Ash Horton:
Welcome to Muscle Talk, where you'll get world champion advice about nutrition and stacking on muscle. Our host Christine Envall, she's a three time world champion bodybuilder, an IFBB professional, a food scientist, and a founding co-owner of our podcast sponsor, International Protein.
Ash Horton:
In this episode, we plug into Christine's food scientist skills, as well as her professional experience, and ask her if we should change the use of our supplements when we're coming back from injuries.
Ash Horton:
Today, Christine, I would like to ask, how do you use supplements when you're on rehab? You're coming back from an injury. What's the best way, or the best timing, of which supplements to use and how?
Christine Envall:
Okay, so yeah, the topic of rehab is obviously going to depend on what you're coming back from, so I'm assuming you're just talking about a basic injury, or you're talking about coming back from some type of surgery, or just having had a flu, or something.
Ash Horton:
Let's talk a basic injury.
Christine Envall:
Okay. Basic injury, you know, your supplementation probably wouldn't change too much from what you were doing beforehand in terms of you're still having your protein, you're probably still having your pre-workout because you're back in the gym, you're maybe just not training at 100%, so with something like a pre-workout, maybe you're dosing that down because you don't want to put yourself in a position where you're trying to go harder than what you need to do.
Christine Envall:
Because obviously the idea of rehab is slowly building back up into regular training, so we'll assume it's at that point when you're still not at 100%, so as far as what you might take different would be something like glutamine. Glutamine is such a conditionally essential amino acid because your body needs more of it when it's trying to repair. When you're coming back from an injury, your body's trying to repair, so as far as supplementation you may be increasing the amount of glutamine that you're taking.
Christine Envall:
You may not have been taking it beforehand, but that's definitely a supplement that you should be adding in because it's going to assist with that repair and recovery of the cells, which is essentially what's happening when you're coming back from an injury. Basically, you either torn muscle tissue, or you've torn ligament tissue, so your body has a larger requirement for that, and again, depending on what it is that you've done, if it's a joint issue, you've damaged a joint, or a tendon, or a ligament, then you'll probably also be looking at some type of collagen supplementation to obviously help to repair and rebuild that.
Christine Envall:
Again, with collagen, we had the podcast on that and we talked about all the different types of collagen.
Ash Horton:
There's good collagen that you like for this, correct?
Christine Envall:
Yeah, specifically for the cartilage and stuff like that, so the type to ... one and three is more for your skin, and whilst it does do connective tissue and all that kind of stuff, it's the type two which is more for your actual cartilage and ligaments, so the bird cartilage is very, very good.
Christine Envall:
I guess something like a chicken bone broth might be a really, really easy way to get that, so that's a type of supplement that you might specifically take, obviously, during the injury phase, and then also once you're coming back from that you would probably continue that supplementation through that phase as well. This is, again, depending on your age, there's also, I guess kind of looking into the types of peptides that are around, there are places that do medically prescribe different types of peptides for repair, whether they be localized injections or whether you kind of just, non-localized I guess.
Christine Envall:
But there are some which, if injected in the site of the injury, do help to build that back, and that's obviously done, I don't have a lot of experience with that but I have seen some studies where there's been a significant regrowth of tendon and good thickness of tendon repair post-operation, and during a recovery phase where they've done a localized injection of different types of things, so that's something where people maybe want to go and do their own research and find somewhere that's a medical, reputable place, not just a dodgy place that's kind of talking about peptides and stuff.
Christine Envall:
But they are definitely allowed to be prescribed, so they're an okay supplement. Now, you were alluding to, in terms of when you're taking these supplements, what's the best type of timing? That's where, with something like the glutamine, again, just spacing that out through the day, I would probably have it in three dosages. It doesn't have to necessarily be connected with your training but obviously just connecting it with a routine so you're regimentally taking it, not kind of hit and miss, take it now, take it there.
