@exercion NOW you've really messed things up!!! Down another rabbit hole I've gone !!
I found a study from the NCBI - certainly seems to that the Creatine/HMB combo has some value!!

Here is the conclusion of the study "In summary, oral supplementation with a combination of 0.04 g/kg/day (≈3g/day) of CrM plus 3 g/day of HMB over 10 weeks of training showed a synergistic effect on aerobic power"

What product are you using??
I may have to add the HMB into my mix...

I've been taking creatine for maybe 15 years or so, only 5g/day in two 2.5g doses. It helps, no downside at that dosage. No water retention, etc. I've been using HMB for several years. It's effect is more noticeable for a geezer than creatine. 3g/day in 3 1g doses as studied. I have a thread about it here: Discovered HMB about 10 days ago. Some people seem to have a prostate reaction to it, but I don't seem to. Major effect on recovery, which then enables more or harder training.

exercion Carbonfiberboy I've now officially ordered HMB (from Bulk Supplements). Hoping this solves my recovery issues!! I'll report back once I get this rolling. Thanks for sharing!!

Me too. Got some Now powder from amazon. It would be nice to recover enough from lifting to ride hard while also recovering enough from riding hard to lift.

Classtime I just want to get up in the morning and not hurt...

Can you provide a link to that study?

Thanks.

I can now - didn't have enough posts yesterday to share a link

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7019716/

I don't know about increased power, endurance numbers, etc. For sure those supplements improve my recovery, all the way from glacial to slow. So they make it possible to improve my abilities simply by making improvement possible, i.e. frequency improves which allows improvement. That said, they only work if I train consistently.

Because HMB is a chemical which is a natural part of the recovery process and gradually decreases as we age - after all, we aren't supposed to be participating in lion hunts at our age - the older one is, the more noticeable is one's reaction to it. At 50, I don't know if it'd be noticeable. At 70, wow.

This is what I'm looking for. I turn 64 in November and it's my slow recovery that I've noticed the most.

GCN just reviewed the magic powder. Here are the results for one presenter:

My HMB arrived yesterday so I celebrated with a pre-ride shake with 10g creatine and 3g of HMB. Followed by a 40mile ride. My plan is to do this daily over the next few weeks when I do my first 100km ride.
My goal is to improve my recovery times. Did some more research as follows (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/art...Fkg%20of%20LBM).

The efficacy of HMB has also been replicated in measures of performance in experienced endurance athletes. Vukovich and Geri [42] investigated the effects of HMB supplementation on peak oxygen consumption (VO2 peak) and the onset of blood lactate accumulation (OBLA) in eight endurance-trained master-level competitive cyclists, with an average training volume of 300 miles per week. Participants performed a graded cycle ergometer test until exhaustion. All participants performed 3, 2-week supplementation protocols consisting of either 3 grams of HMB, leucine, or a placebo daily, while continuing their normal training volume. Results from the graded exercise test indicated that HMB increased the time to reach VO2 peak (8%), while leucine and the placebo did not. The VO2 at 2 mM of lactate (OBLA) increased with HMB (9.1%) and leucine (2.1%), but not with the placebo. Likewise, Vukovich and Adams [43] found that 2 weeks of HMB supplementation in experienced cyclists increased both VO2 peak and the time to reach VO2 peak, while supplementation with leucine or a placebo did not change these measurements.

Knitter et al. [17] examined the effects of 3 grams of HMB or a placebo on muscle damage during a 20 km run in 16 experienced male and female long distance runners. Results showed a decrease in LDH and CK levels with the HMB supplemented participants compared to the non-supplemented participants. These results agreed with Byrd et al. [44] who found that HMB or HMB combined with creatine equally decreased the rise in muscle soreness following a 30 minute downhill run in 28 young, active males; while the creatine only and placebo group did not.

The efficacy of HMB supplementation in the elderly
Several studies have examined if the ergogenic benefits of HMB supplementation can be generalized to the elderly. Vukovich et al. [29] showed that HMB supplementation in 31 untrained, elderly men and women during an 8 week resistance training program resulted in increased body fat lost (-.66 vs. -.03 %), and greater upper (13% vs. 11%) and lower body strength (13 % vs. 7 %) in the HMB condition than the placebo.

