Creatine for Women Over 40: Benefits for Muscle, Brain, Bone and Gut + How Much to Take

Sims highlights that women have 70–80% of the creatine stores that men have, and many don't consume enough creatine-rich food. By taking a consistent daily dose, you keep muscle and tissue stores saturated so that your body can draw on them for repeated high-intensity efforts — whether that's lifting, sprinting, or even daily activities. She tells the story of how it took her 11 years to get one pull-up, but after focusing on training while using creatine, the higher training load became manageable and recovery improved, leading to rapid progress. The host's own experience of suddenly being able to do 10 full press-ups is attributed to chronic creatine saturation, not an acute boost. This protocol is not about pre-workout timing; it's about every-day commitment to fill the tank.

Sims points out that many women suffer from IBS or similar gut dysfunctions. Creatine enters the picture because it is a key building block of the intestinal mucosal lining, physically helping to keep the gut barrier sealed against a 'leaky gut'. She adds that by stabilising the gut environment, creatine also positively influences the gut microbiome and its production of serotonin, a neurotransmitter deeply tied to mood and GI function. In her view, saturating the body with creatine can therefore have a downstream calming effect on both gut symptoms and mood, making it a potential everyday support for women whose gut health has been overlooked by conventional supplement protocols.

Sims stresses that every system in the body uses rapid energy from the phosphocreatine pathway, and that women start at a deficit with only 70–80% of men's creatine stores. Because many women consume less red meat and fish (natural sources of creatine), this gap widens. Beyond muscle, she specifically calls out brain function, bone strength, mood and anxiety as areas where consistent creatine intake can make a difference. She sees creatine as enabling 'better health outcomes' by allowing cells to meet energy demands more robustly, particularly in the brain and bones, which are highly energy-dependent. This position challenges the dated view that supplements should only target one system and instead paints creatine as a systemic nutrient insurance policy for women, especially as they move through perimenopause and beyond.

Sims explains that nitrates act directly on endothelial cells to produce vasodilation. In premenopausal women with adequate circulating oestrogen, the body already has robust endothelial function; loading in more nitrates appears to disrupt rather than enhance performance, actually reducing the ability to hit high intensities. Once women transition through menopause and oestrogen levels drop, that natural endothelial support wanes, making exogenous nitrates effective again. She warns that most performance supplements have never been tested specifically on women, and this nitrate example is a case where blanket recommendations fail. The takeaway is not just about beet juice — it's a call to question all supplements that lack female-specific data.