Vitamin D and testosterone

[Andrew732]

High vitamin D level = high testosterone level

There’s an amazingly simple way for western men to raise their testosterone level. All they have to do is take a supplement containing extra vitamin D. At least, this is what we deduce from an epidemiological study done at the Medical University Graz in Austria, which will soon be published in Clinical Endocrinology.

Vitamin D is actually a hormone – one that regulates three percent of our genes. Among those genes are a few that are responsible for the production of testosterone in the Leydig cells. So vitamin D is an important vitamin, certainly once you realise that an overwhelming majority of the western population has too little vitamin D in their blood.



This is because our food contains too little vitamin D, so we have to rely mainly on the vitamin D that our body makes. When exposed to sunlight our skin cells convert cholesterol into vitamin D. But we get too little sunlight and are therefore unable to make enough vitamin D.

So does that mean that most men in the West therefore make too little testosterone?

This is the question that the Austrians set out to answer. So they examined the blood of 2300 men whose average age was just over sixty. Only eleven percent of them had sufficient vitamin D in their blood. And indeed: the more vitamin D the men had in their blood, the higher their testosterone levels and their concentration of free testosterone [FAI].






Now, the concentration of vitamin D in the blood fluctuates with the seasons. The vitamin D concentration is highest after the summer. And this is when the concentration of testosterone in men is highest, according to some studies. [Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2006 Aug;31(7):895-9.] The Austrians were able to confirm this relationship. The testosterone level and vitamin D level rise and fall in synch in the human body.






So if men make sure they have enough vitamin D in their blood, they’ll also make more testosterone. Vitamin D supplements are what come to mind: pretty strong supplements.

But although most multivitamin tablets contain vitamin D, most people who take these kind of supplements only have a slightly higher vitamin D level compared to people who do not take multivitamins. The Austrians also noticed this in their study. "Seventy-eight patients (2.4 per cent) reported taking vitamin supplements on a regular basis, which usually contained vitamin D3. Because 25(OH)D levels were only slightly higher in users of vitamin D preparations (mean 22.1 microg/l) compared with the remaining cohort (mean 17.2 microg/l), we decided to include these patients in the present analyses."

If you look at the table above, you'll see that the effect of multivitamins on the vitamin D level in the blood is too small to boost your testosterone level. You need to think of heavier vitamin D doses, between 400 and 1000 units per pill.

Fifty years ago German sports scientists discovered that power athletes made better progression in the season when they had high vitamin D levels in their blood. Maybe the Austrians have now discovered why.

Source:
Clin Endocrinol (Oxf). 2009 Dec 29.

[gottabecool]

5-10000 IU's a day here....Works wonders for your immune system too.

[Andrew732]

INDEED bro, energy as well/athletic performance

[Jmuls]

Thanks for posting that man. I haven't stumbled across to many studies examining vit D and testosterone.

[JohnBoy]

I feel like I'm hearing better and better things about Vitamin D by the day. I've always drank a lot of milk, but now I'm going to start supplementing about 5k IU ed

[Andrew732]

^^^^ To the posters above, DO IT bros, I am an MMA athlete so my training takes a lot out of me, since I am in the north east, sunlight is limited. I tell you since I have been taking 5-10,000 i.u.s. I have felt GREAT, my test levels increased, acne went up a bit but nothing horrible. My performance has been which I believe it has to do with Ca+2 release during output force. My mood and immune system has been great, along with my ability to sleep faster. I take Vitamin D in the am with good oils and krill.

[PHYS.ED.]

try the 10 calorie vitamin water you'll never stop drinking those essential vitamins again

[PHYS.ED.]

forget the free test and vitamin milk hahahaha

[freak]

5-10000 IU? a little excessive, dont you think??

[Andrew732]

Originally Posted by freak

5-10000 IU? a little excessive, dont you think??

NOT at all: http://www.westonaprice.org/The-Mira...Vitamin-D.html

http://clltopics.org/VitaminD3/EssentialforHealth.htm

[freak]

Originally Posted by Andrew732

NOT at all: http://www.westonaprice.org/The-Mira...Vitamin-D.html

http://clltopics.org/VitaminD3/EssentialforHealth.htm

so i guess i can assume that you get absolutely zero direct sun exposure and zero vit.D from your diet?

and just so you know, i'm well aware of the benefits of vit.d supplementation.. but, at your level (10000IU) you may be risking hypercalcenemia.

[Andrew732]

Originally Posted by freak

so i guess i can assume that you get absolutely zero direct sun exposure and zero vit.D from your diet?

and just so you know, i'm well aware of the benefits of vit.d supplementation.. but, at your level (10000IU) you may be risking hypercalcenemia.

I aint always outside, so I doubt I will encounter that issue, and I do drop from 10,000 down to 5,000 from time to time.

[newgoal300]

ive always tested low in vit D, i take a script for 50,000 units caps that i take once a week, lots of other negatives to low vit d, google em there's a ton

[RzaBlade]

Originally Posted by Andrew732

NOT at all: http://www.westonaprice.org/The-Mira...Vitamin-D.html

http://clltopics.org/VitaminD3/EssentialforHealth.htm

This is Frosty. I'm borrowing my buddy's login just to post for this subject here because I feel there are potentially issues here.

