutrients (carbs, protein, fat, vitamins, minerals, etc.).  In other words, taking a low dose (3-5 grams) every day (regardless of training status or periodization cycle) to maintain elevated muscle creatine stores…all the time.  I have a strong feeling that this will be the “protocol” that most will follow in the near future.
These aren’t the only relevant questions…
You probably have a few other questions floating through your mind right now…so I’ll try to address those, too.
Does it work right away?  Since you can max out your creatine stores within a few days (Loading protocols), research shows performance benefits even for short-term supplementation.
What about long term supplementation?  Research shows that supplementing with creatine over extended periods of time (12 weeks or more) leads to greater strength and performance gains.  Research also shows that long term supplementation is safe when used within the proper guidelines.
Side effects?  The only significant side effect reported in the clinical studies is weight gain.  All the anecdotally reported side effects (i.e., dehydration, cramping, muscle pulls/tears, etc.) have been refuted by research reviews and other studies looking into the medical safety of this supplement. Interesting thing to note is that creatine supplementation may actually help reduce the risk of heat related injuries due to the increase in muscle “water-weight” associated with supplementation.
One more thing to consider…
Before you decide whether or not creatine supplementation is for you, I have one more piece of information to share.
When it comes to training for power, muscle size is a pretty big deal.  Increases in muscle size (hypertrophy) occur concurrently with increases in myonuclei.  So what does that mean?  Muscle fibers (cells) have one (but not the only) specific characteristic that differentiates them from most other cells in the body.  They have more than one nucleus.  The greater the number of nuclei within a cell means the greater potential for muscle protein synthesis, and thus more potential for training adaptation.
So how do you increase the number of nuclei in muscle?  Let me introduce you, if you have not already been acquainted, to satellite cells.
Satellite cells are basically muscle “stem cells” that exist on the outer edges of skeletal muscle fibers.  When a muscle fiber is damaged, especially the type of damage that occurs due to training, satellite cells are activated and then go through one or more of the stages of mitosis to form “daughter cells” in order to help repair the damaged muscle.  These daughter cells can go through further stages of mitosis and become a myotube.  A myotube can then “donate” its nucleus to existing muscle fibers, thus increasing the total number of nuclei within a muscle fiber…and thus increasing potential for muscle protein synthesis and advanced training adaptation.  Pretty cool stuff.  The coolest part, however, is this:  Creatine supplementation in combination with resistance training has been shown to increase the number and activity of satellite cells as well as increase the number of myonuclei within muscle fibers more than resistance training alone.
So there you have it.  Creatine supplementation is safe, effective, and cheap.  Those three words are very hard to get in the same sentence when talking about a specific supplement, by the way.

Summary:

• Creatine has a variety of proven benefits for speed/power athletes.
• Creatine is best taken directly after a workout with your post-workout supplement.
• American and German creatine monohydrate powders are the way to go; steer clear of the fancy liquid creatine supplements.
• It does not take long in the supplementation process to start noticing the effects of creatine.
• There are a variety of ways to take creatine, you don’t have to take it every single day, and cycling is a good idea when supplementing with it.
• Creatine works with satellite cells during supplementation and resistance training to pack greater amounts of myonuclei into muscle fibers.

Sources:
United States International Trade Commission, Creatine Monohydrate from the People’s Republic of China:  Investigation No. 731-TA-814 (Preliminary). Determination and Views of the Commission (USITC Publication No. 3177, April 1999). Retrieved from
Burke, D.G., Chilibeck, P.D., Parise G., Candow, C.D., Mahoney, D., and Tarnopolsky, M.  (2003).  Effect of Creatine and Weight Training on Muscle Creatine and Performance in Vegetarians.  Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise.  35:  1946-1955.
Hultman, E., Soderlund, K., Timmorns, J.A., Cederblad, G., and Greenhaff, P.L.  (1996).  Muscle Creatine Loading in Men.  Journal of Applied Physiology.  81: 232-237.
Bundle, M.W. & Weyand, P.G.  (2012).  Sprint Exercise Performance: Does Metabolic Power Matter?  Exercise & Sport Sciences Reviews.  40:3  174-182.
Krieder, R.B.  (2008).  Sports Applications of Creatine.  In J. Antonio, D. Kalman, J.R. Stout,M. Greenwood, D.S. Willoughby, and G.G. Haff (Eds.), Essentials of Sports Nutrition and Supplements (pp. 417-439). Totowa, New Jersey:  Humana Press
Chromiak, J.A. & Antonio, J.  (2008).  Skeletal Muscle Plasticity.  In J. Antonio, D. Kalman, J.R. Stout,M. Greenwood, D.S. Willoughby, and G.G. Haff (Eds.), Essentials of Sports Nutrition and Supplements (pp. 21-52). Totowa, New  Jersey:  Humana Press
Olsen, S., Aagaard, P., Kadi, Fawzi, Tufekovic, G., Verney, J., Olesen, J.L., Suetta, C., and Kjaer, M. (2006).  Creatine Supplementation Augements the Increase in Satellite Cell and Myonuclei Number in Human Skeletal Muscle Induced by Strength Training.  Journal of Physiology.  573: 525-534.