Oct. 15, 2025

The Supplement Episode Every Man Over 40 Needs to Hear Before Buying Anything Else - 9

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Season 1NutritionFitness

Supplements: What Works, What’s Hype, and How to Choose Wisely

You walk into a supplement store, and every label promises more muscle, faster recovery, and a better body.

But what’s actually worth it, and what’s just expensive marketing?


In this episode, Coach Brian Parana breaks down the truth about supplements for men over 40.


You’ll learn what the science really says about the products you’ve been told to take and the ones quietly wasting your time and money.


Coach Brian shares on some of the supplement companies that got caught cutting corners and faking results, while spotlighting the few brands that do it right.


He unpacks what to look for on a label, when supplements actually make a difference, and how to build a stack that supports your goals instead of draining your wallet.


Inside this episode:

  • The essential supplements that actually move the needle for strength, muscle, and energy.
  • The hidden differences between “good enough” and “third-party tested” quality.
  • Real stories of fraud from big-name brands that got caught deceiving customers.
  • The trusted companies that go the extra mile for transparency and performance.
  • How to personalize your supplement plan so it fits your training and lifestyle, not someone else’s.

If you’ve ever wondered whether your supplements are helping or just creating expensive urine, this is the episode that finally gives you clarity.

Hit play and learn how to separate fact from hype, so every scoop, capsule, and dollar actually counts toward your goals.



Follow @coachbrianparana for more success stories, tips and tricks for men to 🔥melt away belly fat



👉 Join at www.thecalltorise.com to lose 20+ lbs in 100-days Fat Loss Challenge.

Want help applying this to your own health, weight, energy, or lab numbers?

Coach Brian Parana offers Health Hot Seat coaching segments for men who want a clear next step with nutrition, fitness, weight loss, blood pressure, cholesterol, A1C, or daily consistency.

Learn more about The Call To Rise, a 100-day coaching program for driven men over 40 who want to lose weight, improve their health, and rebuild confidence:

www.thecalltorise.com

To connect with Coach Brian:
brian@brianparana.com

Disclaimer: This podcast is for education and coaching support only. It is not medical advice. Always work with your physician before changing medication, treatment, or medical care.