Christine Envall:
Take it with a meal and that will make it sort of more stick in your head to go off and do that. When it comes to, because we're talking about the fasted training versus not, when it comes to your rehabbing, and weight training just in general, I kind of don't recommend fasted weight training.
Ash Horton:
Yep.
Christine Envall:
Yeah, so if you're coming back from an injury which is impacting your weight training, you would always be ensuring that you're eating a good hour period before you train, having your post-workout supplementation, so it's not really different to what you're doing when you're not rehabbing. It's not exclusive just to rehabbing, so in terms of weight training fasted, I never really recommend that.
Christine Envall:
It's always theoretically, if you have enough of the glycogen stores, you've got enough stores in your body, you should be okay to train, but I think from a mental perspective and how hard you can push, I just never found that pushing on an empty stomach in the morning just never really worked that well.
Christine Envall:
There could, you know, people may be different, but I know that most people I talk to, they do find that without having something solid in them to try to go in and do a really decent weight session is really, really difficult. Flip side, with cardio, if you try to do that on a full stomach, it's often a lot harder.
Christine Envall:
You feel like everything wants to come back up, you feel too heavy, you know, you're jumping around. Your stomach, it's all too full and everything, so as far as I know you were kind of talking about having the nutrients there available to repair and recover, do remember that your body works in that cyclic phase, so it's kind of like, straight after a workout, it's obviously receptive to taking nutrients up, so if you're trying to get your glucosamine in or get your ingredients in to help repair something, you might want to take them after your training session.
Christine Envall:
When your insulin's high and your body's ready to take everything up, you may get a better effect out of them, but longterm, because of how your body takes it up, converts it into other things, and then does what it needs to do with it, it's not specifically that it has to be sitting there whilst you're doing your workout. It's probably more important that you have adequate glycogen stores and that you have some carbs in your blood ready to go so you've got them as a buffer and they actually spare your glycogen stores. That's probably more important for a better workout and in overall helping your rehab or just your training.
Christine Envall:
That doesn't mean the rehabbing versus the normal training isn't necessarily going to be overly different in terms of having that nutrition in your body. It's more like what you would be taking, and then as I said it's like cardio is best done fasted, and weight training, most people don't want to do it on an empty stomach, and a lot of people who train very heavy and bodybuilders, if legs was the hardest session to do, they want to have at least three meals in before they do legs.
Christine Envall:
It really, I guess the people who can relate, who train heavy, will understand what I'm saying when your body feels like there's more strength to it and you feel more solid when you actually have more food in you, and whether it's your glycogen stores have had more of a chance to load, or whether it's just mentally you feel stronger from having those meals in you when you've kind of woken up and grooved into the day, but yeah, there won't be many people who front up first thing in the morning, empty stomach, and get under a full plate squat. It's just not-
Ash Horton:
Yeah, I can completely relate to that, but I guess where question was coming from is I thought as a 10 year old, again, and I was doing some sprinting.
Christine Envall:
Not a good Ash.
Ash Horton:
Taking it too heavy, and I've been going to the physio, and I guess one of the things that I wanted to do was build up the running sort of things, and actually spring again, so that was just a little goal of mine but I just, for whatever reason in my mind, I thought, "Well, is it better to actually probably have some protein or something like that before I get into a cardio session in the morning?"
Ash Horton:
Because especially while I'm sort of building up that muscle base again, so that's probably where the question came from, and I know it's different to strength training, but a lot of people that are listening to this podcast are probably far more than just bodybuilders.
Christine Envall:
It's interesting, too, because sprinting is a different thing, again, because sprinting, to me, is more power. It's short endurance.
Ash Horton:
Sprinting is the goal.
Christine Envall:
Oh, okay, so you're talking-
Ash Horton:
Let's just talk about running.
Christine Envall:
Just running in general. Yeah, I mean, there's also the, if you're wanting to do a very intense cardio session, as I said, most people will either have a very, very light meal, or they won't have anything at all because it's just, in terms of vomiting, basically. You don't want to vomit.
Ash Horton:
For me, it was just iso cuts plus a banana.
