Let's get this straight. I WAS an all-natural bodybuilder. I've moved on to other things now, but I'm still natural and always will be. Most commonly, when you say you're all natural, folks immediately say they don't take steriods. But there's a whole host of other things you can't take as well, like anything that would inhibit your insulin production, prescription diet pills, prescription diauretecs. I did not take anything banned by the International Olympic Committee. If you recall the olympics, there was a skater (or was it a gymnast) who was disqualified because of cold medicine with an ephedra-like substance in it. We sell a drink at our gym called Thermospeed, and my boss who doubled as my trainer, would not even let me drink it.
I don't remember if creatine was on the list or not. Anyway, whether or not that is totally banned by all-natural bodybuilding or not, I still wouldn't and don't take it. I did take a wide assortment of vitamins, and some flax seed oil capsules. I drank whey-based protein shakes and "Pure Protein" bars when food wasn't convenient. They actually constipated me terribly, so I tried not to make a habit of them. Toward the end, I didn't even use those--just food, mainly tuna. I took some over-the-counter laxatives and diauretics the last couple of days before the show. OTC laxatives and diauretics are not banned. You feel terrible but you look great!!?!? Wait a minute, that's now how it's supposed to be, is it????
Before the day of the show, "all-natural" shows require you to take a polygraph at your own expense where they ask you to go over this list of stuff. First you go over everything that you take with the examiner before the machine is hooked up. Then the examiner asks, "Have you taken XYZ for the purpose OF THIS CONTEST?" after the machine is on. That way, if you had a legitimate medical reason to take these substances, you're not going to register as lying. I've never known anyone to fail, but if you do fail, you lose all your entry fee money.
I purposely don't thinks shakes and bars are a necessity, just convenient is all. I think Arnold said it best when he talked about his early days as a bodybuilder. In his book, he said that all those shakes and bars weren't available when he was buffing up, or if they were, they hadn't made it to Austria yet. I figure if he didn't need them, why do I!
