• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

  • Fitness
  • Workouts
    • Best Shoulder Workouts
    • Best Chest Workouts
    • Best Leg Workouts
    • Best Leg Exercises
    • Best Biceps Exercises
    • Best Kettlebell Exercises
    • Best Back Workouts
    • Best HIIT Workouts
    • Best Triceps Exercises
    • Best Arm Workouts
  • Reviews
    • Supplements
      • Best Pre-Workouts
      • Best Whey Protein
    • Equipment
      • Best Home Gym Machines
    • Certifications
      • ISSA Review
  • News
  • Exercise Guides
    • Legs
      • Back Squat
      • Bulgarian Split Squat
      • Goblet Squat
      • Zercher Squat
      • Standing Calf Raise
      • Hack Squat
    • Chest
      • Bench Press
      • Dumbbell Bench Press
      • Close-Grip Bench Press
      • Incline Bench Press
    • Shoulders
      • Overhead Dumbbell Press
      • Lateral Raise
    • Arms
      • Chin-Up
      • Weighted Pull-Up
      • Triceps Pushdown
    • Back
      • Deadlift
      • Trap Bar Deadlift
      • Lat Pulldown
      • Inverted Row
      • Bent-Over Barbell Row
      • Single-Arm Dumbbell Row
      • Pendlay Row
Healthy Eating

The Amazing Benefits of the Mysterious Vitamin P

In the first part of the 20th century, vitamin P was known to reduce blood sugar and improve insulin resistance. What is it? It's now known as flavonoids and you need to eat them.

Doug Dupont

Written by Doug Dupont Last updated on June 3, 2013

You may not know that in the first part of the twentieth century there was such a thing as vitamin P. Not only that, but vitamin P helped to reduce blood sugar, improve insulin resistance, reduce lipids, and fight inflammation. It sounds like pretty good stuff, and you can’t help but wonder where it went. Actually, vitamin P is a substance we now call flavonoids. And yes, flavonoids have been credited with all of those effects and possibly more.

A flavonoid is a byproduct of plant metabolism, so you get flavonoids when you eat plants. Hesperidin is a popular and healthy type of flavonoid that comes from citrus fruits. In a recent study by the Journal of Strength of Conditioning, researchers wanted to see if hesperidin supplementation would benefit chemical and stress indicators during exercise.

In this case researchers looked at rats, not people, but the results were telling. They had the rats do different swimming protocols, both interval and steady, and they supplemented the rats with hesperidin. The workouts were pretty intense by human standards. Either 50 minutes of continuous loaded swimming, or 50 one-minute intervals with even heavier loaded swimming.

Exercise reduces blood glucose, as you would imagine. The more intense the exercise, the lower the glucose level becomes, so the rats performing the intervals had the least glucose. Each rat that supplemented with hesperidin had even less blood glucose. This is likely due to better utilization of blood sugar by an improvement to the insulin system, and as such taking hesperidin presumably wouldn’t be a detriment to people with already low blood sugar.

The hesperidin also improved the blood profiles of other important biochemicals. For example, the rats supplementing with hesperidin had lower total cholesterol, lower LDL cholesterol (the bad kind), and lower triglycerides, but they had higher HDL cholesterol (the good kind). These changes have been associated with a reduction in metabolic diseases like diabetes, in this case not only from the exercise itself, but also from hesperidin supplementation.

Blood chemistry wasn’t the only improvement, though. Protection from cancer-causing free radicals was also increased. In the continuous swimming group, the antioxidant capacity of rats actually increased to 83% more than their non-hesperidin counterparts. The interval swimming group experienced reduced lipid peroxidation to the tune of 45%. Lipid peroxidation is the direct chemical process by which free radicals damage your cells.

No matter which exercise was performed, the protective benefits of this citrus flavonoid were clear. Not only does hesperidin help keep you safe from free radicals, but when combined with steady cardio it will actually improve your protection against future activities.

So the evidence is in. Hesperidin is good for rats. And in this case, although the numbers maybe unreliable – especially since I’d definitely drown if I had to swim weighted for 50 minutes – I think we can extend these benefits in some degree to us as well. And best of all, you can also just eat citrus fruits.

References:

1. David Michel de Oliveira, et. al., “Hesperidin associated with continuous and interval swimming improved biochemical and oxidative biomarkers in rats,” Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition 2013, 10:27

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

Doug Dupont

About Doug Dupont

Having grown up at the foot of a forest covered mountain in rural Vermont, Doug was active from a very young age. Hiking, running, and climbing were a part of everyday life in the Green Mountains. This culture of exercise led to dabbling in martial arts as a teen, and also getting work in a local powerlifting focused gym. Doug continued to pursue knowledge and training in exercise, becoming a certified personal trainer while still a teenager. Once in college he began his hand at the business side of fitness, taking a management position at a large local gym. During that time he became a founding member of the UVM Brazilian Jiu Jitsu club, and was the first among their competition team. After only a few months he was assisting in coaching, and ran conditioning program for the club.

Out of college Doug set up his own training center. He grew his list of clientele including several professional MMA athletes, eventually going so far as to corner a world title fight. He has continued ­­­to develop his business into today.

View All Articles

Recommended Articles

Woman squatting by Bev Childress
A Healthy Approach to Holiday Eating
diymealplanning21
DIY Meal Planning
Vegetarian Protein Alfredo
Comfort Fuel: Vegetarian Protein Alfredo
Why Your Diet Should Be Unique to Just You

Primary Sidebar

Latest Articles

Phillip Herndon Squats 412.7 Kilograms (910 Pounds) For New Massive Personal Record

Justin Medeiros Walks Through a Full Tour of His Home Gym Before CrossFit Season

Powerlifter Jimmy Kolb Logs 612.5-Kilogram (1,350.3-Pound) Equipped Bench Press World Record

The Ultimate Back and Biceps Workout for Every Lifter From Beginner to Advanced

Latest Reviews

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

Best Whey Proteins for Packing on Muscle, Shredding Down, Meal Replacement, and More

Best Pre-Workouts for Building Muscle, Running, Taste, and More

Best Home Gym Machines

Best Home Gym Machines

woman lifting barbell

Be the smartest person in your gym

The Breaking Muscle newsletter is everything you need to know about strength in a 3 minute read.

I WANT IN!

Breaking Muscle is the fitness world’s preeminent destination for timely, high-quality information on exercise, fitness, health, and nutrition. Our audience encompasses the entire spectrum of the fitness community: consumers, aficionados, fitness professionals, and business owners. We seek to inform, educate and advocate for this community.

  • Reviews
  • Healthy Eating
  • Workouts
  • Fitness
  • News

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS Feed

© 2023 · Breaking Muscle · Terms of Use · Privacy Policy · Affiliate Disclaimer · Accessibility · About