(1 tsp = 3.6 g)
Disclaimer
In this supplement guide, it’s very likely I am going to challenge beliefs you may have about creatine and climbing. I have spent hours collating and synthesizing research into this review of the benefits and drawbacks of creatine to climbers, and based on that research I can say that creatine is probably the most effective ergogenic supplement available to climbers. Once you’re done reading, I think you’ll agree.
What Is Creatine?
Simply put, creatine is the backbone of climbing’s most important energy system: the creatine phosphate system, also known as the phosphagen system. When our muscles expend ATP (cellular energy), the phosphate group attached to creatine phosphate can be donated to the spent ADP molecule in order to regenerate it back to ATP and allow work to continue. During rest, our muscles restore the used-up creatine back to creatine phosphate with spare aerobic energy.
Of the three energy systems our body uses, the creatine phosphate system has the greatest capacity for energy regeneration and is therefore the most capable of powering bursts of high intensity activity. Creatine can regenerate ATP about 2x faster than anaerobic carbohydrate oxidation, 4.5x faster than aerobic carbohydrate oxidation, and 11x faster than fat oxidation.1
Unfortunately, the creatine phosphate system is also our most limited energy system, and can only provide about 5-7 seconds of energy in any given spurt. Thankfully, the nature of climbing allows for many “micro-breaks” (e.g., easy sections, rests on good holds, and even the times when you let go for just a second before grabbing the next hold) that allow creatine to be continually regenerated. As a result, an estimated 40% of the energy used to climb comes from creatine, and another 40% comes from the aerobic system whose hypothetical purpose in climbing is mostly to regenerate creatine to creatine phosphate.2 Thus, we could estimate that upwards of 80% of the energy used during a difficult climb either directly or indirectly revolves around creatine phosphate (while the rest comes from anaerobic carbohydrate oxidation).*
*80% is a very loose figure. We have a single study that estimates that around 40% of the energy comes from the creatine phosphate system and another 40% comes from the aerobic system, but that is all. To really be certain, we need some replication, preferably with a larger group. Furthermore, we can only hypothesize about how much of that aerobic energy was spent regenerating ATP—some of it almost certainly was spent just supplying energy for climbing, though really most difficult climbs (difficult being relative to each person) will have far too great of energy demands to derive any significant amount of energy from such a slow system as aerobic respiration. So please understand that my 80% figure is mostly indicative of the general importance of the creatine phosphate system, and that the actual figure will vary from person to person and route to route.
What Creatine Is NOT
No doubt in part because of its vast popularity, creatine has become host to a number of myths and rumors (both positive and negative). It’s important to recognize them for the falsehoods they are, so here I debunk some of the most common and harmful myths—the ones that are repeatedly touted as evidence for why you shouldn’t take creatine yet hold no truth.
Creatine Is NOT a Steroid
Creatine is not a hormone, so by definition it cannot be a steroid. Steroids are fat-soluble, complex hormones derived from cholesterol, while creatine is a water-soluble compound derived from the amino acids glycine and arginine.
Creatine Is NOT Bad for the Kidneys
Creatine has no reported toxicity and all excess creatine is easily broken down into creatinine, which is excreted in the urine. No studies corroborate the myth that extra creatinine stresses or harms the kidneys,3,4 and currently the only group warned to take caution are those who already have kidney problems and thus may have impaired kidney function.
Creatine Does NOT Cause Cramps or Increase Rate of Injury
No evidence suggests creatine causes cramps or increases the rate of injury.5 In fact, the opposite might be true—in at least one study, football players who supplemented with creatine suffered fewer cramps and injuries than non-supplementers.6
Creatine Is NOT Dehydrating
Again, the opposite is actually true. Since creatine reliably increases muscle water content, it can help improve bodily temperature control and overall hydration, thereby also improving comfort in the heat (if not performance).7–11
Creatine Is NOT Unethical or “Unsporting”
Our body naturally produces small amounts of creatine (1-2 grams a day), and those who eat meat or fish will typically consume at least another gram. Vegetarians and vegans typically have lower levels of creatine and have the most to benefit from supplementation.12,13 Creatine supplementation levels the playing field for everyone, regardless of their diet, and is no more unsporting or unethical than any other nutritional intervention that improves performance.
Creatine Is NOT a Banned Substance
Creatine is not banned for use in any competitive sport, including rock climbing. Both the IFSC (International Federation for Sport Climbing) and the IOC (International Olympic Committee) recognize the legality of creatine supplementation.14,15
What Are the Benefits of Creatine?
