Creatine Reimagined: A New, US-Based Product for Strength, Energy & Longevity with Mark Faulkner

This is an exciting day here on Well Beyond 40 because we are in Omaha, Nebraska at Vireo Systems. We went to the source to talk all things creatine. It is one of the biggest questions I get asked, so I decided that this was the best thing to do was come to Vireo Systems, talk concrete creatine, but also unpack creatine in general. And you're gonna learn why I've chosen to use creatine hydro— HCL, hydrochloride, above other types. You're going to learn all about the different types of creatine out there, the benefits of creatine, if there are side effects of creatine, if they are, how to avoid them, why you want to make this your number one supplement of choice, why it's probably the biggest regret that I have when they talk about going back in life to your younger self. What would you tell your younger self? Take creatine. And I have Mark Faulkner with me who's really dedicated his life to creatine. And we're going to learn, learn why and what he's uncovered. So I'm calling this Creatine 101. And Mark Faulkner, welcome to, welcome to your warehouse, your manufacturing plant.

Yes. And you welcome to Plattsmouth, Nebraska, right outside of Omaha, as you said, as well. We're, we're honored to have you here and glad to showcase this American manufacturing, the only American creatine plant.

Yeah, I've been blown away here and I, I wanted to make sure I came and I saw what was really going on here. And you will also be able to see that footage. We've gone through the whole manufacturing process. But before we get into all of that, there's a lot of the foundational high vision stuff that I want to talk about with creatine. But I'd love to know how you got into creatine.

Certainly. Well, first, my background was in science. My degree was in physics with a good smattering of biochem and toxicology and things thrown in. And upon graduating, I fell in love with the business of science. And myself and another gentleman by the name of Dr. David Black started a forensic toxicology laboratory and The original team involved developed the steroid testing program for the National Football League, and then our laboratory, Aegis Analytical Labs, began doing testing for all sorts of professional and amateur athletic organizations, teams, conferences, etc. And these athletes, many of whom were using steroids because it's not that they wanted to be bodybuilders, but the compounds really helped them recover in the wake of their strenuous activities. And they needed something for strength, endurance, recovery. And as they said, nothing on the market works other than these endocrine profile manipulating compounds. Steroids aren't safe, healthy, or legal. And so that piqued my interest into looking into sports medicine research and beginning a project with a variety of very bright sports medicine researchers to find something that could give these elite athletes an alternative to steroids. And we worked with a number of different amino acid conjugations and peptides and creatine compounds and were working on things. And I'll just— that's enough of my background. But that began over 20 years of creatine research that resulted in creatine hydrochloride and, and and this molecule that is as close to steroids as people can get and have it still be safe, healthy, and legal.

Well, we're gonna unpack creatine and the different types, but I'd love to just start with what is creatine? 'Cause I still think there's a lot of confusion around that. Some people think it's some kind of a hormone, it, you know, raises testosterone. So what exactly is creatine?

Yes, unfortunately it got a bad rap initially because it was being used by elite male athletes. And so they thought, many people thought it's just something for men, something for athletes.

Full disclosure, I used to take clients to Gold's Gym in Venice way back when. This was in the '80s, and all the dudes used creatine. And I mean, these were big dudes. They also used steroids. So, but I was like, oh, I'm not taking that. Like, definitely not taking that. So that was my— we always thought it was, you know, a bro supplement.

Yeah. And, and for many years it was, even though it's so much more. Creatine, first of all, is a natural molecule in the body. The body makes about half of it. It's a zwitterion, which means that it's got a both positive and negative charge on it, but it's an amino compound. It's made up of 3 amino acids: arginine, glycine, and methionine. Most of it is synthesized in the liver., and it's responsible for all of the cellular energy of everything in your body. Every cell uses creatine in order to generate optimal cellular energy for that cell to function, to do its job, to repair itself and recover. And besides the half that the body makes, the other half is supposed to come from diet. And I know we'll talk about that later, but it is a natural molecule that, as, as you inferred, it is key and important. I, I like to say that it's the most important supplement people can take because you look at all the other great nutrients, vitamin D, zinc, proteins, you know, uh, fish oil and things, but none of them matter as much if the cells don't have enough energy to use those nutrients properly. And the rate-limiting molecule on cellular energy is creatine.

I, I just had this flash because you look at the rise of Starbucks and clearly people are going there to get energy. And you just wonder if we just had had this rise of like creatine, you know, creatine bars or something.

And it's truly the many things that people think about or take for energy are stimulants, psychomotor stimulants, when in fact the body actually is craving functional energy, just the energy to work and do its job normally. The brain cells, the immune cells, anything. So, yeah.

Well, let's unpack further then, because, you know, at the very core, it's helping your body produce its ATP, make energy. What else does creatine do? What are some of the other benefits?

Well, probably first and foremost, the brain needs it. The body and the brain uses about 20% of our creatine just to think on a regular basis. So people that experience brain fog or feel like they're getting forgetful, there's a good chance they may have low volumes of creatine in their, in their body. Our T cells, our immune health is dependent on how well our T cells protect us from bad cells. And there was some great research done by Dr. Lily Yang out of UCLA that showed the T cells are absolutely dependent on creatine in order to have enough energy to go neutralize bad molecules or bad compounds in the body, whether it be viruses, cancer cells, bacteria, et cetera. They do their job well if they have ample creatine stores. The, the heart absolutely has to have creatine in order to beat optimally, efficiently, strongly. Really, there isn't a cell in the body whose functioning isn't affected by or dependent upon good creatine stores and the creatine function to help drive the mitochondrial energy in a cell.

So we've always thought of it as the thing the bros use for big muscles, but the reality is what it's really just helping someone do is produce more energy.

Yes, there are so many disease states right now that are related to poor cellular energy. And Cellular Energetics is now at the, at the forefront of many medical indication research projects. I saw something recently that said that probably 90% of all chronic diseases are really some form of mitochondrial dysfunction that comes from a lack of mitochondrial energy. And so when you support the mitochondria and the cells with proper energy, the whole body just functions in a more healthy, more optimal health sort of way.

So you talked about the fact that your body makes about half of your need. Mm-hmm. And I would assume that would be the need, normal need, like not when things accelerate. Maybe if someone had Long COVID or is recovering from something, where are you getting the other half?

The other half is supposed to come from our diet. But unfortunately, many Americans have a diet that's not rich in creatine foods. And so—

And the creatine foods would be?

Well, first and foremost, red meat. And with people that are concerned about fat intake, cholesterol intake, or that are vegan or vegetarian and stuff, obviously some of those sources, red meat or other meats, are not as much of a part of their diet. And so anyone that falls into those categories of diet choice or life philosophy and things absolutely needs a creatine supplement. So yeah, the other half is supposed to come from our diet.

