Vitamin D & Training

Vitamin D & Exercise

Can Vitamin D Supplementation Improve Your Athletic Performance? We can answer this question with a clear "Yes!". Because vitamin D 3 doses reduce the risk of injury and the regeneration time, improve muscle strength and speed and influence testosterone levels.

All YPSI trainers are already pointing out the importance of vitamin D in sport to their customers and athletes. And especially in the sports sector, many supplements are taken. Nevertheless, 24 current studies show that around 60 percent of the athletes examined have vitamin D insufficiency [25(OH)D < 32 ng/ml].

Optimal vitamin D levels are essential for your athletic performance and should be checked regularly. Because vitamin D influences:

1) Inflammation in the muscle

In a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 4000 IU/day for 35 days reduced levels of the inflammatory biomarkers alanine (ALT) and aspartate (AST) immediately after 10 sets of 10 peak-force jumps. Also impressive is the observation that the performance of the vitamin D group decreased by only 6% over the repetitions, while the performance of the placebo group deteriorated by 32%.

2) Oxygen uptake

Some studies show that vitamin D 3 doses of 6000 IU/day and more can significantly improve the oxygen uptake of athletes. In an 8-week study, supplementation with vitamin D3 increased the oxygen uptake of 14 elite rowers by 12.1 percent.

3) strength and speed

A randomized controlled study conducted with Liverpool Academy football players showed that supplementation with 5000IU per day for 8 weeks increased sprint times by 2.7% and jumping power by 7.6%.

Systematic meta-analysis from 2014 showed that vitamin D supplementation improves upper and lower extremity strength. Further studies show that with optimal vitamin D levels, hypertrophy of the fast-twitch muscle fibers in particular is increased.

4) testosterone production

Testosterone affects athletic performance. A 12-month study from 2011 shows that testosterone levels increase significantly by 30 percent when vitamin D levels are increased from 30ng/ml to around 60ng/ml.

90 percent of Germans have a vitamin D deficiency. In fact, it's 91 percent of women and 82 percent of men. One in five even has a severe deficiency. Unfortunately, simply holding your face in the sun doesn't help.

Why not?

Your body can synthesize vitamin D in the skin with the help of sunlight. But the self-synthesis only works if the intensity of the UVB rays is sufficient - i.e. in bright sunshine, which shines at a steep angle from a cloudless sky between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Between the end of September and the beginning of April, the sun is also too low at midday to produce vitamin D. That's why your vitamin D level drops steadily from week to week and has reached its lowest point in spring!

The problem: Nature has arranged it in such a way that we can now produce vitamin D. But the modern office guy doesn't spend most of his day outdoors naked. Instead, we spend the day behind walls and glass (which filters out the important UVB rays), wear long pants and shirts or use sunscreen. Nature didn't plan it that way and that's why a vitamin D deficiency is not the exception, but the rule.

The solution: Check your vitamin D level now. General recommendations bring little. Only if you know your individual vitamin D level can you effectively do something for your optimal values ​​and thus your health. Have your vitamin D level tested directly. The Cerascreen home vitamin D test is the most efficient solution for this. And then adjust your vitamin D supplementation based on the test result...

I wish you success!

Sources:
Farrokhyar F, Tabasinejad R, Dao D, Peterson D, Ayeni OR, Hadioonzadeh R, Bhandari M. Prevalence of vitamin D inadequacy in athletes: a systematic-review and meta-analysis. Sports Med. 2015 Mar;45(3):365-78. doi: 10.1007/s40279-014-0267-6. Review.
Dahlquist DT, Dieter BP, Koehle MS. Plausible ergogenic effects of vitamin D on athletic performance and recovery. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2015 Aug 19;12:33. doi: 10.1186/s12970-015-0093-8. eCollection 2015. Review.
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