  • Welcome to Driven for Health, the podcast for men over 40 who are ready to take control of their nutrition, fitness, body's energy, and ultimately their lives. I'm Coach Brian Piranha, and for over 23 years, I've been helping men just like you lose fat around the waistline, build strength in those biceps, feel confident with your clothes on or off, in a body you're proud to show off.
  • Today we're diving into the top of the nutritional pyramid for muscle and strength. We're focused on supplements today. Not the vitamins, minerals like last episode, but the sports performance kinds, ones that you want to know what the little secret is of the in this potion thing that's going to help break through putting 25 pounds on your bench overnight and burn the fat. Those type of things.
  • and we're going to separate what actually works from what's hype. We're going to break down how to choose highquality products and explore which supplements can support your strength, your muscle, your fat loss goals. We're going to skip on on the garbage products, the marketing gimmicks, the flashy claims.
  • If you're just going to stick to good old sciencebacked strategies and supplements to help you make informed decisions and choices to get the most out of your training, your nutrition, and your budget, right? A lot of those supplements can add up quickly in your pocketbook. Let's get started. Now, we're at the top of the nutrition pyramid. All right, the tip top.
  • We went over a variety of the other ones. And this part of the pyramid is the one that often gets the most height, even though it's actually the least important for building strength, muscle, achieving performance, your goals. I think last week we last episode we talked about how we flip the flip that pyramid upside down and have the weakest point supporting it all.
  • And that's what this is. In prior episodes, we covered things like calories, nutrient timing. We've gone over energy balance, macronutrients, fiber, micronutrients, hydration, vitamins, minerals, and how this all effectively stacks on one another. And in our next episode, we'll start to wrap up the pyramid with lifestyle behavior changes.
  • This is arguably the most important layer of all, but for now, let's just focus on the things that supplements can do with your diet and training and results when used correctly. They can actually increase your performance, your recovery, and overall health. We just have to make sure that we're getting the right brands and the right dosage.
  • It's in the dose oftentimes, too. Supplements are just that. They are supplemental to nutrition. They're not magic pills, shortcuts, or replacements for real food. Most come from food sources, herbs, natural compounds. And when we use them correctly, they actually support your health, your training, your results, your body.
  • But before you buy anything, here are two key questions you can think about. Number one is quality. Does what's on the label match what's actually in the bottle? Number two, validity and effectiveness. Does it actually do anything? And is it effective and meaningful? Okay, those are two things.
  • Does the label match what's in the bottle? And does it actually do anything? Let's go with quality first. What's really in a bottle? First up, this is a big one. Third party lab testing. You know, it's easy for a company to say, "Oh, our product is pure, contains exactly what it says it does." But how do we know that for sure? That's where third-party testing comes into play.
  • It means an independent unbiased lab has analyze the product to verify its contents. They're checking it for contaminants, heavy metals, and most importantly confirming that the actual amount of the active ingredients, whether it's protein, creatine, or whatever, is actually what the label claims. A reputable company will make the lab results readily available.
  • They'll often have a dedicated page on their website where you can look up the batch number of the product you purchased and see the certificate of analysis. That's pretty in-depth. You don't find that and you definitely find that in the 90s, the 2000s either, even 2010s. There's just more marketing, marketing, marketing, hype, hype, hype.
  • Sometimes they'll even include a QR code on the bottle that links directly to the results. If a company is hiding this information or can't produce it, it probably could be seen as a major red flag. That's basically saying you have to take our word for it. And in this industry of supplements, billions of dollars, that's a risky bet that I personally am not going to to do.
  • What we want to do is talk about third party certifications. Now, these are quality assurance badges. You see them on the labels themselves. They show that a product has been audited, certified by an independent organization. A few of them you'll want to keep an eye on. These are the important ones. USP, NSF, and GMP seals of approval.
  • Let's jump into what some of those are. USP is United States Pharmacopia. It's a nonprofit organization that sets standards for the quality, purity, and strength of a dietary supplement. And when you see their seal, it means the product has passed a lot of rigorous tests. Okay, USP. The next one is NSF, National Sanitation Foundation.
  • This is another big one, especially the NSF certified for sport program. This is often perceived as the gold standard for athletes. If it has this one, you know, say like college bands or anything, it's not going to be an issue for a band substance. And and that's really important because it's not only been tested for the purity and content, but it has been screened of other upwards of 270 band substances that are on that list.
