Many people use exercise, including running, to help reduce their stress. This might be the emotional stress of a major life event, or the daily stress of work and family. However, your favorite stress reducer also creates other types of stress in your body. What kind of stress? Any form of exercise creates free-radicals, compounds that create inflammation in the body. Long-term inflammation is what leads to pain and chronic disease. So what is a health conscious runner to do?
Let us recommend the Ortho Molecular Alpha Base Premier Pack. This high-powered and highly absorbable multi-vitamin doesn’t just include vitamins and minerals, but it also includes a separate capsule of plant based phytonutrients which have been shown to help reduce inflammation from free-radicals. These include: Turmeric, resveratrol, and broccoli seed extract. Just to make things easy, the premier pack also includes 950mg of omega 3 fatty acids. Many studies done on omega 3 fish oil show that it does reduce inflammation, and many people find that it reduces their pain level1.
In order to recover from your training it’s important to get adequate sleep. In these modern times however, most people are not getting the recommended 8 hours of shuteye. If life stress keeps you up at night because you can’t shut off your mind, you might consider trying 5HTP before crawling into bed. 5HTP is the amino acid that helps your body build serotonin, a neurotransmitter with a calming effect. This calming effect helps many people stop the recycled thoughts and worry. However, do not take 5-HTP with certain prescription anti-anxiety or antidepressant medications without consulting with your physician first. Combining 5HTP with these medications rarely leads to negative side effects such as diarrhea and agitation, but you should be aware of these. For most people though, 100mg of 5HTP helps them get the rest they need to be productive employees and better athletes.
1) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16531187
Author: Brenna Thompson