FAQ
Shipping, FREE to all orders over R550.
What are my delivery options?
- Major City (1-3 working days) e.g. Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Durban, East London, Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria.
- Near Outlying Areas (3-5 working days) e.g. George, Nelspruit, Pietermaritzburg, Polokwane, Richards Bay, Kimberly
- Far Outlying Areas (3-7 working days) e.g All Mines, Dullstroom, Hogsback, Kathu, Mtubatuba, Villersdorp
Ultima Sports Performance and Recovery Range: is not available in retail stores and only available online. This is due to the fact that we want to remain connected with our customers so we can understand their pain points and goals for each individuals sports discipline.
What are the main differences between Fat Away, Metabolift and BurnXpress?
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Fat Away:Binds to Fats and Oils in foods you consume, helping your body eliminate rather then absorb these fats.
- Contains Fat Binding Chitosan which helps bind fat molecules that you consume, thereby may reduce fat absorption. Fat binding blend includes Lecithin, Inositol, Choline, Betaine Hydrocloride.
- Garcinia Cambogia, a potent, natural appetite suppressant
- Energising Blend (Guarana, Caffeine, Capsicum and Taurine) that often found in thermogenic products and energy drinks, to revitalize both mind and body.
- Vitamins: B2, B6, B12, Pantothenic Acid and Mega B-Vitamin Complex with optimal dosages for maximizing energy and assist with anti-stress benefits.
BurnXpress:Assists you to maximize your fat-loss efforts by:- OptiBurn Herbal Blend (Guarana, White Willow bark, Garcia Cambogia, Capsicum Frutescens, Glyzrrhiza Uralensis, Zingiber Officinale and Caffeine)
- Amino Acids: L-Phenylalanine, L-Carnitine and L-Tyrosine.
- Vitamins: Pantothenic Acid, B6 and B12
- How it Works:
- may burn more calories by enhancing the basic metabolic rate
- may promote physical activity by intensifying energy levels
- may increase the body’s fat-burning ability
Metabolift:Thermogenic effect that increases the body BMI to convert carbohydrates and fat into pure energy.- Nutritional Energizers: Ginseng and Spirulina
- Thermogenic Enhancers: Guarana, Caffeine, Cayenne, Ginger, Licorice and Zinc
- Mega B-Vitamin Complex and Chromium Polynicotinate
- How it works:
- helps provide you with every nutrient required to make you fell and be more energetic
- assist in naturally stimulating your metabolism
- assist in naturally stimulating your body’s own thermogenic process
Can pregnant or lactating women drink our nutritional shakes?
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As far as we are aware it is fine to continue taking our shakes, due to the dense nutrition that our shakes contain. We, however, always recommend that mothers-to-be and mothers wishing to take our shake and are concerned should always consult there doctor or GP before taking any new supplement.
Do I need to exercise when taking Ultima’s Weight Loss products?
- Well, in order to maximise the speed of your weight loss, it is advisable to add at least 1 hour of low exertion exercise each day. This will help speed up your metabolism.
- It is also advisable to drink at least 6 glasses of water each day and minimise your fat and oil intake.
When is it a good time to take supplements?
- Generally take your supplements with food, except Adaptogens, Energy and Passion. which should not be taken after 15:00 as it will cause you to stay awake at night.
What Are Adaptogens?
- Adaptogens are a group of herbs used for stress relief and protection, as well as for performance enhancement.
- Stress is a silent killer: It causes adrenaline release which damages the heart, causing high blood pressure and increases the risk of having a heart attack by up to 6-fold. Stress also raises levels of the aging hormone cortisol, which suppresses immune function and causes memory loss. Stress increases the risk of diabetes and also upsets the balance of brain neurotransmitters (brain hormones), resulting in depression, anxiety and insomnia. Stress can also suppress thyroid function, causing hypothyroidism and fatigue.
- Adaptogens protect against ALL the damaging effects of stress and prevent excessive cortisol and adrenaline release. They are life saving phyto-nutrients, yet we get none of them in our diet, unlike vitamins and minerals, where diet at least supplies some, making supplementation with adaptogens more important than vitamins and minerals.
