Alright, after 10 years of lifting and trying all sorts of things pre-workout, logging my lifts, noticing energy level patterns, and forming a damn good predictive model of how my body works... holy crap this experience was amazing.
Some quick background: late 20s male, been lifting weights / working out in gym for over 10 years, and while beginner gains have long since left, I can expect a few percentage point increase in volume (either strength via weight, reps, endurance, etc) per week or month. I pay attention to everything I ingest and track what I do pretty meticulously. And what just happened today is unprecedented in my experience.
-- The Story ---
To start, today started bad. I woke up late, feeling tired and groggy, didn't eat enough the day before (I weigh myself morning and night, lost a kilo), and felt so bad after eating a fast food lunch (work deadlines....) that I couldn't focus for a big part of the day. Yeah not a great start. On an average day like this, knowing my body, I'd usually opt to skip my planned workout entirely, because it's on days like these that I'm most likely to get injured.
But something compelled me to at least try a bit of cardio, maybe I ate something bad and can sweat it out... Reflecting a bit on why I felt so bad and analyzing my food/supps, I realized I hadn't any decent sources of vitamin B3 in a while. In fact my supps for them ran out last month. So I grabbed one, just regular Niacin, 500mg. Had a can of coke, half a caffeine pill, and the niacin, and went for the exercise bike.
(For those thinking the sugar/caffeine pill could be the cause of this great workout, I can assure you it's not - I always have a pre-workout along those lines, in fact usually I try and have more caffeine if my stomach feels good and I think I can tolerate it.)
First few mins of the exercise bike, bleh, pace is a little slower than usual. Then the niacin flush kicks in - I start feeling itchy, turning red. I'd heard of this, whatever, should be fine. Then I start feeling... good. Stomach starts de-bloating after a few more mins. Still itchy and red, but my legs start moving faster. Then they move FAST.
I end up exceeding my 20 minute pace on a 35 minute bike session. Holy ***t. I can assure you after 10 years of exercising and logging my times/reps/lifts this doesn't just happen. Plus-or-minus a few percent due to being tired or having extra good sleep/food the preceding day, sure. But not this.
More than exceeded my cardio goal, feeling great! Usually when I decide to do cardio, I'll do my 20-30 mins and call it a day. But hey, I felt great, let's try weights. The results, on my previous record lifts:
- On shrugs, I added 10% weight and 40% reps on a set.
- Then on pullups I added an extra 2 reps.
- Then on shoulder press I added 20% more reps on a strength set.
- Then on lat pulldown I added 30% weight and did a weight amount I've never been able to do, for 3 reps.
Then I stopped because this is ridiculous and I was worried I might get injured! First of all, if I add, say 3% of anything on any lift (2 lbs, an extra rep, etc), the workout is a success. And that's just on one lift where I'll save my energy and challenge myself, the rest I'll just do lighter/maintenance work. Also, I was in the gym exerting hard for 90 minutes and felt great. Usually I try and cap it to 45 minutes or I'll feel excessive stress response afterwards. Oh, and doing weights at all, after cardio, let alone setting a new cardio record? I haven't done that since I was a beginner lifter.
--- End Story ---
Everything was so much better in a way that even felt like it was outpacing my beginner gains. I'm almost certain it had to be the niacin (500mg) / niacin flush that did this.
And I want to understand why! Plus I want to encourage others who workout to try this experiment and report back, just drink it with some water 5 mins before you start exercising and see what happens :)
I can understand someone feeling better after fixing a deficiency, but it's unlikely I had anything too bad. I usually eat OK-ish, and I always take a multivitamin as insurance, so it's not like I'd be having poverty-levels of vitamin B3 ever.
For me another important datapoint is to see how rough I feel tomorrow when I wake up, as after a tough gym session it's usually noticeable. So I'll report back with that.
In the meantime, would love to hear about you guys' experience with any vitamin B3 supps, if anyone's tried it as a pre-workout like this (especially the niacin flush version), and anyone's theories on why it seemed to make this workout so damn amazing.
