Polyphenol-rich foods for muscle damage recovery 💪💥

A food first recovery strategy?

The effects of a (poly)phenol-rich food intervention on markers of exercise-induced inflammation and oxidative stress: A randomised controlled trial

Study Details

This new study recruited 26 active adults to complete a session of muscle damaging exercise three days after consuming either…

1️⃣ High-polyphenol foods (dates, dark chocolate, pomegranate - 285.1 mg/day)

2️⃣ Low-polyphenol foods (cereal bar, milk chocolate, sports drink - 88.3 mg/day)

Interventions were matched for calories and macronutrient content 🔥

Markers of inflammation and oxidative stress were assessed pre- and post-exercise 🔍

Key Findings

Total plasma polyphenol conc. were greater in the high vs low intervention, peaking 1 h post-exercise 📈

👉 Urinary markers of oxidative stress were higher in the high vs low intervention

👉 But, blood markers of oxidative stress were higher in low vs high interventions

Conclusion

Food-based polyphenol interventions before exercise can increase total plasma polyphenol concentrations 🩸✅

But it appears to have limited and inconsistent effects in the 2 h after strenuous exercise ❌

This may indicate that a higher dose of polyphenols is required for consistent effects, or that polyphenol supplements may be a superior form for recovery 🧐

Reference

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41578624/

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