Amino Acids For Muscle Building

Supplementation can be as important as the very exercise that we are doing to improve our health. With the right supplementation specific to our needs or goals, there can be achieved a great advantage in pairing the exercise with performance and recovery.

Branched Chain Amino Acids (BCAA’s) are a fantastic supplementation to aide in increased exercise performance and decrease Delayed Onset Muscle Syndrome (DOMS). BCAA’s have been a topic of discussion for professional athletes and recreational athletes alike. Performance is of the utmost important to athletes and enhancing that performance with legal supplements is the base for all types of athleticism.  BCAA’s have been studied and proven to increase strength and endurance output.

BCAA’s are made up of leucine, isoleucine and valine, which are three of the eight essential amino acids. When exercising, the BCAA’s are used as an energy source and become depleted. Once this happens, energy levels wane and you are left with not as much strength in your workout as you were in the beginning because exercising promotes the oxidation of BCAA’s. Therefore, if you supplement with BCAA’s prior to working out, this will give you the added zip you need to crank out that extra few reps or run another mile with just as much vigor as when you first started your exercise routine.

Muscle is the very thing you are building when exercising but if your BCAA’s are depleted, this is the very thing it will catabolize (tear down). This goes against the very purpose of your exercise as you are trying to build on muscle not break it down.

Carbohydrates and fats are the principal sources of energy during physical exercise and protein in the form of amino acids is utilized for energy production to a lesser degree. Branched Chain Amino Acids contract skeletal muscle and is thus supported by experiments that the plasma concentration of BCAA will decrease with prolonged exercise. Aromatic Amino Acids (AAA) compete with BCAA at the blood brain barrier (BBB). Blood ammonia accumulates during exercise and has a toxic effect on the central nervous system which contributes to central fatigue when exercise induced brain ammonia accumulation occurs. When physical exertion is so intense that alteration of the blood BCAA concentration occurs, the BCAA/AAA ratio is impaired, CNS function is then impaired.

An experiment was done using rats where brain and blood concentrations of BCAA, AAA, and ammonia concentrations were studied during treadmill exercises in attempt to correlate changes in central fatigue. Blood ammonia level was not experienced during running but rather increased at exhaustion. Brain level of ammonia was high at the end of the exercise with similarities to blood level. The plasma concentrations BCAA and AAA was increased as the rats continued to run but the plasma BCAA/AAA ratio was low at exhaustion. This study finds that physical exercise induced central fatigue causes an increase in brain ammonia as well as a disturbance in brain amine metabolism and plasma and brain BCAA/AAA ratio levels were lowered. The ammonia level and BCAA/AAA ratio in the brain equates with those in the blood. The conclusion of this experiment is that the blood ammonia concentration and plasma BCAA/AAA ratio does potentially serve as an indicator of exercise induced central fatigue.

The effects on muscle hypertrophy and muscle strength were studied when BCAA’s were taken before and after exercise. When the amino acids are taken before exercise, the total uptake of blood amino acids and net muscle protein synthesis by leg muscles were greater than after exercise. Therefore, the results indicate that taking amino acids immediately before exercise will promote amino acid uptake through an increase in muscle blood flow during exercise and promotes muscle protein synthesis. Additionally, an increase in muscle blood flow after exercise will increase the transport of free amino acids to muscle cells and promote muscle protein synthesis.

As noted, BCAA’s have played a role in the recovery from muscle fatigue during and after training. A topic of debate has been at what dosage is the optimal. A study was done that administered 5.6 grams of an amino acid mixture twice daily during and after eccentric contraction exercise training. The oral administration of the amino acid mixture was effective for muscle strength recovery after the eccentric exercises. Studies using a dynamometer indicate that eccentric exercise training proves to be more effective than isometric and concentric training as it relates to increasing muscle strength. The study on contraction exercise training was conducted for the purpose to see if twelve amino acids given orally would facilitate the recovery from muscular fatigue that originates from damage to the infrastructure of muscles during eccentric exercise. It was discovered that there was faster recovery of the isometric muscle strength of the elbow extensor with this mixture of the twelve amino acids and it also produced higher muscle strength during the recovery period. Therefore, the twelve amino acids due in fact protect skeletal muscles from destruction of eccentric exercise training when taken orally.

Delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) is a direct cause from training and can inhibit mobility in the days following intense exercise. BCAA supplementation greatly reduces this effect when taken prior to training. A study was done to determine the effects of BCAA supplementation on plasma free amino acid concentrations in young women as it relates to the effects of exercise. Fifteen minutes prior to the squat exercise, the placebo group BCAA concentrations were decreased and significantly increased in the BCAA trial until two hours after exercise. Plasma concentrations of methionine and aromatic amino acids were temporarily decreased in the BCAA trial which were much lower than those in the placebo trial. The results indicated the BCAA intake before exercise affects methionine and aromatic amino acid metabolism. Therefore BCAA supplementation before the squat exercise suppressed muscle pain that occurred the next day after exercise and lasted for a few days in young untrained women.

There have been many double blind clinical studies done and analysis to substantiate the claim that BCAA’s do in fact have an effect on performance during exercise and recovery post exercise. As with any supplementation, the Law of Individuality must be maintained and the supplement as well as dosages are not interchangeable with each exercise participant. Modifications are to be made to meet specific individual requirements. That being said, there is a direct correlation with increased exercise performance and decrease in DOMS as it relates to ingesting BCAA’s and would be beneficial for the exercise participant.