Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - The Definitive Guide to Collagen Supplements

Episode Date: February 9, 2018

If you’re like, well, most everyone, you have at least a little bit of joint pain. Maybe it’s your shoulder, or your knee, or your hips, and maybe the pain comes and goes or maybe it lingers. Maybe you’ve tried things to sort it out like stretching, resistance training, foam rolling, anti-inflammatories, and natural supplements like glucosamine chondroitin, only to be disappointed. And now you’re looking for information on yet another supplement that promises to finally soothe your joint pain—collagen. Can it? Well, the long story short is yes, it absolutely can. As with all natural supplements, some work better for some people than others, but there is good scientific evidence that collagen can indeed reduce joint pain and inflammation and even benefit people with healthy joints. By the end of this episode, you’re going to know what collagen is, why people supplement with it, how it can improve your joint health, the best kind of collagen to take, and more. Let’s get to it. 4:26 - What is collagen? 5:26 - Why do people take collagen? 6:05 - What are the benefits of collagen supplements? 8:02 - Why do athletes suffer from joint pains? 10:54 - What are the appropriate doses for collagen? 11:37- What are the results from taking collagen supplements? 13:35 - Do collagen supplements have any side effects? Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

Type 2 collagen supplements can work like a natural vaccine of sorts, allowing your body to recognize its own joint collagen as a safe substance. And one of the best things about type 2 collagen supplements is that these effects have been demonstrated both in people with arthritic conditions and people with healthy joints. joints. If you want to know what collagen supplements are, why people supplement with them and how they may or may not be able to improve your joint health, then you want to listen to this podcast. Now, if you are like, well, most everybody, you have at least a little bit of joint pain some of the times in some of the places in your body. Maybe it's your shoulder, maybe it's your knee, maybe it's your

hips or your lower back, and maybe the pain comes and goes, or maybe it lingers, or maybe it only strikes you in the gym or after a workout or whatever, but these things are normal. And it's also normal to have tried many different things to get rid of the pains, to get rid of the nagging aches like stretching and resistance training, foam rolling, anti-inflammatory drugs, and natural supplements, including glucosamine chondroitin, very popular, but not very effective. And despite having done all these things, it is also pretty common to be disappointed and still be dealing with joint pain. And so if you're listening to this podcast because you are looking for the truth about yet another one of these supplements that many people say can finally relieve your joint pain, then I have good news because collagen absolutely can. Now, I can't promise that it's going to do that for you,

because as with all natural supplements, some just work better for some people than others. Some people respond very well to things, even things that are generally accepted as effective like creatine, while other people do not respond to them at all. But in the case of collagen, there is good scientific evidence that it can indeed reduce joint pain and inflammation and also improve joint health and even benefit people who have healthy joints and aren't experiencing any joint problems, which makes it pretty unique. This is where I would normally plug a sponsor to pay the bills, but I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in.

So instead, I'm just going to quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my 100% natural whey protein powder, Whey Plus. Now this is a naturally sweetened and flavored whey isolate protein powder made from exceptionally high quality milk from small dairy farms in Ireland. Whey Plus also contains no GMOs, hormones, antibiotics, artificial food dyes, fillers, or other unnecessary junk. And if I may say so myself, it also tastes delicious and mixes great. And all that is why Whey Plus has over 1,400 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average and another 600 on my website with a five star average. So if you want a clean, all natural, and great tasting whey protein supplement that's low in calories, carbs, and fat,

then you want to head over to www.legionathletics.com and pick up a bottle of Whey Plus today. And just to show how much I appreciate my podcast peeps, use the coupon code podcast at checkout and you will save 10% on your entire order. And lastly, you should also know that I have a very simple 100% money back guarantee that works like this. You either love my stuff or you get your money back, period. You don't have to return the products. You don't have to fill out forms. You don't have to jump through any other hoops or go through any other shenanigans. So you really can't lose here. Head over to www.lesionathletics.com now, place your order and see for yourself why my supplements have thousands of rave reviews all over the internet. And if for whatever reason, they're just not for you, contact us and we will give you a full refund on the spot. All righty.

