Creatine and Weight Gain – Everything You Need to Know
Creatine is one of the most popular supplements which many people use while doing workouts or before doing workouts.
It is mostly used by fitness people to increase muscle mass, strength, power and performance during workouts.
What is Creatine?
Creatine is an amino acid that provides energy to cells during workouts or during physical activity.
Creatine is a compound naturally found in small amounts in foods. People take it to build their muscle mass, aesthetic performance and transform their body.
Creatine is a substance produces naturally by your body from amino acids. It is mainly composed by three amino acids arginine, glycine and methionine.
What Does Creatine Do to Your Body?
Creatine is naturally produced by the liver, Kidneys and pancreas. It helps the muscles to use energy.
1. ATP Regeneration
Adenosine triphosphate is the primary energy used by cells to perform muscle contractions during workouts. Creatine supports in ATP regeneration by contributing its phosphate group to adenosine diphosphate (ADP), which is then converted back into ATP.
2. Muscle Recovery
Creatine helps to recover your muscle damage and inflammation after intense workouts. It recovers your muscle very faster during exercises.
3. Improve Aesthetic Performance
Creatine improves your performance in the gym by boosting your strength and power. Taking it before a workout improves your overall performance mainly during heavy workouts.
When to Take Creatine?
You can take creatine anytime a day but consistency is important. But taking too much of that is not good for your health.
Before Workout: Some people take it before the workout to boost their strength and power during exercise.
After Workout: Some people take it after a workout to recover their muscles faster because it is quickly absorbed by the muscle cells.
Loading Phase: Some people follow the loading phase, which means during this phase you will take nearly 20 grams of creatine throughout the day for 1 week to quickly saturate your muscles. So while this phase you will be taking it at any time.
How to Take Creatine?
There are some important steps you need to follow while taking it.
1. Dosage
You can take 3 to 5 grams of creatine per day for a healthier life. But if you are in a loading phase you can 20-25 grams of creatine per day for a week and then come back to the normal phase and take 3-5 grams.
2. Drink with Liquid
Creatine is a powder so you can mix it with water or juice and shake it well and then drink. You can also mix it with protein powder.
3. Hydration
Drink more water throughout the day if you are taking creatine. Staying hydrated while taking it can help you to avoid many health problems. If you are not drinking water, then you will start getting health problems.
Creatine and Weight Gain
Many people have doubts about this why does creatine make you gain weight? I will explain you clearly about this.
Creatine can make you gain weight because of the increased water content in your muscles, not fat gain.
1. Water Retention in Muscles
Creatine pushes water into the muscles which causes water retention muscles. Due to this water retention, your muscles look bigger and larger which contributes to weight gain.
Creatine has a water-attracting function, and as it is stored in muscle cells, it pulls water with it, resulting in an increase in muscle water content. This is one of the reasons why some people gain a little weight when they use it.
2. Increased Muscle mass
Creatine has the ability to increase your muscle mass and performance when you do heavy exercises. It does not increase muscle mass directly, it increases your performance and helps muscle hydration which increases muscle growth and muscle mass.
It recovers your muscle faster which leads you to do more workouts. Due to this faster recovery, you will train more with higher quality which supports muscle growth.
It draws water into muscle cells, resulting in muscle hydration or cell volumization. This increased water content in the muscles can provide a stronger muscular pump and momentarily improve muscle growth and fullness.
3. Storage of Glycogen
Carbohydrates in the form of glycogen are stored in the muscles and liver, providing the body with an easily accessible energy source. Each gram of glycogen is water-bound, and as your body stores more glycogen in your muscles, it retains more water. This is a typical process that occurs when you ingest carbohydrates through your diet or during periods of high carbohydrate consumption.
How to Minimize the Weight Gain?
Creatine makes you gain weight due to water retention in your body but there are some ideas and tips to minimize your weight gain.
1. Be Patient
Be calm and stop worrying about weight gain. Creatine causes weight gain due to its water retention in your body but that is not permanent, it is just temporary. It will increase your muscle and performance during workouts so focus on that and stop worrying about weight gain.
2. Drink More Water
Water is very important when you start taking creatine. Proper hydration is a must when you are doing exercises. Without drinking water, you will get many health problems and mainly your kidney gets damaged. So, drink more water and stay hydrated. Drink nearly 5-6 liters of water a day to have a healthy life.
3. Reduce your Carbohydrate Intake
You should reduce your carbohydrate intake because carbohydrates hold water in your body. So limit your carbohydrate when you are taking it.
Carbohydrates in the form of glycogen are stored in the muscles and liver, providing the body with an easily accessible energy source. Each gram of glycogen is water-bound, and as your body stores more glycogen in your muscles, it retains more water.
This is a typical process that occurs when you ingest carbohydrates through your diet or during periods of high carbohydrate consumption.
