PART 1: Supplement Sabotage

Can Antioxidants Hamper Muscle Endurance?

One theory of aging, first proposed in 1957, suggests that substances called free radicals , or reactive oxygen species, gradually damage cells, resulting in an acceleration of the aging process. Free radicals are strongly implicated in the onset of many diseases linked to early mortality, such as cardiovascular disease, cancer and degenerative brain diseases.

You may remember from Chemistry w 101 that electrons come in pairs. Free radicals are unpaired electrons and are constantly seeking to combine with electron pairs. When that biochemical menage a trois does occur, it wreaks havoc on cellular structures—for example, cell membranes—and lead to cell destruction.

Some scientists claim that cells are bombarded by some 10,000 free radicals per minute. Fortunately, we're not defenseless against cellular terrorism. The body has a built-in system of antioxidant enzymes—including superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione peroxidase—that can neutralize the attacks. The sheer magnitude and relentlessness of free radicals are nevertheless capable of overwhelming the body's defenses. Additionally, many of the body's defenses diminish with age, which may play a role in diseases that are more prevalent among older people, such as cancer and heart disease.

Dietary antioxidants , mainly from fruits and vegetables, back up the body's antioxidant defenses. You're probably familiar with many of them: vitamins C, E, B-complex and A, plus various minerals, as well as plant compounds called bioflavonoids and polyphenols. The latter are especially plentiful in green tea, red wine and dark chocolate.

Oddly enough, free radicals offer a few significant health benefits. For one thing, they're produced by immune cells as a means of destroying invading toxic organisms, such as bacteria. They're required for the production of thyroid hormones. One dietary antioxidant mineral, selenium, is essential for activating the enzymes that help generate thyroid hormones. Because of its antioxidant properties, however, too much selenium doubles back and inhibits thyroid hormone.

A lesser-known benefit of exercise is that it offers antioxidant protection, and some researchers say that the major health benefit of exercise is that it upgrades antioxidants, a process known as hormesis. The term refers to how exposure to small doses of a toxic substance results in compensatory beneficial effects.

The increased oxygen intake that exercise generates also creates oxidative stress, which in turn generates free radicals. When that happens, several negative conditions can result. One is excessive muscle damage, which can delay training recovery. That's the reason athletes are often advised to get a generous amount of dietary antioxidants—and most don't rely on food but supplement with vitamins C and E and minerals.

The research is contradictory on whether the dietary antioxidant boost is necessary. Studies show that merely continuing to exercise automatically bolsters the body's antioxidant system via hormesis. What's more, while some studies have found that elite athletes generate higher-than-normal free radicals when training, others have found the opposite.

A recent controversial study, which used both animal and human subjects, suggests that adding vitamin C to your supplement regimen may actually hamper endurance gains from training. Fourteen sedentary men underwent eight weeks of endurance training, during which five of the subjects took one gram (1,000 milligrams) of vitamin C daily. Meanwhile, 24 rats went through three- and six-week training routines; half the rats were given a dose of vitamin C species-equivalent to the human dose. The men who didn't take vitamin C showed a 22 percent increase in their body's ability to take up and use oxygen during training, while those who supplemented with C showed only a 10.8 percent increase. Similar results occurred in the rats.

Exercise tests revealed that when forced to run to exhaustion after six weeks of training, the rats not given vitamin C ran almost twice as far as they had before training, amounting to a 186.7 percent increase in endurance capacity. Those that got vitamin C, however, increased their distance by only 25 percent, or a 26.5 percent increase in endurance. The rats not given vitamin C showed higher counts of mitochondria, the portions of cells where energy is produced as ATP and where fat is oxidized. The amount of mitochondria determines endurance, and aerobics increases endurance by generating the production of additional mitochondria.

What gives with those results? It turns out that the production of free radicals from exercise stimulates the production of new mitochondria. Taking vitamin C short-circuits the process. Taking vitamin C prior to exercise also prevented the exercise-induced stimulation of built-in antioxidant enzymes, such as superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase.

Several previous studies have reported unfavorable effects on endurance development due to dietary antioxidants, such as vitamin E and coenzyme Q10. One study published seven years ago found that taking a combination of vitamin E and alpha lipoic acid reduced muscle contractile activity, which would translate into reduced exercise strength.

Another recent study, however, had very different findings. Thirty-six students supplemented their diets with 400 milligrams a day of vitamin E, 1,000 milligrams of vitamin C or a combination of both nutrients for three weeks. Another group got a placebo. The subjects underwent various tests that measure aerobic and anaerobic exercise performance. Those who got the antioxidant nutrients performed significantly better on the aerobic tests than the placebo group. The anaerobic tests showed no differences in ether group. The study concluded, "These test results suggest that daily supplementation with vitamin E (400 units), vitamin C (1,000 milligrams) or vitamin E plus vitamin C for a period of three weeks may significantly improve aerobic power."