Creatine supplementation can boost creatine levels by 20-50%,16–18 and also increases the rate of phosphocreatine resynthesis.19 This directly increases the energy available for high-intensity exercise and leads to numerous downstream benefits, including…
Increased Strength and Power
Creatine significantly increases strength and power for anaerobic activities (such as climbing).20–30 A review of the research concluded that creatine improved strength by roughly 20% compared to only 12% in placebo groups.28
“But wait!” you say, “we climbers are more concerned with our strength-to-weight ratio than any absolute increase in strength, and creatine also causes weight gain!” True, creatine does cause a small amount of weight gain—approximately 2-5 lbs for most people, depending on their current weight (more muscle, more weight gain) and muscle creatine level, or about a 1-2.5% increase in weight—but this small amount of weight gain is dwarfed by the significantly greater increases in strength (even when you consider only the strength of the forearms).31,32
I will admit that there is a lot more to know on exactly how creatine affects strength-to-weight ratio as far as climbing is concerned—but the only way we’ll learn this is through studies on creatine use in actual climbers. It’s possible that creatine does not significantly improve the strength of smaller muscle groups like the forearms, as one study suggests,33 though it will still dramatically increase the strength and power of other groups that are at least as important such as those of the back, shoulder, and upper arms.
Increased Power Endurance
Creatine supplementation will significantly boost your power endurance,33–39 and this time the research specifically includes small muscle groups like the forearm flexors.33,35 Specifically, in one study creatine boosted time-to-fatigue during a handgrip exercise by an average of 18% across repeated trials (compared to placebo),33 and in a second study creatine supplementation boosted maximal grip power across 10 seconds by 15% (again compared to placebo).35
Decreased Pump
To the contrary of anecdotal reports about creatine increasing the pumped sensation, scientific evidence actually suggests creatine should help you resist getting pumped.
Briefly put, a climber gets pumped when muscle acidity starts becoming too great and the arms start to burn. One physiological response to this (and exercise in general) is a swelling of the muscle tissue (the “pump”), but this is actually a beneficial response as the swelling is caused by the dilation of blood vessels and capillaries in order to provide the muscle with more oxygen. Thus, even though pain and fatigue usually accompany tight, swollen forearms, the swollen forearms are actually an adaptive response to help increase energy availability and decrease pain and fatigue.
Creatine fights the part of the pump climbers actually dislike—the pain and fatigue part—by increasing the adaptive response. Compared to a placebo, creatine can increase blood flow to the forearms by a whopping 38%,40 allowing far more oxygen to be supplied and also for better clearance of metabolic byproducts like ammonia and lactate. Creatine also increases the “relaxation velocity” of the forearm muscles,41 or how fast the muscles can relax after being contracted and start to re-oxygenate. Relaxation velocity could be a critical factor to climbing performance, and one study hypothesized that a primary difference between elite climbers and non-climbers is improved speed of forearm re-oxygenation after releasing a hold.42
Creatine also acts a buffer against increasing muscle acidity by absorbing H+ ions (the cause of intramuscular acidity) in order to regenerate used creatine to creatine phosphate. Greater creatine resynthesis rates mean greater buffering capacity, as well, and in this way helps prevent muscle pH from dropping in the first place.
So it makes sense why some people report that creatine actually makes their pump worse—creatine does cause the muscles to swell more, causing the tightness we associate with being pumped. But this is actually a good thing because it means your muscles are being better oxygenated and will be better able to resist the pain and fatigue part of being pumped. Remember, creatine has been shown to significantly increase power endurance—meaning it reliably increases the amount of time you can hold onto something before failing—which implies creatine is doing a rather good job of preventing pump-related fatigue, not increasing it.
Adverse Effects
Creatine is extremely safe, with no toxicity or side effects capable of producing harm. There are potentially a couple adverse effects specific to climbing, however:
Increased Weight
Creatine does reliably increase weight in users, usually by about 2-5 lbs in the beginning (it can also cause further weight gain down the road by improving your ability to build lean muscle, but this should really not be viewed as a bad thing). All of this initial weight gain is “water weight”, as creatine pairs with water when it is stored in the muscle.
As discussed earlier, the gains in strength and power (as well as power endurance) vastly outweigh any increase in weight—but nonetheless, a climber who begins supplementing with creatine should expect to gain a few pounds in the first week.
You might hear anecdotal reports of how creatine won’t cause weight gain if you take a small enough dose. Unfortunately, these reports are patently false. Creatine either works and causes you to gain a little water weight, or it doesn’t work and you don’t gain any weight—there’s no third option. If your muscle creatine stores increase (which is the goal), then your muscle water content will also increase to accommodate that extra creatine and so will your weight. Period.
Also note that the increased water weight is not necessarily a bad thing as it can potentially help buffer your core body temperature against increases.7–11 In certain conditions, core temperature could limit your ability to climb by increasing perceived exertion.43
Decreased Range of Motion
Since creatine can increase intramuscular water content, it can potentially also decrease range of motion. There is not a lot of research on this, but one study did suggest that creatine could decrease range of motion for shoulder extension, shoulder abduction, and ankle dorsiflexion.44 The same study found no change to the range of motion for either the hips or the elbows.
How important is this impaired range of motion to climbers? Not important at all. Two studies that looked at how important flexibility was to climbing both found that only hip flexibility had any impact.45,46 Shoulder flexibility, the joint most significantly affected by creatine, did not affect climbing performance. Thus, even though creatine could slightly impair your flexibility, it will not do so in a meaningful way to a climber.
