2g Spirulina à Day Enhance Quadriceps Strength in Trained and Untrained Individuals

Hitherto, most of you may have considered algae such as spirulina mostly as a source of anti-oxidants or a pretty useless weight-loss supplement. What you probably did not know is that taking 2g of spirulina each day might noticeably increase your strength gains in the gym.

Scientists from the Department of Sports Medicine and Physiotherapy at the Guru Nanak Dev University, in Punjab, India supplemented the diet of a group of 40 healthy volunteers (20 trained, 20 untrained) with 2g of spirulina per day and measured peak force, average force and fatigue index of dominant quadriceps muscle before and after 8 week of supplementation.

Table 1: Comparisons of effect of spirulina supplementation on peak force, average force, and fatigue index of dominant quadriceps muscle in supplemented and placebo trained and untrained groups.
Values are shown as mean values with standard deviation

The data in table 1 shows the astonishing results: While supplementation did not improve time to exhaustion spirulina supplementation did in fact produce a 30% increases in peak force production even in the untrained group.

Unfortunately, the scientists refrain from speculations about the underlying mechanism of action, but maybe you are satisfied to know that it works and do not care about the how's and why's? No? Well, as soon as there is further information available, you'll find it here at the SuppVersity.