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Definition: "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance "
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03.02.2011 |
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5 g BCAAs before training = less muscle soreness
Strength athletes who take 5 g BCAAs just before a training session will have less muscle soreness in the days following, according to researchers at the Japanese Nagoya Institute of Technology. They did an experiment with 30 men and women aged between 21 and 24.
The researchers gave their subjects a high-carb breakfast, and just before they started pumping iron the researchers gave them 150 ml water with 5 g BCAAs dissolved in it. The ratio of isoleucine, leucine and valine was 1 : 2.3 : 1.2. On top of that 1 g green tea powder was also dissolved in the fluid.
The study was partly funded by the Japanese government. Where the rest of the money came from is not clear. What we do know is that two researchers from Ajinomoto worked on the study. Ajinomoto is a BCAA manufacturer.
The training session consisted of 7 sets of squats. The men and women, who otherwise did not take regular exercise, had to do 20 reps in each set.
For the five days after the training session the subjects had to indicate how sore their muscles were. The first figure below shows the scores that the men filled in. The lower figure shows the women's scores.
The BCAAs had more effect on the women than on the men. According to the Japanese that's because women are lighter and therefore got more BCAA per kg bodyweight than the men. The men got 77 mg BCAA per kg bodyweight, and the women 92 mg.
The Japanese did not investigate how the BCAAs affected the test subjects. But going by the literature we have a vague suspicion. "BCAA may attenuate exercise-induced protein breakdown, while leucine may stimulate muscle protein synthesis", the researchers write. "If the finding is substantiated, the results could support the usefulness of BCAA in muscle recovery from exercise."
The research described here was published in 2006. According to the researchers this was a preliminary study. The real thing was published in June 2010. [Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2010 Jun;20(3):236-44.] In that study the researchers explain that BCAA supplementation reduces the post-training increase of the muscle protein myoglobin and elastase in the blood. Myoglobin is released when muscle cells are damaged; elastase is an enzyme that immune cells use to clear up dead cells. That means that BCAA supplementation reduces muscle soreness caused by training.
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