Osmotic Diarrhea
Creatine causes no issues when taken in doses under 10 grams, but large single doses of 10 grams or more may cause osmotic diarrhea in those susceptible—basically, undigested creatine causes water to be pulled into the digestive tract, which leads to loose stool (this is the same mechanism by which all osmotic laxatives works, such as magnesium). Doses under 10 grams have not been reported to cause these problems as the dose should be fully absorbed.
To avoid osmotic diarrhea, be sure to divide your creatine into an appropriate number of doses to keep each single dose under 10 grams (e.g., if your loading week calls for 24 grams total per day, opt for four doses of 6 grams each or three doses of 8 grams rather than two doses of 12 grams).
Dosage
It’s common to divide creatine into two phases: a loading phase (the first week) and a maintenance phase (after the first week). The loading phase quickly increases muscle creatine levels to their max capacity, and the maintenance phase simply keeps those levels at max.
Some people skip the loading phase in an effort to avoid weight gain (again, this does not work) and use the maintenance phase dose from day one to slowly build muscle creatine levels. Speaking long-term, there is no difference between the two protocols—but it will take around a month (as opposed to a week) to build muscle levels up to their maximum potential. Thus, I recommend using the loading protocol as you will get results faster.
Week 1 (Loading Phase)
300 mg per kg bodyweight (136 mg per lb) per day, divided into at least 2 doses and as many as 4.
Week 2 & On (Maintenance Phase)
100 mg per kg bodyweight (45 mg per lb) per day, divided into 2 doses.
Ideally, if you train or climb on a given day, you should take one dose directly after your climbing session with some protein and carbohydrates because insulin will help push the creatine into the muscle cells. This is ultimately of less importance than simply getting the right dose, however, so focus on that first.
Some people insist you should “cycle” creatine, meaning that you take it for a period and then stop for about awhile before resuming. There is no evidence this is effective or worthwhile. If you cease using creatine, your levels will gradually return to baseline and you will lose its benefits (though not the gains you made while training). On the other hand, you will continue to experience the benefits of creatine for as long as you take it, which means you can continue to climb and train hard.
(And don’t worry, as mentioned earlier there is no risk associated with long-term creatine use.4)
How to Choose the Right Product
As with other supplements, many manufacturers put creatine into pre-formulated pre-, peri-, and post-workout mixes. I’m really not a fan of these sorts of mixes because they are impossible to measure out to your own needs—you get the ingredients in whatever proportion the manufacturer has decided. Therefore, as usual, I recommend you choose a “pure” supplement—one that is just creatine.
The second thing you need to consider is the type of creatine, as there are a few options on the market. Hypothetically, all should work the same given enough time—but creatine monohydrate has by far the best evidence for efficacy. Creatine monohydrate is also the cheapest formulation, so do your best to avoid falling for ads for “designer creatines” (like creatine pyruvate, creatine citrate, and Kre-Alkalyn) that are at best equally as effective, at worst far less effective, and always far more expensive.
This third thing to consider is whether the supplement manufacturer you are considering is trustworthy. An unfortunate fact of the sports supplement industry is that product adulteration does occur, and that these adulterants can trigger positives on drug tests. If you’re only a recreational climber, this probably doesn’t matter—but if you’re a competitor and could be drug screened, then I highly recommend choosing a creatine produced by a manufacturer that has a “Trusted by Sport” logo on their label. “Trusted by Sport” is a third-party service that randomly tests product batches to determine if they are pure, and while it is not a 100% guarantee, it is the closest you can get.
Another way you can have reasonable certainty that your product is unadulterated is to buy a name brand creatine (like Creapure®) from a bulk supplier such as TrueNutrition. Creapure® is a creatine monohydrate powder sold to other manufacturers for use in their products, and it’s highly unlikely the raw powder would come from the factory adulterated.
If you do use TrueNutrition.com, you can use the code BNRY639 to get a 5% discount off your entire order. Full disclosure, I get a small kickback if you use this code and are a new customer—but hey, you get something too. And just so you know I offer this in good faith, be sure to check their Promo page for any better deals, because you only get to choose one. Usually 5% off is the best deal, but sometimes it’s not!
Conclusion
If I had to choose a single supplement that every climber should take, it would be creatine. No other supplement has nearly the amount of research, or the track record, of improving athlete performance. Whether you boulder or sport climb, every climber can benefit from improved muscle creatine stores, especially in light of how incredibly important the creatine phosphate system is to climbers.2
Creatine will cause you gain a small amount of weight, but the gains you will make in strength, power, and power endurance vastly outweigh this small downside. Beyond a small increase in weight, there is no other reason to avoid creatine—most of the adverse effects associated with it are nothing more than rumors and myths that are completely unsubstantiated by science.
