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I was re-reading Mark's ebook and he says he starts the creatine loading in his week off. I'm in a loading phase now and I've already started my training programme. I figure it's just a matter of convenience rather than scientific research that this decision is based on, or is the timing of it important? I must say when I've used creatine before I did the loading whenever I needed to rather than on a rest phase, and it has always worked. So a fairly pointless question but I'm interested to know the answer regardless!

Cheers

Just letting you know I read your question... but I'm totally unsure. I've just followed a 5g/day dosing schedule, on for a month, off for a month. Simple and easy to remember, but probably stunting my progress since I'm less than scientific about it.

--Matt B.

I really doubt it matters. I never really "load" creatine. I just take it in my post workout shake. This would mean it builds up more slowly, but it also saves a little money with the creatine budget.

Hey,

Yeah I also figure you don't need to be too scientific about it. If it's working it's working, and I know this way works. Because it's something that gives you a marginal boost when compared to just weights alone, if you're even doing it only 50% vs. 100% efficiently then the difference will be negligible for all but pro athletes where those differences are important and translate into tenths of seconds or an extra KG of performance. Well that's my theory anyway. Still, I wonder if there is a genuinely optimal way of doing it....

richard-a wrote:I was re-reading Mark's ebook and he says he starts the creatine loading in his week off. I'm in a loading phase now and I've already started my training programme. I figure it's just a matter of convenience rather than scientific research that this decision is based on, or is the timing of it important? I must say when I've used creatine before I did the loading whenever I needed to rather than on a rest phase, and it has always worked. So a fairly pointless question but I'm interested to know the answer regardless!

My guess is your muscles probably get saturated faster if you load on your week off. Creatine is used during a workout, so if you load while you work out, it might take a little bit longer to fully saturate your muscles. The difference is probably negligible for folks like us though, so I wouldn't worry about it.