Pros
- L-Citrulline can enhance muscle pumps
- Beetroot Extract contains high amounts of nitrates
- Beta-Alanine can improve muscular endurance
Cons
- Beta-Alanine can cause itchy & tingly skin
- Betaine can cause your breath & sweat to smell fishy
- Slightly high dosage of Caffeine Anhydrous (increased risk of jitters)
- Missing key pre-workout nutrients (eg. Creatine Monohydrate)
See Your Best Options In Our
– Top 3 Pre-Workouts Page –
About The Product
Purge Pre is a pre-workout supplement made by Purge Nutrition. It costs $45 for 25 serving containers along with an added protein shaker, which is a nice touch.
From first glance, we’re quite happy with the Purge Pre’s nutrient profile; Purge Nutrition have added some great ingredients such as Citrulline Malate, Beetroot Extract and even Beta-Alanine.
Anyway, we’ll expand on this in the next section where we’ll analyze Purge Pre’s ingredients. But first, we’ll tell you more about the company behind it.
Who are Purge Nutrition?
We’re not sure how long ago Purge Nutrition was founded, but it looks like a very fresh, modern company so we’re guessing between 2016-2017.
In our honest opinion, their ‘about us’ page wasn’t very informative. We would have liked to have learned key details such as whether their products are made under cGMP or FDA regulations in the USA or UK; this is important factors when choosing a supplement that everyone should look out for.
But you’re here to learn more about Purge Pre. So let’s see which ingredients have been added below…
Purge Pre Ingredients Explained
Purge Pre contains 10 main ingredients overall, which is a good number to have in a pre-workout; from experience, we’ve seen that most products with more than 10 nutrients are usually under-dosed.
As we’ve mentioned, our first impressions of Purge Pre are good. Purge Nutrition haven’t hidden any ingredients in proprietary blends, so you can see the exact dosages of each ingredient, which is exactly what you want to see.
Also, we’re impressed that Purge Nutrition has added some great nutrients in Purge Pre, especially Citrulline Malate.
But there are some negatives too; we’re not fans of DMHA (2-aminoisoheptane) as it’s banned in competitive sports and been reported to cause side effects. We also prefer to avoid Betaine Anhydrous, as it’s known for causing fishy odors in your breath and sweat.
Anyway, we’ll take you through each ingredient in Purge Pre in this section. By the end of this review, you’ll have a good idea of how safe and effective this pre-workout really is.
Here’s Everything You Need To Know:
Citrulline Malate
Citrulline Malate is a key addition to any pre-workout supplement; it’s proven to raise your nitric oxide levels, which directly improves your muscle pumps while you lift weights in the gym.
But it’s important to know that the same studies show that Citrulline Malate is only effective when consumed in 6,000mg dosages per serving.
Now, Purge Nutrition has slightly under-dosed Citrulline Malate in Purge Pre as only 4,000mg has been included. As a result, it might not be as effective as it could be when dosed optimally.
Ultimately, this is a great example of why companies need to add optimal dosages of key ingredients, in order to provide the customer with the best products (in our honest opinion).
Beta-Alanine
Beta-Alanine is one ingredient that everyone has a mixed opinion on. This is because it’s shown to improve your muscular endurance, while also causing a side effect called ‘paresthesia’.
What’s paresthesia? It’s a tingling and itching sensation on the skin of your face, chest hands and extremities. It’s something that distracts us when trying to focus on our gym session, so we personally prefer to avoid Beta-Alanine.
But as we mentioned, we acknowledge that Beta-Alanine can be beneficial. So we’ll leave whether it’s a good addition to Purge Pre or not, up to your personal preference.
Betaine Anhydrous
Now, here’s another controversial ingredient; it’s believed to be capable of enhancing your sports performance, but there have been mixed results in clinical studies.
But the reason why we prefer not to consume Betaine Anhydrous, is because it’s known to cause your breath and sweat to smell fishy; you can see the biggest study that indicates this here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3848652/
Other studies have even shown that Betaine Anhydrous is ineffective at improving your gym session. So as we don’t like to smell fishy while working out, we avoid this ingredient when we can.
We would have preferred Purge Nutrition to have added something more beneficial, such as Creatine Monohydrate in Purge Pre instead.
Taurine
Even if you don’t know much about supplements, you’ve probably heard of Taurine before; this is because it’s commonly found in energy drinks.
For this reason, many mistakenly believe that Taurine is a stimulant that’s able to boost your energy levels. But studies show that it’s not able to deliver this benefit.
So what does Taurine do? Well, it’s shown to help reduce cramping while you exercise, making it a good ‘bonus’ ingredient in Purge Pre here.
However, as you can reduce cramping by simply keeping yourself hydrated, we don’t consider Taurine to be an essential addition to any pre-workout supplement.
L-Tyrosine
L-Tyrosine is a ‘brain booster’ that’s able to improve your cognition (memory, focus etc). It’s for this reason that L-Tyrosine is a popular addition to nootropic supplements.
