Supplement Review

Supplement Review:
Optimum Nutrition Essential Amino Energy

Today I am reviewing Optimum Nutrition's Essential Amino Energy. I know this is a very popular product mainly because of the low price tag (around £19-£25), especially in the pre-workout market where products usually cost around £25-£40.
The product is great value for the amount of servings, 30 in total with each serving being two scoops.
So let's start off with a run through of the ingredients:
2g Carbohydrates
5g Amino blend consisting of free formed amino acids, you have L-Glutamine, L-Arginine, L-Leucine and Beta-Alanine. Now there is no telling how much Beta-Alanine is actually in the product, usually when taking Beta-Alanine you get a tingle sensation on u lips or face the first few times you take this product so I am going to have a guess of around 1-2g per serving. It is quite annoying that you don't know how much of the BCAA you are actually getting.
160mg Energy Blend. The caffeine that ON uses in this product is from good sources, green coffee extract, green tea & green tea extract, so you shouldn't get any 'crashed' feeling once the effects have worn off.

Now I don't enjoy free forming amino acids being in products because I think it's very limited to how well your body can actually absorb them. To enhance this, I would advise it to be taken on an empty stomach so you have a better chance to absorb as much BCAA's as your body can. Ideally I would recommend this product to someone on a low carb diet so they can take it pre-workout to stop their body from going catabolic and breaking down muscle. Essentially the product is some amino acids mixed with caffeine. On the label they do advertise a little energy chart so that you can gauge your levels:
2 scoops is mild with 5g of aminos
4 scoops is moderate with 10g of aminos
6 scoops is intense with 15g of aminos.

I thought this was a nice touch by ON because you can use it any which way u want, as a pre-workout, as an amino replenishing drink during or after training or even just as a 'pick me up' through the day.The product does come in three different flavors, orange cooler, fruit fusion & blue raspberry. I opted for the fruit fusion and flavor wise it is 9/10. I consumed this 15 minutes before my workout and the effects where quick to kick in but the strength of them where average. I used two scoops so maybe I need to up the dosage but to me it seemed on par with consuming a cup of coffee,
which I would also advise. Before a workout just have some coffee or pop a pro plus pill and a protein shake, it would probably have the same effect.

All in all this product is good for people either on a budget or on low carb diets looking for some BCAA's and abit of a kick for there workout. There are better pre-workout shakes out there and even better BCAA's shakes out there, but this is by far not the worst purchase you can make. It a shame because I am a huge Optimum Nutrition fan, after having so many great products like 100% Gold Standard, but in this case of Essential Amino Energy they have fell short of the mark.

Mixibilty 7/10
Taste 9/10
Effectiveness 6/10

Overall Rating 6/10

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