StayActiv | Natural Pain Relief

Is Lactic Acid Build-up Holding You Back From Performing Your Best? You might benefit from StayActiv.

July 17th, 2009

If you are a competitive athlete, then you know what it’s like to push yourself to the limit.  When you do this, you then, in turn, tend to experience unpleasant soreness and muscle fatigue.  As they say, “no pain, no gain!” During strenuous exercises such as strength training, weight lifting, sprinting, or any other form of high-intensity and/or speed workout, the body demands elevated levels of energy.  However, our bodies are wired so that we can only sustain these extreme activities for short periods of time before we need to slow down, catch our breath and recharge our energy stores.  When the muscles are working hard during exercise, and there is limited supply of oxygen, lactic acid is produced at such a rapid rate that the tissue has difficulty processing it, and this results in lactic acid build-up.  This is where an athlete then experiences muscle fatigue and cramp-like pains.  Imagine if you were able to reduce lactic acid build-up during vigorous exercise, and the body could maintain intensity for longer periods of time before experiencing the burn, and/or feeling physically depleted?

Before considering this possibility, let’s look at how lactic acid build-up happens, and what’s called the “energy pathways” for exercise.  Having a better understanding of these energy pathways can also help an athlete put proper eating and training plans in place to improve his or her performance.  Diet is extremely important for the athlete since nutrients including carbohydrates, proteins and fats convert into energy in the form of adenosine triphosphate (ATP).  As foods are broken down in the body, they release energy in the form of ATP, and muscles contract.  Of course each nutrient has unique properties that determine how it gets converted to ATP, with carbohydrates as the main contributor to fueling moderate to high intensity forms of exercise, fats providing energy for low intensity activities for longer lengths of time, and finally proteins helping with muscle recovery and repair.  The body is not capable of storing ATP very well or for very long, and therefore it is necessary that we create this usable energy throughout exercise.

The two major energy pathways in which the body converts nutrients to energy are aerobic metabolism (with oxygen) and anaerobic metabolism (without oxygen).  During forms of exercise where the body has adequate fuel and oxygen, such as long distance running, biking and hiking, etc, muscle cells can contract continuously without experiencing fatigue.  This is when the body is receiving energy from aerobic metabolism.  It’s during quick, high-intensity work-outs that anaerobic metabolism is being utilized, and there is a limited supply of oxygen.  Lactic acid is a by-product of the anaerobic energy pathway, a process which provides energy to muscles by partially breaking down glucose without the need for oxygen.  Under these strenuous anaerobic conditions, the cells continue to produce waste (lactic acid) that cannot be absorbed and therefore accumulates in the muscles as build-up, and causes that muscle soreness and fatigue.  Since this pathway is short-lived, and the athlete can’t sustain the same level of intensity, he/she is forced to eventually ease off and rest to relieve symptoms of the lactic acid build-up by increasing oxygen intake through the aerobic pathway.  This is where the athlete experiences a metabolic threshold.  It is believed that our bodies go back and forth during exercise from aerobic to anaerobic metabolism in this threshold.

Many athletes have found creatine products such as CON-CRET to be beneficial in giving them the strength, endurance and muscle recovery that they need for their physically demanding workouts, but some are finding additional benefits in another supplement called StayActiv to help stave off the unpleasant and challenging side-effects of lactic acid build-up.  Offered as a natural alternative to NSAIDs, StayActiv is most known for its ability to provide pain relief and promote muscle recovery for athletes and people living active lifestyles.  But a study at the University of Nebraska has also shown that StayActiv supports a reduction in the build-up of lactic acid in muscles.  This study showed that after 2-hours of strenuous exercise, lactic acid levels were reduced by more than 50% with StayActiv usage.  The effects of StayActiv on lactic acid production appear to be a direct result of accelerated production of ATP for the cell which thereby allows maximum cell function and recovery.  So, why allow lactic acid build-up to hold you back, when you could have greater success with your sprints, reps and/or overall recovery? It’s worth a try, don’t you think?

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