Ask the Expert Archive Week 21
Sport Supplements
Baseball player Mark McGwire took creatine to bulk up, but as Dr. Andrew Pipe tells us, there are three things you need to know before you take sports supplements.
I think probably one of the most important things that an athlete can be aware of as they consider taking nutritional supplements is to raise the question as to whether they need to take the supplement in the first place. It's still the case that most athletes are far better off eating a balanced diet, and in fact have no need of supplements. The exception might be young feamle athletes who are menstruating, who have a higher requirment for iron.
The second thing that I think its important to realize is that since 1996 there1s absolutely no regulation of the quality, the contents of the accuracy of the labelling of nutritional supplements or compounds produced in the United States, which is where most of the supplements that are sold in Canada come from. This can cause problems for athletes who are tested for performance enhancing drugs in the course of their competition, because we know that many of these compounds or supplements may contain banned substances, or substances that are converted in the body to banned substances.
Finally its important to realize that some of these substances, can also very seriously threaten your health. An NBA player recently had a near death experience as a consequence of his ingestion a supplement which he thought was harmless, but which has been shown on several occasions in the United States to produce near fatal conditions in atheletes.
So three points, supplements generally aren1t needed, secondly their expensive and may get you into trouble with drug testing regulations, thirdly they can be very harmful to your health. If you would like to send a question to Ask the Expert you can either email us at rx@tvo.org or fill out our form.
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