But for the purposes of a pre-workout supplement, it’s not really necessary; Caffeine Anhydrous delivers enough of a raise in your focus to benefit your gym session, so nutrient solely focused on improving your cognition aren’t necessary.
But as there are no negatives to having L-Tyrosine in Purge Pre, we’ll consider it as a great ‘bonus’ addition here.
Agmatine Sulfate
Agmatine is a molecule that’s extracted from L-Arginine, which is why it’s believed to be able to raise your nitric oxide levels.
But it’s important to know that L-Arginine has a poor absorption rate when orally supplemented. So anything extracted from it is highly likely to have the same problem.
Now, we can’t confirm this, as there haven’t been enough studies conducted on Agmatine Sulfate to determine whether it’s effective or not.
For this reason, we consider Agmatine Sulfate to be an unreliable addition to any pre-workout, in our honest opinion.
Beetroot Extract
You might have consumed this in salads before or even roasted it in the oven. But Beetroots are more beneficial than you think…
Why? Because they’re a great source for essential vitamins and minerals, as well as containing high amounts of nitrates; nitrates are a precursor to nitrix oxide, so it’s no suprise that Beetroot Extract has shown to enhance your muscle pumps in the gym.
Not only that, there have been many proving that Beetroot is able to improve your sporting endurance too. For these reasons, we consider Beetroot Extract to be a great addition to any pre-workout – good job by Purge Nutrition here.
Caffeine Anhydrous
When it comes to raising your energy levels, Caffeine Anhydrous is the king of stimulants – just ask any coffee lover!
Simply put, Caffeine Anhydrous is the pure powdered form of Caffeine, and is the safest and most effective stimulant you can find in supplements. We’re especially glad that Purge Nutrition haven’t added Caffeine Anhydrous into any proprietary blends, so you can see the exact dosage in Purge Pre.
The problem for us personally, is that there is a HUGE 325mg dosage of Caffeine Anhydrus in Purge Pre; this increases your risk of jittery side effects, especially if you have a low tolerance to Caffeine.
But for those with a very high tolerance to Caffeine (and consume more than 5 cups of coffee per day), you might find this amount of this stimulant beneficial without suffering any side effects.
Generally speaking, we always advise you to consume under 200mg Caffeine Ahydrous per serving with pre-workouts; this dosage would raise everyone’s energy levels without any risks of jitters or energy crashes.
2-Aminoisoheptane
DMHA began being added into supplements as a replacement for DMAA, which has since been banned due to causing harmful side effects. But the bad news is that DMHA hasn’t proven to be much safer when added to pre-workouts.
Many fitness and health websites warn that DMHA can cause side effects including high blood pressure, nausea and rapid heartbeat. Ultimately, there’s no need to risk side effects when there are many safe and effective ingredients available (such as Creatine Monohydrate).
Not only that, DMHA is banned from use in competitive sports, so you should definitely avoid this ingredient if you compete at a high level at any sport.
Black Pepper Extract
You might be wondering why Purge Nutrition has added Black Pepper Extract into a supplement. Especially if you can’t taste it. right?
But don’t start laughing just yet; Black Pepper Extract has proven to improve digestion and the absorption rate of other nutrients it’s consumed with.
For this reason, as well as being a tasty addition to your meals, Black Pepper Extract is a useful ‘bonus’ addition to have in any supplement. The only slight issue we have, is that it might make pre-workout powder taste slightly peppery and unappetising.
See Your Best Options In Our
– Top 3 Pre-Workouts Page –
Side Effects
There are 4 things that can cause side effects in Purge Pre; Beta-Alanine, Betaine Anhydrous, DMHA and the big dosage of Caffeine.
In case you skimmed past the previous section, we’ll give you a quick overview here. Basically, Beta-Alanine can cause itchy & tingly skin, Betaine can cause your breath & sweat to smell fishy, DMHA is banned from competitive sports & can cause high blood pressure, and the big dosage of Caffeine can cause jitters.
Here’s the potential side effects from taking Purge Pre:
- Itchy & Tingly Skin (Beta-Alanine)
- Fishy Breath & Sweat (Betaine Anhydrous)
- High Blood Pressure (DMHA)
- Rapid Heartbeat (DMHA)
- Jitters (Over 200mg Caffeine Anhydrous per serving)
- Energy Crashes (Over 200mg Caffeine Anhydrous per serving)
Purge Pre Review Conclusion
Purge Pre is a respectable pre-workout supplement and you can see that Purge Nutrition have conducted research while formulating it.
However, there are a few problems with this product, in our honest opinion; these include the fact that not everyone enjoys consuming Beta-Alanine due to it being able to cause itchy & tingly skin, and the HUGE 350mg dosage of Caffeine Anhydrous might be too much for many people that don’t have high tolerance to this stimulant.
Ultimately, we try and recommend pre-workouts that will be beneficial for everyone and not just certain people. With this in mind, we don’t think Purge Pre can compete with the highest rated pre-workouts on the market.
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Here’s the best natural pre-workouts on the market for:
- Energy Boosts
- Enhanced Strength & Endurance
- Increased Focus
- Skin-Splitting Muscle Pumps