ONLINE DRIVERS MEDIA

Marathon de Sable ? Tomato juice

Its about time for another quickie, a news quickie about exercise & supplementation, about vitamin D and tomato juice... actually its rather about tomato juice, a special carbohydrate + protein bar and the notorious "Gatorate(R)-ish" carbohydrate supplement every endurance athlete believes he must be taking. But lets be honest, who cares about tomato juice, carbohydrate, protein bars, pseudo Gatorade and their individual and joint effects on the health and performance of constantly (over-)taxed ultra-marathoners, if the other new item in todays article deals with the potential beneficial effect of vitamin D on IGF-1 and its anabolic consequences?
You care? Ok, in that case, you may be inclined to hear that the bar contained 30.20 g (19.7 g sugars) carbohydrates, 5.2g fiber, a surprisingly high amount of fat (15.6g) and. of course, protein 30.8g to be precise (14.3 g whey protein). If we add the energy content of carbs, fats and protein up, we get an energy content of ~400kcal for the bar and thus approx 24x more than in 100ml of the tomato juice, which is - as you can see in Table 1 more or less devoid of "nutrients", but packed with antioxidants.

Table 1: Average nutritional value per 100 g of tomato juice and protein bar used in the present study (canned, salt added) and the carbohydrate supplementation beverage, as provided by the manufacturer (Samaras. 2014)

As you can see in Figure 1, enough antioxidants to elicit significant increases in flow-mediated dilatation, which was used as an estimate of endothelial function, by the researchers from the  General Hospital of Giannitsa in Greece.

Figure 1: Changes (% pre) in response to tomato juice & protein bar supplementation (Samaras. 2014)

Interestingly, the thiobarbituric-acid reactive substances, and protein carbonyls were significantly decreased in both supplementation groups - a good indicator that these changes were not mediated by the red night-shade elixir, but rather by the protein + carbohydrate bar, which lead to a "whey-typical" increase in reduced glutathione.

Is the vitamin D you produce at the beach youre visiting only rarely the secret to perfect glucose control? Learn more in the "Beyond Carbohydrate Series"

If the marathoners had now had low vitamin D levels, they may even had gained some muscle, if they had followed a similar protocol as the subjects in another recently published study from the St. John Fisher College Rochester NY.

And the results of this study dont even seem completely nonsensical. As a SuppVersity reader you do after all know about the existing evidence of the negative effects low vitamin D levels will have on the function and strength of skeletal muscle ("low" in this context means less than 30ng 25-OHD on the lab report). Against that background, it does after all appear to be logical that refilling the levels would in one way or another help maintain or even build skeletal muscle.

The actual news here is yet not that vitamin D could potentially prevent muscle atrophy and increase hypertrophy. Its rather that these effects could be brought about by the significant increases in total IGF-1, as well as the IGF-1 binding proteins 1 + 3 researchers from the College of Rochester observed, when they added 4,000 IU of vitamin D to the diets of 6 vitamin D insufficient and deficient men (39.0±8.6yo with 25OH D 20.0±7.7ng/mL) who participated in a one-hour exercise program consisting of stretching (ST), aerobic (AB), and resistive (RT) exercises (Darr. 2014)

Suggested Read: "Underestimated Vitamin D Sources: Especially Eggs, But Also Chicken, Pork, Fish & Dairy Contain an Overlooked, Physiologically Relevant Amount of Ready-Made 25OHD" | more

The aerobic training was a intensity treadmill walk, which was rotated with a moderate strength (50% 1-RM, 15, 10 repetitions) full body workout consisting of squats, bench presses, leg presses, and lat pull downs. As previously said, the scientists found that the vitamin D binding protein 3 levels (BP3) were increased after the resistance training in the vitamin D (n=6) vs. placebo (n=7) group (30%). And while the total IGF-1 levels decrease in the placebeo group, the increase in various binding proteins buffered this effect in the vitamin D group. Similar, yet less pronounced effects were observed in response to the aerobic training.

Whether the scientists assumption that the increases in BP3 and BP1 levels and the maintenance of the total IGF-1 levels "potentially alter [...] the IGF system for enhanced muscle health" is accurate, let alone practically relevant is something this study cannot actually confirm.