PART 2: Postworkout Pause

Should You Delay Eating Protein After You Train?

Research has made clear that getting protein onboard as soon as possible after a weight workout favors increased muscle protein synthesis—for men. While protein synthesis is depressed during exercise, it turns on immediately after the workout. Taking in essential amino acids right after your workout gives your body the substrates it needs for the purpose. For women, however, taking in protein either right after or two hours following the workout makes no difference in the degree of muscle protein synthesis.

Fat burning is another story. It also increases right after training, and some of the fat acts as a primary energy source to fuel muscle protein synthesis.

A new study of middle-aged women found that delaying protein intake after a weight-training workout may allow more fat oxidation. Seventeen women, average age 46, got a drink containing either 30 grams of whey protein or a similarly flavored placebo immediately after completing a weight-training workout. The respiratory exchange ratio, a measure of fat use, was measured for two hours after the workout. While fat oxidation was elevated in both groups after the workout, it returned to baseline values faster in the women who got the protein drink.

The authors noted that while the decreased use of fat postworkout wasn't huge (only 5 percent less), over time it could make a significant difference in bodyfat. They also believe that the bodies of the subjects who got the protein drink may have switched to using whey, a rapidly absorbed protein, as an energy source instead of fat, explaining the drop in fat burning in those women.

The study used women as subjects, but there isn't any reason the same effect may not also pertain to men. That presents a real dilemma, as numerous studies have shown that the faster you get protein or amino acids into your body after a workout, the better your muscle gains. On the other hand, taking a fast-acting protein with a simple carb source—the usual procedure following training—boosts insulin. That's great for triggering muscle protein and glycogen synthesis, but when insulin is elevated, fat oxidation ceases.

Some researchers suggest that if you want the extra fat burning, you should delay having a protein-and carb drink for about 30 minutes after a workout. You still get most of the anabolic effect, as it lasts for about two hours. For women, though, the choice is clear. Since it makes no difference whether you get the protein right after or two hours following the workout, it would be prudent for anybody seeking fat loss to wait till the two-hour mark.

PART 3: How Dieting Can Make You Fat

Or Where’d That Ass come From?

You arrive at the Arnold Classic, the premier fitness and bodybuilding event on planet Earth, and you're beyond excited to meet your favorite fitness model. As you walk up to her behind a mass of human beings waiting to get her autograph, your once angelic and adolescent smile turns into a smirk akin to what my pet beagle does when he thinks you've passed gas. "Holy smokes," you say to yourself, "her ass is fat." And it ain't phat.

How can someone look so hot a month ago and then reappear with a body resembling your bon-bon-eating Aunt Rosie? Well, it's called dieting. Mind you, dieting is an integral part of the physique-contest world. Without a proper diet, you'll have a greater chance blocking Yao Ming's dunk than you would looking good onstage. So how can dieting make you fat?

It's this thing called weight regain after you've been calorically restricted--better known as yo-yo dieting. For example, in a study rats were fed to be fatties over 16 weeks. One group was switched to ad libitum feeding of lowfat food for 10 weeks— ad libitum meaning that they could eat whenever they wanted. The remaining rats were switched to an energy-restricted lowfat diet for 10 weeks that reduced bodyweight by 14 percent. Basically, one group went on a diet, and the other didn't.

Here's what happened. Fat oxidation, or burning, remained at a high throughout the day in the rats that could eat at will but was suppressed in the ones that had their food restricted. Whoa, Nellie. That means the rats that were forced to diet ended up having a rebound effect in which it was easier for them to regain fat.

So how can you avoid the rebound or at least lessen it? Protein. Long-term weight-loss maintenance is a major problem. A study looked at whether adding protein to the diet might limit weight regain after a weight loss of 5 to 10 percent in overweight subjects. One hundred thirteen overweight subjects followed a very-low-energy diet for four weeks, then went through a six-month period of weight maintenance, in which they were placed in either a protein or a control group. The subjects in the protein group received 30 grams of protein a day in addition to their own usual diet, and when the study was completed, they had less weight regain as well as smaller waists. Satiety—feeling satisfied after eating—in the fasted state before breakfast increased significantly more in the protein group than in the control group.

So clearly, dieting isn't a good thing for your metabolism. But if you must, make sure you never skimp on protein and always—and I mean always—take in lots of it after a contest.

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