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Definition: "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance "

22.05.2023

In these doses, arginine supplements improve sports performance

Yes, athletes benefit from arginine supplementation. Although there is much to be said for the use of citrulline and nitrate-rich extracts by athletes, this is not to say that good old arginine has no effect on sports performance.

Meta-study
Aitor Viribay Morales is the founder of the Spanish website [glut4science.com], which aims to transfer scientific insights about physiology, nutrition, training and supplementation to athletes. In 2020 he published a meta-study in Nutrients, in which he aggregated and analyzed the results of 15 previously published trials.

In these trials, researchers had given active subjects or athletes supplements with arginine, and then measured the effect on aerobic [where oxygen consumption is less than the maximum oxygen uptake by the body] or anaerobic sports performance [where oxygen consumption exceeds the maximum oxygen uptake by the body. body].

Viribay was not looking at any specific outcome. On one occasion the trials related to the time to exhaustion, the other time on power and yet another time on the total working capacity. In addition, not all studies that Viribay could trace were of the same good quality.

Results
In both types of exercise, supplementation with arginine appeared to improve performance, Viribay concluded. The first figure below relates to anaerobic performance, the second to aerobic.

Doses
In both types of performance, single administration was effective. In the context of a single administration, according to Viribay, you should think of a dose of 10-11 grams, taken an hour to an hour and a half before exercise.

If you take supplements with L-arginine for a longer period of 1-2 months, you need 2 grams of arginine per day to improve aerobic performance. For an improvement in anaerobic performance, the dose with long-term supplementation is approximately equal to the dose you need with a single intake.

Source:
Nutrients. 2020 May 2;12(5):1300.

More:
Why NO-boosters with a modest amount of arginine and citrulline can still be effective 11.05.2023
Just over two grams of arginine-citrulline combi enough to make athletes faster and fitter 29.10.2019
Modest dose of two grams of L-arginine per day makes athletes even fitter 21.02.2018
Better NO boosters contain a combination of L-arginine and L-citrulline 11.02.2015

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