The bottom line is that creatine is safe, effective, and extremely cheap (at the time of writing, you can get a kilogram of Creapure® for about $22, and that kilogram will last around six months). It should be considered a “must take” for all climbers who are serious about improving their performance.
Are those doses correct? 6,611 tsp per day for a 175lb person?!?
Thanks for pointing out the unit typo—it should be “1 tsp = 3.6 g“, not mg. With that correction made, your answer will be accurate.
For posterity, here’s the math for a 175 lb person:
175 lbs * 1 kg * (2.2 lbs)-1 = 175 kg/2.2 = 79.55 kg
79.55 kg * 100 mg * kg-1 = 7,955 mg = 7.955 g
7.955 g * 1 tsp * (3.6 g)-1 = 7.955 tsp/3.6 = 2.209 tsp
For the 1st week: 2.209 tsp * 3 = 6.627 tsp (or just 2.209 tbs)
As creatine apparently increases power and endurance and thus enables climbers to have longer and harder sessions, does it also provide for additional muscle growth? You mentioned that you could stop using creatine supplements, lose the benefits of creatine itself but keep the strenght/muscular gains you got while using it. So, say Steve trains 1 month with creatine and then stops using it, Alex trains for the same time without creatine supplementation, can Steve train longer and harder and therefore be stronger after the effects of creatine wear off or will his gains be approximately equal to Alex?
How much of a difference does it make? Does the difference get bigger if you compare two climbers over the course of 1 year, 10 years etc? Say someone uses creatine over 10 years, will he have made gains that someone who also trained 10 years without creatine can never catch up to?
The short answer is yes—the advantage that creatine offers a climber will compound over time, and the gap between those who train and climb with creatine and those who do not will widen.
The longer answer is that these sorts of differences are, in practice, very difficult to accurately attribute and measure in a real-life scenario. To compare two climbers, they would need to be approximately the same build and age, eat very similar diets, and train in very similar ways. Even then, there are genetic differences that are difficult to account for that could dramatically skew the results—I mean, if two climbers just began climbing, one may have the potential to be a 5.15 climber and the other may find progress halting around 5.12; no amount of creatine can turn an average climber into Chris Sharma or Juli Wurm!
In aggregate, though, we know that creatine improves the gains made through training, so it’s worth using.
As for muscle growth, the answer is again yes: creatine can boost muscle hypertrophy. But ultimately any muscle gain will depend on training style, the sum of nutrition (e.g., you can’t gain muscle in a constant deficit or without sufficient protein), and individual difference. If your goal is hypertrophy, creatine is highly beneficial—but creatine is equally helpful if your goal is just power and avoiding excess muscle gain, as it still boosts your reserves of creatine phosphate.
I started taking creatine about 3 months ago, and I have noticed significant cramping. In your article you stated, “No evidence suggests creatine causes cramps or increases the rate of injury. In fact, the opposite might be true—in at least one study, football players who supplemented with creatine suffered fewer cramps and injuries than non-supplementers.” In climbing, I find myself in situations where tension is required to hold a position (such as a heel hook or a drop knee), and in these positions I find myself cramping a lot (about 80~90% of the time). In fact, I barely remember any times before I started using creatine in which I cramped in these positions. Is this a direct correlation? Should I just give up on creatine altogether or is there something to couple it with, such as foods high in potassium like bananas?
P.S. I also run and do yoga regularly (each around 2 times a week) and have never cramped doing either post-creatine.
The position you describe—essentially, holding tension in a muscle while it is shortened—is the most frequent reason a muscle cramps. Unfortunately, we know so little about the actual etiology of muscle cramps that we have no solid information on how to prevent them or what might exacerbate them (and why). So, for example, we have decent evidence that creatine doesn’t cause cramps, but that doesn’t mean it can’t ever be a contributing factor, depending on an individual’s unique physiology. Similarly, we also have evidence that low sodium and dehydration can exacerbate cramps in some individuals, but they’re not always (or even reliably) a contributing factor.
In your case, you can try ensuring your blood volume stays high by increasing sodium intake (along with water) during exercise, and if that doesn’t help, then you can try ceasing creatine supplementation to see if you stop cramping so frequently (most evidence suggests potassium isn’t helpful). There is also evidence that engaging in plyometric exercises with the affected muscle can decrease cramping, so you could try that as well.
Great article and really well researched, however I still have one concern about using creatine for climbing. You addressed that the added weight from creatine will not make you a worse climber because the power gained more than compensates for the extra weight, but how does this affect finger strength? If the ability to hold onto tiny holds is the limiting factor, is it wise to add more weight that could pull you off the wall? After reading your article, I’m pretty convinced that it’s great to use if muscle strength is your limiting factor, but if you’re falling off due to lack of grip strength, will this be detrimental to climbing?
