My brother-in-law is a personal trainer for 24 Fitness Gym. They have a product called Apex that has 4 levels of pills to be taking, but he recommended one for sure that has pyruvate. Apparently it speeds up your kreb cycle and that makes you burn more fat. I know that the kreb cycle is how your body burns cells for energy (or something slightly more technical than that) but does anyone think that this stuff is for real? It seems a bit too fancy or something. Any thoughts on what pyruvate and or lipotropics are?

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/pyruvate.html

http://www.bodybuildingforyou.com/weight-loss-etc/pyruvate.htm

http://www.rpi.edu/dept/bcbp/molbiochem/MBWeb/mb1/part2/krebs.htm

http://www.naturodoc.com/library/nutrition/lipotrophics.htm
(VERY interesting article on lipotrophics)

http://dietandbody.com/Pyruvate_Lipotropics.html
("WHAT IS PYRUVATE? WHAT ARE LIPOTROPICS?" -- another interesting one)

That was from a 15 minute google search, you can probably find much more.

Personally I wouldn't mess with that stuff. A good nutrition plan and exercise routine (weights and cardio) will do much better than any pill. :)


My brother-in-law is a personal trainer for 24 Fitness Gym. They have a product called Apex that has 4 levels of pills to be taking, but he recommended one for sure that has pyruvate. Apparently it speeds up your kreb cycle and that makes you burn more fat. I know that the kreb cycle is how your body burns cells for energy (or something slightly more technical than that) but does anyone think that this stuff is for real? It seems a bit too fancy or something. Any thoughts on what pyruvate and or lipotropics are?

Someone recently had a post about diet pills and someone responded (think it was SC) saying that they can help you, but only if used as an aid. Don't count on them to magically burn away fat. You should primarily be concerned with a good nutrition and excercise plan (as 1FGTX pointed out). And the pills on top of that might give you a little bit extra, if used as an aid to your diet and exercise.

EDIT:
I found the post i was refering to:
http://forums.johnstonefitness.com/showpost.php?p=46570&postcount=6

Yeah, they might provide something extra. Personally though if you want a little bit extra I believe there are better, more proven routes. Well maybe not better, but for example I KNOW ephedra works. I've used it before many times. Running an ECA stack would prove to be a pretty good addition to a fat loss routine in my opinion.

Heck caffeine by itself can do something too.

acappy -- Go here: http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/index.html, there will be 3 drop-down boxes. Click the 3rd one and choose your goal. Pick "Fat Loss" and look at some of the products. Be wary though, they ARE trying to sell you stuff, but you can get some ideas here...

-Chris

Pyruvate is an intermediate of the Krebs cycle, which is the main pathway through which energy is burned. Pyruvate results from the breakdown of one sugar molecule. One sugar molecule becomes two pyruvates. I can see how eating straight pyruvate could possibly benefit those on an Atkins style low carbohydrate diet since they wouldn't be consuming much or any sugar. However, even a low carbohydrate diet calls for some carbs (like 100 or more grams per day) for this very reason.

I'm with 1FastGTX on this one. It seems silly to take a pill which is basically pre-metabolized sugar and nothing more. There are definitely better options.

yeah, I'm totally combining diet and exercise as well. He just recommended them and it seemed a bit on the shady side so I thought I'd ask around and see if anyone had any experience. I took ephedra a few years ago and that worked really really well, but now I'm kinda scared of it from all of the bad news coverage. Most of the people on the boards seem to be ok with it though.

[QUOTE=1FastGTX]Yeah, they might provide something extra. Personally though if you want a little bit extra I believe there are better, more proven routes. Well maybe not better, but for example I KNOW ephedra works. I've used it before many times. Running an ECA stack would prove to be a pretty good addition to a fat loss routine in my opinion.

Out of curiosity, how effective would an ECA stack be without the "A"? asprin gives me a stomach ache, so would the rest be pointless without the asprin addition?

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Out of curiosity, how effective would an ECA stack be without the "A"? asprin gives me a stomach ache, so would the rest be pointless without the asprin addition?
I have never tried it without aspirin, but I'd have to think that it would still be EXTREMELY effective. I am ASSUMING that the "E" and the "C" are the more powerful substances in this stack anyhow. I think the strength of both ephedra and caffeine are well known.

the green tea extract sold by Kent Nutrition not only is packed fulla them polyphenols that are supposed to be so good for you, but it also has a pretty hefty kick to it. I take two in the morning and two more in the afternoon if I remember. primarily I bought it for the preventive stuff and the thermo effect was a surprise.