To Supplement Or Not To Supplement
Supplements can get pretty intensive. If you are not an expert in the industry, I can't even begin to imagine how confused you must be. The marketing behind some of these products is incredible. Here at our centre, we don't want any supplement that does not have any health benefits. For example, fish oil is ideal. There is nothing it doesn't do in terms of health benefits, yet a great side effect is that it will help you lose body fat. That's a real supplement.
The Abs on the Go diet is about increasing lean muscle mass and shedding body fat by working out with as little muscle breakdown as possible. The results are primarily dependent on your physical training. However, they are also dependent on the manipulation of hormones through diet that will work in your body to maximize Abs on the Go activity and minimize catabolic activity. For this to work most effectively, you will need to supplement your diet.
There are also three other reasons to supplement your diet. One of these is that you may already have vitamin and mineral deficiencies in your body, which are preventing you from performing at peak efficiency and being healthy. Your intense workouts will also be using the body's resources more quickly, especially by losing vital minerals through sweat and urine, and supplementation will help provide your body with the extra support it needs.
Another reason to supplement your diet is that we live in a highly polluted world. With the amount of air pollutants, soil depletion, pesticide use, poor agricultural practices, and industrial waste dumping, the earth is often unable to provide us with nutrient dense food it once did. Supplements will provide us with what the earth no longer can at this point in time.
The third reason for supplementation is as a preventative measure. By ensuring you have adequate nutrition, your body will be able to handle the rigors of training and be better able to fight off the illnesses prevalent in our North American society today.
When it comes to choosing supplements, the majority of people really do not know what supplements to take and what combinations are best. You have to beware when taking the supplement companies' word for it because they are only out to make money. They will tell you whatever they need to in order to convince you that you need what they have to offer and not all of what they say is the truth.
Even when it comes to articles in sports publications, you cannot always trust what you read. The editors and/or the authors might have a vested financial interest in the product and will go to great lengths to promote it. Be sure you can trust the author or the publication before you act on any advice they might give.
The absolute number one rule when it comes to supplements is that you must be critical about the whole process, especially if you have tried a supplement that seems to have worked. You really need to step back and take a look at the situation because you might find that the supplement was not at all responsible for your success - you were.
How does this happen? Sometimes a supplement can act like a placebo. You take it and your whole mentality shifts. You have a psychological shift that causes you to change your lifestyle, improve your diet, and increase your workouts to become the most effective they can be. You think the supplement has changed things a lot and that it has a great effect, but with this amount of effort and attention to detail, you are sure to see positive results, without the supplement.
Of course, the supplement might be responsible for the improvements you have experienced, but only an honest look at the situation will tell you if this is the case. Take a step back and look at what you have been doing. Take a look at your exercise regimen and your diet and lifestyle. You should easily be able to tell if these alone could be responsible for your progress. If you find that the supplement is helping, then keep it. If it isn't helping, then you don't need it.
Please remember that supplements are just that - supplements. They are designed to work with the food you eat, not to take the place of it. The supplements that I have listed will work synergistically with the Abs on the Go diet when they are used properly, although if you were to try to use them with another diet, such as a high carb diet, you might find them useless.