  • And if you are getting drug tested, this would be the one you'd really pay a lot of attention to. GMP is good manufacturing practices. This seal indicates that the facility where the supplement was actually follows strict rules to enhance the product and is consistently produced and controlled according to quality standards.
  • Think of it as a stamp of approval of the manufacturing process itself. They come in and poof right onto the label GMP. And also consider licensed ingredient sources. Some of the best supplement companies don't just use generic versions of an ingredient. They use a special specific trademark version that is known for its quality and backed by plenty of research.
  • An example is going to be creatine monohydrate. blanketly. Creatine monohydrate is the creatine you would want to use. But we can look a layer deeper and there is a widely recognized and trusted form called Creopure. You'll see their logo on the label of highquality creatine products.
  • Creopure with a little R in a circle is made in Germany and it's known for being the purest form of creatine on the market. and it'd be worth maybe a couple extra bucks to ensure that you actually got that brand. Now, when a company actually uses these ingredients, they're not just saying, "Yeah, we have creatine," they're saying, "We're using a specific licensed form of creatine that has a reputation known for its quality, efficacy, and often this can apply to other ingredients that you have to just look for trademark names that you can go research." Here's
  • the the key thing you actually want to avoid is proprietary blends. If a company has a product list that's 30 ingredients but doesn't disclose dosages, please just skip past. Save your money. Keep it in your wallet. You really want to know how much of what is in this thing because it could have all 30, but it could just not be a good viable amount that you would want or need to get the results that you are after that supplement.
  • Let's focus on say right now the validity and the effectiveness and does it actually work? Validity, does it have any benefit at all? just it's a really relevant question. The effectiveness is this effect significant enough to justify using it? Some supplements work, but the effect may be so tiny and small, it it just might not be worth it.
  • Simple resources to find more on these. I love examine.com. This website's been around for a long time. It's evidence-based supplement analysis with the studying the quality grading and the effectiveness size of the dose and the product itself. It will give you an in-depth number knowledge all the things that you need on that website of a specific supplement itself.
  • The journal of the international society of sports nutrition. This is open access science on everything from creatine to nutrient timing. You might find it as Jisn for short. And that is another resource that you could do. You could just literally search creatine J I SSN. Put that into your search bar and you will be able to find what you need.
  • Or put Creapure. That's C R E A P U R E. Creapure. creatine and you'll find brands that actually use it pretty quick. Supplements that actually work. Here is a simple list. It's broken into essential and conditional categories. I've also added the ones we didn't cover in previous episodes. Vitamins and minerals and don't need to go over those again.
  • Now, essential supplements. These things are are really good. Protein powders. They're everywhere and they're widely used. Food science has gotten significantly better. We're not really worried about chalky powders or things like that. It's significantly better these days. This helps with convenience, with ease, with muscle growth, repair.
  • They taste good. The Fruity Pebble kind flavor is some of my favorite. Good old vanilla chocolate goes well, too. There are so many different kinds out there that you could really make enjoyable food from. I just side note, I love mixing it in with my cereal, my oatmeal, my cottage cheese, yogurt, mix it into pancakes, waffles, muffins, just to name a few.
  • And there are widely available recipes online that you could find high protein pancakes online and not default to say Kodiak cakes. To be honest, you're paying a lot more for that particular brand name to have a little bit more protein inside that product. It's I think it was like five maybe seven grams per serving more.
  • It's not necessarily significant amount to pay what the extra amount of money might be. Breaking down protein powders way fast digesting. It's great for post-workouts. It's great for times in the day that's super busy and need something for convenience. We have casein. It's like Wei's sister. Quin way gets skimmed off the top of the the milk dairy process and casein is a slow digestion ideal before bed.
  • Another really cool thing you can do with casein is actually make protein whip. Chocolate protein whip turns into if you put it into that with some say for me I'd probably put oat milk in because I enjoy that combo and I'd put it into a mixer KitchenAid mixer and you turn it on and you whip it for eight minutes or so.
  • It volumizes and fills up the whole container. You freeze it. Now you have a mock ice cream. It's very good. the protein whip, plant-based soy, pea, and other varieties. These are, again, food science has come a long way. They taste a lot better than they have in the past. It's not like you're going to be scooping in quotations grass into your your shake or something.
  • And you'd want to trial and error some of these. There's so many brands out there that I didn't even necessarily need to specify which ones would be productive for you. You could just literally go to grocery store, probably not say Walmart, but you can go to a lot of grocery stores and get some of the more name brand ones or on Amazon and just look at reviews.
