Wow, almost a month since my last post... With Thanksgiving, then getting sick for a week, and exams coming up soon, it was a rough month; and now with the Halloween party night over, I'm sure you're all wondering how things went.
I fell short.
It's not even close. So costume-less I went to a buddy's house with a few other guys and watched some Rob Zombie movies last night. With the 7-week goal over, you might think I'm just quit now and fall back into some old habits. But the thing is, I'm feeling great. The workouts are going well, so I'm going to continue the blog as a bit of an outlet, and a way to show off my progress. So here's a post about my supplements:
An important part of any new fitness regime is making sure
that you’re body gets the nutrients it needs to perform at it’s best. With a bit of internet research and a
trip to Popeye’s I came home with 4 bottles of supplements.
Active Men’s
Performance Multivitamin
A multivitamin is key to any active lifestyle. As hard as you try, you’ll probably
miss your daily intake of one or more key vitamins and minerals, so they’re a
must if you’re going to really push yourself. To make a traditional, once-a-day multivitamin, the powdered
ingredients are pressed together with a small amount of bonding agent; and a
lot of heat/energy is produced when they’re manufactured this way. In the same way that nutrients are lost
when you cook vegetables, some of the vitamins and minerals are lost when the
vitamins are made this way.
I chose the Active Men’s Performance multivitamin because
it’s an uncompressed multivitamin. Instead of compressing it all together it’s
contained in a small capsule, but this also means that in comparison, you need
to take more. In this case, it’s a
3/day vitamin, so I take it with every meal.
VegeGreen
I don’t think it’s any secret that non-starchy vegetables
are supposed to make up a large part of your diet, whether you’re embarking on
a fitness plan or not. They become
even more important when everything you’re putting into your body is absolutely
necessary. They help your body to
absorb all of the nutrients that you eat in your food, or supplement with a
multivitamin.
VegeGreen is exactly what it sounds like: green
vegetables. Dried and ground into
a powder, they recommend you take it in the morning so it can help your body
absorb all it needs from the food you eat through the day. You can mix it with juice or water and
I found it in 2 flavours: blueberry or natural vegetable. I picked blueberry, but unfortunately
it still makes a pretty gross looking green drink, and I really think a more
accurate title for it’s flavour would be: Green Death. But I suffer through, every morning.
Detonator
A pre-workout drink was the supplement I was most leery
about. I’ve never been a big
believer in things that will help you “lift more, gain more, recover more
quickly, etc”… Until one of my roommates a few years ago started experimenting
with one. I definitely noticed
some quick results when he was using it, and he swore by it. After discussing it with a few friends
and the Popeye’s consultant I thought I’d give it a try.
It’s pretty simple, you mix the powder with some water and
drink it about 30 minutes before you workout. Some magic happens, like when Popeye would eat his can of
spinach, and you’re suddenly able to get a couple more reps.
*stay tuned for a more detailed review to
come*
IsoSensation
Protein. The
most complicated decision you’ll ever make about your supplements. There are HUNDREDS of different kinds
of protein out there: stuff to help you lose weight, stuff to help you gain
weight, high-cal, low-cal, whey protein, with creatine, without creatine… the
list goes on. What’s right for
you? Honestly, I have no
idea. Do some research, and talk
to the guy where you’re going to buy it.
I chose IsoSensation.
It’s a low-cal option, with just protein isolates. According to the guy that helped
me pick it (and confirmed by the label on the bucket) it’ll help boost my
protein intake without adding tons of calories: 30g of protein and 130cal per
serving. So, in theory, it’ll help
build lean muscle mass, as opposed to adding tons of mass.