Some quick background: late 20s male, been lifting weights / working out in gym for over 10 years, and while beginner gains have long since left, I can expect a few percentage point increase in volume (either strength via weight, reps, endurance, etc) per week or month. I pay attention to everything I ingest and track what I do pretty meticulously. And what just happened today is unprecedented in my experience.
-- The Story ---
To start, today started bad. I woke up late, feeling tired and groggy, didn't eat enough the day before (I weigh myself morning and night, lost a kilo), and felt so bad after eating a fast food lunch (work deadlines....) that I couldn't focus for a big part of the day. Yeah not a great start. On an average day like this, knowing my body, I'd usually opt to skip my planned workout entirely, because it's on days like these that I'm most likely to get injured.
But something compelled me to at least try a bit of cardio, maybe I ate something bad and can sweat it out... Reflecting a bit on why I felt so bad and analyzing my food/supps, I realized I hadn't any decent sources of vitamin B3 in a while. In fact my supps for them ran out last month. So I grabbed one, just regular Niacin, 500mg. Had a can of coke, half a caffeine pill, and the niacin, and went for the exercise bike.
(For those thinking the sugar/caffeine pill could be the cause of this great workout, I can assure you it's not - I always have a pre-workout along those lines, in fact usually I try and have more caffeine if my stomach feels good and I think I can tolerate it.)
First few mins of the exercise bike, bleh, pace is a little slower than usual. Then the niacin flush kicks in - I start feeling itchy, turning red. I'd heard of this, whatever, should be fine. Then I start feeling... good. Stomach starts de-bloating after a few more mins. Still itchy and red, but my legs start moving faster. Then they move FAST.
I end up exceeding my 20 minute pace on a 35 minute bike session. Holy ***t. I can assure you after 10 years of exercising and logging my times/reps/lifts this doesn't just happen. Plus-or-minus a few percent due to being tired or having extra good sleep/food the preceding day, sure. But not this.
More than exceeded my cardio goal, feeling great! Usually when I decide to do cardio, I'll do my 20-30 mins and call it a day. But hey, I felt great, let's try weights. The results, on my previous record lifts:
- On shrugs, I added 10% weight and 40% reps on a set.
- Then on pullups I added an extra 2 reps.
- Then on shoulder press I added 20% more reps on a strength set.
- Then on lat pulldown I added 30% weight and did a weight amount I've never been able to do, for 3 reps.
Then I stopped because this is ridiculous and I was worried I might get injured! First of all, if I add, say 3% of anything on any lift (2 lbs, an extra rep, etc), the workout is a success. And that's just on one lift where I'll save my energy and challenge myself, the rest I'll just do lighter/maintenance work. Also, I was in the gym exerting hard for 90 minutes and felt great. Usually I try and cap it to 45 minutes or I'll feel excessive stress response afterwards. Oh, and doing weights at all, after cardio, let alone setting a new cardio record? I haven't done that since I was a beginner lifter.
--- End Story ---
Everything was so much better in a way that even felt like it was outpacing my beginner gains. I'm almost certain it had to be the niacin (500mg) / niacin flush that did this.
And I want to understand why! Plus I want to encourage others who workout to try this experiment and report back, just drink it with some water 5 mins before you start exercising and see what happens :)
I can understand someone feeling better after fixing a deficiency, but it's unlikely I had anything too bad. I usually eat OK-ish, and I always take a multivitamin as insurance, so it's not like I'd be having poverty-levels of vitamin B3 ever.
For me another important datapoint is to see how rough I feel tomorrow when I wake up, as after a tough gym session it's usually noticeable. So I'll report back with that.
In the meantime, would love to hear about you guys' experience with any vitamin B3 supps, if anyone's tried it as a pre-workout like this (especially the niacin flush version), and anyone's theories on why it seemed to make this workout so damn amazing.