Chromium Picolinate

A Key Factor To Adding Lean Muscle

By Xavier Fox

When it comes to being a successful bodybuilder, supplementation is a very important part of the total program. With the incredible amount of work that a bodybuilder forces their body to endure, it is almost impossible to get enough nutrition from food alone. Choosing the right supplements can make or break your program. In addition to helping your body recuperate by providing the necessary nutrients that directly control muscle repair, a good supplement will also have an affect on the hormones that influence your body’s ability to add muscle. It is not always the direct mechanisms of action that make a supplement good… some supplements are very effective due to their ability to directly influence certain processes that then in return directly influence muscle development. Chromium picolinate is a very good supplement that not only works to directly help the body recover from intense training, but also directly affects hormone production so that those hormones can enhance muscle mass development.

Although chromium is mostly found in meats such as beef, chicken and fish, it is also found in whole-grains. Whenever food is processed, a fair amount of the chromium in it gets destroyed. Chromium picolinate is created by combining the naturally occurring mineral chromium with picolinic acid. The picolinic acid is added in order to enhance the ability to absorb the chromium. Since processing foods wipes out some of the chromium, having picolinic acid to maximize the absorption of what chromium remains is very important. There is no question that if you have less of a nutrient, being able to absorb as much as possible of what is left is critical.
If your body does not have enough chromium, many systems in your body that are associated with insulin will not operate correctly, and that can lead to smaller and weaker muscles in addition to poor health. As you may already know, when you consume food (especially carbohydrates) your body releases insulin as a response to the rise in blood sugar. The insulin will help transport the broken down carbohydrates into muscles and organs where it is needed for energy production. At the same time that insulin is pushing nutrients into the cells, the other hormones are actually working against it and taking up the receptors insulin binds to. Chromium picolinate works on those receptors to make them more sensitive to insulin so that more can be absorbed. This ensures that insulin can do its job of getting the nutrients where they need to be.
Since chromium picolinate increases the rate at which insulin is absorbed, it allows your body to take advantage of another beneficial mechanism of insulin: protein and fat metabolism. If more protein can be metabolized, then more can be converted into muscle tissue. You will recuperate faster from workouts as well as develop new muscle. The advantages of increased fat metabolism hardly need to be explained. One of the reasons that 99.9% of the people in the gym are there in the first place is to eliminate some of that unsightly excess body fat they are carrying around. One other plus related to insulin that chromium creates is the increase in serotonin, which is the hormone that controls the appetite. If more serotonin is released, your body will be less likely to experience a feeling of hunger. Reducing hunger is a great way to keep you from sneaking too many snacks during the day.
Many ads about chromium will claim that it increases energy. The action that chromium picolinate has on insulin that causes more broken down carbohydrates to get pushed into the muscles is what actually gives you more energy. The chromium picolinate itself is not directly converted to energy. As someone who spends a lot of time in the gym, you probably do not care what mechanism brings the energy, as long as it is there. It is kind of like someone giving you a coupon that you could take to the bank to turn in to receive £50 for free. Sure, they didn’t directly hand you £50… but in the end it is all the same.
Chromium picolinate’s indirect effect on increasing energy is promising. If you have more energy available, you will most likely be able to train more intensely, and it will also take longer for fatigue to overcome you to the point that you have to stop. If you can train harder for longer periods of time, you should be able to add more muscle. The longer duration of hard training will also help you to burn more calories from training. The added muscle will add to the caloric consumption, since muscle burns calories even at rest.
Once again… it is the indirect things that happen because of chromium picolinate that enhances your overall physique. It is the same principle as increasing testosterone in your system. The testosterone does not get converted into muscle, but it increases levels of other hormones as well as increases protein synthesis, and those things lead to more muscle. The point is, chromium picolinate helps insulin to be more effective in driving nutrients into the muscles, and that action leads to a series of other beneficial side effects.
Since we are on the subjects of insulin, testosterone, and the indirect effects of chromium picolinate, let’s dig a little deeper into other things that go on with increased intake of chromium picolinate. A British study had subjects supplement with either chromium or a placebo for a little more than a week. The subjects underwent activities that would lead to increased cortisol levels. The findings illustrated that those subjects who received chromium produced significantly less cortisol compared to the placebo group. Cortisol is the stress hormone released by the body that breaks down muscle tissue and puts the body in a catabolic state. The ability of chromium to inhibit cortisol is huge for a bodybuilder.
Cortisol and testosterone will actually compete for the same receptors. So if cortisol is left unchecked, then it will take a lot of the receptors that should have been binding to testosterone. Now that testosterone that should have been used to help your body become much bigger and stronger will just end up as wasted by-product. In addition, all of the systems that testosterone has influence on will also be hindered. There will be a lot of lost opportunity when it comes to the muscle that you could have added. If less cortisol is acting on the body, then more testosterone can bind to its receptors, less muscle is being broken down, more protein is being synthesized, and the body will be more anabolic. The result is more muscle and less fat.
Cortisol will also cause insulin resistance, so the receptors will not absorb as much insulin in its presence. As chromium picolinate blocks cortisol, it allows for more insulin to act on the receptor sites and there is more advantage than simply getting additional nutrients into the cell. As we already know, insulin has many effects on the body that add up to increased muscle and less body fat. However, the dangerous part is that if cortisol continues to make the receptors resistant to absorbing insulin, then the body will be fooled into thinking there is not enough insulin. It will continue to generate more and more insulin, and that can lead to the development of type-2 diabetes. In case you were unaware, that is bad… very bad. Excess insulin can also lead to excess fat gain.
The recommended dosage of chromium picolinate is in the 200-400 micrograms range with half the dosage taken at two different times during the day. It should be taken along with food. Since chromium picolinate works with insulin, the optimal times to take it would be with your pre- and post-workout meals. Your post-workout meal should include large amounts of quick-acting carbohydrates to enhance insulin production. Not only will the post-workout consumption of chromium benefit your insulin production, but the best time to take a supplement that fights cortisol is just after the body has been put through a stressful training session when cortisol production will be at its highest.
Chromium picolinate may not directly turn into energy or affect protein synthesis and fat metabolism, but its influence on insulin and cortisol lead to indirect mechanisms that make these processes more effective. Building lean muscle mass takes a lot of work and a lot of time. Anything that you do in order to help this process become more efficient will make you a better bodybuilder. As time goes on, that little bit each month will continue to add up, and then as you become an experienced bodybuilding competitor, you will be much farther ahead than you would have been without chromium picolinate. Every little bit helps.