- Adaptogens also speed recovery from illness and injury; they increase mental and physical stamina; protect the heart and liver, and have anti-oxidant, anti-ageing, and anti-cancer properties.
- Ultima’s Adaptogens contain all the adaptogens to protect from stress and promote performance and wellbeing.
Is there anything useful for children with ADD/ADHD?
- Preliminary research also shows that the ingredients in Brain Fuel help to correct the neurotransmitter (brain hormone) imbalances found in children with attention deficit disorder/attention deficit hyperactive disorder.
- I’ve heard that Brain Fuel helps prevent memory loss in the elderly. Can it be used by young people too.
- Contrary to popular belief, reduced mental performance, far from striking late in life, creeps up on people from their mid-20s, according to research published by the New Scientist. This research found that performance in a wide variety of mental tasks deteriorated steadily from an early age and that the rate of decline in mental performance between people in their 70s and 80s was the same as that between the 20s and 30s. Brain Fuel is therefore ideal for all ages, even for students needing to concentrate for exams.
Are Carbohydrates Bad?
- This depends on the type of carbohydrate (referred to as glycemic index) and how much you eat of it (referred to as glycemic load). Too much refined high glycemic carbohydrate, is bad because this will raise insulin and cortisol hormone levels. This can result in obesity, fatigue, binge eating, immune system complaints, diabetes, heart disease, increased oxidative tissue damage and accelerated aging. Examples of refined high glycaemic carbohydrates are: sugar, pasta and bread. Good carbohydrates are those foods with a low glycaemic index and lots of fibre. Examples are whole grains, whole cereals, fruits and vegetables (not fruit JUICE because it contains no fibre and high amounts of sugar).
What Are Anti-Oxidants and Do I Need to Take Them?
- Antioxidants neutralise free-radical toxins. Free-radicals are unavoidable toxins produced by our bodies and they cause cumulative damage to all body tissues and systems by oxidising them (called oxidative damage). Over time this damage accumulates and presents as degenerative diseases such as arthritis, cancer, immune malfunction, memory loss etc. Antioxidant supplementation is therefore essential for preventing the degeneration associated with the aging process. Examples of antioxidants are vitamins C and E, selenium, lipoic acid and co-enzyme Q10 etc.
Can I get all I need from one tablet or capsule, or do I need to taken more than one product?
- You can’t get enough of all you need from one capsule or tablet. There simply is not enough space in once capsule to supply optimal quantities of everything.
Is it better to take a mixture of many low-dose supplements for the same condition, or rather one or two supplements in larger doses?
This depends:
- IF the supplements are carefully chosen to work in different ways to treat the same problem AND all of them have good evidence off effectiveness, then it is better to take a combination at lower doses. This is because the law of synergy applies, where the combination is both much more effective and safer.
- However, IF a combination is used with no logic applied to why you are using a specific combination, then it is very likely that you will be combining supplements that work similarly to each other (ie that you are not treating the problem via different mechanisms of action). This, combined with the probability that in such a case you may be using some supplements with very little evidence of effectiveness, means that, in such scenarios, it would be better to stick to higher effective doses of proven supplements.
Where Can I Find Unbiased and True Information on Supplements and Medicines?
- This can be found by reviewing information on the supplement found at the following web sites:
- Drug Digest
- Physicians Desk Reference
Vitamins:
- The best form of a vitamin is a concentrated one, in its pure form that is identical to how it is found in nature (termed bio-identical). Normally these are sythesised by bacteria. The reason that these are better than “food-form” vitamins, which are merely food concentrates, is that it is impossible to get optimal quantities of vitamins from capsules or tablets that contain concentrated food-form vitamins. For example 500mg is all that will fit into one capsule. So 500mg pure Vitamin C will supply half a gram of pure vitamin C, where as 500mg Acerola Vitamin C (food-form) will supply only 50mg vitamin C, which is sub therapeutic.
Minerals:
- The above rule that applies for vitamins does NOT apply for minerals. You only require VERY LITTLE of a mineral, yet if you take it in its pure form it can be dangerous. The best forms (i.e. the most effective, absorbable and safest) are minerals bound (i.e chelated) to amino-acids (a type of protein). These are called Amino Acid Chelates and can be identified by the term AAC, e.g selenium AAC. Sometimes chelates are described by the type of amino acid they are bound to, e.g a glycinate, picolinate or succinate. eg calcium glycinate, iron succinate or chromium picolinate.