Hold on, though. Can you get enough from diet if you were optimizing your food intake to get creatine within your meat or your fish? Could you actually get enough? Because I've looked at the statistics of someone on a carnivore diet. Sounds like you'd be having to eat a lot.

You do. And you have to also cook it in a specific way, which is not cook it much because heat will destroy the creatine. And so, you know, even if a certain number of ounces of meat has a day's supply of creatine, as soon as you cook it, 80, 90% of that creatine unfortunately is destroyed. So it is difficult. To get enough creatine in your diet, especially nowadays. But if somebody were to consume enough steak tartare or other things, you could get enough from, from your diet. But certainly the modern supplementation of creatine is something that is having good advances and is moving forward in a way that now people can supplement their diet effectively and safely with a a well-chosen creatine supplement.

It is a fun fact that when I met you, when you came out to Tampa, Florida, we went to dinner and had carpaccio.

We did.

We were like, absolutely. It was so funny that it was on the menu.

Yeah.

We had 2 servings of it.

That's right. We liked it so much, we decided we needed another.

All right. So your body makes about half of what you would need if needs were, if you didn't have more than normal needs.

Mm-hmm.

Because we've gotta put that out and we'll talk about what might increase your need for creatine. You have a challenge getting it from your diet. You would have to eat high amounts of meat and fish. They'd have to be sashimi, carpaccio, or not cooked much. So the reality is we need to supplement.

Most people need the supplement in their diet in order to have optimal health.

All right. So it is a confusing landscape out there. Now, everything that if you are just listening to the podcasts and influencers and experts, you hear about creatine monohydrate. And I'm just going to tell you what I've heard. And then I want to go unpack the different forms and what is truth, because I know you've gone through a lot of the research on this. And let's, and I'd love people to be able to learn and then be able to discern the difference, but The information out there is that you need to take creatine monohydrate, that there are different forms. They're just expensive and marketing, that creatine monohydrate is the most studied. And this is the, the only one that you should be taking because of that. So let's unpack the different forms and then I want to definitely address that.

Certainly you are right. Creatine monohydrate is the most popular form. It's the form that's been around the longest. In the past, many years ago, the only creatine that was available was what was extracted from meat. And then science learned how to synthesize it, and that was the start of creatine monohydrate. Since then, there have been a number of different forms of creatine that have been synthesized, mostly in attempt, if the researchers are straightforward about it, to improve upon creatine monohydrate.

It is. Why do you need to improve upon creatine monohydrate?

Well, because I think people early on realized that there was a, a non-optimal bioavailability. It was not a great molecule for uptake in the body, for absorption. And so things like creatine citrate, creatine malate, creatine nitrate, creatine ethyl ester, creatine disaccharate and things were all attempts to create better bioavailability. And we got 8 patents because creatine hydrochloride was a conjugation that was discovered and introduced to the market, and it had far superior bioavailability compared to other forms.

Now, why did you start doing that in the first place? Like why didn't you just take the creatine monohydrate?

Well, we listened to the athletes. The athletes that were using the steroids had also used the monohydrate. And they said that the quote, as I said earlier, nothing on the market currently works in the way that we need it to. Well, that included creatine monohydrate. Yes, it helped them some, but it did not help them nearly enough to make up for the strength, endurance, and recovery advantages that the hormonal compounds, the androgens, provided them. So we needed to find something that would catalyze those performance enhancement characteristics without being an illegal endocrine profile manipulator. So the— that's why we got into studying different forms that, that hopefully would provide these athletes the sort of, of non-doping control compounds that they needed to do their jobs.

And to help everybody understand, we all know, like, there's magnesium glycinate, threonate, citrate. So there's different things that magnesium has been combined with to carry it, to make it absorb differently. And creatine monohydrate monohydrate is the carrier. So you start to look at different carriers so that you could get away from some of the issues that you have when you take straight monohydrate, right?

That's correct.

And I'll tell you, the other thing that's out in the zeitgeist is that creatine monohydrate is 100% absorbed. And so I'd love to know why you were looking, what you were looking to overcome. What are the issues with monohydrate? Because I know for some people creatine monohydrate works fine. But when I started pushing out into the world, I was like, all right, as I unpacked the research on creatine, I'm like, every woman 40 plus, this is the single most important supplement I can see that they should be on, like this supplement. And I just pushed it out there. Everyone should be taking it. And I started getting more reports than I've ever gotten on anything in 40 years. I don't like the way I feel. I feel bloated, bug in my gut, like blah, blah, blah. And I'm in and I was like, just, you can get through it, you know? Well, no, no one wants to get through that. So, you know, what were you seeing? What were you trying to accomplish with this? And what do you say about the, you know, what there are some big influencers out there saying that creatine monohydrate is 100% absorbed.

Yeah. The first of all, I'll state that that is not an accurate fact or statement. It is. It's unfortunate that that mindset has been promulgated and it's based on some very early creatine research that was done on what I would call tracer levels of creatine, where tiny little amounts were absorbed and they thought, well, then probably all dosing levels of creatine are similarly absorbed. That's not the case for any compound, really. There are oftentimes with, with substances a diminishing return. It just so happens that the diminishing return for creatine is for creatine monohydrate actually gets— you hit that level pretty quickly. There was a great study done, peer-reviewed, published in the Journal of Pharmaceutics, where this doctoral individual, Dr. Al-Raddadi, showed with radioisotope-tagged monohydrate that on a standard dose, only about 15% is making it into your bloodstream. So when we first were doing our research, the number one objective was to find a compound that provided more strength, endurance, and recovery than creatine monohydrate for the athletes. Secondarily, many of the athletes were wanting to be not just stronger, but faster and quicker. And the monohydrate stories that we got were that it doesn't provide as much strength as we need and want, and it slows us down because of the excess water weight. So first, we were focused on strength. Second, we were focused on trying to avoid the side effects. And so we developed this, this molecule that would deliver more creatine to the cells so that they could have more muscular energy, be able to train harder, longer, build natural muscle strength, and that you could do it on small enough doses that there would be none of the excretion dynamics associated with monohydrate where the body struggles and has what's called extracellular fluid redistribution to try to flush out the amount that the body can't use.

Extracellular fluid redistribution is bloating.

That is exactly right.

Bloating.

That's right.

That was a very scientific term for that. That all the things the women were coming back to me going, I feel puffy, I feel bloated, I'm getting off of it. I'm like, no, just stick with it.

No. There was a study that was completed recently. I don't think it's been published yet, but I saw an early look at some of the data came out of Princeton Clinical in New Jersey. And 76% of the women in the study taking creatine monohydrate experienced and reported mild to severe bloating, puffiness, GI distress, etc. So it's—

it is a 76%.

