5 Dietary supplements You Shouldn’t Combine With Protein Powder

For many individuals trying to optimize their well being, protein powders and dietary dietary supplements are useful instruments, however the mixture isn’t at all times helpful. Some pairings may cause digestive upset or make the vitamins much less efficient.

For most individuals, combining creatine and protein powder is completely secure and should even improve nutrient uptake and efficiency advantages.

However extra isn’t essentially higher. “As soon as muscle shops are saturated, the physique merely excretes the surplus,” mentioned Lara Zakaria, PharmD, CNS, an integrative pharmacist and nutritionist specializing in useful drugs and personalised vitamin. “That’s why most research use that vary persistently and safely.”

Combining greater than advisable (3 to five grams every day) with protein may trigger dehydration, gastrointestinal upset, and even kidney pressure in some folks. Total, “Creatine itself is secure and well-studied,” mentioned Alex Larson, RDN, a registered sports activities dietitian and founding father of Alex Larson Vitamin. “Simply keep on with the efficient dosing.”

Many pre-workout dietary supplements include caffeine, which might trigger your coronary heart charge and blood strain to spike. Sure protein powders and shakes additionally include caffeine, which might double your dose.

Whenever you mix numerous caffeine with a heavy protein shake, it may possibly delay gastric emptying—the method the place meals exits the abdomen—and trigger nausea, cramping, or reflux.

This isn’t essentially dangerous, however it may be uncomfortable. “It’s much less about [supplement] interplay and extra about timing and tolerance,” mentioned Zakaria. “Protein shakes digest greatest when the physique isn’t in full sympathetic fight-or-flight mode from caffeine.”

Amino acid blends, like BCAAs (branched-chain amino acids), are important vitamins that assist construct muscle. Most protein powders additionally naturally include amino acids, so that you don’t essentially want so as to add extra to the combination.

“In case your protein powder already delivers about 20 to 30 grams per serving, [with BCAAs], there’s no significant benefit to stacking [more] BCAAs on prime,” mentioned Zakaria, who added that too many further amino acids may probably decrease tryptophan (an important amino acid) availability and have an effect on your temper.

Totally different protein powders usually include various quantities of calcium, so you might wish to take iron or zinc dietary supplements individually—calcium can compete with iron for absorption, mentioned Larson.

Nevertheless, having a protein shake across the similar time you’re taking your iron complement isn’t essentially dangerous, mentioned Zakaria, and the delayed impact is clinically irrelevant for most folk who don’t have an present iron deficiency.

Natural dietary supplements like ginseng and inexperienced tea extract usually include hidden stimulants. When these stimulants are mixed with caffeine from different sources, like some protein powders or pre-workout dietary supplements, they’ll elevate your coronary heart charge and put extra stress in your digestive system, mentioned Larson.