(dramatic bellow)
- ZMA, zinc, magnesium, vitamin B6.
Does it work or is it total bogus?
Let's find out.
(techno music)
(dramatic music)
Hey, what's up, everyone?
If you've ever worked out in your life,
you've probably entertained the
idea of taking a supplement.
You might also have
caught on that supplements
can be a bit of a controversial
topic within the fitness community.
Some people are totally all for it
and some people are not so much.
Me personally, well, it
depends on the supplement,
and personally, the way I think of it is
the only way to find out
for sure if it's for you
is to do it yourself which is
exactly what I did with ZMA.
So, to see if ZMA actually works
for me, I did a 60 day experiment.
Now, before I get into the details
of the experiment, what exactly is ZMA?
Well, it's basically zinc,
magnesium, and vitamin B6
wrapped up in a nice little package,
usually in a pill form like this,
and it's pretty commonly
used by fitness folks,
but it's also one of those supplements
where there's a lot of mixed opinions.
I mean, take a look at this,
(dramatic music)
and this.
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So, as you can see, there
are people out there
who not only believe
that ZMA doesn't work,
they also think it's just a humongous
scam for your hard-earned money.
On the flip side, there
are people who not only say
that ZMA works, but
treat it as if it's like
the holy grail of all supplements
and would probably sell their
own mother for another bottle.
Okay, maybe selling their
own mother is a bit much,
but as you can see, there
are a lot of mixed opinions.
I'm not gonna dive too
much into the benefits
of zinc, magnesium, and vitamin B6
because there's a lot
of wonderful resources
on Google in which you
can find out for yourself,
and I'll include some in
the description below,
but the general gist
of the benefits of ZMA
are increased endurance,
increased strength,
faster recovery, and better sleep quality.
So, to see for myself
if ZMA actually works,
I did a 60 day experiment.
I wanted to see if ZMA works for me
but specifically as a
sleep-enhancing supplement,
because better sleep by itself
is already a huge benefit
and would promote faster
recovery and better gains.
I mean, we already know what the bad parts
of sleep deprivation are so I don't
even need to measure them,
and while it would be nice
to track the other benefits
of ZMA, realistically,
it's a bit impractical
seeing as I'm just one guy.
Most studies have a ton of people
and a control group, and I just
can't do that because I'm one guy.
I already track my workouts
so I know if I'm making
progress in strength and what not,
but it's really hard to
know if it's coming from
the ZMA or if it's just coming
from all the other things
like smarter programming,
better programming, what not.
Now, before we do an experiment,
it's always a good idea
to lay it out in good old
scientific method style just
so that we're all clear.
So the question is does ZMA
improve the quality of your sleep?
Now that we have a question,
we need a hypothesis.
As it turns out, I've actually
taken ZMA before in the past,
but I didn't really do a
good job of tracking it,
but I did remember feeling a little
bit better rested each night.
Was it just the placebo?
Maybe, but that's what the
point of this experiment is,
to find out if it's actually real or not.
So based on my own previous experience
and the experience that
I've heard from others,
I decided to make my
hypothesis as follows.
During the days I take ZMA, I
predict that my sleep quality
will be on average, 10% higher
than on the days that I don't.
So why did I choose 10%?
Well, back in the day when I took ZMA,
I coulda sworn I felt like
I had gotten an extra hour
of sleep during the night when I took ZMA.
So, six hours felt like seven hours,
seven hours felt like eight hours,
and eight hours felt like nine hours.
That seems pretty
significant, so I'm gonna say
that 10% is not too big of a stretch.
Now here comes the fun part,
the actual experiment itself.
Here is exactly what I did.
I tracked my sleep for 60 days,
30 days without ZMA and 30 days with.
The app that I used to track
it is called Sleep Cycle.
It's an alarm clock app that tracks
your movement while you sleep.
The idea behind it is
that you move differently
during the different stages of your sleep,
so it uses that information to find
an optimal time to wake you up
within the half hour range you set.
You end up getting a
percentage that represents
how good your overall sleep
quality was that night.
Now, generally speaking,
if you get more sleep,
you'll have a higher
sleep quality percentage
which is why I also recorded
the duration of my sleep
so I can compare those
numbers with the percentages.
