What supplements can be taken to maximize the effects of creatine?
Alpha lipoic acid Alpha lipoic acid (ALA) is a potent antioxidant compound that causes significant improvement in patients with type II diabetes by increasing insulin sensitivity. It has been theorized that ALA could increase muscle creatine uptake in healthy humans by increasing muscle insulin sensitivity and thus enhancing creatine uptake. Although the effects of ALA on insulin sensitivity in healthy humans is not established, one study compared the effects of 20 g creatine (CR), 20 g creatine and 100 g sucrose (CRS), and 20 g creatine, 100 g sucrose, and 1000 mg ALA (CRSLA) daily on healthy, recreational weight liftters (who did not exercise during the study) without impaired glucose metabolism. They found an equivalent increase in body weight in all groups over the duration of the study, while the CRSLA group had greater increases in both phosphocreatine and total muscle creatine, suggesting that ALA did indeed have an effect. There were a number of problems with this study, so the
