BCAAs — 7 Crucial Benefits for Your Health and Performance

BCAAs have long been used in the fitness industry to great effect, and recently endurance athletes have been catching up to the trend.

And it was high time, in our opinion, as BCAAs provide several crucial benefits for endurance athletes, especially those performing short or fasted training sessions.

The main 7 benefits of BCAAs are:

1. Muscle protection
2. Fat burn
3. Energy production
4. Reduced sensation of fatigue
5. Increased muscle growth
6. Improved muscle recovery
7. Stronger immune system

In this blog, we'll discuss BCAAs, short for branched-chain amino acids, and their effect on your health and performance.

What Are BCAAs

BCAAs are a subtype of amino acids that represents three (leucine, isoleucine, and valine) out of nine essential amino acids (EAAs).

The term 'essential' means the body is not able to produce them in sufficient amounts by itself, so they must be obtained through food or supplements. To get sufficient amounts of BCAAs, you should consume at least 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day.

Note that the body breaks down all ingested protein into amino acids before using them for various other tasks, including the synthesis of new protein.

BCAAs, short for branched-chain amino acids, are 3 out 9 essential amino acids.

The Intake of BCAAs

Being an integral part of your metabolism, there is no wrong time to take BCAAs.

However, in terms of exercise, it is recommended to take 5 grams of BCAAs before, during, or after exercise. Depending on your goals and circumstances, you may increase the dose to 10 grams — e.g., 5 grams before exercise and 5 grams after exercise.

Also keep in mind that while you could replace BCAAs with a regular source of protein throughout the day, such as whey protein isolate, during intense exercise, when your digestion slows down, amino acids provide faster absorption and greater efficiency than protein.

Since endurance athletes often train fasted or, especially in case of ultra distance events, in a calorie deficit, supplementing BCAAs is a great way to unlock their vital benefits.

During intense exercise, BCAAs are more efficient than protein — the recommended intake is 5 grams.

BCAA Metabolism

While most amino acids are oxidized in the liver, BCAAs are primarily oxidized in the muscles, which makes them the most important amino acid group for muscle growth. We could go as far as to say that without BCAAs, there is no muscle growth.

BCAAs are involved in complex metabolic processes in the body, which includes glucose metabolism. As usual, your body is very crafty in regulating the level of amino acids in the system, as both too high and too low levels may lead to complications.

In terms of athletic performance, your body simply can't function without BCAAs, which is why you need to be very mindful of your protein intake and supplement BCAAs whenever you feel your protein or energy intakes are insufficient. 

Branched-chain amino acids are crucial for your health and athletic performance.

Benefits of BCAAs

BCAAs have several significant roles in the body which greatly transcend mere muscle growth, as they are also involved in fat metabolism, immune system, brain function, energy production, and the synthesis of protein and neurotransmitters.

This makes BCAA supplementation a great way for endurance athletes to boost their health, strength, vitality, and athletic performance.

Let's look at the 7 main benefits of BCAAs for an endurance athlete.

1. Muscle Protection

BCAAs reduce muscle breakdown, i.e. muscle catabolism, during intense endurance exercise.

This is particularly important for endurance athletes, as they often train in a calorie deficit, either because they train fasted or because their need for energy exceeds its availability.

That's why we recommend that whenever you engage in prolonged endurance activity, you should consider supplementing BCAAs to protect the health and strength of your muscles.

BCAAs protect your muscles from breakdown.

2. Fat Burn

BCAAs are involved in the oxidation of fatty acids, i.e. fat metabolism.

Having sufficient amounts of branched-chain amino acids at your disposal will increase your body's efficiency in burning fat. BCAAs will also improve the length, intensity, and efficiency of your training sessions, further boosting your body's natural fat-burning abilities.

While BCAAs should not be considered as a fat-burning supplement by themselves, they will increase the efficiency of any fat burner you might use.

BCAAs support and improve fat burn.

3. Energy Production

BCAAs are involved not only in fat metabolism but also in glucose metabolism.

BCAAs directly support the Krebs cycle, your body's main energy system that converts glucose into ATP energy. This allows your body to preserve its glycogen stores for longer, resulting in longer and better training sessions.

Furthermore, BCAAs reduce the accumulation of lactic acid, thus delaying the onset of the lactate threshold, burning muscles, and muscle fatigue.

BCAAs increase ATP energy production.

4. Reduced Sensation of Fatigue

BCAAs improve brain function and boost the production of neurotransmitters.

This effect leads to an overall reduction of the sensation of fatigue, which is often increased because of the body processes required to fuel intense endurance exercise.

This effect also improves cognitive function, which is crucial to sustain important parameters, such as reaction time and muscle coordination.

BCAAs improve cognitive function and reduce the sensation of fatigue.

5. Increased Muscle Growth

BCAAs directly boost protein synthesis.

Branched-chain amino acids, especially leucine, are crucial for the formation of protein, which is required for muscle growth.

This means that taking BCAAs in addition to your protein intake will improve your body's efficiency in using protein to build muscles.

BCAAs boost the effect of your protein intake.

6. Improved Muscle Recovery

BCAAs not only affect protein synthesis but also decrease levels of creatine kinase.

Creatine kinase is an enzyme involved in the production of ATP energy in the muscles, and high levels of creatine kinase after exercise are an indicator of muscle damage.

By decreasing the levels of creatine kinase, BCAAs increase ATP energy levels in the muscles, reducing the sensation of muscle fatigue and improving muscle recovery.

BCAAs increase energy in the muscles and improve muscle recovery.

7. Stronger Immune System

BCAAs are essential to support the immune system.

BCAAs regulate the activation of killer cells and the production of antibodies, which are crucial to fight off diseases and inflammations.

This is especially important for endurance athletes, as intense endurance exercise creates the "window of vulnerability", which occurs immediately after exercise and temporarily suppresses the immune system, providing an opportunity for infection.

BCAAs boost the immune system.

Conclusion

BCAAs, short for branched-chain amino acids, are 3 of 9 essential amino acids, which the body cannot produce by itself and must be obtained through food or supplements.

It is possible to obtain sufficient amounts of BCAAs through food, but this requires a high intake of protein. Supplementation can alleviate this fact, which is especially important for endurance athletes who often train in a calorie deficit.

BCAAs provide several benefits, and in this article we explored the 7 most important ones.

1. Muscle protection
2. Fat burn
3. Energy production
4. Reduced sensation of fatigue
5. Increased muscle growth
6. Improved muscle recovery
7. Stronger immune system

As an endurance athlete, you should strongly consider supplementing BCAAs, as they are a great way to preserve the health and strength of your muscles and improve your athletic performance.