I was recently wandering around a supplement store and was blown away by the huge amount of pre-workout options available. I started talking to the guy who runs the shop (a competitive bodybuilder) and he said nearly every second purchase these days are pre-workout supplements.
From a bodybuilding perspective he thought it was funny that all these skinny guys were coming in and buying pre-workout supps but then failing to eat anywhere near enough food to see any real gains. There is, in his mind anyway, a prevailing mindset that if you just train HARDER you will see more gains.
It would appear that some things never change. The hardest part about gaining a lot of muscle is the eating. Unlike a workout that pretty much takes an hour 4x per week, food intake is a constant test of discipline (whether you are trying to gain muscle or lose weight).
I am not anti pre-workout supps either though. My training goal this year is to get my safety bar box squat up to 180kg for 5 reps. I do other things in my training but come Saturday Squat day I am happy to take a pre-workout supplement to boost my concentration and intensity, but even then I only take it if I am not already feeling pretty pumped about the workout. This amounts to a serving once every three weeks or so.
The fact is, I have days when I train really hard and get great workouts without supplementation, and then there are some days when i do take a supplement and my workouts still aren't that great. I definitely think they do what they say they do but as always, if you haven't got the essentials of good diet, plenty of sleep and recovery, and your training program having an appropriate volume of load and intensity, then no matter what your goal is, a supplement isn't going to make that much of a difference.
For the record I like USP Labs (I think) Jacked as my pre-workout booster of choice. It has a really, really, really cool name
And it seems to work well and not taste like sh#t.
I have a small tub that has probably lasted me 6 months and at my current rate of consumption will probably go off before I finish it.
Jack
