With hot summer months ahead, July to August can present some potential problems for optimal training therefore I thought I’d devote this blog entry to getting the most out of training during the hottest summer months. Here are my 2 important summer supplements.
These two important summer supplements have been chosen because they will help you to reach optimum performance during the heat of summer.
2 important summer supplements
Magnesium
Digestive Enzymes
These supplements are great for those spending long hours out in the sun training and who wish to improve their performance as well as aid their digestion. The perfect combination for martial arts students that will be susceptible to tummy bugs and long rigours training schedules in either Thailand or China.
So here’s why:
1. Magnesium
Magnesium is important for maintaining and improving sports performance, as magnesium plays a pivotal role in energy production and the maintenance of health. This mineral is often poorly supplied by diet. And you will especially find this when your diet is mostly made up of cabbage, conge, rice, tofu and a few other vegetables which make up the average kung fu school meal here in China.
There are a selection of these products that you can choose from. – Other ways you can get magnesium into the body include effervescent tablets. There are plenty of products on the market to choose from.
Modern research actually suggests that even small shortfalls in magnesium intake can seriously impair athletic performance. This mineral should become your new friend as a supplement or by naturally adding magnesium rich foods to your diet.
So why is magnesium important?
Magnesium is important because it is required for the activation of crucial enzymes known as ATPases, which are required for the generation of ATP, the body’s ‘energy currency’ used for all muscular contraction. It reduces heart rate, ventilation rate, oxygen uptake and carbon dioxide production. Where there is a magnesium shortfall the efficiency of muscle relaxation is reduced, which accounts for an important fraction of total energy needs during exercise. Additionally, magnesium reduces the accumulation of fatiguing lactic acid during intense exercise. Don’t take my word for it click the link to find out more. //wwww.pponline.co.uk/encyc/using-magnesium-to-improve-your-exercise-performance-39415
2. Digestive Enzymes
Digestive enzymes help with: Allergies by minimizing the absorption of allergy-triggering, incompletely digested “foreign proteins” (antigens) in foods that cause allergies. Back Pain, as the enzymes chymotrypsin and trypsin have been found to successfully treat the sciatica (leg pain) that occurs in some patients with back pain. Digestion and flatulence, as they add to your body’s natural digestive enzymes reserves. This little benefit maybe much needed for students practicing qigong. The combination qigong and poorly digested food leads to the release of more than a little how shall we say bad qi into the training environment. Other benefits of these enzymes include gallbladder health, as one of the enzymes in digestive enzyme supplements (named lipase) facilitates the digestion of dietary fats in the gallbladder so take a little strain of this organ.
Rosacea patients have been found to have lower than normal levels of pancreatic lipase (an enzyme involved in the digestion of fat). Therefore, insufficient lipase production could be responsible, at least partly, for the symptoms of rosacea. If this is the case, supplemental lipases may be useful for rosacea patients while sciatica may also be alleviated as a combination of the enzymes chymotrypsin and trypsin have been found to successfully treat the sciatica (leg pain) that occurs in some patients with back pain.
Look into which product best suits you. I’ve not looked into every product but whatever supplement go for trusted and quality brands.
Digestive Enzymes and Sports Injuries
Finally, and maybe more relevantly to most sports injuries can be helped by taking this supplement as certain digestive enzymes (either alone or in combination) have been demonstrated in several clinical trials to accelerate the healing of sports injuries that involve soft tissue damage (sprains and strains), leading them to heal up to twice as fast as normal. This is a great benefit for those with knocks and niggling injuries. This benefit has been studied in injuries from karate, ice hockey, soccer, football, boxing, judo, running and more.
The most noticeable effects of enzyme therapy include reduced pain, blood clotting, swelling, heat, edema and inflammation. These effects occur via improved blood circulation, accelerated tissue repair, delivery of nutrients to damaged areas, removal of debris from the injured area and direct anti-inflammatory effects.
For the month of June to July I studied at Master Chen Fusheng’s Traditional Martial Arts School on the outskirts of Beijng. Here’s a link www.Bajizhandao.com. The usual training day began at 5am with standing meditation followed by drills and basics. After breakfast forms and applications. Then lunch and conditioning, qigong and applications. After dinner we then practice forms, do various workouts for strength, power and conditioning, finishing the evening training with more standing meditation. During this time I took magnesium and enzyme supplements and felt the benefits in my training for doing so.
