COMMUNITY: A final look at supplements

Editor's note: Adam Rees is founder of GRIT GYM, a gym based on results, creating a culture and lifestyle of performance, strength, health and freedom to live life on your own terms. Rees attended Wartburg, worked under nationally recognized strength coach Matt McGettigan at ISU and generally is a glutton for information and improvement in all forms.

It is easy to observe the love-hate spectrum for supplements in our world today.

One extreme likens supplements as simple as whey protein with the unnatural gift giving power of steroids, ephedrine, Human Growth Hormone, ampethatimes or a myostatin blocker. The other extreme supports a supplement industry by buying their products, and usually from companies that aren't even in the business of helping people.

The truth is certain supplements can aid our daily life. It's also true you will not fulfill all of your nutritional needs from your diet alone.

Supplements should never replace anything in your diet and there is not one supplement that exists that will overturn a poor diet/workout or even a mediocre diet/workout.

In the first pieces about supplementation, it became overwhelmingly apparent how much interest as well as confusion there is on this topic. This piece is to get clear.

This is 99.99 percent of the population's stack (a group of supplements taken everyday):

• Fish oil - It is an absolute must for this to come from a good source and it usually will be expensive. Otherwise it is not worth it.
• Probiotic - The gut is the most evolved part of all animals, it's health determines the health of everything else. Any probiotic is good. Fermented foods are great for you and for this but not complete.
• Vitamin D3 - The evidence is conclusive. Just take it. Extra won't hurt you and the government is extremely undershooting your needs with an RDA of 600iu.
• Greens drink - This has nothing to do with green tea or the amphetamines professional athletes use to stay alert during performances. It is an assortment of vegetables, grasses and algae's made into a powder that you mix with water. It's about alkalinity, which is to bring the body away from an acidic state. In an alkaline state we heal much faster and are much healthier in general.

These are your top four musts every single day. I'm not asking the athletes I train to understand or to agree with me, but I'm asking them to trust me.

• For more of Rees' advice go to www.GRITGYM.com/resources and adamrees.blogspot.com. Email Rees at adam@gritgym.com Adam Rees