Herbs:
- When buying herb tablets/capsules, always buy extracts, never milled dried powder. A milled powdered herb is about 5 – 10 times less concentrated than an extract. A plant extract is manufactured by removing the fibrous inactive material from the plant, leaving a concentration of active components. Therefore a 5:1 Ginseng extract (eg as contained in Brain Fuel™) contains five times more active components than Ginseng powder found in many other products. Extracts are far superior to milled powders, albeit more expensive. The best type of extract is a standardised extract, such as the Rhodiola rosea standardised extract in P2Life’s Adaptogens. A standardised extract means that tests have been performed on the extract to verify the concentration of its active components. Another problem with milled powered herbs is oxidation. Oxidation destroys what little actives are in the product. Clinical studies showing heath benefits are always performed on extracts. If you are expecting similar benefits from non-extract milled powder products, you would have to take 5 – 10 times the quantity. Labels are often ambiguous as to whether the product is made from an extract or not. Ultima has carefully chosen the best forms of vitamins, minerals and herbal extract possible –to provide optimal effectiveness and safety.
Do I Need to Take Supplements if I Eat a Healthy Diet?
YES, for two reasons:
FIRSTLY
- Our diet, lifestyle and food-quality are very different now to what they were 100-200 years ago. Back then you could get all you needed from your diet, but this IS NO LONGER TRUE. Unlike 100 years ago, nowadays men, women and children need to take vitamins and minerals to keep healthy for the following reasons:
- Soil Quality: DID YOU KNOW NOWADAYS SOME ORANGES CONTAIN NO VITAMIN C?! Yet 100 years ago oranges contained 120mg of vitamin C – that’s twice the recommended daily requirements (RDA)! This is because fruits and vegetables are only as good as the soil they are grown in. All the vitamins and minerals in plants are made by them from the nutrients the plant absorbs from the soil. 100 years ago soil contained a full spectrum of nutrients. Nowadays, because of overuse of soil, our soils have very little natural full-spectrum nutrient building blocks. Therefore we ADD fertilizers and nutrients to the soil. BUT we don’t add the full spectrum of nutrients required for the plant to make all its vitamins and minerals -we merely add enough for fast growth of the plant for basic food. The plant therefore is lacking in vitamins and minerals. Therefore so we have to supplement with a multivitamin/mineral.
- Pesticides, Insecticides, Preservatives, Hormones and Antibiotics are added to our food: These require extra vitamins to be eliminated from our bodies. Plants are sprayed with insecticides and pesticides. Cattle are given antibiotics to prevent infections and are given hormones to grow fast. These hormones and antibiotics are stored in the animal’s fat, which we then consume when we eat meat. This never happened 100 years ago –and the body requires extra vitamins to get rid of these.
- Pollution: Air and water pollution put toxins into our bodies and into the fruits and veggies we eat. Consider for example a lettuce: Its like a sponge: 90% water, absorbing what ever pollutants are in the water it receives. Rain will dissolve any air pollution and pollute the water table that fruits and veggies receive. Water can become polluted from industry too. A recent example is the Philippi area in Cape Town, where many of our lettuces are grown: In a test performed by the CSIR, lettuces were tested and found to have unacceptably high levels of Cadmium, a heavy metal toxin which is more toxic than mercury or lead. Cadmium damages the immune system and causes heat disease. The body requires extra vitamins and minerals which it uses to flush these toxins out of the body.
- We don’t eat enough fruits and veggies: Even IF the fruits and veggies we ate contained all the goodness they did 100 years ago (which they don’t), we would have to eat 5 servings a day, which almost nobody does. Therefore we need to take extra vitamins and minerals.
- Refined Carbohydrate / High-Fat Diet: Our modern diet contains too many refined carbohydrates (sugar, bread, pasta, chips, sweets, biscuits, chocolates) and too much fat (especially animal fat). These carbohydrates and fats don’t contain any vitamins or minerals, yet our body requires vitamins and mineral to metabolise them.
