Alot of people come in my store asking for fancy preworkout powders or prohormones or expensive creatines but after I talk to them a few minutes I realize they aren’t even consuming the basics. Those of you who read my articles or know me know that even though I own a supplement store I always tell people “Whole food is always best”. Supplements are meant to fill gaps in your diet, or as a convenience item when whole food is either not 1)available 2)affordable 3)digestible 4)convenient. So here’s a brief breakdown on “The Basics” and why they’re necessary:

1) Multivitamins – Lets face it, our food these days is not as nutritious as it was 100 years ago due to farming and grocery practices I don’t have room to go into right now. Multivitamins (tablets, capsules, or liquid) make sure you are consuming all your essential micronutrients and cofactors to make the body run smoothly as if it was a finely tuned sports car instead of a 20 year old lawnmower.

2) EFA’s (Essential Fatty Acids) – They are called essential for a reason. The typical American diet is loaded with bad fats that have an inflamatory effect on the body. EFA’s such as fish oil, flax, coconut, borage, evening primrose and others have an anti-inflamatory effect on the body and balance out the inflamatory fats. This not only aides in fat loss but overall health and recovery.

3) High quality protein powder – It wouldn’t be considered a basic if everyone ate an ample amount of high quality protein for 4-6 meals a day, and some people do…but most don’t. The meal most usually lacking in protein is breakfast with most people consuming coffee, cereal, fruit, maybe a granola bar with a yogurt, or even a couple eggs and a piece of toast….but NONE of these have an AMPLE amount of protein, even the 2 eggs or yogurt which only contain about 6 grams of protein apiece. Take your IDEAL bodyweight in pounds, divide by the number of meals you eat in a day, and that’s approximately how many grams of protein you should have in EACH and EVERY meal.

Notice the relationship between all the “Basics”? They’re the most nutritious components of most of the foods that we eat (or don’t eat) and they’re common sense nutrients that should serve for the basis of a diet, but in most instances where you just can’t get enough of them from your food due to circumstances out of your control…..well, that’s why supplements were created.