Christine Envall:
Yeah. Depending on the timing, you know, if you had it an hour before, that's a very light meal, and again, some people prefer to do that. Again, it's your carbohydrates, I guess, that people are trying to avoid, because that's what's going to fuel that workout, and the theory being that you obviously force your body to burn body fat but it's never as simple as that. You know, it depends on the intensity that you're working at, which fuel source that you're going to use, the timeframe that you're doing it for, your fitness level, because all of those things will interact and your body will dictate what gets used.
Christine Envall:
The metabolism does stay up longer if you do it faster, but then other people say, "Well, what if I have more energy but I go harder? Do I burn more calories that way?" It does have to work for each individual person and I know a lot of people do say, if you feel, same as what I feel about a heavy weight training session, if you feel you need that in you to do the workout that you're going to do, then by all means that you would do it, and you know, for example, Saturday morning, 8:45, we do an hour long class.
Christine Envall:
I do it, normally I do the class 4:30 AM during the week, but on the weekend, obviously, it's 7:15, so that's significantly later, and if I'm eating at the same time of night, then my body's gone more time without food and it's a longer class, and sometimes I will do maybe 20, 30 grams of extreme carbs, and 20, 30 grams of iso cuts, again, just as a very, very small meal, because I feel like, "Okay, I'm not going to get through this workout properly."
Christine Envall:
And talking of pulling your hammy, whether it's mental or not, you kind of feel like you're going to risk an injury. You feel like you're kind of a little bit run down, and you need to have something to get you through it, and if it is mental and that serves a purpose, then by all means do it. It physiologically maybe doesn't have as much impact, as much as the mental thought that without this, I'm not going to be able to do it, which that can kill us at training session as quick as anything else.
Christine Envall:
If you don't believe you can do it, but again, if you have gone all night and your body's basically run out of those foods, and again, it depends if you're in a diet phase, if you're in off season phase, what you ate the night before, all those things still do come into play.
Christine Envall:
You know, your nighttime meal, the last meal before what you're doing the next morning if you are doing something on an empty stomach is very, very important, whereas if you're going to have something potentially less important but what you do have at that point in time, if it's like an hour before or half an hour before, particularly carbohydrates, they will be available and your body will use those up first and it won't draw on your other stores.
Christine Envall:
But if you're working at a 95% capacity, then you're not going to be using those fat stores at all. You're going to be drawing purely from that carbohydrate. If you're working at a much lower rate, then your body's going to quite comfortably be drawing off its own fat stores and essentially what you just put in your body isn't as critical.
Christine Envall:
I think the key thing, though, with the recovery and rehab is more like just a couple of different supplements in terms of, as I said, not overdoing your pre-workout, because that might cause you to want to go harder than what you need to and undo all that rehab. The glutamine, which is so critical for the repair, because your body actually has an increased requirement and it's utilizing that to help with the repair.
Christine Envall:
And then depending on what the nature of the injury, or something, to support the regrowth of connective tissue or tendon. Obviously, if it's a muscle tear, then those things aren't going to be as important. It is going to be more your protein and potentially looking at things like peptides if it's a reliable source and done through a proper medical facility.
Christine Envall:
So yeah, it's more about the supplementation than what it is necessarily about the timing but it has to be what's comfortable and what works for you.
Ash Horton:
Okay, well, that was very helpful. Thank you very much, Christine.
Christine Envall:
Yeah, and just got to stop trying to be 16 again, Ash, and-
Ash Horton:
I was 10.
Christine Envall:
10. 10, gosh.
Ash Horton:
All right. Cool. Thank you very much, Christine. Let's wrap it up. Words of wisdom. If you like what you've heard, recognize that these tips, they are free, so show your support by becoming a loyal International Protein customer by jumping online, hunt our product down, and hit that buy now button.
Ash Horton:
Once again, like, share, and subscribe to our podcast so we can continue to bring you these episodes from our one and only Aussie muscle guru, three times world champion, Christine Envall.