Thanks
It’s important to keep in mind that outside of finger strength, creatine does improve power endurance specifically within the forearms (and elsewhere as well, of course). So even if the 1-2.5% weight gain reduces your strength-to-weight ratio to the point where you cannot grip onto a hold as long as normal, the extra endurance will more than likely compensate you back up to normal. In this way, it seems like the only situation where the extra weight would cause a significant change is if you’re grasping a hold that is just barely within your ability level and adding even a couple pounds would make it impossible to hold. Even then, though, the increased ability to train (or just climb for extended periods of time) that creatine affords would probably allow you to improve your strength for that particular hold faster, thereby shortening your training curve for the project, so I think the benefit would persevere!
Thanks for the article. Creatine is so misunderstood by climbers. I can say to someone ‘I take protein supplements’ and no biggie, but say ‘I take creatine’ and most will look at you suspiciously…
I’ll take creatine for a few weeks before a road trip and then maybe a for a few weeks after, so for 5 or 6 weeks. I’m over age 50, and I weigh 135 lbs, and my creatine routine is to load at 2 grams/day for 5 days, then generally 1gm/day for the duration. I will take 2 gm/day if I’m feeling really worked or close to sending a project. Even at these ‘low’ levels, I notice a significant difference. And I don’t have any weight gain as my usage coincides with much more activity than my desk job typically offers.
Same as b, I have experienced quite a bit of cramping in my legs since I started taking creatine. My legs never cramped before even though I always use loads of heelhooks and now I sometimes have to shake away cramps on sport routes after foot moves that aren´t even strenuous at all.
I was simply wondering if, like you say the weight gain is due to water, will it then follow that by terminating the use of creatine you will lose this extra weight? thanks
Yes, you will lose any water weight you gained—but since it takes about a month to fully wash out extra creatine out of the system, it’ll also take about a month to wash the extra water out.
So, on one side I have a nutricionist saying that creatine is benefical for climbers. On the other hand, I have a climbing trainer saying that creatine is detrimental to climbers (http://trainingforclimbing.com/the-truth-about-creatine-for-climbers/). Could you comment on this? I mean, could you elaborate on Eric Horst’s arguments, so I can make a better decision?
The article you linked to by Eric Hörst is actually one of the reasons why I first wrote about creatine and climbing (there are older versions available on other websites he contributes to, such as nicros.com). I saw a number of errors (or at least inaccuracies) in the article in regards to how creatine works, and knew that if I was going to change a climber’s mind I would need to do better and provide a rationale to the contrary. So, I put together a short guide for my clients who were climbers, and when I eventually started this site it was one of the first guides I uploaded and the whole impetus behind my supplement guides in general.
No one disputes the ability of creatine to increase overall strength and power, not even Hörst. What Hörst argues is that the additional 2-5 lbs gained as a result of creatine usage would mitigate that increased strength and that creatine will increase your susceptibility to blood flow occlusion and getting “pumped”. I disagree with both of these conclusions, and have tried to provide scientific evidence to the contrary to back my positions up.
In regards to weight gain, for example, we know that the relative increase in strength/power is significantly greater than the relative increase in weight—and that we should therefore expect an overall benefit. Hörst argues that we cannot control where this weight ends up, and that much of it will end up in the legs. This is an exaggeration, at best. For one, the legs only make up approximately 35-40% of our total mass (closer to 40-45% if we discount the weight of our organs), so we should expect less than 50% of that extra weight to end up in a “bad area”. For two, our legs are primarily composed of Type I muscle fibers (slow twitch), and those fibers don’t store large amounts of creatine phosphate because they’re primarily used for endurance-based activities. Our upper body, and in particular our forearms, are much higher in Type IIa and IIx fibers (fast twitch) because we primarily use those muscles for more powerful, burst movements. (There is a wide degree of individual variation, of course, but these are the averages.) So we can actually predict that we’ll gain significantly more of the extra weight in the exact same muscles we train and increase in size due to climbing—not much room for complaint there!
In regards to the pump, we have good data to suggest that creatine increases blood flow and will actually improve power endurance. It’s important separate out the superficial effects of getting pumped (swollen, tight muscles) from the physiological effects that actually lead to fatigue. The pump (as in the swollen muscles) occurs because of increased blood flow, which is a positive adaptation meant to delay pain and fatigue. This increased blood flow is one reason why we warm up, and coincidentally why bodybuilders use weights immediately before a show—the increased blood flow allows our muscles to work better and for longer, and also happens to increase their size and tightness to the obvious benefit to anyone getting judged for standing on stage in a speedo and spray tan.
Finally, it’s important to note that the protocol Hörst recommends (taking 2-5 grams per day) will yield the exact, same results after approximately 1 month of use as the loading protocol I (and most others) recommend, which is a good example of how mental expectations can change the way you subjectively experience a nutritional intervention. In intervention 1 (load for 1 week, then maintain) he thought his climbing impaired by a preconceived notion that weight gain and increased pump; in intervention 2, he found small benefits. A peek behind the curtain reveals that both interventions are the same, but when he didn’t expect to get poor results he wasn’t impaired.
