When you’ve been following elite operating in any respect the previous yr or two, you realize there’s an issue over a “new” product known as bicarb.
Together with tremendous footwear, bicarb has been attributed to the latest assault on world data.
However, does it actually work? Or is that this simply one other “overhyped” product beetroot juice was a number of years in the past?
Effectively, that’s what we’re going to discover on this article. We’ll have a look at the analysis and…
Breakdown what precisely bicarb is and what it’s theorized to do
Have a look at the early analysis and why it’s solely now changing into well-liked
Dig deep on the newer scientific literature to see if it has any advantage
And eventually present some sensible methods must you wish to attempt it.
What precisely is bicarb?
“Bicarb” is a standard shorthand for bicarbonate of soda, which can be mostly often called baking soda or sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3).
Sure, this is identical white powder you often affiliate with as a leavening agent in baking.
Apparently, whereas it’s solely lately gaining reputation, bicarb loading has a protracted historical past in sports activities science typically and operating particularly.
That’s as a result of sodium bicarbonate is a salt that breaks all the way down to type sodium and bicarbonate in water. This makes an answer alkaline, that means it’s capable of neutralize acid.
Thus, taking a bicarb complement was initially thought up as an nearly comically easy answer to the issue of fatigue: if lactic acid causes fatigue, take bicarb to neutralize the acid!
Whereas we now know that the issue of fatigue in operating is much more complicated than “lactic acid” the shocking factor about bicarb supplementation is that it really labored—on paper not less than.
The early days of bicarb loading
A wave of optimistic outcomes from research within the Nineteen Eighties and Nineteen Nineties confirmed that taking a excessive dose of bicarb simply earlier than a tough anaerobic effort (like operating a mile all-out) improved efficiency in sports activities like operating, swimming, and biking.
However after this preliminary wave of curiosity, bicarb turned one thing of a poster little one for a complement that labored within the lab, however whose real-world unintended effects had been so irksome that it simply wasn’t value it.
The difficulty with bicarbonate is twofold:
First, it’s a strongly alkaline substance, so similar to baking soda reacting with vinegar, bicarbonate reacts with the acids in your abdomen, altering the chemical setting of your digestive tract.
Second, the standard dose of bicarb was very massive—generally upwards of 25 grams—which amplified the gut-disturbing results [1].
The result’s what physiology researchers delicately name “gastrointestinal disturbances”: nausea, flatulence, vomiting, bloating, and diarrhea, all occurring proper earlier than you’re about to start out your huge race.
A professor I had in graduate faculty informed tales of a few of his early work on bicarb loading in swimmers, who would leap out of the pool after their time trial to make a mad sprint for the toilet.
The Maurten Bicarb System
On account of those unintended effects, bicarb was not extensively used exterior of sports activities science analysis till 2023, when sports activities diet firm Maurten launched its “bicarb system,” a brand new tackle bicarb loading.
Maurten, already recognized for its sports activities drinks and vitality gels that claimed to make use of a hydrogel compound to hurry up carbohydrate absorption, utilized the identical expertise to bicarbonate.
The launch of this new system, plus flashy press releases and media spotlights claiming as much as 80% of observe athletes on the Paris Olympics can be utilizing it, created an enormous quantity of buzz round bicarb normally, and Maurten’s system particularly.
The Maurten bicarb system doesn’t declare to boost the effectiveness of bicarbonate itself. All it does (in line with the corporate) is make two tweaks to cut back the chance of gastrointestinal issues.
First, as a substitute of a uncooked powder, the bicarbonate is pressed into miniature tablets, leading to much less floor space to react with abdomen acid.
Second, the Maurten system makes use of a hydrogel that congeals right into a thick, gel-like consistency on contact with acidic liquids. The hydrogel goals to additional decelerate the response between bicarbonate and abdomen acid, delaying the discharge of bicarb till it will get into the small gut.
Does bicarb actually work? What the science says
With regards to bicarbonate loading normally, the science is pretty clear: for occasions lasting about 45 seconds to eight minutes in period, you may get a efficiency profit of some share factors—roughly on par with the results you’d see from caffeine.
That was the conclusion of a 2017 meta-analysis that pooled information from 25 totally different research on bicarbonate loading [2], which discovered very comparable efficiency advantages for bicarb and caffeine.
A later overview from 2021 got here to the same conclusion: for brief to middle-distance occasions, the place fatigue is dominated by “peripheral fatigue” within the muscle groups brought on by anaerobic vitality manufacturing, bicarbonate loading exerts a small however important impact on efficiency [3].
As for Maurten’s bicarb system particularly, there are, understandably, fewer dependable research.
In whole, three papers have examined the Maurten bicarb system, although all of them are in male cyclists and two are literally repeat research on the identical athletes.
By way of efficacy, the Maurten system appears to work in addition to conventional bicarbonate dietary supplements, in line with a 2024 research on 14 cyclists who accomplished a 40 km time trial [4].
In contrast with a placebo, the cyclists lined the 40 km distance 1.5% quicker, in step with analysis on conventional bicarb loading.
This research discovered no important distinction in gastrointestinal signs between the placebo and the bicarb.
However particularly in a small research, “absence of proof” just isn’t the identical factor as “proof of absence”—the research would possibly’ve simply been too small to see an impact on abdomen issues, and this paper didn’t instantly evaluate conventional bicarb with Maurten’s system.
One research that did do a direct comparability was a 2024 paper on 12 cyclists who accomplished a progressive train check both after taking Maurten bicarb or a standard bicarb complement [5].
This paper discovered considerably decrease gastrointestinal issues within the Maurten group, however comparable blood ranges of bicarbonate, suggesting the bicarb was certainly making its method into the bloodstream.
The identical analysis group individually revealed information from a subset of 10 of those 12 cyclists who returned for 2 units of two x 4 km time trials that they accomplished after taking both Maurten bicarb or a sodium chloride (i.e. desk salt) complement [6].
Whereas the cyclists did enhance their efficiency with the bicarb complement, this experiment additionally isn’t fairly what we wish: a head-to-head three-way comparability of Maurten, conventional bicarb, and placebo, that tracks each efficiency and gastrointestinal complaints.
Sensible methods for utilizing bicarb for runners
So, does Maurten’s bicarb system dwell as much as the hype?
The reality is we don’t have sufficient information. There are zero research on Maurten’s bicarb system in runners, and nil research on girls in any sport.
Bicarb loading as a common technique does have strong proof supporting its efficacy in occasions lasting from 45 seconds to eight minutes
You possibly can most likely argue that the advantages would carry over to championship-style sit-and-kick races lasting as much as 15 and even half-hour
However for longer races (just like the marathon), any profit is much much less clear.
Longer occasions additionally depart you way more susceptible to the well-known gastrointestinal unintended effects that come together with conventional bicarbonate loading.
If you’re competing in short-distance occasions and wish to attempt the Maurten system, the same old golden rule applies: attempt it out in a exercise first.
The standard research-backed protocols contain taking 300 mg of bicarb (0.3 grams) per kilogram of physique weight, inside one to 2 hours of your exercise or race.
In all probability, runners range of their diploma of susceptibility to gastrointestinal issues, so check out your physique’s response first earlier than taking bicarb on race day.