That is enough shameless plugging for now, at least. Let's get to the show. All right, so what is collagen? Well, collagen is the main component of your body's connective tissues, which means that it serves as the primary building block for various things in your body, like your skin, your teeth, your cartilage, and even your bones and tendons. And the collagen that is found in supplements comes from the connective tissue in animals, including cows, chickens, and fish. And while there are over 37 different kinds of collagen in animals, they can be divided into two main categories. So you have type 1 collagen, and that's the collagen

that is most abundant in the human body, and it's present in scar tissue, in tendons, ligaments, skin bones, and more. And then you have type 2 collagen, which is the collagen that preserves joint function in particular and also helps protect your joints against damage. Now the main reasons that people take collagen supplements, type one and type two, are to improve their joint health and reduce joint pain. That's type two, of course, and to improve the appearance of their hair, skin, and nails. And that would be type one supplements. Now, you can get collagen from your diet, of course. You can eat foods like organ meats are a good source of collagen, whole fish because of the

bones, good source of collagen, bone broth is a good source of collagen. But of course, most of us don't serve those types of things up very often. And this is why collagen supplements are a more convenient and reliable way to get enough collagen to reap its benefits. Now, speaking of benefits, unfortunately, there isn't much research available on type one collagen supplements, but they may be able to improve skin elasticity and wound healing. We do have some evidence that suggests those things. And unfortunately, as of the time of this recording, there is no good evidence that I know of that they can make your hair, skin, and nails look or feel better. Now, in terms of type two collagen supplements, these are much more promising, at least when

you look at them in the perspective of the scientific literature, because studies show that they can markedly improve joint health and function. And to understand how that works, we first have to look at how joints commonly become dysfunctional and painful in the first place. Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of word of mouth. So if you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it. It really

helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say thank you. You can find me on Instagram at Muscle for Life Fitness, Twitter at Muscle for Life, and Facebook at Muscle for Life Fitness. So your joints are lined with a flexible tissue known as cartilage, and cartilage lubricates your joints, and it also absorbs physical impacts. And this is why having healthy cartilage makes it easy to move around and helps keep your joints pain free. Now, most people who are having joint problems assume that exercise is to blame. They think that, you know, it's all the repetitive impact from running or the repetitive use from squatting and benching that is just taking its toll. And while it seems

to make sense on the surface, it turns out that that's not entirely accurate. While doing too much exercise absolutely can make for achy inflamed joints, research shows that various kinds of exercise that you'd think are harmful to your joints, like long distance running and weightlifting, for example, actually aren't associated with cartilage loss or joint damage. In fact, studies show that regular exercise seems to help keep your joints healthy and working properly and is an effective way to keep your joints healthy and stave off joint pain. Now, if that's the case, why do so many athletes and why do so many exercise enthusiasts suffer from joint pains? Well, many of these people

are dealing with a condition that's actually unrelated to their physical activities, and it is known as arthritis, which is often caused in part by an unwanted immune response to the joint collagen that eats away at the cartilage. So in other words, what happens is your body's immune system mistakenly targets and starts attacking joint cartilage as a foreign unwanted substance. And of course, then over time undermines the structural integrity of your joints. Now, an effective way to combat this is to do things that reduce inflammation in the body. So for example, you can achieve that through healthy dieting, eating plenty of nutritious foods, fruits and vegetables. You can achieve

this through certain types of supplements like fish oil, for example. You can achieve this through other modes of therapy like ice baths or infrared saunas. And another way that you can help your joints out is with type 2 collagen, because studies show that this type of collagen, when taken as a supplement, can help alleviate this arthritic condition by, you could think of it as teaching your immune system to stop attacking the proteins that are in joint cartilage. And once that immune system response is mitigated or turned off, this can significantly improve your joint health and function and decrease or even eliminate pain and swelling altogether. So a good analogy here is vaccination. together. So a good analogy here is vaccination. Type 2 collagen supplements can work like a natural vaccine of sorts, allowing your body to recognize its own joint collagen as a safe

substance. And one of the best things about type 2 collagen supplements is that these effects have been demonstrated both in people with arthritic conditions and people with healthy joints. That's pretty significant because it makes type 2 collagen one of the only supplements that I know of that can help preserve joint health and function as opposed to treating joints that are already damaged and dysfunctional. Now let's talk dosages. For type 1, unfortunately, there really isn't a clinically effective dose because we don't really know if it does anything. But if you want to give it a shot, then I would say go with about two and a half to three grams per day. And for type two collagen, the clinically effective dose appears to be between 10 and