I want to finish up by saying that I truly respect Eric Hörst and the information he has put out there on the subject of climbing and training; the way he’s expanded the knowledge base for his subject of expertise is exactly what I want to do with nutrition and climbing. He’s a very smart man with a lot of great things to say. But he’s not a nutritionist (or dietitian, or nutrition researcher). His expertise is in other areas, and while there is always a certain amount of crossover (for example, the crossover of sports nutrition and exercise physiology), his discussions on the subject should be weighted against what other experts in the actual field have to say. I’m not saying you should never take his or any other trainer’s advice on nutrition, just that there might be others out there that can offer a more complete, nuanced picture!
“…just that there might be others out there that can offer a more complete, nuanced picture!” That was exactly what I was looking for! Thanks a bunch for your thoroughly explanation. I started taking creatine because of your supplement guide, and I was feeling good, I had a great climbing season, and I’ve noticed the expected weight gain. One of these days I’ve stumbled on Eric Horst’s article, and as huge fan of Eric’s ideas about training, that got me thinking again about creatine usage.
I will keep that up and going!
Thanks again
Just another thought on the fear of additional weight pulling one off of tiny holds: I found holding a hold (no matter what kind) isn’t only about finger strength but also a lot about body tension. So the overall benefit (with proper training) should not be weighed with weight against finger strength, especially for most people who don’t just try to send a special project with tiny holds only, but who try to improve their overall performance.
Anyways being on an intermediate level in bouldering, I experienced a huge boost in performance with a focused finger strength training (6s holds with weights) while using creatin.
I just found out the hard way that creatine can cause some serious diarrhea. I just tried a “loading” dose – about 10g for 150lb me – and was immediately beset by the most liquid shits a terrestrial animal has ever created. Did I get the dosing wrong? I thought 20g split into two or more doses was about the right dose for a guy my size? A quick google search shows that I’m not the only one who’s experienced this. Maybe you should note this in the ‘possible side effects’ section. I think smaller, more frequent doses might give your body a chance to move the creatine into your muscles before it starts drawing insane amounts of water into your bowels. Does this sound reasonable?
Fellow climbers, learn from my sad experience. Don’t overdo it!
You did not get the dosing wrong, but it does seem you are susceptible to an uncommon effect—osmotic diarrhea. While uncommon, the risk does increase as dose increases, and I should have been more clear about keeping doses low so that no one experiences this problem. I’ve updated the article with a number of warnings so that hopefully no one else taking my advice ends up with diarrhea, and I hope that your experience hasn’t turned you off from creatine in general! I would recommend splitting your loading phase into 4x doses of 5 grams each so you can be sure that it is fully absorbed and does not liquify your stool again. Thankfully, after the loading week, the dose is almost always small enough that it shouldn’t ever be an issue again.
Hi Brian,
Great article. I’m a big fan of Creatine for climbing and believe I’ve had good results .
I recommended my girlfriend who is an intermediate climber uses it also. In your studies did you come across anything that should be taken into account for a women using Creatine?
Cheers
I haven’t seen anything that suggests creatine affects women differently or should be taken in a different manner, and biochemically I think it would be strange given the ubiquity of the molecule across animals. Women will likely need less (given their generally lesser amount of muscle), but this is more weight and height dependent than sex-dependent.
Thank you for the great information. In your research, have you come across any evidence that creatine increases DHT and accelerates hair loss in men already predisposed to male pattern baldness?
As far as I’ve seen, there’s only a single study that linked creatine to increased DHT. By itself, this suggests there could be a link, but we need more evidence before we could really have an idea of how strong an effect this minor increase would have (if any). It would be nice to have longer-term studies, too, as hormones that are thrown off-kilter often normalize after a month or so, but the above study only went out to three weeks (and in the study, DHT was trending back towards normal after three weeks, as far as the data reads). So unfortunately, for now we can’t really say much!
Thanks for your great and informative articles,not just on supplements but also on nutrition for climbers.There are a lot of half truths and misleading articles circulating on the internet . Your rationale here is just what climbers need.
Thanks, I appreciate that!
Hello, very impressive blog and article, I love that someone brings this to light with a scientific argumentation and I follow all your posts with a mild obsession. (I apologize in advance for the content of this comment, that I hope to proofread and correct one day but it’s quite late already)
I noted a few times in this article and others (I’ll elaborate further another day if necessary) that you use the ABSENCE of proof for something to be the proof of its opposite.
As an example, you say :
“Creatine Does NOT Cause Cramps or Increase Rate of Injury
No evidence suggests creatine causes cramps or increases the rate of injury. In fact, the opposite might be true—in at least one study, football players who supplemented with creatine suffered fewer cramps and injuries than non-supplementers.”
No evidence suggests it causes cramps or injury indeed, but (forgetting the football article for now) no evidence suggests the opposite neither ( it does not prove that creatine does NOT cause cramps/injuries). You are just underlining the fact that no study supports any of the two statements yet (still forgetting the football article). I haven’t read your references in details yet so please correct me if I am wrong but, in my very mathematical opinion, if you want to prove something doesn’t exist, you have to have tried all possibilities.
