My Experience With Nectar

I receive a lot of questions about Nectar, and I’ve written a reference document to answer many of them.  This article is a bit different.  I’m writing it to share my personal experience, and my response to some common objections regarding its use.  Of course, I’ve included a bit of background information as well, and links to helpful posts and articles if you’d like to give it a try for yourself.

If you’re not familiar with Nectar, I’d suggest checking out the product page and this Instagram post to get up to speed.  Nectar is a combination of L-carnitine and citicoline that improves energy, focus, fat loss, and contractile output; in short, it’s a powerful performance enhancer.

The Benefits of Nectar

I will typically use 1 CC of Nectar about 5 minutes before I start training.  I actually wait until I’m in the gym parking lot before injecting, because I feel Nectar start to work within seconds.  To me, it feels similar to a strong preworkout — I feel more alert and focused, and a bit more aggressive.  Not a great feeling when you’re stuck in traffic, but it’s perfect to help fuel some heavy lifts.

About 30 minutes after injecting, the physical feelings start to fade, and within an hour and a half they’re no longer noticeable.  The cognitive effects seem to last longer. It’s significantly easier to focus on my work after a hard training session when I use Nectar.

Within a couple of weeks of consistent use, I can notice fairly significant improvements in body composition.  I’m always pretty lean, though, so even small decreases in body fat make a big difference in the mirror.  I suspect it would take most people a bit longer to notice these benefits.

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Nectar vs. Traditional Preworkouts

If you’ve followed me for a while, you know I’m not an advocate for frequent use of stimulant-based preworkouts.  They allow you to train harder (in the short term), but that extra energy comes at a cost — you feel more fatigued a few hours later.  Many people compensate for the latter by taking more stimulants, and they quickly end up in a caffeine-fueled downward spiral.  You can check these posts out for some more info:

• Preworkouts are overhyped

• Preworkout for bodybuilding and powerlifting

Nectar doesn’t have the same biological cost as caffeine and other stimulants used in typical preworkouts.

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Excuses, Excuses

Here are some not-so-good reasons for avoiding Nectar:

It’s too expensive.

Well, look — your finances are your own business, and if you think that Nectar isn’t worth the price, that’s your decision to make.  The fact is, though, that cost per dose of Nectar is nearly identical to all of these products:

• Granite GX Preworkout

• HD Muscle PreHD Elite

• Raw Nutrition Thavage

• GHOST Legend

If you think Nectar isn’t worth the price, but you’re shelling out for a conventional preworkout, then I seriously question your judgment. (If you’re not using any preworkout at all, I applaud that!)

It hurts!

It’s true that the original version of Nectar could hurt a bit.  The new version, which uses citicoline instead of choline, does not hurt at all.  Regardless, in my experience, the “it hurts” excuse is usually a euphemism for “I don’t like injections.”  So, here’s another truth: no one likes injections, but if you avoid them, you’re simply not serious about achieving your goals. 

I’m natural.

I was a little upset the first time someone told me they wouldn’t use Nectar because they wanted to “stay natural.”  None of the ingredients in Nectar are banned in drug-tested competition, and both carnitine and citicoline are bioidentical compounds (chemically identical to those your body produces on its own).  

That said, I do recognize that injectable products are commonly associated with illegal performance-enhancing drug use.  I think that’s largely because most people do not know how to safely perform injections.  And it’s true that you can run into trouble if you’re injecting improperly.  Fortunately, it’s pretty simple to learn, and here are some great resources on exactly that:

• How to Perform Intramuscular Injections

• How to Perform Subcutaneous Injections

Wrapping Up

Hopefully this post has encouraged you to give Nectar a shot (pun intended) — I really think it will benefit both your training and your health.  If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to either me or to Better Through Biology, and we’ll do our best to answer!