We’ve all been there—following a bout of vigorous exercise, our muscles end up feeling sore and achy, leaving us feeling fatigued during our day-to-day activities.
Feeling your muscles stiffen up for a while after exercise is completely normal and is the result of a phenomenon known as delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS). This is caused by tiny micro-tears that occur in your muscle fibres during exercise, leading to inflammation and tenderness.
Sometimes, muscle soreness can be irritating and painful, and can even stop you from sticking to your training regimen.
So, how can you cut down on those recovery times and ease that post-workout burn?
What Are the Best Supplements for Muscle Recovery?
Supporting your muscles during recovery is vital.
Muscle growth occurs during the recovery stage, when the body creates more fibres to better handle future exercise.
If you don’t give your muscles the time and resources they need to recover, it can actually result in muscle degradation, meaning you’ll lose muscles instead of gaining them.
The best way to prevent this is to respect your muscle recovery. Give yourself proper time to heal, and eat a diet rich in vitamin C, omega-3 fatty acids, proteins, carbohydrates, and healthy fats.
It’s also a good idea to further support your muscles with nutritional supplements to aid their recovery. Supplements can offer your muscles the building blocks they need to heal and have been proven to improve post-exercise recovery.
Now that’s out of the way, let’s look at some of the best workout recovery supplements on the market today.
L-Glutamine
Benefits:
- Reduce post-workout recovery time
- Overcome feelings of fatigue
- Support muscle growth
- Boost immune system
L-glutamine is a staple in the exercise world, used by thousands of athletes and gym-goers to accelerate muscle recovery, repair damaged muscle tissue, and reduce fatigue.
Glutamine is one of the – if not the most – important amino acids in your body, used as a building block for proteins, glucose, and other amino acids.
Glutamine is used by the body to repair muscle tissues following exercise. If glutamine levels fall too low, the body may actually break down muscle to produce more of it.
This is where supplementation comes in. Research has shown that L-glutamine could provide the body with the essential building blocks it needs to repair and restore muscle following exercise, improving muscle recovery times and significantly reducing soreness.
L-glutamine has also been shown to help support muscle growth. Many people pair this powerful amino acid with other supplements, such as BCAA and creatine, to maximise gains while minimising recovery times.
If you’re keen to stick to your workout routine while avoiding muscle loss, L-glutamine is the answer.
Suggested Use: Take 2 Capsules a day with a glass of water.
BCAA
Benefits:
- Improve exercise recovery
- Prevent muscle wastage
- Boost energy
- Enhance muscle growth
Your body needs a variety of amino acids to function correctly, especially when you’re regularly undergoing tough exercise. However, your body can’t produce all of them on its own. These are known as essential amino acids, which must be absorbed externally.
Cue BCAA supplements. These handy capsules contain the three vitally important amino acids – L-valine, L-leucine, and L-isoleucine – that your body needs to synthesise proteins.
Branched-chain amino acids have been shown to significantly reduce muscle recovery times and soreness, all while stopping muscle atrophy.
Providing your body with these essential protein building blocks can also help to majorly improve muscle growth. Research has shown that BCAA supplementation can actually boost muscle protein synthesis by 22%, resulting in better gains.
Keeping your body topped up with these essential amino nutrients is a good way to optimise your recovery times and your results.
Suggested Usage: Take 2 Capsules a day with a glass of water.
Creatine Monohydrate
Benefits:
- Accelerate muscle recovery time
- Optimise muscle growth
- Enhance athletic performance
- Improve the appearance of muscles
One of the most widely researched exercise supplements in the world, creatine has a range of scientifically-backed benefits. Thought to be a powerful muscle-booster, creatine has also demonstrated the ability to improve muscle recovery.
Creatine allows your body to produce ATP, an important nucleotide that fuels your cells, boosts your energy levels, and facilitates protein synthesis.
Unlike some other muscle recovery supplements, creatine is thought to improve recovery time by helping to stop the damage from occuring in the first place.
It’s believed that this is because creatine gives your muscles more power, allowing you to mitigate the effects of heavy exercise.
Largely thought to be the most effective muscle-building supplement on the market, creatine can also allow you to increase your muscle growth by 2-3 times.
A perfect choice for those who are looking to stick to a regular exercise routine, creatine could slash your recovery times while increasing your physical performance and growth.
Suggested Use: Take 4 Capsules a day with a glass of water.
L-Carnitine
Benefits:
- Decreases muscle recovery time
- Boosts your metabolism
- Increases exercise performance
- Strengthens immune system
L-carnitine is a vitally important amino acid, and has become a wildly popular supplement among athletes, those on plant-based diets, and people on weight-loss regimes.
Carnitine plays a crucial role in our body’s metabolism, transporting long-chain fatty acids to your cell’s mitochondria so that they can be converted into energy. Physical exercise quickly uses up your carnitine reserves, which can lead to tired and sore muscles.
Keeping your carnitine levels topped up with supplements could help better regulate the metabolic pathways involved in muscle protein synthesis, protecting against muscle mass atrophy while reducing muscle recovery times.
But that’s not all L-carnitine has to offer. By boosting your metabolic function, L-carnitine is thought to improve physical performance and endurance, helping to users to speed up weight loss.
If you’re looking for the perfect companion for your weight loss journey, L-carnitine is the way to go. Keep to your routine, while potentially improving your workout recovery and performance.
Suggested Use: Take 2 Capsules a day with water.
When to Take Muscle Recovery Supplements?
Like most exercise supplements, timing is important when it comes to muscle recovery.
Taking your workout repair supplements without some proper strategy can lead to them being less effective, potentially minimising results.
Don’t worry, though – avoiding this is very straightforward.
To get the most out of your post-workout recovery supplements, we advise taking them either just before or just after your exercise session, introducing them at the optimal time for muscle repair.
For the best results, be sure to accompany your supplements with a high-protein diet, giving your body the fuel it needs to perform and grow.
Choosing the Right Muscle Recovery Supplement for You
Supporting your muscles during their post-workout recovery period is essential if you want to look after your progress and health. But with so many options available, knowing the right one can be confusing.
The best way to make a decision is to weigh up the other benefits each supplement has to offer, considering which could help you best achieve your overall health goals. Skim back over the bulleted benefits in this guide to get a quick rundown of each supplement’s main perks.
All in all, L-glutamine is probably the most effective muscle recovery agent, but if you’re looking for more of an all-rounder, you may want to consider creatine monohydrate.
Our scientists have picked each of these research-backed sports and performance Fitimins to help you optimise your training. Whichever you choose, you know you’re on the way to a fitter future!
