Ever ran on the treadmill thinking how sooner will this help you reach your ultimate goal? It can get a bit frustrating to keep hustling without any gains. It is hard to shed a dozen kilos within a week or gain muscles overnight. It is going to take its own time, however, you may improve your exercise performance by drink tart cherry juice, suggests a study.
The ruby-red juice may help reduce strength loss and improving muscle recovery after intensive exercise. The study published in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition revealed a link between improved exercise performance and tart cherry juice as well.
"The recovery benefits of tart cherry concentrate are well researched, yet evidence on performance enhancement is scarce and results have been mixed," said study co-author Philip Chilibeck from University of Saskatchewan in Canada.
"The results of this meta-analysis found that tart cherries did help improve performance, and we gained greater insight into the potential mechanism responsible for this benefit," Chilibeck added.
For the study, researchers examined 10 previously published studies on tart cherries and exercise recovery. The sample sizes ranged from 8-27, whereas the average ages of study participants ranged from 18.6 to 34.6 years.
A bunch of endurance-trained individuals, including cyclists, runners and triathletes were included in the study. The 10 studies totalled 127 males and 20 females.
To qualify, studies were required to be randomised controlled trials conducted in a healthy adult population and use a placebo as a comparison for tart cherry supplementation (including tart cherry juice, tart cherry concentrate, tart cherry powder and tart cherry powder capsules).
Nine of the 10 studies involved longer-term tart cherry consumption (around two to seven days prior to exercise) while one involved same-day supplementation.
The dosage of tart cherry varied across studies. For instance, some participants took 200 to 500 mg/day in capsule or some took powder form, 60 to 90 mL/day of tart cherry juice concentrate diluted with 100 to 510 mL water and 300 to 473mL/day of tart cherry juice.
The total amount of anthocyanins consumed daily ranged from 66 to 2,760 mg.
A significant improvement in endurance performance with tart cherry concentrate, with two of the 10 studies reporting significant performance-enhancing effects on their own were observed in pooled studied
The meta-analysis revealed that tart cherry consumed for seven days to 1.5 hours before cycling, swimming or running, may boost exercise performance. You can have it in juice form, or powdered form.
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