First off, there is NO way to know know what's a safe dose for vitamin D when you get into the higher ranges without having 25-hydroxyvitaminD blood test done by your doctor. None. Zero. You're just guessing otherwise, and you may be wrong and it could be a bad thing. It's measured in ng/mL and "normal" is about 30-100. You want to be in the 80-100 range. You CAN'T KNOW without a blood test if you're supplementing. Sun is a great way to get vitamin D, but really there's so many variables that you still need to test.

Yes, there is a potential to take too much, and YES that is a bad thing as freak mentioned. YOU HAVE TO HAVE A BLOOD TEST. DON'T GUESS.

Another issue, if we're quoting weston price website, is that I don't believe in ONLY vitamin D in large doses. There is interaction between all the fat soluble vitamins. Vitamin A is vital and another very important vitamin, and it does help in reducing side effects/toxicity of high vitamin D intake. They have an entire article on this there that is very extensive and well worth a read. Really you should have 10-12.5 times vitamin A as vitamin D in IUs. So if you get 10,000 IU vitamin D, that's at least 100,000 IU of vitamin A. Yes. No, it's not toxic...it takes way more than that. The two nutrients are synergistic. And no, beta-carotene is NOT vitamin A (retinol), and you can't substitute it. You need animal form (retinol).

Another nutrient is vitamin K2. Vitamin K2 actually helps reduce vitamin D toxicity as well. This is not the vitamin K1 found in plants, this is the animal form (mk-4 from fermentation and mk-7 from animal fats). Mk-7 is found in animal fats such as egg yolks but supplementing at least some is a good idea with large intakes of vitamin D. It is available via supplementation but make sure it's K2, mk-4 and/or mk-7.




Now guys I've been talking about vitamin D being important since about 2003, and I was talking a good bit about it in the keto thread before all this started coming out from people like Poliquin, DiPasquale, etc. Listen to me when I say vitamin A, while not as hugely important as vitamin D, is also a very important fat soluble vitamin that has been over-looked and under-dosed. The two nutrients are synergistic and should be taken together. K2 is another synergist and maybe be a good idea to have in there as well, but if I could only do one thing it would be have 10-12.5x as much vitamin A as vitamin D. This is why a normal cod liver oil is a superior to fish oil (and for other reasons as well).


OUT

[gottabecool]

I was low (Work in an office), I am getting another blood test this week to find out if this balanced me back out among other things.

[freak]

Originally Posted by RzaBlade

This is Frosty. I'm borrowing my buddy's login just to post for this subject here because I feel there are potentially issues here.

First off, there is NO way to know know what's a safe dose for vitamin D when you get into the higher ranges without having 25-hydroxyvitaminD blood test done by your doctor. None. Zero. You're just guessing otherwise, and you may be wrong and it could be a bad thing. It's measured in ng/mL and "normal" is about 30-100. You want to be in the 80-100 range. You CAN'T KNOW without a blood test if you're supplementing. Sun is a great way to get vitamin D, but really there's so many variables that you still need to test.

Yes, there is a potential to take too much, and YES that is a bad thing as freak mentioned. YOU HAVE TO HAVE A BLOOD TEST. DON'T GUESS.

Another issue, if we're quoting weston price website, is that I don't believe in ONLY vitamin D in large doses. There is interaction between all the fat soluble vitamins. Vitamin A is vital and another very important vitamin, and it does help in reducing side effects/toxicity of high vitamin D intake. They have an entire article on this there that is very extensive and well worth a read. Really you should have 10-12.5 times vitamin A as vitamin D in IUs. So if you get 10,000 IU vitamin D, that's at least 100,000 IU of vitamin A. Yes. No, it's not toxic...it takes way more than that. The two nutrients are synergistic. And no, beta-carotene is NOT vitamin A (retinol), and you can't substitute it. You need animal form (retinol).

Another nutrient is vitamin K2. Vitamin K2 actually helps reduce vitamin D toxicity as well. This is not the vitamin K1 found in plants, this is the animal form (mk-4 from fermentation and mk-7 from animal fats). Mk-7 is found in animal fats such as egg yolks but supplementing at least some is a good idea with large intakes of vitamin D. It is available via supplementation but make sure it's K2, mk-4 and/or mk-7.




Now guys I've been talking about vitamin D being important since about 2003, and I was talking a good bit about it in the keto thread before all this started coming out from people like Poliquin, DiPasquale, etc. Listen to me when I say vitamin A, while not as hugely important as vitamin D, is also a very important fat soluble vitamin that has been over-looked and under-dosed. The two nutrients are synergistic and should be taken together. K2 is another synergist and maybe be a good idea to have in there as well, but if I could only do one thing it would be have 10-12.5x as much vitamin A as vitamin D. This is why a normal cod liver oil is a superior to fish oil (and for other reasons as well).


OUT

i dont agree with your vitamin A recommendations at all. and you will never see the recommendation for vit.a go that high. that RDA is established from good research.. and why take things to counteract vit.d toxicity when you could just stop supplementing so much vit.d??

frosty, i dont think this vit.a recommendation is safe at all. 100000IU = 30,000micrograms retinol which is 30 times the UL.

[freak]

Originally Posted by freak

i dont agree with your vitamin A recommendations at all. and you will never see the recommendation for vit.a go that high. that RDA is established from good research.. and why take things to counteract vit.d toxicity when you could just stop supplementing so much vit.d??

frosty, i dont think this vit.a recommendation is safe at all. 100000IU = 30,000micrograms retinol which is 30 times the UL.

correction - it is 10x the UL