76%.

I mean, that's significant. Well, and it's completely in alignment with what I saw.

Yeah, it's so the monohydrate its absorption, as I said, on a, on a standard dose is about 15%, not 100%. Now, I think there could be some splitting hairs going on with some of this commentary because of the 15% that gets into your bloodstream, 100% of that is taken up into the muscles. Once creatine gets into your blood compartment, the body is very good at taking what you give it or get into its, its plasma and, and then using the creatine transport system or the creatine receptors, it, it absorbs it into the cells as it's needed. And so 100% that gets into your bloodstream, I would say, is absorbed, but not 100% of creatine is absorbed into the body.

A couple of more things on the monohydrate story. And again, for some people, you know, for that 24% of women, you might be fine. You can just use more creatine monohydrate because you have to use 7 times more for the same effect. But, you know, I've also heard that you should use CreaPure because all creatine comes from China. And so you must use CreaPure from Germany. What about that?

Well, I would say that early on, especially the products coming out of China were suspect in terms of their quality and, and many of them still are. So it's kind of Russian roulette with the, with the Chinese. Some is pretty decent quality. We monitor most of the creatine plants in China. We'll, we'll spot by just to test and to kind of compare and contrast the product out of Germany. The Creapure, the creatine monohydrate that comes out of Germany is much more consistent in terms of its quality. If I was going to take a creatine monohydrate, I would probably choose the, the German monohydrate. But monohydrate, creatine monohydrate is creatine monohydrate. The molecule itself, no matter how the synthesis happens, no matter, you know, what the— where the source is. If you have pure creatine monohydrate that is of good quality, it's going to have the same biochemistry characters characterization as, as any of it from around the world. So CreaPure is a, is a good product, but it's still similarly has only about 15% uptake when you, when you look at its, its absorption.

And to be fair, if you bought a creatine monohydrate from China, if you're buying it from a reputable company who's doing their testing, which we're going to talk about in a moment, it's going to be the same.

Yeah, there's, there are some plants over in China that have done a good job improving their quality and their attention to scientific detail, and they're churning out some, some pretty good product. It's a, a Chinese product that's 99.5% pure is as good as a German product that's 99.5% pure. So you never get 100% purity of any compound. So it's those, those character characteristics, if done under proper quality conditions, are similar.

So beyond that, there's also micronized, anhydrous, krealkalin. So what about these things?

Sure. Micronized is simply just different, different mesh size. They've just, you know, the creatine, the creatine monohydrate, just like creatine hydrochloride, is a crystal. And you can either based on how long you react it or what sort of processing you do, you can change the particle size. You can have a larger salt-like particle or you can have a smaller powdered sugar-like particle. It just depends on how, in effect, it's, it's ground up or ground down. Micronized is a, is a smaller particle size. It doesn't change the biochemical dynamics in the body. And, and so micronized is mesh form. When you look at anhydrous, anhydrous just means without water. You've stripped out water molecules, but it again doesn't change the dynamics of just a creatine monohydrate or a creatine like that. Creatine Cre-Alkaline is actually just creatine monohydrate that has been buffered with some magnesium phosphate or something. And, and once you introduce it into the gut, the gastric juices of the stomach, the acidic gastric juices immediately neutralize or, you know, take care of that buffering. And, and you're just left with creatine monohydrate in the gut, just as if you had ingested that. So Cre-Alkaline was all the rage for a little while in an attempt to have it not cyclize into creatinine when it's in an aqueous beverage powder form, but you certainly don't want to try to buffer the gut. It's meant to be acidic. And, and beyond keeping it stable in the glass, it's, it's just monohydrate blended. It's not reacted. It's not bounded or there's no bonding going on by the buffering.

That one's a lot more expensive too. Yeah. Yeah, so there's that. So, well, let's talk GI since you mentioned it, and that is one of those big complaints about creatine monohydrate is what happens in the gut. And I did notice that because I decided to do the old-fashioned, you know, loading dose of creatine monohydrate when I started it, which, um, we should also talk about whether loading is really necessary or not. So I definitely noticed some GI issues when you hit yourself with 20 grams of creatine monohydrate. What about the HCL version?

Yeah, because it's so efficient in its uptake and its dosing format, you don't have to load, you don't have to cycle. And because you're not overloading your system with a bolus of something, there is no GI distress. So the, the, the body is very naturally reacting to a large dose of monohydrate and looking at it going, We can't use all this. We got to get rid of it. And then it struggles to get rid of it. And that's where, as it tries to wash it out, oftentimes people experience, you know, the polite term is GI distress. Otherwise you'd say it was diarrhea as the body is really working to get rid of it. But with the small doses, you know, milligram level of dosing versus gram level of dosing, you just have none of that experience with, with the hydrochloride conjugation.

And no need to do this loading, which I had always heard. And correct me on this if I'm wrong, because what I heard was that women have less tissue stores of creatine than men, which makes sense because we have less muscle mass and most of it's in our muscle, a little bit in our brain, but that You initially, you either use it for a month as if this is a miraculous time period, or you load for 5 days to get your tissue stores up and then you're maintaining it. Is this—

Yeah, it's the loading legend or what? Well, it's the idea. There's, there's two schools of thought about how creatine dosing came about. I'll give you the Jim Bro version first is they were so used to steroids and they would cycle them because they couldn't stay on them for too long or else they would have negative hormonal effects starting to take place. Gynecomastia and gonadal atrophy and all sorts of things. And so they would, they would cycle them. And so to make creatine appear more like a muscle building steroid, they talked about cycling it because then the mindset was, oh, it's like steroids, you know, that, that. But So that there was that kind of urban gym legendary approach to, to creatine monohydrate initially. Really what it was is that there was such poor uptake, you did have to flood your system in order to get your muscles as saturated as possible with it. But people couldn't stand taking that much for that an extended period of time. So then they would cycle down or off of it to give the body a rest and to let the normal healthy hydration levels of the body kind of restabilize. And, and it's one of the reasons why early on, as people were doing that loading, you would see athletes that were having cramping and muscle tears and things that, that was— would happen at various times in competition that weren't normal. Usually a muscle tear happens when it's early on in competition and you're cold. And at the end of an athletic activity or engagement or game or something, your muscles would be warm and there was less likelihood of tearing. A lot of early creatine users had muscle tears and bad cramping that caused tears and things later in competition because their muscles had effectively become so dehydrated. And so there's creatine normally pulls water into the cells, but when your body is trying to flush unused creatine, then you get, you can get muscular dehydration or at least have your hydration levels out of balance. But that loading was all initially a part of, yes, trying to saturate the muscles. Yes, if you take lower doses over an extended period of time, you can build that up. But again, if you're taking 5 grams a day, the research shows that only about 700 or so milligrams of that are actually getting into the bloodstream. So it does take a while to saturate as opposed to, you know, a smaller dose of a more efficient creatine that can feed those muscles the creatine that they need for more rapid effects and without the side effects. People oftentimes ask me, how quickly will you tell a difference? And many people with creatine monohydrate will say, well, you know, within a couple of weeks or so you can tell your muscles are, you know, getting more full and they're saturated with creatine and you're lifting more or something. I tell people, take a dose of creatine hydrochloride about an hour before you work out and then do a workout that you know will make you hurt and see how you feel the next day or two. You either won't hurt or you'll hurt a whole lot less because your muscles right off the bat with that efficient dose have been fed and fueled with what they need in order to function optimally and then to recover and repair themselves efficiently and quickly.

