Do You Need Them? Glucose Disposal Agents

​Imagine that you're building your dream house. You are doing all the planning and putting hard work day in and day out in order to build the house. You have made an order of many supplies, you have many workers ready to lay bricks, but your shipments of supplies are coming on a horse and buggy while they could be coming in a transport truck. Your workers are constantly standing around waiting to be able to lay more bricks but they just are not available to them. On top of all that, when the bricks do get there, it is a limited amount until another shipment comes over. How does this relate towards your journey of building a great physique? 
The supplies are the amino acids you ingest, the workers are the calories and the mode of transportation is the way your body shuttles the protein in order to be able to recover. 
It is true that many more factors play a part in order to be able to build muscle, but without this simple process it is impossible.
This process is very important specifically around your workout when we want to flood our bodies with the amino acids and nutrients it needs. You want your body to be as anabolic as possible around your workout. This is when a pathway called M-Tor is activated which begins the muscle building process. The hormone that is responsible with shuttling these nutrients as fast as possible is called insulin. Manipulating your insulin levels can be a great way to accelerate muscle gains. This works by not only shuttling the nutrients faster to the muscles but maximizing to what degree nutrients are absorbed by your body. 
When we eat, our bodies turn the food into glucose. From there it can be stored as glycogen which is essentially stored energy within your body. Any excess glucose in the body once our glycogen stores have been filled up can be turned into fat. But there is a way in order to maximize the amount of glycogen we can store in order to force more nutrients into the muscles and prevent fat gains.
Many do it through exogenous insulin use, but this can be a dangerous practice. This process can also be mimicked through the use of glucose disposal agents. Glucose disposal agents will help your body absorb as many nutrients as possible by mimicking the effects of insulin in the body. This will ensure that you are not only maximizing your muscle gains but also minimizing your fat gains. 
There are many products in the market that have one, or a combination of ingredients such as R-ALA, cinnamon, chromium and many more. These ingredients all have ways of regulating your blood sugar levels and maximizing how our body handles carbohydrates.
Now that we know what Glucose disposal agents do, do we really need them in our arsenal of supplements?
Although they are not needed, they can be very beneficial in terms of utilizing your nutrients properly. These supplements can be fairly inexpensive and will help you in the long run not only in terms of muscle gaining, but in terms of health. Many of these supplements will help you regulate your blood sugar better, will help you stay leaner, will help you absorb more nutrients and even are potent antioxidants to keep away free radicals. Another benefit is that since there is better glycogen uptake, you will have much better pumps in the gym. If you are looking to maximize your muscle gains definitely look into trying one of these supplements out!
The best time to take these supplements is before and after your training as this is when many individuals intake higher amounts of carbohydrates and protein. They can also be very beneficial when you take a refeed or a cheat meal as they will help you shuttle these excess carbohydrates and put them to good use. Make sure to give your body all the nutrients it needs in order to have the best physique you can!
 
 
http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/mic/dietary-factors/lipoic-acid
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2756298/