The Importance of Supplements

Nutritional supplements have played a major role in the development of some of the most impressive physiques of all time. Professional athletes use them; fitness models use supplements, even the average Joe who only occasionally makes it to the gym takes supplements. You don’t even have to ever set foot in a gym to reap the rewards of using certain nutritional supplements. The fact of the matter is that supplements can benefit just about everyone, but they do have their limitations.

Many people will argue that they get enough nutrition from their food and that they don’t need to take any form of supplement. My question to these people is; “How much Vitamin A did you take in today?” This question applies not only to Vitamin A, but all the other nutrients that are essential to optimal health and daily living. Other than processed foods or supplements, the nutritional content of the micronutrients, like Vitamin A, is rarely ever listed for a food. Think about this; if you bought a bag of apples from the grocery, where was the nutritional content listed for them?

Not only that, but who really keeps track of their daily intake of nutrients? Most of the time I hear people saying they rarely have enough time to get to the gym, let alone calculate their daily nutritional intake. It just doesn’t happen that way.

That is why supplements are so important. A multivitamin and mineral supplement helps to ensure adequate micronutrient intake on a daily basis. Once these bases have been covered, additional supplements can be used to combat the ailments of a specific person. For example; as we get older, more calcium is needed for strong bones. The calcium in a multimineral supplement is better than nothing, but those amounts are for general health. Calcium is used by the body for more than just strong bones, and when more calcium is needed, a higher potency calcium supplement is used on top of the calcium contained in the multivitamin. That way, the body does not take calcium from the other functions of the body to be used by the bones. The same principle applies to other nutrients also.

Sports supplements like protein and creatine are also to be used on top of the basic nutritional requirements. When your muscles reach their genetic limit, and this is different for everyone, their growth will stagnate. Adding in supplements like protein powders and creatine help to break down the barriers of your personal limits and take you to new growth, strength and performance. Without the addition of these supplements, it would be much more difficult to grow muscle mass.

The human body is a complex and highly sophisticated machine, but it still requires the proper fuel to keep it running at its best. By adding in the proper nutritional supplements, you can keep your body running longer at its best, as well as push it to new limits of greatness.