So let's talk dosing, because when I was first looking at all of this and looking at monohydrate, I thought, well, once you have your tissue levels up, what difference would it make as to when you took it? Because you've got your tissue stores up. And, you know, then I started to really look at, well, wouldn't you want to just take it right before you went and worked out? So what— where— and again, now I've switched over in the past year, and I played around. So I'm a good test bunny over here because I did the creatine monohydrate. I've done the creatine HCL. I won't go back to the creatine monohydrate. Like, don't— I don't have to. Um, but what would you say for dosing? And now we're going to talk dosing of HCL. Realize that it is a 7th. It's much smaller dosing than you're going to need for monohydrate. So give us the example of dosing, and I'd really like to unpack dosing. And we're talking about women. Here, you know, just kind of standard dosing and in what situations where you would you want to have higher doses?

Yeah, I typically talk about dosing in kind of 3 different categories or 3 different buckets of use. One is if you're just taking creatine for optimal health, and that is something where about 750 milligrams of creatine hydrochloride a day is going to provide, in addition to some level of creatine that I expect people get from some of their diet, it's going to provide your body with the, the creatine necessary for your body to keep itself functioning well and to keep yourself healthy. So number one, just optimal health, 750 milligrams a day. And I don't even think it's a big deal whether you take it in the morning or the evening. If you take it in the morning, it's going to help fuel you during the day and still then provide recovery at night. If you take it at night, your body's— when it's very busy repairing and recovering itself, it's going to have the fuel necessary to do that. But, and it doesn't matter what you weigh, it's like for, for optimal health, just that, that general— most people need about, or they, their bodies use about 2 grams of creatine a day. About a gram is generated from your, your your own system, your, your liver and, and your own bodily functions. So supplementation needs to be about a gram from diet or supplementation. And so, you know, the 750 milligrams plus any that comes along in your diet, that's going to keep most people pretty healthy. For people who are engaged in strenuous exercise, then I recommend 750 milligrams per 100 pounds of body weight 30 to 60 minutes before you work out. In addition, in addition, yeah, because then you're going to be expending more energy. You're— you have got what, regardless of whether it's aerobic or anaerobic activity, you're going to— your cells are going to be burning more creatine and are using more creatine to burn more fuel in the body. And you set up a situation, if it is strenuous exercise, to have to have more creatine to help recover. And so that, that dose beforehand fuels your workout, creates the strength and endurance during that period of time, but then it sets you up for good recovery afterwards. So Everyday Health, 750. Strenuous exercise, 750 per 100 pounds of body weight.

Everyone listening is doing strenuous exercise.

There you go. Yes. So, so that will be the second bucket. And then the third is, is when somebody is under what I would consider medical duress or some disease state or a medical indication that's causing their body to have to work hard to be more resilient against some sort of chemical or physical insult. And it could be a physical insult would be like a concussion. A chemical insult would be like you've got a virus or bacteria that's attacking your body or you've got neurodegeneration going on because of some disease. And those levels of creatine dosing are more of creatine hydrochloride dosing or more in the 4 to 6 grams a day because your body is, is needing more cellular energy to fight off whatever or to repair from whatever condition it's, it's being subjected to. And for comparison, 4 to 6 gram dose of creatine hydrochloride would be like taking a 30 to 40 gram dose of creatine monohydrate in terms of the amount of creatine being delivered to the cells. But we have— we can talk more about it whenever you're ready to. But in those— in that third bucket, that third category, we have doctors who are using creatine hydrochloride in cases of dreaded neurodegenerative diseases and finding that it's helping keep the neurons resilient and fighting against the disease and having virtually no disease symptomology progression with that dosing in a, in a circumstance where normally they would see marked cognitive decline. So it's Those, those are my three dosing rules.

We're going to talk some studies because there's some exciting stuff happening. How would someone know? Because I would sense that most people walking around do not have enough creatine. What are the risks of getting too much? How would you know if you are where you need to be or if you've gone overboard?

Yeah. Most of the creatine conjugations that are out on the market are creatine salts. They're salts of creatine. There are some ester forms and things. But typically you pay attention to your body. Your body, as you said, when you started taking creatine and you loaded with 20 grams of creatine monohydrate, your body told you, nope, we don't like this. Well, the body with a creatine salt will generally let you know when you've had too much or you're— it's not liking what you're taking or the dosing by responding in that same way with bloat, with GI distress, et cetera. Really any creatine conjugation can generate those kind of symptoms if too much of it is taken. But that's one of the beauties.

Is that too much taken at one time or?

Or over time.

Building up. Okay. Yeah.

So both. Either way. Yep, exactly. But again, if somebody like, I've had powerlifters who take exorbitant amounts of creatine hydrochloride to the level that I think ought to cause side effects akin to creatine monohydrate, and they have none of it. They build strength, they cut weight, and it's because their workout regimens are so strenuous and so taxing that their bodies are, are effectively consuming, needing, wanting that much creatine. And in those doses, in those circumstance, are creating pretty remarkable performance enhancement. In fact, there have been several world record holders in powerlifting that the federations were sure that they were on steroids because they're like, there's nobody in that weight class that can lift that much weight. And yet these people were clean as a whistle. They just took significant amounts of creatine HCL and had really efficient, effective workouts that, that built their strength naturally.

Yeah. So the cool thing with creatine, you're not going to take creatine, sit on the couch and build muscle, right? It helps you work out harder and recover better. You just mentioned something that, that brings up an important topic here, and this is around testing. And I was not aware of this till I came to the plant. Because you just talked about using it in sport. And in sports, you have to be so careful as an athlete as to what you take, because if you take something that has got an illegal, a banned substance in sport, you're out. And so I didn't realize when I came in here, I, I, I knew you were GMP, good manufacturing practices, because everybody, you know, everybody is. I didn't know about any of the other testing and especially the NSF testing. So I'd love you just to talk about that piece of it because that is major. And of course, the fact that we're sitting here in the United States in a manufacturing plant.

