Should I Take Creatine?

Why You Should Take Creatine

Love lifting, strength training, and being active? Want to take your performance and recovery to the next level? Creatine is one of the most studied sports supplements and if you love lifting, training, and being active, you’ll likely see massive benefits from taking it.

Creatine May Help You:

• Gain and build more muscle
• Increase strength and recover better
• Improve power output and performance during workouts
• Improve body composition (by building more muscle)
• May improve depression/anxiety (!!)
• Lots of new studies regarding potential positive cognitive benefits!

Better workouts, better performance, and more muscle? Sign us up!

How Much Creatine To Take

Supplementing ~5 grams of creatine monohydrate a day for those who work out and strength train is generally the guideline you’ll likely see when researching.

We DO definitely get some creatine from the foods we eat, such as meat and seafood.

But if you want to maximize your time and energy spent working out, I can’t recommend enough to supplement creatine monohydrate daily as you may or may not get enough from the food you eat.

Research has gone back and forth over the years on when it’s best to take it. I’d recommend just supplementing it daily whenever you remember to and call it day. No need to cycle on/off it or worry about “front-loading” it.

Tips On Supplementing

• No need to “load it” or cycle on/off it
• Guidelines generally suggest ~3-5 grams per day
• Doesn’t really matter WHEN you take it, just that you consistently take it daily
• Don’t forget to drink a ton of water and fluids during the day! 
• No need to spend tons of money – just buy whatever creatine monohydrate is cheapest
• You may retain a little extra water while supplementing with creatine, but it’ll likely become unnoticeable over time

Note: The current body of research does *not* currently indicate that creatine can cause hair loss, baldness, or any changes to testosterone or DHT levels – these are all just common myths.

If concerned about potential side effects, PMID: 33557850 would be a helpful read as they cover and debunk tons of other common creatine supplementation myths (:

Where To Start

While creatine is a great supplement to add to your routine, it’s not going to be as effective if you’re not following a good strength training program that actually supports its benefits. 

You should check out our online workout program at Paragon Training Methods!

Our Paragon workouts are evidence-based and backed by science. You have the choice of lifting for 30, 45, or 60 minutes per day, and we have workouts for all goals and levels of lifting experience. As well as the option to still include things you love (whether that’s running, Olympic Lifting, Peloton, etc).

Read more about our Paragon workouts here!