Another look at vitamin supplementation

Runner's Web and Triathlete's Web, a Running, Track and Field and Triathlon Resource Portal

Very few areas of nutrition are more controversial than vitamin supplementation. Some studies say we should supplement, others say that vitamin can be detrimental.

Runner's Web attempts to cover the research in an interesting piece. Some highlights:

1. "Two South African studies have produced encouraging results regarding vitamin C supplementation...The supplemented runners experienced fewer upper-respiratory infections in the two weeks following the race...A following up study confirmed these results, though a recent study is not as encouraging."
2. "Regardless of your level of supplementation, sticking with a high intake of fruits and vegetables should pay off immune wise. They contain hundreds of phytochemicals that provide many preventative health benefits, and are also excellent sources of carotenoids that boost the activity of white blood cells called lymphocytes. "
3. "What we do know is that a daily dose of 250 mg is adequate to your saturate body stores with vitamin C. Excellent sources of vitamin C include sweet peppers, citrus fruits and juices, strawberries, cantaloupe, kiwi fruit and broccoli."

What do I do? I try to eat as nutritiously as possible but then also supplement. On a fairly regular basis (6 days a week) I take an antioxidant, calcium, vitamin B, a mega mineral supplement, fish oil, and often grapeseed extract or pycnogenol. But I try to keep the doses fairly low and treat them really as supplements and not substitutes for fruits and vegetables.