- Modern Lifestyle: Unlike 100 years ago, our modern lifestyle uses up more vitamins, minerals and good fats to detoxify the body and to help us cope with these hectic and unhealthy lifestyles. Lifestyles that use up huge amounts of vitamins, minerals are: Smoking, Excessive Alcohol Consumption (more than two alcoholic drinks per occasion), Lack of Sleep, Stress and Intense Exercise
SECONDLY
- Even if we tried our best to eat a balanced diet, and were able to get 100% RDA amounts of vitamins and mineral from the diet, 100% of RDA is often not enough!
- We need optimal health and disease-prevention doses – these are scientifically determined doses, higher than RDA, based on risk-benefit scientific models, incorporating scientific research. These doses cannot be obtained from diet and must be supplemented (Kathleen M. Fairfield, MD,DrPH; Robert H. Fletcher, MD,MSc; Vitamins for Chronic Disease Prevention in Adults – Scientific Review; JAMA. 2002;287:3116-3126). These doses offer additional health benefits that RDA doses do not, such as disease prevention, heart protection, energy and longevity. HOWEVER, it is impossible to obtain these amounts from diet – eg it is impossible to eat 20 oranges, 2kg carrots etc per day, required to get these ideal amounts.
Are Supplements as Effective as Prescription Medicines?
- This depends on how you define “effective”. Supplements are slower and less dramatic in their effects than prescription medicines. However, because supplements treat the cause of the problem and improve over-all health, they are generally more effective than prescription medicines in the long run. This is because prescription medicines only treat specific signs and symptoms, albeit dramatically, but yet they leave the under-lying cause of the problem unchanged -whilst doing nothing to improve the overall health of the patient.
Do Supplements Prevent Chronic Disease and Ageing?
Is there any evidence that supplements prevent chronic diseases and slow ageing?
- Yes. There is both preliminary evidence that dietary supplements directly extend life-span in humans, and strong evidence that they prevent premature death caused by chronic diseases associated with the ageing process. These diseases include heart disease, immune diseases, arthritis and cancers: The Journal of the American Medical Association showed that vitamin supplementation can prevent heart disease and other diseases associated with the ageing process, which often result in premature death (reference: Fletcher RH, Fairfield KM; Vitamins for chronic disease prevention in adults: clinical applications; JAMA. 2002 Jun 19;287(23):3127-9).
- There is further evidence that supplements can improve the quality of life in later years by slowing the degeneration of tissues. An examples is ginseng (contained in Brain Fuel™), which prevents brain degeneration and age-related-memory-loss.
- New research shows that supplements such as resveratrol may actually extend life-span by preventing oxidative damage to tissues and the immune system, correcting hormone imbalances, protecting DNA from mutations and damage, and by protecting enzyme function.
Can Supplements Treat Disease or Do They Only Improve Health?
Supplements most certainly can both prevent and treat disease.This is achieved in two ways:
- Firstly, indirectly, as a consequence of the improvements in health that supplements cause, disease can be prevented. For example Co-enzyme Q10 and omega 3 fatty acids improve general heart health, which helps prevent heart attacks in the future. The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reported in 2002, that folic acid and the B-group vitamins reduce the risk of heart disease, whilst the antioxidant vitamins (vitamins A, C, E) reduce the risk of many chronic diseases.
- Secondly, supplements can directly treat diseases due to pharmacologically active components contained in them. Examples are Rhodiola Rosea which prevent excessive stress-induced adrenaline release, thereby reducing the risk of heart attack; another example is Boswellia a herb that has powerful anti-inflammatory effects.
What is a Health Supplement?
- A dietary supplement is a substance that is isolated or derived from a plant or food. It is generally sold in a medicinal form (such as a capsule, tablet, or cream). Supplements are a sub-category of complementary medicines. Being a complementary medicine means they provide a general or specific health benefit, or protection from chronic disease. Supplements can be vitamins, minerals, herbs or other botanicals, amino acids, essential fats (also known as fatty acids), enzymes or micro-organisms (eg probiotic intestinal flora). They can also be a dietary substance for use by man to supplement the diet by increasing the total dietary intake (e.g. fats, proteins, carbohydrates or fibre [soluble or insoluble]).
What are the gelatin capsules made from?