Beta Alanine: a simple guide

If you do endurance exercise then you may have considered supplementing with beta alanine to improve your performance – here is your summary guide.

Table of contents:

• What is beta alanine?
• Why not just take carnosine or histidine?
• How can beta alanine help me?
• Is beta alanine safe?
• How much should I take and when?
• Take aways

What is Beta Alanine?

Beta alanine is an amino acid that is naturally produced in the liver.

When consumed it combines with another amino acid, histidine, to form a substance named carnosine. Carnosine is found in the muscle, predominantly in the fast twitch (type II) fibres. During high intensity exercise training it is involved in helping your muscle fibres to contract and to keep you going during those high intensity intervals, and it also has antioxidant activity (1).

Beta alanine is used as a supplement because it increases muscle carnosine levels! Levels of beta-alanine are the rate-limiting step to carnosine production (1,4) and supplementation with beta alanine is shown to significantly increase muscle carnosine concentrations (1, 5).

By elevating levels of carnosine in the muscle, the capacity to perform high intensity exercise during training may increase, leading to greater training adaptations and performance.

Why not just take carnosine or histidine?

Research indicates that ingested carnosine may be mostly metabolised before it reaches the muscle cells, and therefore supplementation with carnosine may be less effective at increasing muscle carnosine levels (17).

Whilst carnosine is found in animal sources of food such as turkey, chicken, beef and pork, it may not be possible to consume enough carnosine via diet alone. Additionally, for a vegetarian or vegan, they may have lower muscle carnosine levels.

Additionally, there are already high levels of histidine within the cell so supplementation may not further help. It is the beta alanine levels that determine whether carnosine can be made or not.

How can beta alanine help me?

Beta alanine supplementation is shown to be most effective for near maximal output training of intervals lasting 1-4 minutes.

Supplementation may reduce becoming fatigued (associated with increased lactic acid levels (6)), improving the recovery period and overall performance in high intensity training (HIIT) (7,8).

Supplementation with beta alanine for a minimum of 4 weeks delays time to exhaustion and subsequently improves performance in cycling (1,11,12). Supplementation is also shown to enhance sprint (13), swimming and boxing performance (14,15).

Research indicates that supplementation may also benefit resistance training outcomes (11) resulting in significantly higher training volumes and lower subjective feelings of fatigue (16).

A meta-analysis concluded that an average supplementation of 179g of beta alanine taken over a 4 week period provides an average improvement of 2.85% in the outcome of an exercise measure (18).

It should be noted that the research mostly explores the impact of beta alanine in the context of time to exhaustion style trials and therefore may be most beneficial in training that replicates this.

If you are a vegetarian or vegan then you are likely to have lower levels of muscle carnosine due to carnosine mainly being found in animal products such as turkey, chicken, beef and pork.

Is beta-alanine safe?

Beta alanine supplementation currently appears to be safe for individuals who are healthy. There are reported side effects of a tingling sensation (paraesthesia) – but reports indicate that this can be reduced by taking a lowered dosage of 1.6g (20).

How much should I take and when?

The International Society of Sports Nutrition (ISSN) recommends a daily supplementation of 4-6g for at least 4 weeks to see improvements in performance (20). This is in line with the current research above which indicates that approx. 2-5g of beta alanine are sufficient to increase muscle carnosine levels.

Whilst you do not need to worry about taking beta alanine at specific times, having it with a meal is better than taking it solo – increasing levels of muscle carnosine further (19).

Take aways:

For endurance athletes: if you do 1-4 min periods at near maximal output, then there is strong evidence that beta alanine may enhance your performance.

If you’re an athlete and are a vegetarian/vegan: then supplementation with beta alanine may benefit you due to carnosine being found in animal sources of protein.

If you’re trying to gain muscle strength and size: then whether supplementation with beta-alanine may be of benefit remains unclear.

Supplementation guidelines: are to take a daily dose of 2-6g for 2-12 weeks to see benefits & consider taking your dose with your meal.

Related articles

Creatine: a simple guide

Do you take beta-alanine? What are your thoughts on it? Would love to hear in the comments below.

References

1. Hill et al. (2007). Influence of beta alanine supplementation on skeletal muscle carnosine concentrations and high intensity cycling capacity.
2. Baguet et al. (2010). Important role of muscle carnosine in rowing performance.
3. Suzuki et al. (2002). High level of skeletal muscle carnosine contributes to the latter half of exercise performance during 30-s maximal cycle ergometer sprinting.
4. Harris et al. (2006). The absorption of orally supplied beta alanine and its effect on muscle carnosine synthesis in human vastus lateralis.
5. Derave et al. (2010). Muscle carnosine metabolism and beta alanine supplementation in relation to exercise and training.
6. Hargreaves et al. (1998). Muscle metabolites and performance during high-intensity, intermittent exercise.
7. Saunders et al. (2012). Beta alanine supplementation improves YoYo intermittent recovery test performance.
8. Tobias et al. (2013). Additive effects of beta-alanine and sodium bicarbonate on upper-body intermittent performance.
9. Jordan et al. (2010). Effect of beta-alanine supplementation on the onset of blood lactate accumulation (OBLA) during treadmill running: pre/post 2 treatment experimental design.
10. Stout et al. (2007). Effects of beta alanine supplementation on the onset of neuromuscular fatigue and ventilator threshold in women.
11. Sale et al. (2012). Beta alanine supplementation improves isometric endurance of the knee extensor muscles.
12. Howe et al. (2013). The effect of beta-alanine supplementation in highly trained cyclists.
13. Thienen et al. (2009). Beta alanine improves sprint performance in endurance cycling.
14. Painelli et al. (2013). The ergogenic effect of beta-alanine combined with sodium bicarbonate on high-intensity swimming performance.
15. Donovan et al. (2012). Beta alanine improves punch force and frequency in amateur boxers during a simulated contest.
16. Hoffman et al. (2007). Short duration beta alanine supplementation increases training volume and reduces subjective feelings of fatigue in college football players.
17. Gardner et al. (1991). Intestinal absorption of the intact peptide carnosine in man, and comparison with intestinal permeability to lactulose.
18. Hobson et al. (2012). Effects of beta alanine supplementation on exercise performance: a meta-analysis.
19. Stegen et al. (2013). Meal and beta-alanine co ingestion enhances muscle carnosine loading.
20. Trexler et al. (2015). International society of sports nutrition position stand: Beta-alanine