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I've used creatine, as have a few friends. It's pretty good stuff but as with most it works by enabling you to train harder - still no pain, no gain.
Make sure you load up properly (5g 4x a day for a week) before you go into the maintenance (5g once or 2x a day). And it's good if you take it with some sugar/fruit juice/energy shake or whatever you use - helps it get into cells. Apparently, orange juice is bad for it - but I've never found out why or seen any papers proving it.
As for its effectiveness, it definitely increases size (mostly by putting water into your cells - so make sure you're drinking plenty or you might get stomach cramps, a common side effect). Lots of studies have suggested it increases strength and short term power - not useful if you're a long distance runner/cyclist, but good if your sport involves short bursts of energy.
And lastly, I remember reading one study that investigated changes in muscle creatine after using it, which suggested that there is a small group of people who just won't get it into their cells - if you're one of them you'll just pee it all out anyway!
But definitely worth a try.
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I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones. -- John Cage (1912 - 1992)
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