Want to know a "secret" to looking at supplement claims by GooRoos online?

Look for the top 3: Mechanism, animal vs hooooman data, and clinical signals.

If they are all pointing in the same direction like three weirdos at a roadside diner whispering, then pay attention, meathead!

Today is the final day yammering about the king of sports supplements: creatine.

Full Contact

I personally think creatine is super useful in full contact sports and have recommended it to athletes potentially for that purpose going on 7+ years now.

However, we still do not have the giant adult randomized contact-sport athlete trial that slams the gavel and closes the case. And due to that thing called "ethics / IRB approval" which is a good thing, we will never have an air tight RCT in hooomans on this aspect.

I’m not going to inflate the evidence just because creatine is cheap, boring, safe in healthy humans, and sitting on the supplement shelf like a tax accountant with delts.

Perfect data would be nice.

Reality does not wait for perfect data.

Parents, coaches, fighters, hockey players, football athletes, military folks, and tactical humans still have to decide what goes into the system before the bad day happens.

With creatine, the downside in healthy people is low.
Cost is low.
Safety literature is strong.
Mechanistic upside is hard to ignore.

That is the practical calculus.

Dr. Darren Candow said it directly when asked about contact sport athletes:

Important: that is not a cure claim.

It is a risk-to-reward statement.

The Sleep-Deprivation Grenade

Now toss sleep loss into the blender, because apparently your brain enjoys doing burpees in a power outage.

Gordji-Nejad and colleagues used a 21-hour sleep deprivation protocol plus one massive 0.35 g/kg creatine dose with brain imaging.

Cognitive performance improved.

Processing speed improved.

Brain high-energy phosphate metabolism shifted.

MRS also showed prevention of a pH drop during sleep deprivation (Gordji-Nejad et al., 2024).

That dose is huge.

I am not telling your sleep-deprived client to shovel 30 grams into a shaker at 2 a.m. before driving a forklift like a caffeinated lab badger.

Bigger point:

Under brain-energy stress, creatine is no longer just “gym powder.”

It is part of the bioenergetic conversation.

ATP. Phosphocreatine. pH buffering. Brain fuel resilience.

That is the nerd chute that is practical.

My Take

If you or someone you coach is in a contact sport, combat sport, tactical role, shift-work job, or brain-stress environment, 10 g/day of creatine monohydrate is a rational baseline.

Split it:

5 g with meal one.
5 g with meal two.

Keep it boring.

Make it consistent.

Do not confuse it with a force field.

Creatine does not replace helmets, correct vision training, technique, sleep, food, medical care, or not making dumb decisions at 1 AM. under fluorescent gas-station lighting staring at crazy blue pecker pills.

It stacks on top of the basics.

One more energetic sandbag around the mitochondrial bunker.

​The full brain and TBI breakdown lives in Section 10 of the Complete Creatine Manual.​

Sleep deprivation is Section 11.

Safety sits in Section 12.

Dosing by population and goal is Section 13.

If this week made you rethink creatine as more than “gym powder,” the manual is the map.

The manual is $37.

Code DRMIKE drops it to $27 through tonight at midnight PST.

Go here:
​https://creatine.miketnelson.com​

Much love, mitochondria, and better buffers,
Dr Mike

PS —tonight is the final call before the code dies. If you coach lifters, parents, fighters, masters athletes, or sleep-deprived maniacs with deadlines and bad lighting, this is the creatine resource I’d want in your hands before the inbox turns into a flaming raccoon in a dumpster again.

References

Candow, D. G., Forbes, S. C., Ostojic, S. M., Prokopidis, K., Stock, M. S., Harmon, K. K., & Faulkner, P. (2023). “Heads up” for creatine supplementation and its potential applications for brain health and function. Sports Medicine, 53(Suppl 1), 49–65.

Gordji-Nejad, A., Matusch, A., Kleedörfer, S., Jayeshkumar Patel, H., Drzezga, A., Elmenhorst, D., Binkofski, F., & Bauer, A. (2024). Single dose creatine improves cognitive performance and induces changes in cerebral high energy phosphates during sleep deprivation. Scientific Reports, 14, 4937.

Sakellaris, G., Kotsiou, M., Tamiolaki, M., Kalostos, G., Tsapaki, E., Spanaki, M., Spilioti, M., Charissis, G., & Evangeliou, A. (2006). Prevention of complications related to traumatic brain injury in children and adolescents with creatine administration: An open label randomized pilot study. Journal of Trauma: Injury, Infection, and Critical Care, 61(2), 322–329.

Sakellaris, G., Nasis, G., Kotsiou, M., Tamiolaki, M., Charissis, G., & Evangeliou, A. (2008). Prevention of traumatic headache, dizziness and fatigue with creatine administration. A pilot study. Acta Paediatrica, 97(1), 31–34.

Sullivan, P. G., Geiger, J. D., Mattson, M. P., & Scheff, S. W. (2000). Dietary supplement creatine protects against traumatic brain injury. Annals of Neurology, 48(5), 723–729.

Reminder that the 10 clams off the Complete Creatine Manual goes away tomorrow night at midnight PST.

​https://creatine.miketnelson.com/ << Use code DRMIKE at checkout

_____________________

Mike T Nelson CISSN, CSCS, MSME, PhD
Associate Professor, Carrick Institute
Owner, Extreme Human Performance, LLC
Editorial Board Member, STRONG Fitness Mag
​​Mike T Nelson is a Ph.D. and not a physician or registered dietitian. The contents of this email should not be taken as medical advice. It is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any health problem - nor is it intended to replace the advice of a physician. Always consult your physician or qualified health professional on any matters regarding your health.

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