And lets be honest, is it even likely? For someone without a pre-existing vitamin D deficiency? No. For someone with similarly low vitamin D levels as the deficient and insufficient subjects in a 2011 study by Stockton et al. (2011)? Probably, yes - but are you actually D-ficient?
References:

• Ceglia, Lisa, et al. "Effects of alkali supplementation and vitamin D insufficiency on rat skeletal muscle." Endocrine 44.2 (2013): 454-464.
• Darr, Rachel, et al. "Vitamin D supplementation effects on the IGF system in men after acute exercise (828.15)." The FASEB Journal 28.1 Supplement (2014): 828-15.
• Samaras, Antonios, et al. "Effect of a special carbohydrate-protein bar and tomato juice supplementation on oxidative stress markers and vascular endothelial dynamics in ultra-marathon runners." Food and Chemical Toxicology (2014).
• Stockton, K. A., et al. "Effect of vitamin D supplementation on muscle strength: a systematic review and meta-analysis." Osteoporosis international 22.3 (2011): 859-871.

The study at hand was conducted with liquid vitamin D. Sincecaps and pills increase OHD levels effectively, its yet unlikely that this explains the differences to other less successfull trials.

Zbigniew Jastrzebski from the Gdansk University of Physical Education and Sport found in his latest study that the provision of 6,000IU vitamin D3 per day did not just increase the levels of vitamin D3 in the blood of 14 elite light weight rowers by 400%, but "could be the reason for the improvement of aerobic metabolism in the rowers and reduction of their inflammatory reactions in response to the high-intensity training" (Jastrzebski. 2014).

I know that sounds kind of awkward without knowing what exactly the Polish scientists did. This is why I am going to give you a few more details below.
The experiment started on Mondays’ morning. The participants’ blood was taken from the cubital vein. Blood cell count, ASPAT, ALAT, GGTP, LDH, CK, total cholesterol, lipid profile (HDL, TGL, LDL), creatinine, phosphates, calcium salts, electrolytes (natrium, potassium, chloride) and the vitamin 25OHD (=vitamin D) content in blood were determined. In addition the scientists determined the total antioxidative status and the levels of lactic acid, the heart rate (HR), O2 uptake and kinetics as well as the respiratory exchange ratio (RER) in all subjects before and after 12 week supplementation with 6,000IU of liquid vitamin D3 (Vigantol) or identical placebo drops during and after a standardized graded exercise test on a Concept II rowing ergometer.

The same was true for most of the effects of the exercise regimen, which lead to significant increase in liver enzymes AspAT (asparagine aminotransferase), GGTP (gamma-glutamyltransferase) and LDH (lactate dehydrogenase) which suggest that the applied training program, after its completion, improved the function of some organs such as liver, heart or kidneys - with slightly greater increases in enzymes activity in the vitamin D group.

Figure 1: The vitamin D supplement added to the seasonal increase in vitamin D levels and increase the total antioxidant capacity of the rowers (Jastrzebski. 2014).

Significant increases in vitamin D were observed in both groups. In the non-supplemented group due to seasonal variation in the vitamin D group due to season variation and supplementation, which kicked the levels up to 120ng/ml which is more than 2x higher than "normal" (no, in the study at hand there were no side effects). Only in the former the scientists observed a corresponding, albeit non-significant increase in total antioxidant capacity, though.

In some, but not all subjects these changes went hand in hand with higher results of power and oxygen consumption obtained during a continuous graded exercise test in the vitamin D group. At the same time their blood parameters such as IL-1b, CRP, LDH reached lower values. As the author points out, "[t]he results suggest that vitamin D3, whose concentration in blood increased by 400% in GS as a result of supplementation, could be the reason for the improvement of aerobic metabolism in the rowers and reduction of their inflammatory reactions in response to the high-intensity training" (Jastrzebski. 2014) - a result that is quite surprising given the fact that the athletes were, unlike the subjects in previous studies with beneficial results, not vitamin D deficient at the onset of the study.
References:

• Dubnov-Raz, G., et al. "Vitamin D Supplementation and Physical Performance in Adolescent Swimmers." International journal of sport nutrition and exercise metabolism (2014).
• Jastrz?bski, Zbigniew. "Effect Of Vitamin D Supplementation On The Level Of Physical Fitness And Blood Parameters Of Rowers During The 8-Week High Intensity Training." Analele Universit??ii din Oradea Facicula Educa?ie Fizic? ?i Sport 2 (2014): 57 - 67