Gut Microbiota and Sports Performance

It is widely documented that gastrointestinal complaints are common in athletes,
especially in endurance sports, with 30-50% of athletes affected with gastrointestinal symptoms include cramps, bloating, diarrhea and nausea, what is the reason behind this?? Well, it’s the stress of constant training.

What is the relation between stress and these symptoms?

You should understand what does the stress do to your body that causes these effects.
Every individual has their own distinctive pattern of gut microbiota whose functions include enhancing the way nutrients and vitamins are absorbed, converting the food we eat into valuable by-products, working with the immune system protecting against inflammation, and increasing ability to access fat as fuel.
If the gut microbiology is not optimized then this can lead to increased gut permeability; the movement of gut microbiota and their products, and incompletely digested nutrients such as food proteins.
This happens because of stress, in more details, the redistribution of blood flow with exercise, significantly reduces blood flow to the gut, leading to hyperthermia, ischemia and hypoperfusion that can affect microbial balance and also contribute to damage to the intestinal mucosa, causing intestinal barrier disruption, followed by an inevitable inflammatory response.
Usually, athletes are motivated by the concept “NO PAIN, NO GAIN” which consequently lead them to be FIT BUT NOT HEALTHY!!
So a stressed or over-trained body is the result, along with The resulting “leaky gut” further increases the probability that larger food particles can enter the blood stream and this creates the potential for those food particles to trigger a food-specific IgG immune response which are known as ”food intolerance” and this will, in a vicious circle, further impact exercise performance, subsequent postexercise and exercise training routines recovery due to impairments in the uptake of vital fluids and nutrients “malabsorption”.
Approaches that reduce inflammation are the key to improve performance and increase recovery and restoration of overall health.

How is it done?

Food-specific IgG testing can be used to help understand the root cause and guide such an approach.
Diet plays a key role in an active person’s preparation, competition and recovery strategies.

1- It’s important to Improve gut condition, and food intolerances, measured by food-specific IgG antibodies, can indicate that gut damage has occurred and promote inflammation across the body through the passage of incompletely digested foods and eliminate them in the designed dietary modification.

2- Establishing a nutrition strategy that meets an individual’s dietary requirements, while still maximizing performance, by using guided elimination diet plan based on food-specific IgG antibodies

3- Dietary optimization is needed as part of a sports program and an optimal diet requires a personalized approach, taking food reactions into account.

FoodPrint test is the perfect diagnostic tool that can not only help evaluate how far gut damage is, but also identify offending food items that cause an increase in inflammation and worsen the gut permeability condition.

It helps identify 200+ of food items and is provided with a customized diet plan that helps you though your gut repair journey.