Body Myths - How much muscle mass can I expect to gain with creatine?

How much muscle mass can I expect to gain with creatine?

I'll be using 1000g of GNC's brand of Creatine Monohydrate. Assume I will use all my potential in the gym, do proper workouts, take the creatine when it's best, and of course drink a lot of water. How many pounds of muscle will I be able to gain? I'll also be consuming 1g of protein for every pound on my body. Any estimates? Thanks! Any tips are appreciated.

Public Comments

depends on how hard you work and how long you exercise for at the gym. do upper body 1 day, lower body next, abs triceps biceps etc. like that one day and make sure you take a day to rest your muscles
That's not really possible to estimate. How much muscle you will/can build depends on too many factors, some examples being: -How you react to creatine supplementation. Some people notice benefit, some people don't. Remember, your body does produce some of the stuff itself and you get more from some foods (meat in particular). -How long/hard you've been training (diminishing returns). -The quality of your routine and how often you vary it. -Age. -Genetics. Some people naturally develop more. -Diet. Not just protein intake, but carbs and fat as well. Even if you assume you eat and workout perfectly (which is a pretty ambiguous definition to begin with), it's just not something you can quantify. What I can say is that creatine will not work magic. A realistic guess (if it works, if you do everything right, etc) would be if you would gain 5lbs of lean mass over a period of time without taking creatine, you might gain 6 or 7lbs taking it.
You can expect a 2-3 pound increase in muscle mass in the first few weeks of using it. Some have claimed this just water weight, and this partially true. Creatine will cause you to hold more water in your muscle cells, which is why you need to drink plenty of water when taking it. The fact that much of the weight gain is water weight does not negate creatine's benefits though. The additional water makes the muscle more anabolic and also increases your strength.