Yeah, it, it's true that being in the United States is going to subject us to more scrutiny. The, the plants— I can't speak for Germany. I'm sure they do a good job with QA and QC, but the plants over in China certainly are not subjected to the same sort of scientific and accreditation or regulatory body scrutiny as, as we are. And you're right that GMP, good manufacturing practices, is what's kind of the minimum that's expected for good supplement manufacturing or good supplement co-packing and things by the FDA in the United States. But that's really kind of the base level and nothing that we do— we're not content with being at the base level of anything. So One of the things that, that we did after proving that we could do good GMP processing was to achieve what's called HACCP. And then we went further. If GMP is like getting your bachelor's degree, HACCP is like getting your master's in terms of quality control, quality assurance. And then the next level up is SQF, Safe Quality Foods.. And that is like getting your doctorate. It is the pinnacle of, of a facility like this in terms of scrutiny, regulatory oversight, quality testing, documentation, inspection and auditing.

And I wasn't even aware. So I had been in this industry for decades, over 3 decades. I'd never heard of this. I've never seen it.

Yeah. SQF is not common. We had, we had a major retailer whose name you would recognize say that they wanted to come inspect our plant. And, and I said, that's fine. And they said, you know, we've got to check all the GMP processes. And I said, yep, and you'll get to see HACCP and SQF as well. And they, they stopped and they looked at me and said, wait, you're SQF? And I said, yeah. And they're like, oh, well, then we don't need to come audit. You're, you're beyond, you know, what, what we would expect and, and stuff. So it was that was a nice tip of the hat and very flattering. We put in a lot of effort to achieve that degree of, of affirmation that our processes are all above board, that the consumers who take products that come out of this plant or any of our facilities can trust that there, there is nothing but quality. There's— it's above reproach. It can be trusted. And on top of SQF, we went a little further, especially with creatine, because of the sports, as you talked about, and concerns about doping control and, and the, the PED testing that goes on out there. And there's— over the last year or two, there's been a slew of athletes that have been sanctioned or suspended because of supplements that were contaminated. And, and so that's where these elite athletes that have got millions of dollars of sponsorships and contracts and things that are on the line, they don't want to risk that and they know they're going to be tested. And so now they look for NSF certification, which is Certified for Sport. Major League Baseball, you know, the NHL, all the major athletic organizations now recognize Certified for Sport. As what they want their athletes to be using so that they don't risk their careers. And so on top of the GMP, the HACCP, the SQF, we also recently achieved NSF Certified for Sport status. And we're the only creatine hydrochloride that is certified for sport. There is one other creatine, a creatine monohydrate that certified, but we're very proud of all of those accreditations and certifications. And we're prepared on any given day for any of these governing bodies to come in and inspect us because many of them or most of them come in unannounced. And so every day we have to be operating as if the FDA is going to be knocking on our door or the EPA or OSHA or USDA or SQF or NSF or any of those. So We, we're very proud of the, of the quality processes that we have here and that level of testing, both in all levels, the raw materials, the process as it's a synthesis or as a batch is being done, and then the finished goods all support and are focused on being able to see that the consumer can trust anything that's got our label on it or one of our licensees' labels or that's coming out of our facilities.

So beyond that, which is expensive, um, and you went, you went far beyond the extra mile, you've also been investing in research, which is— and it's something I'm really excited about— is I want to unpack the research that you've been doing. Um, but I also just have to give you a shout out about the fact that you're doing research on menopause.

We are. Yay.

Yeah. So tell us about some of the research you've got going on.

Research. Having a science background, the research is the stuff that excites me the most. I mean, I love our facility. I love the engineering that has gone on, the millions of dollars that it took to effectuate and bring this plant to life. But it's really the research that helps to demonstrate to people the the value of this, which we're making, the value of this molecule, and why you and I both believe that it's the most important supplement that people can take and why creatine hydrochloride is simply a better creatine. And let me start with the idea that many medical researchers have known that creatine should help in a variety of different conditions. What they've not been able to do is achieve those therapeutic results with the older creatines on the market because they can't get the dosing efficiency or the dosing regimen to be sustainable and to deliver enough creatine to, to effectuate or to have those, those therapeutic results come about, the positive clinical outcomes. With the efficiency of creatine hydrochloride, it has allowed us to reopen a number of research circumstances that previously had failed research projects that had failed with creatine monohydrate or other forms and, and really be able to see clinical outcomes that are very encouraging. You mentioned menopause. We had seen leading indicators of, of results that demonstrate creatine in menopausal and perimenopausal women would provide benefits like a lessening of brain fog, a lessening of fatigue, a better ability to modulate weight. There are some signs, and I'm not going to divulge too much because we've got this study that's going on right now that the results will be published in the not too distant future. But it appears that creatine helps with some of the balancing and the modulation of the endocrine profile, the hormone profile. So we— the research that's going on right now with menopause is looking at brain scans of women before, during, and after taking creatine in those life stages of menopause and perimenopause, looking at endocrine profile tracking and the impacts of creatine on the hormonal profile, looking at brain biomarkers. It's some, it's some terrific research, and I think it'll benefit that that category of women or those categories of women that frankly have not had enough attention paid to them over the years.

No, we got given Prozac and a birth control pill.

Oh yeah, exactly.

Well, and when you look at perimenopause and menopause, you get brain fog, fatigue, you're losing muscle, you're becoming more insulin resistant because you're losing the muscle because your estrogens are like all the things you're getting more inflamed. And then you, you're starting to lose bone, your skin's wrinkling. I just went through it and I went, creatine, creatine, creatine. Creatine can help in all of these situations. Then I was reading a study they'd done with monohydrate where they gave postmenopausal women 20 grams of creatine. I guess they just kind of suffered through that, but it helped their depression. Yeah.