The sleep duration goes from
the time I turned on the app
when I went to bed until the
time I turned off the app
when I woke up, so it's how long
I was in bed, not how long I was asleep.
As for the ZMA itself, I used the one
made by the brand Optimum Nutrition.
At the end of the 60 days, I
ended up with a bunch of data.
It's right here, but I'll also have a link
in the description if you
wanna see all the data.
Here are the results I got.
During the 30 days without ZMA,
I slept an average of seven
hours and seven minutes
with an average sleep quality of 75.43%.
During the 30 days with
ZMA, I slept an average
of seven hours 30 minutes with
an average sleep quality of 77.5%.
Wait, what?
(record scratch)
Yeah, just looking at those numbers,
it would appear that my
hypothesis was a little bit off.
Yeah, I mean I got higher sleep quality
when I was taking ZMA, but
I also got about 23 minutes
on average more sleep per night.
So it's entirely possible
that that's the reason
why my sleep quality was higher.
So, does that mean the ZMA didn't work?
Well, hold your horses, people.
Okay, that's only the most obvious
interpretation of the results.
Let's dig a little deeper
and see what we can find.
Let's look at the number of days where
my sleep quality was 80% or higher.
For the days that I didn't take ZMA,
I had 14 days where my sleep
quality was 80% or higher.
For the days I took ZMA,
there were (drum roll)
14 days where I had 80%
sleep quality or higher.
Aw, shit!
(disappointing music)
It's exactly the same!
This really isn't making
ZMA look really great.
Well, what if we split up the
results by sleep time, hmm?
Without ZMA, there were 16 days where
I slept between seven and eight hours.
Average sleep time was
seven hours 22 minutes,
and average sleep quality was 79.875%.
With ZMA, there were 20 days where
I slept between seven and eight hours.
Average sleep time was
seven hours and 25 minutes,
and average sleep quality was (drum roll)
77.1%, wow.
(disappointing music)
I mean, it's a very small difference,
but I actually had lower quality
of sleep when I was on ZMA.
Well, we're not finished.
I also created a category for under
seven hours and over eight hours.
Here are the results of those.
Without ZMA, there were
11 days under seven hours
with an average sleep
time and average quality
of six hours 27 minutes
and 65.18% respectively.
With ZMA, there were six
days under seven hours
with an average sleep time and quality
of six hours 31 minutes
and 67.83% respectively.
Without ZMA, there were three days
that I slept over eight hours.
The average sleep time and quality
was eight hours and 12 minutes
and 89.33% respectively.
With ZMA, there were four days
where I slept over eight hours.
The average sleep time and quality
was nine hours 26 minutes
and 94% respectively.
So, as you can see, the ZMA
won in those two categories,
but the sample size was a lot smaller
and in the case of the
over eight hour group,
I got a lot more sleep,
so there's a good chance
that that's the reason why
my sleep quality was higher.
So unfortunately the results are just
not definitely in favor of the ZMA.
So what is the final
verdict of this experiment?
Well, based on the results,
I would have to say
that no, ZMA does not
appear to have increased
my sleep quality by
any significant amount,
and it would seem that any
previous effects I felt
in the past were just a placebo.
I realized I coulda controlled
the experiment better
by going to bed at the exact same time
and waking up at the exact
same time every single night,
but that's really not that practical.
I also realize that I might
get a lot of hate from ZMA
lovers out there, so here's
what I have to say to that.
Bring it on!
(grunting)
(thunder rolling)
Overall, I'm a little disappointed.
I was actually a pretty big fan of ZMA.
I could've sworn it worked,
but looking at the numbers,
I guess it didn't actually work for me.
Then again, as always, a placebo effect
is still an effect, so if
you get a placebo effect,
does that count as it working?
So have any of you tried ZMA
and how did it go for you?
I would really love to hear
about it in the comments below,
and, of course, I'm also gonna include
some useful links like links to my data
as well as links to the
benefits of zinc, magnesium,
and B6 that I mentioned earlier,
and in the mean time, if
you enjoyed this video,
don't forget to subscribe to my
channel and give this video a like.
You can also find links to my social media
and my websites in the description below,
and if you have any other
suggestions on supplements
I should try, let me know that as well.
Alright, I'll see you next time.