This is a big logical misconception and the way you present it here I think can be “dangerous”.
Moreover, for the football study, indeed a greater muscular strength may protect these football players in their sport. But from a climbing TRAINING perspective, the limiting factors end up usually being the tendons and articulations. From a purely mechanical point of view, if Creatine DOES increase mass AND strength, then I really don’t see how the risk of finger injury, which is always a consequence of these two specific factors, might not increase.
Still, I consider this article to be THE reference regarding Creatine and sports/climbing and I really don’t want to attack this admirable piece of work, but from my understanding, some of your arguments should be positioned more carefully, you do this in a few other articles as well.Since your reasoning is extremely intelligent and convincing, I think a lot of people could follow your statements blindly even though they are not always equally supported by the litterature.
Please feel free to answer/contact me if what I say sound weird/unclear, I wrote this in 10 minutes in my bed and I am completely open to discuss it !
Regards
Thanks for the well-thought through comment! I’ll try to address your two concerns as best I can.
As far as absence of evidence goes (and it not always being evidence of absence), we need not always exhaust all hypotheses to claim something does not occur physiologically. In the case of creatine and cramps, we may only have the one article that specifically looks for cramping as a variable, but we have many more studies that never find cramping amongst their participants’ adverse effects. If cramping were something that creatine was correlated with, we should expect to see that evidence; since we don’t see any, we can reasonably assume creatine probably does not cause cramps. This doesn’t mean we can’t overturn this conclusion with new evidence that suggests creatine does cause cramps, but we don’t have a reason to hypothesize that it does given the totality of the evidence. Related, we also don’t have strong biological plausibility for how creatine would cause cramps—though to be fair, we don’t really understand what causes cramps in general (perhaps something electrolyte-related), so it’s not the strongest argument.
In regard to climbing training and creatine, I don’t think we can simply state the connective tissue to be the limiting factor, though it’s certainly a greater limiting factor for climbers than for football players (ignoring knee ligament injuries since they’re not really a limiter in training itself). For example, increased strength in the limiting muscles (forearm flexors) can help a climber position their grip in a less dangerous manner (such as an open crimp versus a full crimp), reducing stress on connective tissue links that don’t normally (or perhaps ever) hypertrophy and grow stronger. The increased weight does potentially increase strain and could influence rate of injury, but given the minor amount of weight gain it’d be surprising if injury rates were significantly higher. In the end, I think it’d be hard to measure since injuries are so multifaceted and—barring accidents—can often be correlated to decisions like training while fatigued, not adequately recovering, not consuming sufficient calories, etc. These are all factors that remain functionally static while consuming creatine, as even if training volume can be increased there is still a line between training while rested and training while fatigued, for example.
Those are my thoughts, anyway. Thanks again for the comment, and don’t hesitate to argue back if you see things differently!
I began supplementing with creatine about 6 weeks ago in an effort to increase my end of climb endurance when going from the last bolt to the anchors leading on gym climbs.
I was climbing at the same grade (10.c lead) for about 3 weeks and then it began to drop. I’m now struggling to redpoint 9’s after three or four routes and my forearms feel exceptionally pumped despite climbing 3 times/week. I’m also noticing a sensation of tightness in my shoulders, legs and biceps and a general sense of weakness that I can’t attribute to any other changes.
I’m going to see how my TR climbing is impacted to see if it’s merely psychological and the “perceived pump” is just psyching me out on lead. But with so much of leading being a head game, couldn’t it be argued that the sensation of being pumped could be detrimental to your climbing?
I think you could make that argument, but we’d have to allow that nearly anything can psychologically trigger a person and that perhaps psychological triggers shouldn’t be sorted into the same category as other types of performance inhibitors. That being said, it’s fully possible that (for you) creatine is not providing the same benefit or could even be hindering your performance; over the years, I have heard from a few other people that for whatever reason, they get cramps and/or tightness when supplementing with creatine. Neither of these side effects are well-documented in the literature, but even with the plethora of studies out there we’re still just looking at aggregate data representative of an “average person”. I can reasonably say that most people should tolerate creatine well and gain a benefit, but I can’t extend that to mean everyone, and you may be one of the poor responders. Or, as you said, it could be a nocebo effect where you expect something bad to happen and trigger it mentally. But that’s the tough part about nutrition—it’s interwoven with our feelings about foods, diets, supplements, etc., and so we can never truly have a non-biased experienced. Regardless, I hope you sorted it out and are back to climbing hard!
Why do you insist on taking 2 doses a day during the maintenance phase? Shouldn’t the required daily maintenance dose (for me around 7 grams) be fully absorbed in a single intake since in contrast to the loading phase doses it’s rather low?
Also I’ve read that creatine needs a fair bit of water to solute. Will it impair my absorption in the gut if its not fully soluted into the drink or is the only disadvantage the mildly unpleasant powdery sensation on my tongue when I take the last chugs?
