Unlike what I’ve read at the PETA website, I do not believe idioms that mention animals or meat can be compared to homophobic and racist language.

I can’t see for the life of me how telling someone to “Hold your horses” in any way shape or form sends what the PETA people call the “mixed signals” that can “normalize” animal abuse. (PETA suggests “Hold your phone” instead and even offers lesson plans and posters to teachers to engender such change.)

That’s why the admission I’m about to make contains two old-time idioms. I sincerely hope you don’t take offense.

Sometimes I kill two birds with one stone in an effort to bring home the bacon.

Like today.

An article I’ve just written for the cycling crazed who read RoadBikeRider.com also contains some really good stuff for those who don’t ride much or exercise at all. In fact, I write that I don’t care if you cycle a lot or the only riding you do is on an electric cart when you shop at Walmart.

To help your health, you should be taking 5 grams of creatine every day of every month forevermore.

Creatine, a chemical found naturally in the body as well as in red meat and seafood, helps in the creation of energy for muscles, so you can see why I suggested it to cyclists - despite a pretty big bugaboo. The research to determine if it actually improves cycling performance is uneven at best.

But cyclists tend to lose muscle mass when they ride more total miles in the summer. The older ones also need to stymie sarcopenia, the natural muscle loss that occurs with aging.

No other legal supplement combines with weightlifting to increase muscle mass or limit the loss of it as effectively as creatine. No expert would argue otherwise.

In fact, if supplements were hockey players, creatine is Wayne Gretzky and Gordie Howe combined.

But the reason I wrote a second article for RBR.com about the benefits of creatine less than six month after the first one is because of how much good taking it does anyone - including that aforementioned guy riding an electric cart at Walmart.

He’s probably using that cart because he’s in poor health.

If that’s because of type 2 diabetes, taking 5 grams of daily creatine could help. According to a study published in the February 2021 issue of Nutrients, small-scale trials using creatine monohydrate supplementation to combat type 2 diabetes have been “promising.”

More importantly, the same paper found a “growing body of evidence” that creatine has “potential therapeutic effects” for cancer, muscle dystrophy and neurodegenerative disorders.

Combine that with prior research suggesting creatine may help improve memory and brain function in older adults and vegetarians (meat and fish are the greatest sources of natural creatine); help treat diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease; aid those who have had ischemic strokes, brain or spinal cord injuries, or suffer from epilepsy; and you understand why the original article I wrote likens creatine to a Swiss Army knife.

Yet all the positives already explained can be topped by another revealed in the same journal one month later.

What seals the deal, makes daily use of 5 grams of creatine (though big dudes may need a bit more) a no-brainer, is a review of creatine found it can have a positive effect on your immune system by working as an antioxidant against free radicals.

That’s a big deal, a truly bid deal.

You produce free radicals naturally in your body, mainly as a byproduct of metabolic processes, inflammation, or exercise. You encounter them from outside sources as well, as part of pollution, pesticides, industrial solvents, radiation, prescription and non-prescription drugs, cigarette smoke - and also because there’s a growing hole in the ozone.

Left unabated, they accelerate the aging process and increase the likelihood of the incidence of disease, including heart disease and cancer. Your immune system, though, produces antioxidants to negate free-radical damage and also knows how to use the ones found in found in foods to aid the process.

But this one-two punch can fall short against an onslaught of free radicals, one that can occur if the exercise you do requires more than a moderate effort. So even if using creatine doesn’t guarantee a cyclist a faster time in a race or a charity ride, they should still use the stuff to help their overall health - and you should too.

Weightlifters usually start the supplementing process by one week of overloading, by ingesting 5 grams four separate times a day. You don’t need to do that though it can’t hurt. You can take a single dose of 5 grams per day (or more accurately 0.3 g/kg body weight) ad infinitum.

While studies have determined ingesting a carb/protein mixture with the creatine enhances its assimilation, many people prefer to add it to a hot beverage like tea or coffee. Not only does the heat in the beverage insure dissolution, but the creatine, which is tasteless, appears to work synergistically with caffeine.