Some authors have recommended that HMB should be standardized according to body weight. Using this framework, it is advised to have 38 mg/kg of body weight per day (equivalent to 17.3 mg/lb of body weight per day) [19].

In summary, when supplementing with HMB, current evidence suggests that 1 gram of HMB should be consumed 3 times per day, for a total of 3 g of HMB daily (or 38 mg/kg of LBM).

But if you are exercising to get stronger, is reducing muscle soreness and recovery time a "good thing"?

The training adaptation response is induced by inflammation. For an athlete wishing to get stronger, inflammation is their buddy. It's a sign that the training was hard enough to elicit a response, and they are likely to become stronger because of it.

If taking a supplement reduces inflammation, could it be interfering with the adaptation?

Some studies suggest taking high dose NSAIDs like ibuprofen after exercise inhibit muscle strength gains. Could HMB inhibit gains in the same way?

Terry, you brought up a valid question. I don’t recall reading any links between HMB and improved strength and/or endurance but less muscle soreness was touted which one would think would get one back out there sooner thus defeating adaptation. The link between taking a high amount of ibuprofen vs HMB might be a stretch but the result may very well be the same.

I have been giving myself more rest days after hard or long efforts and it seems to be working - at least AI Strava seems to agree.

Don't equate delayed muscle soreness with inflammation intrinsic to the process of adaptation. No one even knows what causes soreness.

Kidney stones.

(I do worry about this occasional side-effect, enough to put me off taking these supplements, and no, I never had one.)

I and a close friend have been taking HMB for quite a while. As far as we can tell, reduced soreness from HMB is because of faster healing. If I overdo it, I still get sore, but it doesn't last as long with HMB. The soreness is still definitely there. As you say, soreness is your buddy. If one is taking HMB and not getting sore, one just needs to increase intensity, the desired benefit from HMB. The effect is simply like being a few years younger, back when your body made the HMB all by itself.

I am in agreement with you about NSAIDs. They're tempting but usually a bad idea unless it's so bad you can't sleep. Randonneurs know better than to use NSAIDs on a long ride - temps one to really F it up.

Eh? I think we're discussing muscle soreness resulting from exercise.
https://www.houstonmethodist.org/blo...ter-a-workout/
I ride with a physiologist who researched this sort of thing, using dogs (and he loves dogs, but it is what it is). He told me that lactate has nothing to do with anything, pain-wise. One gets the lactate burn, but it's not the lactate that's causing the burn, it's another chemical. Which in any case has nothing to do with our subject, muscle soreness, which as explained in the link, is caused by damage, nothing to do with what we feel during exercise, just DOMS.

From my reading, the cause of DOMS is still unknown and the micro-tear hypothesis of muscle hypertrophy and strengthening seems to have less and less support. Micro tearing occurs, but does not seem to be necessary for the response. No time to pull literature now. Maybe later.

It seems to be the H+ ion associated with lactate that stimulates pain muscle pain receptors during exercise.

Thanks. I found this over on Quora: "The real cause of sore muscles, hours and days after extreme exercise, is the influx of fluids, prostaglandins, and white bloods cells, to the muscle area in an effort to repair the damaged tissue." Like you say. I wonder how this produces nerve signals, but I wonder about a lot of things. HMB, which reduces muscle soreness, rather than speeding muscle repair seems to reduce muscle breakdown in the first place, which fits.

Yeah, that’s a long way of saying “inflammation.”

Inflammation, sounds good.

From a German abstract (translated):

"In the past few decades, many hypotheses have been developed to explain the aetiology of DOMS. Although the exact pathophysiological pathway remains unknown, the primary mechanism is currently considered to be the ultrastructural damage of muscle cells due to unfamiliar sporting activities or eccentric exercise, which leads to further protein degradation, apoptosis and local inflammatory response."

Good translation. The handwaving comes through very clearly!

Creatine: https://trainright.com/creatine-for-cyclists/
Seems right to me.