Stimol
Stimol is a proprietary compound whose scientific name is citrulline malate. It has been clinically proven to drastically increase aerobic energy production during exercise and reduce fatigue.
Citrulline malate is made up of the nonessential amino acid citrulline and malate, or malic acid, which is an organic acid.
There are four key benefits of Stimol: 1) It increases aerobic energy production during exercise; 2) it enhances muscle performance during exercise; 3) it neutralizes fatigue-causing by-products of exercise metabolism; and 4) it accelerates post-exercise muscle refueling. Let’s look at each of these benefits separately:
Increased Aerobic Energy
A study published in the British Journal of Medicine found that daily supplementation with Stimol’s active ingredient resulted in a 34% increase in aerobic energy production. Increasing the aerobic contribution to energy needs during exercise is important because unlike anaerobic metabolism, aerobic metabolism is very efficient and produces no fatigue causing by-products. So, the more energy your muscles can produce aerobically, the longer they can keep working before fatigue sets in.
The common name for Stimol is citrulline malate. The malate component of this natural compound plays an important and limiting role in aerobic metabolism. Malate contributes to a part of aerobic metabolism that is known as the TCA cycle. The TCA cycle is a very complex process that uses oxygen to transform pyruvate molecules into ATP molecules, which provide the energy for muscle contractions. Although malate participates in only one step of this process, it is considered a rate limiter because when more malate is made available, the potential rate of aerobic metabolism increases. This appears to be why Stimol supplementation increases aerobic output.
Enhanced Muscle Performance
During high-intensity exercise, one of the main causes of muscle fatigue is muscular acidosis, or loss of pH balance in the muscle tissue. Muscular acidosis results from anaerobic metabolism in the muscles, which produces acidic by-products. Aerobic metabolism does not produce these by-products and does not cause acidosis.
For this reason, the more energy your muscles produce aerobically at any given exercise intensity, and the less they produce anaerobically, the longer they can continue working at that intensity. In the British Journal of Medicine Study mentioned above, subjects taking a citrulline malate supplement were able to sustain a higher intensity of exercise at a constant muscle pH level. In other words, their muscle performance improved, thanks to a boost in aerobic metabolism.
Better Clearance of Fatigue Causing By-products
During very high-intensity and very prolonged exercise, the body produces large amounts of ammonia, a toxic by-product of muscle protein breakdown. The accumulation of ammonia in the muscles and blood may contribute to muscle fatigue. Animal studies have shown that citrulline supplementation enhances the body’s ability to “buffer” ammonia produced during exercise.
Citrulline specializes in removing ammonia from the body. It helps transform ammonia into urea in the liver. Urea then passes through the kidneys to the bladder, where it is excreted in the urine. Due to its important role in ammonia detoxification, citrulline is most abundant in the liver.
Another by-product of high-intensity anaerobic energy production is hydrogen protons, which are produced with lactate and cause fatigue by making the muscles too acidic to functional optimally. Stimol has been shown to effectively clear lactate away from the muscles and restore normal muscle pH balance during post-exercise recovery.
Excess lactate is also cleared away from the muscles in the urea cycle. Studies have shown that when higher levels of citrulline are available in the blood during exercise, blood lactate levels are lower. While lactate is not a direct cause of muscle fatigue, blood lactate levels are closely linked to the events that cause muscle fatigue due to muscular acidosis.
Faster Muscle Recovery After Exercise
During very intense exercise, muscle energy comes primarily from anaerobic breakdown of a compound called phosphocreatine. The supply of phosphocreatine in the muscles is very small—large enough to last roughly 15 seconds at maximum intensity. The faster you can replenish this fuel source after a heavy set of weightlifting or a high-intensity cardio interval, the more total sets or intervals you can do before you’re exhausted, and the more benefit you’ll get from the workout.
After maximum-intensity exercise, the aerobic TCA cycle mentioned above helps replenish phosphocreatine stores. By enabling the TCA cycle to proceed more rapidly, Stimol supplementation allows for faster recovery after maximum-intensity muscle work. In other words, it appears that Stimol accelerates phosphocreatine replenishment by enhancing aerobic metabolism.
The bottom line: With Stimol you will be able to work out harder, longer, with less fatigue, and make faster progress, whether your goal is to burn fat, build muscle, increase your endurance, or improve your sports performance.