  • People are really good at calling brands out these days, especially in the socials. Let's say a plant-based one could be Vega, Vega G- A. That one's been pretty popular. Or Garden for Life, they have a high protein, lower carb one as well for plant-based. And that's what you're going to get.
  • Regular protein is going to have powder is going to have a little bit of carbs, a little bit of fat, a lot of protein. A whey isolate is going to have a lot of protein, no carbs, no fats. Okay, those are the differences there. Now, the plant-based one is going to have a lot more carbs associated with it because of the food source itself.
  • soy peas as an example. They have carbs in them and naturally you'll have carbs into that powder. The second one, and you could even think of these as listed in order of priority, but creatine monohydrate. It's proven for decades now. All right? It's cheap, it's safe, you can get it anywhere, just creatine monohydrate.
  • And if you want to make sure they have that extra layer of protection there on a quality supplement, the Creopure brand name is what you're going to look for. 5 g is always the undertone. It's basically a scoop every day. And you can take it long term. You don't have to cycle on and off. You don't even have to have a loading phase of it either.
  • You can just take it and that's fine. Next up is beta alanine. Uh, this reduces muscle fatigue and helps with longer training sessions. But you need three to four grams of this in a day is sufficient. EPA and DHA, fish oils, omega-3 fatty acids. Yes, please. We definitely want this to reduce inflammation.
  • They help with joints, with connective tissues, with heart health. Might even be able to improve your mood. Now, we're looking to aim for two to three grams of combined EPA and DHA in a day. All right. Vitamin D3 K2. We talked about that last time. Remember, said upwards of 5,000 IUs.
  • And this is something that get the sun, but if you can't, then you can supplement with this caffeine. Yes, please. Right. 200 to 400 milligrams is probably the upper range of most people. A cup of coffee say average is about 100 and espresso about 100. A lot of the beginner energy drinks are going to be about 100 150 grams of milligrams of caffeine.
  • Some of the bigger boys, Monsters, Rain, Bang, and a variety of other ones, they'll be 300 milligrams. It's important to note the dosage that is in them. One hack that I've done is I've actually taken my energy drink. Say it's got a 200 milligrams or even 300. I will mix it in to 40 ounces. So, I'll take the big can, the taller ones.
  • I'll pour that in my 40 container and I'll fill the rest with water. that helps dilute the caffeine out and then over 40 ounces of liquid and that then I can drink it a little bit longer over the course of say an hour or two and that can just prolong that big hit and bang of caffeine and the jitters and all that stuff that that causes.
  • That's the stuff that we we really really don't want. Now, we already covered multivitamins. One a day is fine. calcium. If you feel like you don't have good calcium, you could take one gram a day. Now, branch chain amino acids, you have your essential and non-essential amino acids, leucine, isolucine, valine, and it's not necessary, especially proven in recent times, that you don't even have to take branch chain amino acids.
  • And before is all the rage. You you'd just get the you get that that container that was, you know, 3 4 in tall and you'd unscrew and it's half full, right? That one. And it'd have a 30-day supply for $40. Yeah. You don't necessarily need to take those anymore. As long as, guys, you're getting 140, 170, 200 grams of protein consistently with your strength workouts.
  • Llutamine supports muscle function and recovery. It's useful for heavy training and stress periods. For llutamine, there's going to be this can be found in natural food sources, eggs, beef, skim milk, tofu, a little bit in white rice or corn. On the low end, five grams per day up to 45 grams per day in say a six week cycle.
  • If you're going to do something like that, you might be cycling off of it after you do. Now, somewhere, let's find the range in the middle. 10 15 grams could be somewhat effective, but again, you would want to make sure that you are paying attention to it and adding it into your day. I personally am not necessarily going to go out of my way to grab a glutamine for my basic day-to-day life and I don't know if you need to either.
  • Carbohydrate supplements. We'll see lots of bars and goos and different things that have carbs in them. If you're an endurance athlete, yes, totally. And then maybe even if you are working hard in the gym, you could have supplements that have carbohydrates in them. Or you could just eat say rice cake with honey, lots of carbs there, way cheaper than any supplement.
  • Graham crackers, lots of carbs, pretty cheap. Pretzels, lots of carbs, pretty cheap. You get the gist. I wouldn't necessarily buy carbohydrate supplements or bars or goose or something like even gummy bears fit that bill. Weight gainers. These are your high calorie combos of protein, carbs. I mean, a scoop can have of this stuff could be you four or 500 calories by far.
  • Carnitine. How much of this is important? Well, it helps with energy metabolism and may support recovery. doses for alcarnitine can be 500 milligrams to 3,000 with if you are actually working out maybe you're at a,000
  • milligrams if you wanted to. I'm not necessarily going to be using that. HMBB hydroxymethylate. It's a anti catabolic substance that helps reduce muscle breakdown during say a cutting phase or in moments where you're really pushing hard and overreaching your body. Three grams a day can help with this during really intense training cycles.
  • That rounds out a lot of our list of the supplements. Let's check in with a couple credible brands. I wanted to leave you with a couple here that are credible and then some that aren't. So, we're going to go with the ones that aren't. USP Labs. They had things like Jack 3D or Oxy Elite Pro.
