McGregor, who makes a speciality of hormonal well being, consuming issues and RED-S, has labored with Olympic, Paralympic and Commonwealth sports activities groups, and English and Scottish nationwide ballet dancers.
At this 12 months’s NutraIngredients’ Energetic Diet Summit held in Vienna from June 23 to 25, she offered key insights into the distinctive dietary wants of the feminine athlete and the psychological challenges many ladies encounter throughout the menstrual cycle.
Ought to feminine athletes modify their vitamin throughout the menstrual cycle?
A key focus of the dialogue centered across the significance of adequately fueling the physique to keep away from RED-S, the results of inadequate caloric consumption and/or extreme power expenditure.
Analysis means that RED-S can alter a number of physiological systems, together with metabolism, menstrual perform, bone well being, immunity, protein synthesis and cardiovascular and psychological well being. McGregor says this explicit challenge remains to be one of many ‘greatest challenges’ dealing with the feminine athlete.
“The most important problem remains to be the identical problem that it’s at all times been, which is feminine athletes not appreciating how a lot fueling they want to be able to help their organic processes but in addition all of the coaching that they do,” she informed NutraIngredients.
“There’s nonetheless this perception system that feminine athletes must look a sure method to carry out a sure approach, and I really feel until we begin altering that, it’s going to be tough for feminine athletes to alter their route of consumption.”
RED-S can current explicit challenges associated to the menstrual cycle. McGregor famous that whereas there may be now a basic consensus that ladies don’t must eat or prepare in another way round their cycle, monitoring it could actually assist them higher handle any psychological challenges which will come up.
“Now we have research that present that when progesterone is dominant in that luteal part, typically we really feel much less enticing as ladies,” she stated. “Should you’re responding to that, you may not gas your coaching effectively.”
This could result in a sample of restrictive consuming, affecting efficiency each bodily and mentally.
“It’s going to be totally different for each feminine and for each cycle as effectively,” McGregor added. “It’s actually essential to not underestimate the ability of hormones and the way they affect how we really feel.”
Which particular vitamins do feminine athletes want?
On the subject of recommending particular vitamins, McGregor stated each feminine athlete may have distinctive dietary wants, and a blanket strategy to vitamin is unlikely to be efficient, apart from vitamin D.
“Some feminine athletes might effectively must complement with iron if they’ve excessive menstrual losses,” she added. “Or endurance athletes, we all know, have a a lot increased breakdown of crimson blood cells, which suggests their iron ranges could also be a bit decrease.
“Should you’ve received somebody who’s plant-based, then you definitely would most likely encourage them to take B12 and perhaps omega-3s as effectively, but it surely’s very particular person and it’s about having the ability to have a look at a person’s blood profile often.”
Some ladies may battle to control their physique temperature throughout their cycle and might have to regulate their fluid and electrolyte consumption when coaching.
McGregor additionally recommended that probiotics could also be useful, primarily to help immune well being reasonably than enhance efficiency.
“After I was working in direction of [the Olympics] in London 2012, we had been encouraging athletes to take probiotics 12 weeks out from going to the video games as a result of we knew that it reduces their prevalence of higher respiratory tract infections,” she stated.
Whereas this immunity hyperlink is well-established, analysis on how intestine well being impacts efficiency remains to be missing.
“It’s nonetheless an rising space,” McGregor stated. “It’s actually thrilling and actually fascinating and I feel it’s one we will do quite a bit with as sports activities dietitians […], however I feel we nonetheless want much more [research].”
Recommending different vitamins, corresponding to creatine, is barely tougher, she famous, given the shortage of consensus on dosages, timings and use instances.
“Extra ladies have gotten fascinated with [creatine], however I feel we’ve to nonetheless be very cautious in regards to the software of it,” she stated. “There was a current place paper speaking in regards to the potential advantages of creatine in females, notably across the menstrual cycle, cognitive perform and sustaining muscle mass, […] however I feel from an ergogenic viewpoint, there isn’t actually sufficient proof.
“The place paper says that it’s wanting very, very optimistic, however we nonetheless want extra research on the appropriate dose and the appropriate timing. I feel we’ve to be actually cautious, […] if we don’t have the appropriate data, we might do extra harm than good.”