I learned a lot from this article and your detailed responses in the comments so thank you for that!
Haha, you’re right, I shouldn’t be so insistent—and honestly, I only take a single dose per day on the maintenance phase because the dose is so low, so I’m hardly leading by example on my insistence!
Creatine isn’t very water soluble, so it does take a lot of water to solubize it (or you can increase solubility by mixing it with a warm or hot beverage). That being said, there’s no benefit to absorption if you don’t fully dissolve it (though some people find it “gentler” on the stomach; most have no issue either way). If you don’t mind the powdery feeling, then don’t worry about it!
I oppose the statement that shoulder flexibility is insignificant for climbing, notably bouldering. I also noticed a clear reduction of flexibility after starting creatine in most body parts, including hip, leg, abs, and shoulders. I will try stretching more or else I will reduce or quit taking creatine.
I made that statement based on the current level of evidence, which is admittedly not robust. That being said, whether creatine affects flexibility is a bit secondary to the actual issue because any effect creatine has will be minor as the mechanism of action would be increased muscle girth and it has only a very small effect in that area (due to increased water retention in the muscles). Improving active flexibility will make a much greater difference to your ROM in any joint, so I hope your stretching helps!
Hi Brian, I left a comment a few years ago (November 12, 2018 at 3:32 pm) expressing my doubts about your article, your answer was absolutely perfect and I apologize for never having taken the time to answer, it was mostly because I didn’t have much to add. This article ended up becoming my reference for Creatine.
From what I read on your blog (and I apologize if I missed a line/an article, I have tried to be careful but I didn’t read everything perfectly), you don’t seem to mention explicitly the basic recovery benefits of Creatine. I mean taking it not as an improvement supplement but simply as a better way to “recharge the batteries”.
From what I understand, Creatine stocks are indeed depleted after an effort. Do you think it would be useful to take the complement to only get back to baseline levels ? If yes, what would dosages would you recommend to just get “the stocks” back between climbing sessions ? If these are much smaller than the doses you recommend as supplements here, would a “balanced” diet be enough ? I feel like the natural sources of creatine may be needed on unhealthy amounts (but to be honest, I never took the time to look for those sources).
On a sidenote (Sorry for the kilometer of text), I did try to take pure creatine monohydrate for a while, at the dosages found here. I feel like it made me a bit dizzy at times, I read on unreliable forums that other people sometimes felt that way too, have you read anything reliable about it ? That was the primary reason for me to actually stop it.
Thanks a lot for the time you put in this blog, and even more for the time you put answering comments, this place is a beautiful source of information and I am always glad when a new article is up.
Hi Barry, sorry for the slow reply, I’ll do my best to address your questions!
I think it’s unlikely there will be much benefit to creatine for “recharging the batteries” because when we deplete creatine (physiologically creatine phosphate), it doesn’t get destroyed or excreted but will rather take up another phosphate ion to regenerate into creatine phosphate. This happens relatively quickly—though with exertion the rate does slow down as a part of fatigue—and in time all the creatine phosphate stores will be regenerated. We do break down some creatine into creatinine that is excreted, but the turnover rate is very slow and easily kept up with by our body in physiological homeostasis. The other problem is that creatine from a supplement comes unphosphorylated, so before we can use it for ATP regeneration we have to attach the phosphate ion to it the same as we would need to to recover after exercise. So, a good hypothesis, but in practice I don’t think it would work out.
As for dizziness, I haven’t heard that from any study or any of my readers, and in fact the only study I could find suggests it may reduce dizziness (at least as a result of traumatic brain injury), but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a link. One potential explanation I saw floating around is dehydration, which would potentially reduce blood pressure and blood flow to the head, causing dizziness. This seems a bit unlikely since the increase in water storage caused by creatine shouldn’t actually affect the rest of our hydration status—it’s such a slow transition that any water shifted from our blood to our muscles would be compensated for by an increase in thirst and water intake—but it’s at least a potential explanation. Or it could simply be idiopathic!
At any rate, while I think creatine is certainly beneficial, it’s not so important that I recommend anybody fight through any adverse effects they may feel (and I have received a number of emails about side effects, mostly cramping). Whether these effects are physiological in origin or psychological I cannot say (nor can the person experiencing them), but neither do we need to find out. If a person really wants to take creatine and is willing to put in the effort to find out, I’ll help them trial creatine—still not a perfect solution since there’s no blinding, but if they consistently get the same results then we can leave the idea of creatine safely behind.
Thanks for comment and the kind words!
Hi Brian
What are your thoughts on creatine use for youth climbers?Dr Krissy kendall did an interview with bodybuilding.com some years back that gave a positive review on creatine use for teenagers.
I’m concerned about increased injury risk. Wouldn’t the increased power place more strain on the tendons and ligaments? Or could the opposite be true, e.g. that creatine’s effect of improved recovery also applies to connective tissue? Someone on some forum hypothesized that the water retention would also benefit the tendons