Many athletes neglect giving the body what it needs to recover. While there are many ways to recover your body, today’s focus is on one of the purest supplements to help with recovery—Glutamine! Glutamine is the most common amino acid found in your muscles. In fact, over 61% of your skeletal muscle is glutamine.
Glutamine has a wide range of benefits on a human body and bodily processes. A previous study on the subject shows that supplementation with the amino acid L-glutamine can minimize breakdown of muscle and improve protein metabolism. To build your muscles, it’s of the utmost importance that you maintain a positive nitrogen balance. After a hard exercise session, rushing nitrogen stimulates repair of your muscle tissue. If your body lacks glutamine, the damaged muscle tissue may stay damaged as it does not have all the necessary materials and substances to rebuild. For experienced athletes and bodybuilders, glutamine will help boost their body’s immune system after long and hard events such as marathon or bodybuilding contest. In addition, if you take high-protein food and glutamine, you migh
experience some weight loss benefits.
Best Time to take Glutamine: I would recommend taking glutamine supplements right after you wake up, 30 minutes before and after workouts, and right before you go to bed. It works best when used at these times because this is the time that you can have the best effect on your muscle mass and strength. The most common time to take it preferred by a lot of professional athletes is right before and after an exercise session.
Avoid: I don’t recommend taking glutamine at the same time as you take a creatine supplement as they are competitive supplements that will make your body a battlefield when it comes to absorption.
How many grams of Glutamine to take: I recommend the glutamine dosage to be around 20 to 30 grams per day. It works best when frequently consumed (on a daily basis). On workout days, it's recommended that you take glutamine supplements before or during workouts to keep your body hydrated. Ideally, you can take 5 grams of supplements before the workout, 5 grams during the workout and 5 grams after your exercise. If you’re a newbie to this supplement, feel free to reduce the dosage.
Very Important: Another important thing to keep in mind is to take glutamine supplements appropriately. There are some rules that you need to strictly follow. Glutamine supplements can be taken without or with meals, but keep in mind not to combine it with hot meals or drinks. The reason why we suggest this is because glutamine is known as an amino acid, which substance can be changed due to the temperature change. Therefore, it should be taken with cold or room temperature drinks.
When it comes to powder, glutamine can be combined with juice that is low in acidities such as carrot juice or apple or water. Consuming glutamine supplements with juices that are acidic such as grapefruit or orange juice may cause the glutamine to have diminished benefits.
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