40 milligrams per day for improving joint health and function. And I know that's a rather large range for dosing, but that's because the studies that have shown these benefits have used various doses and it isn't quite clear if more is better. So we know that 10 milligrams is definitely effective, but we don't know that 20, 30, or 40 milligrams is necessarily better than 10. So let's talk bottom line results. What type of results should you expect from collagen supplements? As with all natural supplements, I don't want you to pin unrealistically high expectations on collagen. It's not going to magically give you vibrant glowing skin and nails and luxuriant hair. Joint pain is a rather complex and mysterious phenomenon that is notoriously

hard to deal with. So while type 2 collagen is definitely promising, it may or may not make a difference in your case. Now, as far as type 1 goes, I would say don't expect any results because research indicates it's probably a dud. And if you want to do everything you can to keep your joints healthy and pain-free, then I would say taking a type two collagen supplement is a wise choice, especially when you consider just how important your joints are to your overall health and wellbeing. Because if you have messed up joints, then you're going to find it very hard to do all the things that you want to do, especially as you get older, you're going to

find it very hard to stay in the game. And that's one of the reasons why type two collagen is one of my favorite preventative supplements that you can take. If you have healthy joints, you want to keep them that way. And taking type two collagen is probably going to help. Now I can speak to specific benefits that I know people are achieving with type two collagen because it is in one of my supplements. It's in my joint supplement fortify along with a few other things that reduce inflammation and improve joint health and function. And the main benefit that I hear about from customers is fewer joint aches and pains during everyday activities, and especially during and after exercise. A little caveat though, is I wouldn't expect immediate results. It actually usually takes a couple months for a type two collagen supplement to noticeably impact your joint health

and function. And that's one of the reasons why we have included a couple other ingredients in Fortify that are faster acting. Now, side effects. That's another thing that many people wonder about with any supplement. Does collagen have any side effects? And the quick answer here is no. Collagen is about as harmless of a supplement as you can find. And that means that while there is a very small percentage of people who are not going to respond well to it because they are simply allergic to certain forms of collagen, the vast majority of us are going to tolerate it just fine. Now, if you are reaching for your wallet, ready to go shopping for collagen, don't buy anything just yet because you should know that not all collagen supplements are the same and particularly type two, not all type two collagen

supplements are the same. The only kind of collagen supplement that has been shown to significantly improve joint health is an undenatured type 2 collagen. Now, undenatured means that the collagen proteins haven't been broken down or modified during processing. And this is important because popular methods of commercial processing use chemical and heat to alter the collagen's basic form. And that process is known as denaturing it. And studies show that denatured collagen cannot produce the same beneficial results as undenatured collagen, which is in its more natural state. And that of course is why my joint supplement Fortify contains undenatured type two collagen. So the bottom line here is if you want to improve your skin and your hair and

your nail health, then type 1 collagen supplements probably won't help. You can try them, but they probably won't make any kind of noticeable difference. And if you are one of the many people who regularly struggles with joint pain or joint aches, then there's a good chance that taking an undenatured type 2 collagen supplement can help. Studies show they can help reduce joint inflammation and swelling, and can also help stop your body's immune system from destroying the cartilage in your joints. Now, you do have to be careful though. You have to pick the right kind of collagen supplement. Remember, undenatured type 2 collagen is on iTunes or wherever you're listening from. This not only convinces people that they should check the show out, it also increases its search visibility and thus helps more people find their way to me and learn how

to build their best bodies ever too. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then just subscribe to the podcast and you won't miss out on any of the new goodies. Lastly, if you didn't like something about the show, then definitely shoot me an email at mike at muscleforlife.com and share your thoughts on how you think it could be better. I read everything myself and I'm always looking for constructive feedback, so please do reach out. All right, that's it. Thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon. And lastly, this episode is brought to you by me. Seriously, though, I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in. So instead, I'm going to just quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my 100% natural whey protein powder, Whey Plus. Now, this is a naturally

sweetened and flavored whey isolate protein powder made from exceptionally high quality milk from small dairy farms in Ireland. Whey Plus also contains no GMOs, hormones, antibiotics, artificial food dyes, fillers, or other unnecessary junk. And if I may say so myself, it also tastes delicious and mixes great. And all that is why way plus has over 1,400 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average and another 600 on my website with a five star average. So if you want a clean, all-natural, and great-tasting whey protein supplement that's low in calories, carbs, and fat,

then you wanna head over to www.legionathletics.com and pick up a bottle of Whey Plus today. And just to show how much I appreciate my podcast peeps, use the coupon code P at checkout and you will save 10% on your entire order. or you get your money back, period. You don't have to return the products. You don't have to fill out forms. You don't have to jump through any other hoops or go through any other shenanigans.

So you really can't lose here. Head over to www.lesionathletics.com now, place your order, and see for yourself why my supplements have thousands of rave reviews all over the internet. And if for whatever reason, they're just not for you, contact us and we will give you a full refund on the spot.