Vitamin Tips: To Fuel Physical Activity
By: News Canada

(NC)—Physical activity and athletic performance can be enhanced through good nutrition. This can be achieved by eating the right foods and drinking the right fluids at the right time, coupled with nutritional supplementation.

Regular physical activity might increase the body's nutritional needs. So it's important to have an adequate amount of vitamins and minerals every day. For athletes in particular, inadequate diets have been shown to result in less than optimal performance in otherwise fit individuals.

Here is what a diet with the recommended daily intake of vitamins and minerals can do for you:

• Help replace minerals lost through sweat and urination. Minerals such as potassium, sodium, calcium, and magnesium are necessary for muscle and nerve contractions.

• Provide antioxidants, such as vitamins C and E, to boost the immune system and help reduce cell damage caused by free radicals generated by physical activity.

• Provide B vitamins to convert carbohydrates, fat, and protein into fuel for energy.

• Boost calcium, which is critical to bone health, muscle contractions, nerve impulses and metabolism.

• Correct an iron deficiency, which is one of the most common nutritional deficiencies in North America. Iron stores can be depleted by physical activity, resulting in fatigue, lack of energy and an inability to concentrate.

It can be challenging to consume the recommended amounts of essential vitamins and minerals on a daily basis. Canadians who are physically active, therefore, should consider taking a quality, balanced, complete multivitamin formulated specifically for people with a physically active lifestyle, such as Centrum Protegra®.

For more information on vitamin and mineral supplementation, visit www.centrumvitamins.ca.

- News Canada

About The Author News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web. News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial "fill" items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

This article was posted on August 09, 2003

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