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Beta-alanine: practical benefits for athletes

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Article written by Nigel Mitchell

Date published 21 June 2021

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Nigel Mitchell, Performance Nutritionist, provides an overview of beta-alanine, explaining the extensive use of the supplement and its practical application at Olympic and professional level.

What is beta-alanine and what does it do?

Beta-alanine is a sports nutrition supplement that genuinely works to support the performance of athletes. The problem is, it is often misused, so that potential benefits are mitigated by inappropriate application. This article aims to provide information about the supplement's potential uses and practical applications, based on experience of real-world use with world-class athletes.

"I use beta-alanine with the players on a daily basis to help extend intense energy training sessions and increase each athlete's output. It's great that we now have this available from Healthspan Elite, as it provides me with assurance that it's of the highest quality."

Kat Darry, All Blacks Nutritionist

History of beta-alanine

I was first introduced to beta-alanine in the mid 2000s by Professor Roger Harris, a sports biochemist; he was part of the team that first researched creatine. Professor Roger and his team were interested to see if muscle carnosine could be increased by dietary manipulation.

Carnosine acts as an intra-cellular (inside the cell) buffer to the acid produced during strenuous exercise. The body uses multiple buffering systems; for example, sodium bicarbonate (produced by the kidneys) works outside the cell and neutralises the acid as it leaves.

Carnosine is a histidine dipeptide (this means beta-alanine and histidine joined together). Professor Roger had worked out that the limiting amino acid was the beta-alanine, so that supplementing with it should result in increased carnosine.

At that time beta-alanine supplements were difficult to find, so the original research, which demonstrated that increasing dietary beta-alanine resulted in increased muscle carnosine, used poultry as the beta-alanine source.1

Beta-alanine effects

Professor Roger demonstrated that by consuming extra beta-alanine (4g a day for four weeks) you can increase the muscle carnosine content. This led to performance research that showed improvements in high-intensity exercise.2

Initially, due to the lack of quality beta-alanine supplements, I used beta-alanine diets with athletes – this included foods high in beta-alanine such as turkey and prawns. As the research started to be published there was an increase in sport-specific products.

The first athletes were short track speed skaters, followed by team pursuit track riders. At the time using beta-alanine was very much cutting-edge, but it's now standard practice.

Find out more about beta-alanine

Woman in sportswear facing into sunrise

Beta-alanine: use in sport and exercise

Wendy Martinson OBE explains how beta-alanine can be used in sport, what effects it has on the body, safety and side effects and why nutritionists may want to include it in their plans.


Find out more

Takeaway points on beta-alanine

  • Loading: you must load on beta-alanine. Just taking it before exercise will not improve performance.
  • By taking 4g/day of beta-alanine it takes about 4 weeks to load.
  • Beta-alanine can cause parathesis (itching, in particular the scalp and lips). This can be very uncomfortable for some people. This is why it is important not to exceed the recommended dosage.
  • I tend to see beta-alanine supplementation as more of a training aid than for competition, in that it helps athletes to recover and deal with high-intensity repeated exercise that results in high levels of lactate formation. For this reason athletes should plan to load on it about four weeks before the targeted training block, not just before competition.
  • Plant-based diets tend to be lower in beta-alanine, so I tend to suggest that athletes who follow a predominately plant-based diet consider supplementation.
  • Some athletes will combine both acute sodium bicarbonate supplementation with beta-alanine.

If you are looking at including or already include repeated high-intensity exercise in your routine, it may also be worth including beta-alanine supplementation.

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  • Plays a vital role in the production of carnosine, which buffers lactic acid
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About Nigel Mitchell

Nigel Mitchell is Technical Lead for the English Institute of Sport, nutritionist for British Sailing and an honorary senior lecturer at the University of Portsmouth, UK.

References

1R. C. Harris et al (2006). The absorption of orally supplied b-alanine and its effect on muscle carnosine synthesis in human vastus lateralis, Amino Acids DOI 10.1007/s00726-006-0299-9
2C.A. Hill (2007). Influence of beta-alanine supplementation on skeletal muscle carnosine concentrations and high intensity cycling capacity, Amino Acids 32: 225-233, 2007

This article is written by nutrition professionals, and is aimed at nutritionists and athletes. It is not intended to replace advice from your own doctor or nutritionist. Please consult a professional before trying supplements.