So yeah, there are some, uh, really neat studies going on. These are not studies we're doing right now, but we've been watching them closely and reporting them, and that is on the, the addition of creatine for MAT, medical-assisted treatment of depression, bipolar, etc. And, and they find, uh, significantly better outcomes in the populations that are being treated but also having creatine added to that regimen. So that's exciting. We've, we've got research going on right now on neurodegeneration. We have a doctor that is using creatine in his Huntington's patients. Huntington's is like Alzheimer's on steroids. It kills younger and faster, and it's a dreaded disease. And they're seeing very therapeutic results in terms of no disease progression, no symptomology advancement in these patients, these Huntington's patients that are taking substantial doses of the creatine hydrochloride. And it's delivering more creatine to the neurons, making them more resilient. Under the ravages of that disease. We see research— I mentioned, I think, previously Dr. Lily Yang and her T-cell research. Creatine is being demonstrated to be very important in cancer to help keep the body resilient, to fight off chemo brain fog, chemo fatigue, and to help support the T-cells in our own body's natural fight and, you know, survival against, against cancer. We've got a study going on right now kind of along the lines of neuron resilience with TBI and concussion, where we are investigating whether or not creatine dosing can, can either prevent or lessen concussions or can help accelerate recovery and help the brain recover better. There's been research done that there was one study, it's an older study, but it, it showed that there were no changes in creatine levels in the brain in the wake of oral administration or oral consumption of creatine monohydrate. So they were thinking, oh, well, creatine doesn't get to the brain. Well, no, creatine monohydrate doesn't get to the brain because it's not efficient enough. You don't have enough absorption. But we have demonstrated that creatine hydrochloride very effectively gets to the brain and helps with, with neuron energy and the cellular energetics of, of the brain. So those are neat studies. We finished up a study on creatine and coronavirus and demonstrated how the T cells have more energy to fight off, you know, COVID-19 or SARS or MERS and those sorts of things. So yeah, there's, there is a considerable, there's a considerable body of research with creatine. There's a considerable additional body of research that's coming on more of the, the creatine efficacy when the doses are able to be sustained in patients. They're at a level that creates a positive clinical outcome. And I think it's where we're entering over the next 2 or 3 years, a very exciting time to, to see some of that research demonstrate that creatine will become an important part of many therapeutic regimens.

You're being like that old radio host who kept thumping on the table and I'm waiting to wrestle your papers. I'm like, he's thumping over there.

That's how excited I get about the research.

He wants to talk with his hands so much. I'm like, thump, thump, thump. So I just have to share a little anecdotal story I was telling you about. Before we sat down that I'd read the research about creatine helping with sleep and, and, or creatine helping when you're sleep deprived. And I try, I try my hardest never to be sleep deprived. Like sleep's my big thing. However, you know, when you're traveling country to country, sometimes your sleep can get really wonky. And so I thought, well, if it works for sleep deprivation, what will it do for jet lag? And I literally had the craziest summer where I was flipping time zones. I was, went from Florida to London to Boston to Spain to Portugal to back to Florida, over to British Columbia, back to, and I was like, okay, this is just silly. I just used creatine the whole way through and had no issues whatsoever. Like no jet lag, no jet lag whatsoever.

That's amazing.

I'm like, do you know what a game changer that is in life? Because this used to be the thing holding me back. I was living between California and Florida and struggling just doing that. Now I can go over to Europe with no problems.

Yeah, yeah. It, it's amazing how when you give the body the nutritional, energetic compounds and substances that it needs, it performs really well. We're pretty amazing that way. But a lot of people suffer because they don't have the right nutritional or supplementary regimen in their lives.

So I'm not surprised to hear that. Yeah, this is the ultimate travel hack. It's fantastic. Well, let's talk about some of the side effects, real or perceived, you know, because there's, there's so much out there that I think I don't know. I think it was maybe one study way back when that was mis— misinterpreted about hair loss or something. So hair loss is definitely one that I get asked about all the time.

Yeah. Yeah. That was a study back in 2009 and it was a bunch of rugby players. And I'm— first of all, I'm not really sure about the, the legitimacy of some of the testing and some of the data interpretation. But what it showed was that these guys had an elevated level of DHT. And DHT is dihydrotestosterone, is associated with hair loss. And, and they thought that, oh, this must be from the creatine use.

And they were taking testosterone.

Well, it could have been all sorts of things. And but there certainly were a number of other variables in the study that they didn't monitor in, in order to try to create some veracity to, to those claims or concerns. What's happened since then, there's been at least a dozen studies that have looked at creatine and DHT and hair loss, and, um, what those studies have shown is that that's an unfounded concern. Creatine is not associated with hair loss, and in fact, just like it helps any cell function optimally, it makes dermal and hair cells function optimally. So that's not a side effect of creatine. Uh, conversely, you know, obviously men, uh, would be concerned about that.

Um, women would be concerned about—

yeah, women certainly.

Everyone's concerned about—

yeah, that's true. It's, uh, DHT is a little more prevalent in men, but it certainly would affect anybody. I'll say on the positive side for men, um, one side effect that has been demonstrated in at least one study is that creatine can help, uh, with— I'll just simply describe it as male vitality. So I won't, I won't belabor that much, but just simply that, that there is improved male vitality associated with creatine use.

So, so, gals, you can take the chiatine and just cover the S with your finger and let your guys have the heat.

Heat. There you go.

Or tell them that it's only for women so that they can't take your stash. That's right. Either way you want to play it, I won't tell.

Yeah.

So what about kidneys and creatinine?

Yeah. So creatinine is, is a marker that is oftentimes used for assessing kidney functions. And creatinine is the metabolite of creatine when the body has used it. And if you are a creatine user, a creatine supplementer, or taking a lot of it and your body is, is involved in strenuous activity, so it's using more creatine, you're going to have elevated creatinine levels. It doesn't mean that your kidneys aren't working, and your kidneys are made to filter out creatinine. So it's not as if it's some— something that's toxic that's negatively affecting.

Wouldn't it show that your kidneys are working?

Yeah, actually.

What am I missing?

So it's— so being a natural metabolite, it needs to not be the only marker that a physician or a nurse practitioner or somebody is monitoring to assess, um, kidney health or renal health. Um, better when— if, if you see an elevated creatinine, especially in a creatine user, um, the attending healthcare professional should be looking at, uh, albumin, uh, or BUN, blood urea nitrogen, or, uh, a marker called GFR, glomerular filtration rate. And those will typically, in a healthy properly renal functioning individual who's taking creatine, they will be at normal levels. And even when the creatinine is elevated. But, but creatinine by itself is not a health concern. It's, it's been seen as a, an inactive, you know, just excretion product from, from creatinine, creatinine usage. But there's actually going to There'll be more research coming out about creatinine and some of its unique properties as well, but that'll be for a different podcast.

Interesting. What a tease. Well, I also think that just shouts out to you don't look at your labs and pull one marker out in isolation and make a, you know, a game call on it. Right, right. You have to look at these things in combination. Shout out to Function Health on that one because that's what they do. All right. So We've talked about this, but I'd like to just take it home because it just comes up again and again and again. The fluid retention, because I would like you to address what is happening intracellularly in the muscle versus bloating or overall retention.

Yeah, the puffiness, the water retention, the bloating is all a result of the body struggling to get rid of excessive creatine, typically creatine monohydrate that it, that it can't absorb or it can't use. And creatine, when it's properly dosed, will draw water into the muscle cells, which is a good thing. It increases muscle cell size, it increases muscle hydration. That is all good.

You get that, you are so fortunate.

Yes.

Right. That's what you want. This is one of the— this is like the side benefit we're all looking for.

