I have a student that I have tasked with measuring the nitrate (and nitrite) content of a number of beetroot juice products (ideally a dozen or more). We’re specifically looking for ones that are 1) marketed to athletes/as enhancing athletic performance, and 2) do not contain other ingredients (e.g., arginine) aimed at increasing nitric oxide production. Here is what we have acquired so far:
Beet It! (regular juice)
Beet It! Sport (“platinum” concentrate)
Red Rush
Red Ace
Beet-Power
Beet Elite
Beet Performer
Knudson organic beet juice
Biotta organic beet juice
I would appreciate any additional suggestions, especially if you can tell me how to lay my hands on the product.
Thanks!
P.S. If anybody wants to buy the leftovers, I have a fair bit of stuff to unload.
I just juice the beets and drink up. I would be interested in seeing some data for time since juicing, as I have heard there is fast nutritional decay with juicing. I also have no idea if organic offers any nutritional benefit.
The ergogenic effects are directly related to the levels of nitrates present. Time-since-juicing shouldn’t be a significant issue on realistic time-frames (i.e. hours are probably fine, days may start to be noticeable) but cooking for example has a major deleterious effect.
Similarly, organically-grown beets generally have much *lower *levels of nitrates due to the lack of use nitrate-rich fertilisers, thus for performance-enhancing purposes, non-organic beets are considered better; although as AC mentions above, this can vary drastically depending on farming methods so YMMV.
I grabbed Salus red beet crystals at a grocery store and use them in a pinch one time. I’ve also seen them on Amazon. I’d be interested to see how the nutritional properties change in crystal form, it is probably my favorite way to consume beets.
Yes, when the project is complete the goal is to publish the results somewhere. I expect that every company will hate us except the one that comes out on top.
Yes, dietary nitrate does “work”, at least in most people (about 25% seem to be low responders…something we’re looking into).
Nitrate is actually a very hardy little molecule. For example, you can boil it in water for 24 h, or use beet juice/powder to make baked goods, and there will be no change.
Although there are lots of beet root powders on the market, we’ve been avoiding them because it is more difficult to define the recommended “dose”, and thus compare different products.
Please, keep the suggestions coming! This is hardly earth-shattering research, but at the same time, I think people will find the results really interesting.
You should feed some keto athletes some nitrate bacon and see how they do.
It’s fat and nitrates from celery, essentially. They use nitrates from celery juice instead of nitrites in the bacon to make it seem more “consumer friendly”.
A silly comment,I know, but I don’t even know if the nitrates in bacon are the same thing.
Carry on with the meaningful work! I’ll be interested in results.
I am just trying to be funny. It is funny that a lot of foods I hated as a kid I like now. Brussel sprouts and beets for instance. Still don’t understand kale though. It is disgusting never understood how it got to be hip.
I was too :). And same for me. I never liked broccoli or a lot of other veggies when I was a kid but I love them now. Except beets. And Kale is awful too. :).
If any of these supplements actually offer some kind of performance advantage without me hurling after I drink it then I’m willing to give them a go. As a tter I’m always after that last .001%