  • In 2015, they got slapped with mislabeling causing liver injuries, injuries, a lot of problems. Legendary Supplements sold products that had designer steroids in them. No wonder they gave you a boost. Blackstone Labs had some other legal compounds in them. Bountiful company or Nature's Bounty and Sundown brands.
  • They crossed FTC fines for fake reviews on sites like Amazon, Pro SUPS USA. This is as say 2025 for mislabeling BCAAs and product calories saying that there was zero calories and actually had 50 calories. And so they got some finds. Some of the key takeaways is again we go back to the USP, NSF or using the GMP ways to test.
  • We just want to also be careful of big claims without any particular evidence that outside being anecdotal or just said this. I notice a really good boost, right? You hear those things all the time. I started taking this and I up my squat rate 500% something. That's that's not it. So, we do want to stick with some reputable brands.
  • Here's a couple. Citadel Nutrition. They have transparent lab results, licensed ingredient sources, and no proprietary blends. Thorn has evident evidence evidencebased products that have third party validation. And that's why you see them so much. Now Foods does a lot of independent testing as well for consistency and their quality.
  • Caged Muscle has a full label transparency, licensed ingredients, high quality sources, and Gyarro formulas sciencebacked, regularly tested in their batches for purity and potency. Now, wrapping it up here, supplements are the icing on the cake. First, we need to focus on nutrition, and we talked about that in the last couple episodes.
  • We need to talk about training, which we will continually talk about, and sleep lifestyle. Then, we can use supplements to fill in those gaps to optimize performance for you. Now, definitely want to give props to sites like examin.com for going out of their way to create credible research and allow different types of brands like Citadel Nutrition for setting a high standard.
  • And that'll keep keep the playing field and the marketplace clean and healthy and productive. Our next episode, we're going to talk about lifestyle, behavior, and real foundation for long-term results. It's going to be really important and I'll tell you the secret to my coaching secret sauce is going to be the lifestyle behavior stuff.
  • Educate someone on nutrition first. Figure out how to implement into their busy lifestyle and start to adjust lifestyle behavior changes in the way they think, the way they act, the choices they make, things like that. Now, I hope that you're enjoying the series and we will keep it up and comment, send me an email of other topics you'd love to hear.
  • And now we're going to trans transition into our fast five questions. Question number one, what's one supplement you always have in your cabinet and why? It's more of a personal question. I have creatine monohydrate. It's cheap, safe, taking five to 10 grams a day. I use it. I have a sour apple flavor.
  • I use it to flavor my water. Tastes good, makes me drink more. And at 42, I want to preserve as much muscle as I can. And because it's so sciencebacked, it just makes sense. Number two, if you could only do one type of workout for the rest of your life, what would it be? The answer would be strength training with a focus on compound lifts, doing squats, deadlifts, chest press, shoulder press, and pull-ups.
  • Those would be the five ones that I would work on. Then occasionally biceps, triceps, core. I would do it in that order. Number three, what's one common nutrition myth you wish more people knew the truth about? Well, that protein alone builds muscle, but you actually need total calories, proper carbs, proteins, fats, all these combinations, micronutrients, a solid training program, consistency in the gym, and protein is just one piece.
  • Taking a protein shake after you get done with a workout that was lackluster isn't going to save you. Favorite recovery strategy? Well, or stretching or mobility or something else. I love my hot tub. We got it back in the COVID days. It's been amazing. I get in it usually in the morning first thing and I warm up the old I say I get in there, I stretch out and just soak in the heat.
  • When I get out, my body is ready to roll. I also use that a lot after workouts or before workouts for warm-ups. So, if I'm warming up my body by dumping in 105 degree water for 10 minutes, getting some bubbles and stretching, all the joints, the the tendons, ligaments, muscle, bellies are going to be a lot more ready to function at a higher level that I need them to.
  • Question number five, coffee first or workout first? Well, I'm going coffee. I like doing a French press with Texas peon and it's by Lola Savannah. So good. We have that stuff consistently. We grind the beans, fill up a French press and my wife and I share it. It's delicious. Tastes wonderful.
  • I do put a splash of oat milk in just enough to cream it up a little bit. But it's a great combo. Thank you so much for joining us today. And I just want to make sure you knew that I have a 30 tips in 30 days to help you get quick actionable health, fat loss recipe tips. You can join this email list for simple strategies to improve your nutrition, your fitness, your health, and overall self-care.
  • Each day introduces one practical simple tip that gets you to actually build sustainable habits, boost confidence, and feel your best without getting overwhelmed. I literally went through built each email specifically to help compound momentum and movement and get you headed in the right direction. Some of it we're going to focus in those are meal ideas, grocery lists, how to optimize those, quick workouts, there's movements.