Post Workout

Post-workout products are supplements designed for a post-workout use. Post-workout products are used to accelerate post-workout recovery, create an anabolic environment in the body, and stimulate protein synthesis for faster muscle repair and growth, among other things. Post-workout products help you make the most of the anabolic window during the first 90 to 120 minutes after training to maximize recovery and muscle building.

How do post-workout products develop their effect after training?

There is a whole range of ingredients and mechanisms of action through which post-workout products can speed up recovery and promote muscle building, and different products contain different combinations of ingredients. Some products aim more at speeding up recovery, while others focus more on stimulating protein synthesis and muscle building, and still others try to cover both aspects in equal measure. Basically, though, speeding up recovery and stimulating muscle building are so closely linked that they can't really be considered separately. Many ingredients that stimulate muscle building also promote regeneration, and faster and better regeneration in turn promotes muscle building.

What ingredients are most commonly found in post-workout products and what do they do when used after a workout?

Almost all post-workout products in powder form contain one or more types of rapidly digestible carbohydrates such as dextrose, maltodextrin and waxy corn starch. These are used to quickly replenish glycogen stores that have been depleted during exercise and to induce a strong insulin release. This has a strong anti-catabolic effect and also promotes the transport of amino acids into the muscle cells, stimulating protein synthesis and promoting muscle growth.

This brings us to the second group of ingredients most commonly found in post-workout products: fast-digesting protein and amino acids. While protein and essential amino acids (EAAs) provide your muscles with important building blocks for recovery and muscle building after training, branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) serve to replace the BCAAs used up during training in muscle tissue and stimulate protein synthesis. The frequently added amino acid glutamine accelerates the recovery of your muscles after training. Very often, post-workout products also contain some form of creatine to replenish your muscles' creatine stores. Ingredients such as arginine, citrulline, and other nitric oxide production stimulants that improve blood flow are also common in post-workout products. The increased blood flow to the muscles due to these ingredients allows for a faster and more extensive supply of your muscles with nutrients urgently needed for regeneration and repair, as well as the body's own anabolic hormones.

What are the main benefits of post-workout products when used after a workout?

• Promotion and acceleration of regeneration
• Stimulation of protein synthesis and muscle building
• Generation of an anabolic environment
• Optimal use of the anabolic time window after training
• Replenishment of glycogen stores