Benefits of Vitamin D.
With Melbourne's colder weather now well and truly upon us the importance of getting enough Vitamin D is ever greater. Sure living in Australia you'd be forgiven for thinking that we are all swimming in the stuff.
Unfortunately this couldn't be further from the truth. Statistics will tell us that we are actually not all tickedy-boo. In fact Deakin University states that 1 in 3 of us are deficient in Vitamin D. 
So why is Vitamin D so important to us? Well we did a bit of research for you and we found that Adequate vitamin D intake is important for the regulation of calcium and phosphorus absorption, maintenance of healthy bones and teeth, and is suggested to supply a protective effect against multiple diseases and conditions such as cancer, type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis. So basically it's great for bone health but we all already knew that right? And all we need is more sun right? Not quite. I mean that would be an awesome way of getting it but alas it's not sustainable year round.
This brings us to adding it into your diet. The would be an optimal way to try and get it in but it's in actual quite difficult to get enough good levels absorbed through food. That leaves us with supplementation
We then thought we'd then ask our friends over at Pure Pharma what the health benefits are in relation to us as active people doing CrossFit and other healthy activities on a regular basis. This is what they came up with:
HEALTH BENEFITS- It helps maintain strong bones: Vitamin D is essential for the mineralization of bone, working in synergy with calcium. Vitamin D deficiency cause an increase of osteoid in the bone, an immature bone precursor (1).
- Increases fast-twitch muscle fibers: The number and size of fast-twitch muscle fibers have been shown to increase with vitamin D supplementation (2).
- Can help improves your high intensity exercise performance (alà your WoDs): Vitamin D improves phosphocreatine recovery time, which improves high intensity exercise performance (3).
- Can help Improve your immune system: Vitamin D can control both innate and adaptive immune responses, as the vitamin D receptor is present on all immune system cells. Deficiency in vitamin D is associated with increased autoimmunity as well as an increased susceptibility to infection (4).
- Can help Reduce the risk of osteoporosis: Calcium in combination with vitamin D supplementation has been shown to prevent osteoporosis in people aged 50 years or older (5).
- Improves sleep: Patients in a trial exhibited improved sleep quality when supplementing with vitamin D (6).
A lot there to digest hey? (No pun intended! Lol). So it seems there is more to Vitamin D than just strong bones. Now you have a bit knowledge we should take a quick look at how much you should take?
The recommended dietary allowance (RDA) for vitamin D is currently 400IU (International Units) per day. More recently, some experts are calling to increase the RDA of vitamin D to 600IU for individuals aged 1-70.
Some are calling for more dosage like Professor Heaney, (Professor at the Creighton University School of Medicine & researcher at the Creighton University Osteoporosis Research Center). He recommends adults take a much higher dose, 70-80 IU/day/kg of body weight. For a 70kg adult, this is equivalent to 4900IU per day.
Each Pure Pharma D3 soft gel contains 2500IU of vitamin D, so it is recommend that just one is taken per day. Vitamin D is naturally synthesized in our skin when exposed to sunlight, but this can be quite affected by things like sunscreen, age and geographical location (Hellooo Melbourne winter!!).
Therefore the guys over at Pure Pharma recommend taking two soft gels (containing 5000IU) if your sun exposure is less than 20 minutes per day.?
In any case Vitamin D should be taken regularly to benefit your long-term health.
So, where can you get good quality Vit D?
The key part to that question is the "good quality" part. We stock Pure Pharma's full range of Vitamins and Minerals here at CrossFit CBD as we believe it to be one of the cleanest of its kind on the market.
If you would like to give the Vit-D a try email us on karl@crossfitcbd.com to reserve a bottle, or alternatively grab one next time you're at the Rooftop.
Post any comments to Beyond The Whiteboard.
*References (1), (2), (3), (4), (5) & (6) can be found here