Yep. But when your body sees too much of something that it doesn't want or can't use, then it stops, you know, having things operate the way that you would consider is optimal. And it's like it just simply wants to get rid of it. And so that's where if it needs fluid to flush it and to get rid of it, well, then it's going to pull fluid from anywhere it can get it. Mussels are one of the most optimal or most opportune places for it to pull fluid. And so that's where you get water that is outside of the cells, that's under the skin, that is, that is creating that puffiness. It frankly ruins definition, you know, muscle definition for, for people that are working out and like to see some, some good muscular definition and muscular curves.

Every woman working out wants to see good muscles.

Yeah, that's right. So it's— those things happen. The good news is, is you can get the benefits of creatine without that happening if you, if you dose properly and choose your supplement carefully.

And you'd said creatine monohydrate— remind me again, it was 76% of women. Tell me about that.

Was it— it was a study where a group of individuals took— it was a large, statistically significant group of individuals took creatine for a month, 28 days, whatever. And, and during that time, they had all sorts of physiological and blood chemistry assessments being taken. And then there was an element of self-reporting. And, and during that period of time, The women that were involved in the study, 76% of them reported that they were having or experiencing those creatine monohydrate side effects of the Puffin.

That's in 76%.

Yeah. So yeah, that'll be published. And that's one of the things people have always called those side effect reports anecdotal, that there was nothing. So this, this study, it'll be peer reviewed, it'll be published, and it will help to demonstrate that the experiences that people were having were not just, uh, something they were imagining, that they, they are, you know, actual clinical outcomes of having that high of a dose and the body struggling to get rid of it.

Wow. Well, let's walk through, uh, like a hypothetical case study. So someone listening to this podcast is working out regularly already. They're doing some of their resistance training. They're lifting heavy things. They're eating protein first, doing a little high-intensity interval training, and now they're going to add in chiotine. They're going to add in their creatine HCL, so they'll take 3 capsules as their foundational— we'll talk, we're going to talk the formula in a moment— but then they're going to take the extra that you talked about because they're going to go hit it. What could they expect to see shifting and what amount of time?

Certainly, um, I mentioned earlier that I oftentimes suggest to people to take a strenuous exercise dose of creatine 30 to 60 minutes before they work out, kick their tail on a good hard workout and see how they feel afterwards. And so the first thing is usually with that very first bout of tough exercise, they will experience little to no DOMS, delayed onset muscle soreness. Which, you know, you sometimes after a leg day or something, you're, you're, you know, you're just creaky and hurting and, you know, a day or two later. So that's number one. That's the first thing that they can see is a lessening of those, what you might call negative side effects of strenuous workout. And it's not that your, your muscles aren't affected and strengthening and growing. It's just that they're recovering that much faster. Which means you can get back into the gym sooner and train harder. The next thing that I would say is that usually within that kind of regimen, 750 milligrams per 100 pounds of body weight before you work out, within 2 or 3 weeks, besides not suffering as much soreness, most people see significant improvements in either the amount of weight that they can push, that they can lift, or the reps that they can do. And that's the muscle naturally getting stronger because of the good, healthy, strenuous work that you're doing. And that is real verifiable strength gain and improvement. So the immediate outcome of a dose the 2 to 3 week noticeable increase in strength. And then I would say throughout it, the endurance level, the being able to between sets to recover more quickly during a set, to be able to extend it a little longer and get some more reps. I, I haven't been to a gym in decades. I play ice hockey, and the thing that I noticed about the creatine use was that when I would normally be very fatigued in the third period skating against guys half my age, I would have as much endurance during a shift and as quick a recovery between shifts as I did in the first period. And, and so Uh, it's a reason why not just gym goers and weightlifters and people, um, uh, want to take creatine, but endurance athletes, cyclists, runners, et cetera. They're finding out that creatine is very important for them to have. They may be less focused on strength, but they're very much focused on endurance and recovery, and creatine provides that to those, uh, athletes as well. So, um, those are some of the things people can expect from taking a dose of, uh, chiotine, a dose of, of good creatine, uh, when they're, when they're challenging their bodies?

I'll tell you what, very few supplements out there— like, you take, uh, you take some vitamin D, you don't go, wow, feeling great, you know. Hit a little vitamin C, my immune system, amazing. Yeah, like, you just, you just don't really feel it. Um, this one You take it, you go to the gym, you're like, yep. Or you're out traveling. You've— this is, this is a one that you can use. And I am a big fan of Dr. Peter Attia and his idea of the centenarian decathlon. But, you know, he talks about how he realizes he'll never be as strong as he was in his 20s. He'll never be able to do those things again. And I realized I was listening to him talk about this this morning, as a matter of fact, and I thought, you know what? I feel stronger, and I've worked out since forever, like little kid, like started, started in dance class at 3 and started in the gym with the football team at 16. And so I've always worked out, and I literally feel as strong, if not stronger, now. But I think it's because I was a late bloomer in the creatine world. So maybe that is the side benefit, is that You know, it's fun to have this little, you know, magic pill that I can take now that makes the difference. Who can't take it? Are there some poor folks out there? I would imagine there might be that this would be contraindicated for.

Because creatine is a natural molecule in the body, there's virtually no one for which there's any sort of interactions or contraindications or things. Everybody needs creatine. Your body just simply won't function as well. If you're not taking creatine, it doesn't mean things don't function. Everything just functions a little slower. Yeah, suboptimally. And, and so, you know, you made the comment earlier about, you know, you can't take creatine, sit on the couch and build muscle. That's absolutely true. But you can take creatine, sit on the couch and have a stronger immune system. Have healthier neurons, have better mood, better mood, better cardiovascular health, and things start unwrinkling. Yeah, that's right.

Exactly.

Wrinkle. Yeah. But in terms of, you know, any bottle of creatine that comes out of this plant, you'll see on the label, not intended for use by people under 18 or pregnant or nursing women or such things.

Let me to say legally have to say that legally have to say that.

That's exactly right. But really everyone 18 or below, 18 and up, pregnant women, whatever the case is, everybody has to have creatine in order to have optimal health.

So even with impaired kidney function, would that be a contraindication or no?

Well, I mean, your kidneys need creatine to function properly.

And I was thinking about that because I actually have two friends, one who only has one kidney and one who has some impaired kidney function, and both of them, you know, have had doctors tell them not to take creatine. I'm thinking, well, then should they tell them not to eat carpaccio or sashimi?

Yeah, right. Exactly. It's— I think that is a, a poor level of medical advice. So it's a case where we have people who have gone to 4 years of medical school and got to respect them for that. But they've probably in 4 years of medical school only had 4 hours of nutrition. And, and so there's, there's a lot, I think, for the medical community to learn about creatine in that and just healthy nutrition in general. And so I, I I, yeah, we, we have to say not for use under 18.

