We Finally Know the Best Time to Take Antioxidants (Backed by New Research)

I've mentioned many times on the channel that taking antioxidants after exercise blunts some of the benefits you get from exercise, especially when it comes to muscle growth. The same with ice baths, lowering the inflammation after resistance training blunts the muscle growth signaling. But there have been a few studies on this topic that added much needed context. And for some people, taking antioxidants while exercising can actually be more beneficial. So in this video I'm going to talk about when and how you should take antioxidants when combining it with exercise. Exercise raises pro-inflammatory cytokines during the exercise because your body is dealing with the physical stress. These inflammatory cytokines are signaling molecules that make the body produce its own endogenous antioxidant defenses, and they also signal muscle growth. After the exercise, your inflammation levels will drop, and if you exercise regularly, your baseline inflammation is lower. There are several examples of taking antioxidants after exercise that lower the inflammation, also blunting some of the benefits you get from exercise. The reason is that the antioxidants block these reactive oxygen species that act as signaling molecules that make the body stronger. Historically, it's been applied mostly to resistance training for muscle growth because inflammation is more relevant to muscle growth. However, there appears to be some effects on the benefits from endurance training as well, although this is less studied. An important point is age. There seems to be an age-dependent effect. With age, you tend to see an increase in inflammation due to the process of aging, so older people have a much higher baseline inflammation to begin with. This 2024 meta-analysis of 39 randomness control trials saw that antioxidants alone could increase muscle strength, as measured by a leg press, by 1.9 kg. The combination of an exercise program and antioxidants resulted in a significantly greater increase in leg press, by 15.28 kg. Exercise alone, however, resulted in 5 kg lower leg press. What it means is that for the elderly people, the combination of antioxidants plus exercise is better than exercise alone, or antioxidants alone for that matter. That's quite a surprising result, but it makes sense because older individuals have much higher baseline inflammation to begin with. It's also not the same for all antioxidants, which is quite interesting. So in the rest of this video, I'm going to go through different types of antioxidants and see what the research says. Let's talk about omega-3 fatty acids. They're often talked about in the context of heart health, but one of the reasons they improve cardiovascular outcomes is because they're anti-inflammatory. People online claim that omega-3 fats are inflammatory, but that's the complete opposite of the truth. This 2022 umbrella meta-analysis of 32 separate meta-analyses spanning over 400 papers found that omega-3 supplementation significantly lowered inflammatory markers like CRP, tumor necrosis factor alpha, and interleukin-6. The effects are around 10-25% reduction. This is an insane amount of studies, and they're all consistent. Interestingly, omega-3 supplementation, although it lowers inflammation, it doesn't reduce muscle growth. In fact, omega-3 supplements support muscle growth and muscle strength as per these meta-analyses of over 12 studies. This 2020 meta-analysis saw that older people who took antioxidants and or omega-3s improved their response to exercise and saw lower muscle damage. So my overall verdict is that omega-3s don't suppress muscle growth, and they actually support recovery, even if you take them after exercise. But if I wanted to be absolutely safe about it, then I would take the omega-3s before exercise rather than after exercise. Moving on with NAC, which is a precursor to glutathione, a powerful antioxidant in the body. Taking NAC after exercise has been seen to disrupt the skeletal muscle inflammatory process and blunting some of the adaptations from exercise. Now this is where it gets interesting. Taking NAC before exercise increases performance. A 2023 meta-analysis of 16 RCTs saw that 600-1200 mg of NAC 1-2 hours before exercise was able to improve time to exhaustion, endurance, and reduce fatigue. NAC at a dose of 2400 mg has also been seen to delay the decline in force production during isometric exercise, presumably because as you exercise, you see an increase in oxidative stress that makes you feel tired. With NAC, you have higher glutathione and thus you can postpone this fatigue by actively eliminating oxidative stress generated during exercise. What it means is that if you take NAC before a workout, you can work out for longer and your performance is higher because of lower fatigue. What about some of the more common run-in-the-mill antioxidants like vitamin C? This 2023 review claimed that the effects of vitamin C and E on post-exercise recovery are not fully clear and there is evidence for potential harm on training adaptations. In this 2014 study, 10 weeks of vitamin C and E supplementation didn't reduce muscle growth, but it did reduce strength in the biceps curl and it also altered protein signaling. Again, there's a difference between taking it after a workout and before a workout. Taking vitamin C before a workout might enhance collagen synthesis. In this study, 15 g of gelatin with 48 mg of vitamin C before exercise enhanced collagen synthesis more than exercise alone, or 5 g of gelatin for that matter. Yes, the gelatin contributes to collagen synthesis, but vitamin C is also an essential component of collagen synthesis, so you need both. Based on this, taking vitamin C one hour before exercise, ideally combined with collagen, can be a collagen synthesis hack for your joints. Carotenoids like azaxanthin are significantly more potent of antioxidants than vitamin C. If vitamin C reduces muscle growth, then azaxanthin surely will do so as well because azaxanthin is 500 times more potent of an antioxidant than vitamin C. Well, in this 2017 clinical trial on elderly people, azaxanthin combined with exercise resulted in greater muscle strength and muscle mass compared to exercise alone. They didn't specify if the azaxanthin was taken before or after a workout, but based on the other studies that I've shared throughout this video, it's better to take the azaxanthin before a workout rather than after the workout. Melatonin is also interesting because it's a very powerful antioxidant. Because of that, there is research that melatonin lowers inflammation and speeds up recovery from exercise. Taking melatonin after exercise has been seen to block or attenuate some of the beneficial adaptations caused by exercise as seen in this study. Now I'm not sure if you should take melatonin after exercise because on one hand it can improve your sleep, which improves your recovery, but on the other hand it's a powerful antioxidant that can blunt some of the benefits of exercise, so I don't know, there's not enough studies on this. But at the same time, there is research in animals showing that melatonin promotes muscle growth and reduces age-related sarcopenia. That might be because chronic inflammation seen in aging leads to muscle loss and sarcopenia. So my verdict is that if you don't need it, don't take it, at least on the days that you exercise or resistance training specifically for muscle growth. Overall, the timing appears to be the most critical aspect of antioxidants. So now let me give you some bullet points to keep in mind. Antioxidants after exercise reduce muscle damage and inflammation. That can blunt the positive adaptations you see from exercise, especially the ones that are partly dependent on inflammation, such as muscle hypertrophy. Examples of this include vitamin C, melatonin, and NAC. The exceptions might include omega-3s. Antioxidants before exercise might improve performance to a certain extent and increase the time to fatigue by postponing it. Examples include vitamin C, melatonin, and NAC. Older individuals with higher baseline inflammation benefit from co-administration of antioxidants and exercise, preferably antioxidants before exercise. Examples include omega-3s, NAC, and vitamin C. People who train a lot, like athletes, or people who just over-train, will also benefit from antioxidants because their body has higher inflammation from the over-training. All of these supplements that I mentioned in this video are otherwise great. Axanthin, melatonin, NAC, omega-3s, they're all god-tier supplements in my opinion, meaning they have a lot of evidence in humans. If you want me to rank 100 of the most popular supplements, then check out this video next.