This page contains information about iron and ferritin levels. It is not intended to be a medical recommendation, and your coaches will not make you get tested, nor pressure you in anyway to supplement or test. We will suggest testing, if it's within your means, if you describe symptoms or characteristics which might suggest you'd benefit from iron supplementation.
Athletes should NOT supplement with iron if they have not gotten a blood test.
What is Iron
Iron is an essential mineral; its main tasks are reversibly carrying oxygen in hemoglobin molecules in red blood cells and in myoglobin in muscle cells.
From: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10608302/
Why is it necessary for runners?
Proper Iron levels allow athletes to perform more efficiently, which results in better performance, faster recovery, and higher gains.
Proper iron levels resulted in lower heart rate during exercise and less blood lactate. Low levels of iron resulted in lower V02 Max.
From: Iron and the endurance athlete - PubMed (Full Text)
Why can it be low for runners?
Iron is lost in bleeding, sweating, and because a hormone
"hepcidin" is increased postexercise which inhibits the absorption of
iron.
From: The effects of acute exercise bouts on hepcidin in women - PubMed (nih.gov)
“Most of the recent research has focused on an inflammation-linked hormone called hepcidin, whose levels spike after hard workouts and inhibit iron absorption, with the worst effects occurring between about three and six hours afterward. If you’re training hard and eating your main iron-rich meals during that relatively long post-workout window, you may simply not be absorbing it.”
From: How Much Iron Is Enough for Endurance Athletes?
What levels are "normal"
What are ideal Ferritin
levels for runners vs normal people?
Normal: 10-300 ng/ml
Necessary range for Runners: 40-100 ng/ml
Where to test
Your doctor can run draw blood at run a test at the same
time as the physical.
Ultalabtests.com does a Ferritin, Iron and Total iron
Binding Capacity test for ~$40
When to consider supplements
Ferritin Levels
200 ng/ml – do not supplement
80-100 ng/ml – no supplement needed
40-79 ng/ml – occasional supplement may work
Less than 40 ng/ml – supplement recommended