Look at this. Yeah, I, I look at, well, and I know there's some really great research coming out with pregnancy and fertility and all of that too. So, and, and you look at these things and go, so many of these things that, that we think of as supplements actually are just, we're repleting things that we used to have more of in our diet and we don't anymore, like magnesium or omega-3s, creatine. Vitamin D and K, you know, these things we're trying to get ourselves back to where we should be. They're not, it's not like we are supplementing with something that's not orthomolecular that we're not used to. This is bringing us back to homeostasis. So someone starts taking it, they feel fabulous. They cannot believe how much stronger they are. They're starting to notice a shift in their body composition. They're happy, their mood's better, they don't walk into the bedroom or the bathroom and wonder why they went there and what are they supposed to do there, you know, which happens. Um, and then they decide to stop taking it. What would happen?

Kind of as I inferred earlier, um, nothing other than slowing down. Um, everything would, would slow down or not function quite as optimally. Um, but, um, uh, your body would, uh, uh, would be sad. Some of the cells who were used to, you know, functioning at a higher rate of efficiency would, would not be able to do so.

Now, I will just tell you, I haven't had anyone come up to me and go, you know what, I was feeling amazing, so I'm going to quit this. You know, it's just not— has not happened. Yeah. So I sincerely doubt it's going to happen, especially with the formula that I created with you, which I'm super excited about because when I started to— you, you found me speaking about creatine at a conference, turned me on to HCL. I was ridiculously skeptical because I was parroting what I was hearing and I'm kind of embarrassed to admit it, you know. But when you look and go, just because we've always done something doesn't mean we should always keep doing the thing. If that was the case, I'd be wearing leg warmers.

And calling on a rotary phone.

Yeah, I'd still be teaching aerobics and, and doing all that. So, you know, we progress. And so I was very excited when I started to play around with this, especially as I was hearing all these things from the community. The 76% of women— I think maybe 80% in my community— there are definitely people complaining about bloating, puffiness, and they weren't going to use it. And I, I am convinced that this is something everyone needs to be on. Everyone needs to be on this. But then I looked at what, what could you do to make it even better? And when you think about this, to me, this is the ultimate cellular energy product, and it is helping you create your body's cellular energy currency, ATP. And I thought, what else could I do to just make it like an ATP rocket booster. And so I thought, one, magnesium. First of all, I have people take magnesium, you know, before they go to bed at night. I think it's super important.

Outstanding.

Yeah, right. I mean, you know, when you look at like, if you do RBC, red blood cell magnesium on people, everyone's deficient in magnesium. We're not getting what we need from the soil. And so then, you know, we're not going to be able to recover well from workout. I mean, 300 different things that magnesium does, but I think of it just for rest, recovery, restore. Bone health, we always think calcium. So magnesium was to me an obvious one, 'cause I'm always trying to get more magnesium in. But the other one that I've been really excited about, and I think when you think of this, you think of Red Bull, but, you know, taurine, there's, granted, it's not in human studies yet, but I think hopefully it will be soon, you know, that it being good for longevity, but it's also great for ATP production. And it's another one that we're not getting enough of. We're not getting it in our diet. You know, I'm not sitting down and eating a lot of the— sadly, I wish I loved things like oysters. I don't. Um, so I put together chiotine with, of course, creatine HCL and then magnesium glycinate, which I love that form of magnesium, easy to absorb, very calming. And then touring, and you helped me do this. I'm so excited about this.

I am too. I think it's, as you've indicated, it's a, it's a great formula really for anybody, but particularly for women. And I know you focus a lot on the need states of menopausal and perimenopausal women, and that is a stage of life for women where those nutrients are going to make a big difference. One of the things that people talk about, or I hear women talk about, is, yeah, they, they have trouble sleeping during menopause. And I have to echo Magnesium glycinate is fantastic. I got to where I wasn't sleeping that well. I've introduced magnesium glycinate into my regimen at night and I sleep better. And, and the taurine, as you say, there will be more and more studies that demonstrate its efficacy and its, and its help. But when you look at cellular energy and the need for it for menopausal and perimenopausal women, they will have very short-term benefits that they will feel from that formula that you came up with.

Yes. So you'll feel it, you'll feel it immediately. And then you will also notice, just like Mark was talking about, you'll feel it long-term as you start to notice your strength increase. You know, you won't notice your bone density, but know that that's getting worked on too, because if you're getting stronger, you're also impacting your bones. Yeah. So all of these things that are so important for us— mood and focus and skin— we didn't even really talk much about skin and inflammation.

You know, that's one of the things that as we age, inflammation becomes more a part of our life. And creatine is being shown to have positive impacts on, on inflammation. And it's something that, that I think—

sorry, your wife's calling and she wants you to bring home some shiitake.

And I will do so for her. Yeah, she, she struggled through a lot of the symptoms that you spoke about today. She would have benefited from it if you came out with it a few years ago.

But, but yeah, whenever the male researchers are like, yeah, you don't gain weight during menopause, nothing really happens, I go, Has your wife gone through menopause yet? Yeah. Because you just wait. Yeah. Big guy.

Yeah. Yeah. Your eyes will be open. Yep. It's, that's why I'm, as I said before, I'm very excited about this study that's gonna be finished soon about menopause, cuz it's gonna, I think, validate a lot of the things from a biochemistry standpoint that women have been experiencing, that they've been talking about, and hopefully we'll be showing some very therapeutic effects on it. But it's, As you said, we hadn't talked about skin. We hadn't had a chance maybe in a different podcast to talk about elderly beyond menopause for men and women in maintaining muscle mass and not being an increased fall risk and having a quality of life that endures. I mean, you talk about powerful aging. Literally, creatine is at the heart of making sure that you age powerfully.

There's the soundbite. Thank you so much for that. Well, Mark Faulkner, it's been amazing. I am just so grateful that you found me after my talk at Integrative Healthcare Symposium.

I'm grateful that you came to Nebraska to, to see this facility that is the only one in, in this hemisphere that makes creatine. And we're proud of it.

Huge thing. American made. I can say my creatine is American made.

Yep, absolutely can.

Yep. Thank you. And tested on 4 different ways. So I mean, this is, this is pretty amazing. 4 different ways to test that creatine HCL. Like, that's fantastic. So for everybody listening who is now dying to get their hands on their bottle of chiatine, check the show notes. We will make sure that you are taken care of. We have a special code we will be honoring, um, JJ10. That will get you 10% off your first order. So be sure to check that out and, uh, share this episode with everyone that you want to have fun with you so they have more energy too, and you can all hang out.

Thanks very much for having me.

Thank you.