Unleash Your Endurance: The Benefits of Beta-Alanine for CrossFitters

By revealing his use of beta-alanine on Joe Rogan’s Podcast, Mat Fraser single-handedly broke the beta-alanine supply-chain by sending all Crossfitters scrambling to get their hands on the tingly powder. But is the tingly powder even worthwhile?

Beta-alanine has gained attention for its potential to boost endurance and reduce fatigue, or improve fatigue tolerance. In this article, I’ll delve into why Crossfitters might consider incorporating beta-alanine into their supplement regimen. I’ll also give a brief explanation of how it works, and what the recommended strategy is for using the supplement.

How does beta-alanine work?

Beta-alanine is a non-essential amino acid that is used together with histidine by the body to produce carnosine. Carnosine is stored in your skeletal muscle and helps to buffer acids by binding to positive hydrogen ions. This slows the decline of your muscle’s pH. Low pH levels are an important driver of fatigue because it reduces the effectiveness of our energy metabolism.

What does this mean for Crossfitters?

Shortly, beta-alanine helps to reduce fatigue or slow down its onset. Thus allowing the athlete to push harder and sustain their efforts for longer periods of time. As the decline of muscle pH is especially a prevalent factor in intense efforts, its benefits for Crossfit are clear. Research indicates that the additional carnosine is most effective for shorter time domains (1-10 minutes), an often seen time-domain in Crossfit.

Obviously, this does not only impact your game-day performance but can also increase your performance during training and can therefore be utilized during more intense training blocks to increase output. Although Mat Fraser described it as feeling like he had a third-lung, it’s important to realize that we’re talking about slight improvements for the average athlete here and no supplement can replace proper training & recovery.

How to take Beta-Alanine:

Beta-alanine requires a loading phase of 2-4 weeks, of consistent daily supplementation before it starts having a significant effect on performance. This means that there is not really an instant effect apart from the tingling that many people feel shortly after ingesting the powder. This tingling effect is therefore also the main reason it is put in many pre-workouts, because it makes you feel like it’s “kicking-in”. This is essentially just a marketing trick because irregularly using beta-alanine is inefficient at best and ineffective at worst.

So, to help you properly use it. Here’s a basic guide to taking beta-alanine:

1. Loading phase: 

1. Take about 4-6 grams daily, potentially divided over smaller doses throughout the day.

2. Aim for a total loading phase of 2-4 weeks

2. Maintenance:

1. Probably about 3-6 grams daily. Although there isn’t much research on maintenance

3. Timing & Intake

1. To avoid tingling multiple lower doses can be taken

2. As there is no immediate impact consistency is more important than timing

3. There is some evidence suggesting that it is best taken with carbs & proteins to enhance the effects, same goes for creatine.

Besides the tingling effect that can be felt after taking it, there don’t seem to be many drawbacks to taking Beta-Alanine. However, as there isn’t much research on long-term use, it’s probably smart to cycle its use.

Conclusioin

So, for CrossFitters seeking that extra edge in their workouts, beta-alanine can be a valuable addition. By delaying fatigue and supporting endurance, this amino acid opens the door to improved performance and increased training volume. Obviously, I always preach a food-first approach and supplements can never be the pillars of our nutrition. But as an addition to a healthy and suitable diet, beta-alanine can be a good addition.