New supplement may help women run faster: study

A supplement specially prepared by blending minerals and nutrients may boost performance in women and help them run faster, a study claims.
Women who took the supplement for a month saw their three-mile run times drop by almost a minute, according to researchers from The Ohio State University in the US.
They also saw improvements in distance covered in 25 minutes on a stationary bike and a third test in which they stepped on and off a bench, the researchers said.
The study of young women, published in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition, compared the performance of those who took the supplement with a control group that took a placebo.

The minerals in the study included forms of iron, copper and zinc along with two other nutrients - carnitine (derived from an amino acid) and phosphatidylserine (made up of fatty acids and amino acids).
Participants were recreational athletes 18 to 30 years old who had regularly done aerobic exercise at least two to three hours a week for six months. They also had to be runners.

In an initial experiment including 28 women, half of whom took the supplement, researchers found that those in the study group saw their three-mile run times drop from 26.5 minutes on average to 25.6 minutes.

Stationary bike distance covered in 25 minutes increased to an average of 6.5 miles, compared to 6 miles at the start of the study.
Steps in the step test increased to almost 44 from about 40. All of the changes were statistically significant and were not seen in the placebo group, researchers said.
A second follow-up experiment - designed to see if the first was reproducible and test a lower dose of one of the nutrients - included 36 women and found a 41-second average decrease in run times.
"We know that young women, in particular, often have micro-deficiencies in nutrients and that those nutrients play a role in how cells work during exercise," said Robert DiSilvestro, lead author of the study and a professor of human nutrition at Ohio State.

"They tend to eat less meat than men, and menstruation also plays an important role in mineral loss," he said.
The supplement is expected to cost between USD 35 and USD 40 for a month's supply, researchers said.