Supplements Ranked
Supplements Ranked: Spend your money where it'll work best
Supplements ARE worth using but there is a lot of shit on the market thats a waste of money - we rank the most commonly mentioned to see if it is worth spending your cash.
We support hundreds of Tameside residents every week at our Personal Training facility in Dukinfield. As part of that we support people with nutrition. Often we get on to the subject of Supplements. Now they are worth taking but it is person dependent - what might be 'God Tier' for one person might be 'Mid Tier' for someone else depending on their goals, their genetics, training and injury history and so on.


At our facility we can make these suggestions personal and suggest individually whats worthwhile but while we can't do that for everyone we thought we would rank some of the most common and help you decide if they are worth spending your money on.

God Tier: Creatine
One of the most researched supplements and one of the very few that shows positive benefits to usage time after time. Not only does Creatine help you build more muscle and preserve muscle mass in a deficit, not only does it give you performance benefits in the gym, more recent research shows huge benefits in brain function too - something everyone could use!

Take 5g everyday even on rest days.

God Tier: Fish Oils
Supporting brain function, healthy cell development, hair, joints and skin health. Fish oils help keep everything else working well. The reason it is worth supplementing with is we only really get it from oily fish and hardly anyone is eating enough every week to get enough - it isn't really something you can 'overdose' either so taking a supplement will be huge.

Aim to get a supplement with 1g combined EPA/DHA per day with around 0.6g of that in EPA.

God Tier: Vitamin D
It being produced in our bodies by exposure to Sunlight and living in the UK means even in summer most of us will be deficient - it is something to take year round. Helping to combat depression, support brain health again, build strong bones, control your bodies circadian rhythm and a big booster of mood everyone in the UK should take Vitamin D.

Aim for 1000-4000 IU per day.

Top Tier: Protein
Now we are getting contextual. Struggle to consume enough daily protein, supplementing will help but ideally you want to be getting a solid 80-90% of daily intake from your food. So thats why we put this as Top Tier - a powerful supplement with huge benefits, but only if your diet is deficient and you need the help.

Aim for 1.5g-2g per KG of Bodyweight per day, ideally broken in to 3-5 servings every 3-6 hours.

Top Tier: Beta Alanine
Beta Alanine supports your bodies ability to buffer lactic acid (the stuff that makes you burn). So if you do any form of cardio this is really gonna help you go longer. HOWEVER it causes Parathesia - a completely safe reaction but its still unpleasant, a burning tingiling sensation on your skin. So if your a competing athlete take it and put up with it, if your just training to feel better it is up to you!

FYI If you ever take preworkout and it makes you tingle, this is why. Beta Alanine has no acute effect within your session (you need to take it long term to build up msucular stores of Carnitine) but they add it to give the placebo effect of the pre workout.

Aim for 3g per day

NOTE - due to the tingle it is likely best take it 1.5g twice per day until it settles down.

Top Tier: Multi Vitamin

Similar to protein in that if you eat a balanced diet with lots of different types and colours of fruit and veg your likely covered, but if not it is worth using and research backed.

Aim for any daily multivitamin with a good range of Vitamins and Minerals in there - the goal here is to tick the bases not necessarily get perfect amounts of everything.

Mid Tier: Pre Workout

Now we think this will be contentious and we debated on it being Top Tier BUT we only allowed ourselves 3 on each category so it got the chop. The reason we chopped it is most people take far too much caffeine to the detriment of their sleep and the benefit you get from getting better sleep far outweighs the benefit of taking more caffeine.

However Pre Workouts/ Caffeine DO work and have lots of research to show it so aren't a waste of money, we just think people should sleep better and control caffeine more (oursleves included!)

As pre-workouts work primarily from caffeine you'd want one with 150-200mg (MAXIMUM!) of caffeine in.

There are other substances that support the mechanisms such as vasodilators and other types of stimulants but without getting to in to it aim for one with 150mg caffeine (coffee works just fine!)


Mid Tier: Collagen

This is one which could be God Tier depending on your scenario but for most people is less essential. Collagen supports your joints in regenerating and it is really powerful. So if you don't do anything that is very joint intensive or have a sedentary job Collagen will be less essential. If you have a heavy job and play sports then it should go right up your list. Super powerful post surgery too. Research backed and beneficial but depends on your scenario. Most people don't need it but definitely works.

NOTE: Collagen needs to have Vitamin C present for your body to use it - so either buy one with Vitamin C added (like the Weider one) or take a Vitamin C supp at the same time.

Aim for 10g Collagen per day.


Mid Tier: BCAAs
I'll just cut to the chase here and rip the band aid off. Pointless for pretty much everyone. May benefit like less than 1% of the population. Save your money and just take Whey Protein - it contains all the BCAAs anyway.

These honestly should probably be bottom tier so we arent going to give suggestions - save your money.

Bottom Tier: Glucosamine

I am not aware of any research that has ever shown it actually works. I'm pretty sure it made me develop a shell fish allergy as a kid as well haha. Whether it did or not it is still pointless and I wasted a lot of money when I knew no better - supposed to support joints, just take Collagen.

Dont bother.


Bottom Tier: Diet Whey

Literally has the same macro profile as normal whey but because it says Diet they stick a £10er on. Avoid and get normal whey. One scoop of normal whey is about as lean as you can get as it is.

See the above recommendations for protein.

Bottom Tier: Anything Detox
Unless you are one of those people who was born without a liver then your body already detoxes and doesn't need any help. Again no research has ever shown a benefit, save your money. If you really need to detox there are probably bigger issues going on - for example drinking less alcohol.

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So there you are! This sort of personalised supplement strategy is exactly the kind of thing we can work through with our members - we cut the fluff and support them with the shit that actually works for them.

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