Vitamin D and the athlete–patient: state of the art

This review article found a strong correlation between vitamin D sufficiency and optimal muscle function. They found that increasing levels of vitamin D reduced inflammation, pain, and myopathy while increasing muscle protein synthesis, ATP concentration, strength, jump height, jump velocity, jump power, exercise capacity, and physical performance.

This review discusses how vitamin D impacts fatigue through biochemical factors connected to oxidative stress and inflammatory cytokines, neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin, and control of voltage-gated calcium and chloride channels.

This double-blind placebo-controlled study in ultra-marathon runners found that supplementation with 2000 IU of vitamin D daily decreased post-exercise skeletal muscle biomarkers levels including post-exercise (TN max) and 1 h post-exercise troponin, 1 h post-exercise myoglobin concentration, and TNF-α levels. 24 hour post exercise creatine kinase activity was also significantly lower in the supplemented group compared to the placebo. This suggests that vitamin D supplementation might play an important role in prevention of skeletal muscle injuries following exercise with eccentric muscle contraction in athletes.