Female Athletes at Risk for Bone Loss

Another study confirms that female athletes involved in significant aerobic exercise, such as running and swimming, have lower bone density.  While the researchers seem puzzled by their findings, this is not hard to understand.

Aerobic output is inherently catabolic, meaning that it breaks down body tissue.  A high level of aerobics is a form of stress the body must offset.  Bones are mineralized collagen, thus too much activity may break them down at too fast a pace.  Young women are also growing as well as running their menstrual cycles, which are energy intense activities.

This is not a difficult problem to solve for those young women who like to exercise a lot.  It is vital to get adequate dietary protein, especially branch chain amino acids that support muscle and collagen.  Whey protein is best.  Athletes generally need 2/3 of their ideal weight in grams of protein per day.  High quality iron is vital in young female athletes, and 25 mg of iron bisglycinate per day is usually enough.  Adequate dietary calcium is also needed and typically requires extra supplementation to get a full 1000 mg per day.