by John Hobbs

Created on: January 30, 2009

Supplements although not essential, will help immensely to improve the general performance of your workouts as well bringing you close to your goals. Firstly, the most essential supplements that are needed for an intense workout regimen are multi-vitamins and minerals. There are many benefits of supplementing vitamins and minerals with your workout routine as intense physical exercise can have a negative effect on our health and wellbeing, in particular it can affect the performance of your immune system and thus can make your more susceptible to injury or illness.

Therefore, taking a variety of vitamins and minerals every day you can ensure your immune system is performing optimally. They are especially vital to those who are involved in intensive resistance training and routines aimed at building muscle mass. The reason for this is vitamins and minerals allow you to function to your full potential and so aid recovery as well as the process of protein synthesis (muscle mass).

If your main goal is to build muscle then other supplements such as whey protein and creatine may also be beneficial to your workouts. Many people will suggest that a good diet is all you need but it requires a lot of time and discipline to plan and cook all your meals for the day in order to get enough protein. In simple terms, it's much easier and more practical to use whey protein powders to boost your protein intake during the day as long as you don't use it as a substitute for a good diet.

The best times to take this supplement are before and after your workout as this is when your body most requires protein. Most protein supplements also have the added bonus of containing BCAA's which play an important role in many functions which impact muscle growth such as creating a very anabolic environment (prevents muscle being used as a source of energy and promotes muscle growth).

Finally, the use of creatine also has a number of benefits which mainly improves weight training performance as it can be used as a secondary energy source when ATP (primary energy source) is low. This allows you to perform more reps thus putting more stress on muscles and allowing more stimulation for them to grow. Moreover creatine has a more direct impact on muscle building by enhancing the body's ability to recover after intensive resistance training sessions as well as boosting the amount of amino acids in the body (promotes protein synthesis). Ultimately the main purpose of supplements are too improve your performance and results and should not be used as a substitute to a good diet and workout regime.

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