For those who use these can you share your experience whether they work or not? Looks like they have a supplement for anything! I hate the taste (and the poor ingredients) of their gels but their bars rock and got the multivitamin a month ago (Premium Insurance Caps-Weird name!!!) and really liked the results.
Some stuff is really expensive when you look at the key ingredient. Something they sell “Race Caps Supreme” consists of Vitamin E, Calcium and magnesium and it is $50 Do these actually help anything?
Just a waste of $$$, JFT
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I use the race caps supremes and must say I feel a bit better during the workout. I only use them before a long or hard training session and sparringly at that due to the cost. I also find I recover faster, nothing scientific, maybe even the placebo effect but that is my experience. I am not a Hammer fan, I don’t like their fueling products but do find their nutritional supplements to be good.
I use their nutrition products a lot, but supplements only now and then. I like their stuff, but if you follow all their advice, it seems like you’d be taking 30 pills a day.
I’m sold on and suggest their supplements to my athletes. I use PICs and Race Caps. Try them–they’re very worth it!
I use the Race Caps Supreme and agree with others that they are expensive and use them sparingly. I also have used MAP(BioBuilde) which cost around the same. Pros and Cons for each but they DO help my long and hard workouts as well as recovery time.
PROs for Race Cap Supreme
taste WAY better…no taste or after taste
Combine shipping when buying othere Hammer products
Gel caps dissolve better/faster without indigestion
Go down easier during a race
I seem to have to take less Race Caps than BioBuilde
Cons for Race Cap Supreme
if they get wet you’ve got a mess
subject to sticking together in bottle even with the little gel pack we’re not supposed to eat
Pro/Con for MAP BioBuilde
You can get two for one deals periodically
Con…taste like sand paper going down along with indigestion sometimes
THEY BOTH HAVE MADE A DIFFERENCE TO MY PERFORMANCES
For those who use these can you share your experience whether they work or not? Looks like they have a supplement for anything! I hate the taste (and the poor ingredients) of their gels but their bars rock and got the multivitamin a month ago (Premium Insurance Caps-Weird name!!!) and really liked the results.
Some stuff is really expensive when you look at the key ingredient. Something they sell “Race Caps Supreme” consists of Vitamin E, Calcium and magnesium and it is $50 Do these actually help anything?
I have had very good results for years with Perpetuem and Endurolytes in long rides/runs and races. I lose interest in what they have to offer quickly after that: don’t think many healthy athletes benefit from all those supplements. I think the customers just end up with very expensive urine.
The Rebekah Keat affair did not help Hammer’s standing in the world either, FWIW. I use Clif products mostly now.
First 2 IM’s eating on the bike lead to GI trouble. I switched to Hammer products, and have had 8 IM’s with no GI. I use Sustained Energy mixed thick in my jetstream, then add Hammer Gel to the concoction. I add water or gatorade along the course to dilute it as I go. I swear by the stuff. I’ve also tried Energy surge, race caps supreme, anti-fatigue caps, and Premium Insurance caps, but don’t use anymore, didn’t see much difference. Sustained Energy (maltodextrin, similar to Iron Fuel) was a saviour to me.
Oh, how could I forget…Enduralytes (sodium capsules)… A must have!
I’ve been using Hammer products for some time now. The Endurolytes are a must for longer races especially in the heat. I have tried using Anti-Fatigue caps but not sure if I gained anything. During an IM, I didn’t like having to take all of the pills every hour so now its only Endurolytes. I like Perpetum but at times I feel like I need additional calories so for my next IM I will add one of their bars. Espresso Hammer Gel is my favorite and using it to augment my calorie intake. I also have tried Race Day Boost with limited success. It seems to work better (at least for me) for short races.
My story sounds similar to others here. I started with the line-up of stuff, taking Premium and race day, super a’s, mito caps, you name it. Money was going fast, so I simplified to the essentials. Perpetuem, HEED I still use on most hour plus rides and races, as well as the electrolyte caps for races only but that’s it from them. I really love the recoverite and whey protein also, in fact for recovery I felt these products were the most important, but again too expensive for the amount of training day in day out. I just went to the local nutrition store to find a cheaper protein isolate, which has some added chemicals in it that the hammer doesn’t but for now it seems to working fine (the whole reason I started using hammer was the quality/purity of the product). I also bought a bulk of pure glutamine, nothing added to it, which gives the special kick the Hammer whey and recoverite deliver.
I use the multi vitamin but the only thing I notice is that it turns my pee neon for most of the day. Not sure how anyone could tell a difference between one vitamin and the next. I just take them and hope they are better than the GNC vitamin I used before. I do like the Heed, Sustained Energy and Recoverite. It is a very mild flavor mix which is really nice when it is hot out after 3+ hours on the bike. I think a lot of the other vitamin stuff is just marketing. It might be better than competing products but does anyone really need it? Who knows. But scientists proove over and over that the placebo effect is real so if you convince yourself that it will help then maybe it will.
The Rebekah Keat affair did not help Hammer’s standing in the world either, FWIW. I use Clif products mostly now.
I’m glad you’ve referred to it as the “Rebekah Keat Affair” and not the Hammer Nutrition Affair.
I used their products for training and recovery (Endurolytes, Perpetuem, and Recoverite) all year. THe first half of the year I used Optygen HP and felt it helped with my recovery (the day after a 20 mile run I felt great riding up some hills and a couple people were suprised at how strong I was for running 20 miles the day before). I switched to Hammer supplements and didn’t notice a change in how I felt (between Optygen and Hammer products). I still felt great the day after long or hard workouts.
Hi,
I used E-caps with my partner in the transrockies. That was our only endurolyte and worked very well, assuming you followed the discipline of taking as prescribed.
My partner used Perpetuem almost exclusively and it worked extremely well. I already had a big stock of maltodextrin and so made my own comparable mix using protein and soy lecithin. Mine tasted disgusting and mixing it was a challenge (you have to add the lecithin consistently to provide lubrication) but the tase could probably have been improved easily enough with some milk shake mix. I think my recipe was a big $ saving on buying Perpeteum. I would save the real stuff for races and make my own for training.
I believe their best product to be Recoverite. It definitely seemed to provide an improved recovery for the 7 day race. If you have time etc and access to facilities I am sure that wouldn’t be hard to replicate, although it seems to have a lot more special stuff in it than perpeteum.
I don’t like the gels, but do use the Liquid Endurance before big events.
I have visited their facilities in Montana, they seemed pretty good at answering telephone calls; it certainly seemed as if 90% of callers were future IM competitors. Steve Born impressed the hell out of me, and I left with a feeling of trusting their product.