Hello everyone.
I found out about T-Nation while following Dr. John Berardi’s “Scrawny to Brawney” program, which I am still doing. Currently I am in phase 7 of the 16 total monthly workout plans. His program recommended taking Surge, but at the time I started it was always out of stock. So I started making my own shakes out of dextrose and Optimum Nutrition 100% Gold Standard Whey.
Following Berardi’s forumla, my shakes contain about 76 g of dextrose and 36 g of protein. His book recommends taking 3 of these: one before, one during, and one after the workout. Berardi has a lot of followers around here, and I’ve noticed many devoted Surge-drinkers, yet I’ve seen no one on T-Nation suggest drinking 3 of these. There’s even a thread about how drinking 2 of them is a very unconventional idea that is being “tested”. This may come from the fact that only us special scrawny folks with our ridiculous metabolisms need the extra one, I’m not sure. Has anyone here tried this?
Anyway, things have been slowing down for me lately, and I’m looking to improve my nutrition. I think the protein in Surge is better than in ON Whey because only some small percentage in the ON blend is hydrolyzed, whereas I understand its moreso in Surge. Although I think my homemade shakes might have more BCAAs per serving than Surge does, I’m not sure how much this matters. Basically, I am trying to find out if the nutritional benefit is worth the extra money to switch to Surge (especially given the 3 per workout consumption rate).
Also, I currently use the same protein for everything: meals as well as protein shakes. Obviously a bad idea, but I’ve been a bit lazy about doing the research on different proteins to solve this problem. Any suggestions? Currently, I eat 5 meals a day, the protein source in 3 of these meals is “real” food. The other 2 need to be eaten on the go so I use shakes. I tried beef jerky but its just too expensive ($7 per bag?!).
I am also not sure about BCAAs. Everyone says to take them, but ON Whey has about 2.5 g leucine, 1.5 g isoleucine, and 1.5 g valine per serving. So I get at least 22 g on non-workout days from the shakes alone, not counting whatever is the natural food I eat. On workout days I get about 40g on account of extra servings in the workout shakes, plus whatever is in the food I eat. Since pure BCAAs are relatively expensive for me (I’m a graduate student) I have to ask if its even worth it for me, as I get a fair amount of BCAAs already.
Thanks for the advice.