Portland, Oregon chiropractic, nutrition, functional medicine, functional movement and clinical hypnosis

A new review of the body of research on athletic performance and vitamin D suggests that adequate vitamin D levels in athletes could dramatically improve their performance.
Vitamin D is a steroid hormone that is activated in the kidneys; when activated, it regulates more than 1,000 genetic functions. This number seems to grow, touting the importance of vitamin D with every study published. If you have been reading my blog entries, you know that I have posted many blogs about vitamin D.
Researchers involved in this study reviewed the world’s literature for evidence that vitamin D affects physical and athletic performance. Numerous studies, particularly in the German literature in the 1950s, show vitamin D-producing UV light improves athletic performance. There is also a lot of research indicating physical and athletic performance varies in relation to vitamin D levels; it peaks when vitamin D levels peak, declines as levels decline.
What I found incredibly interesting is that Vitamin D also increases the size and number of fast twitch muscle fibers which could make an athlete more pwerful. It is apparent from this study and others that vitamin D levels are directly associated with musculoskeletal and therefore athletic performance.
The levels needed for these affects seem to be above 50ng/dl. As I wrote about in a previous blog levels may also protect the athlete from several acute and chronic medical conditions. Here’s a link to hat entry (Athletes Like The Rest of Us, Need More Vitamin D).

My last blog entry announced the addition of a fantastic Vitamin D product by Metagenics called D3 5000. Click on the following link and register in my Meta-Ehealth store to purchase yours at a 10% discount (current patients receive 15%) Optimum Function: Meta-Ehealth store

Source: Cannell, John J.; Hollis, Bruce W. et. al. “Athletic Performance and Vitamin D.” Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. 41(5):1102-1110, May 2009.

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Tags: athletes, chiropractor portland oregon, Health, nutrition portland oregon, Vitamin D, vitamins

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 24th, 2009 at 1:15 am and is filed under Chiropractic, Functional Medicine, Nutrition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.