01 Jul Why Tribal advocates CurraNZ supplementation?

Are you keen to find a way of increasing the amount of quality training you can complete each week? Wouldn’t it be amazing if you could reduce your training soreness so that your bouncebackability from hard sessions was only 1 sleep away?

Dietary dogma, nutritional confusion and the new cure all solutions to your training needs are rife within the performance world, so, when Fleur from CurraNZ approached Tribal and myself about trying their new product I was initially resistant, our values founded in a natural and balanced approach to health mean that the majority of products are impossible for us to align with.

Upon meeting Fleur and Nicki I was enthused by the natural properties of CurraNZ and the benefits of the powerhouse polyphenols found in New Zealand black currants-

• Curbs muscle damage and soreness
• Increases fat burning by 15% at moderate exercise intensity
• Controls oxidative stress and inflammation
• Helps promote tissue repair, recovery and performance
• Assists immune protection
• May boost running and cycling performance
• Aids clearance and tolerance of lactate

Not to mention these further benefits-

Protection from oxidative stress

• Combats free-radical activity
• Protection against DNA damage
• Enhances neuronal function and neuroprotective responses to stress

Improved gut health

• Promotes viability and growth of probiotic bacteria, which has an important role in health and disease
• Increase of lactobacilli and bifidobacteria in the colon

Controls inflammation

• Modulates inflammatory responses

All of which are priorities for our Tribal athletes, I had to give it a go.

I started supplementing the product in November 2014 (2 tablets daily before exercise, a definite +75kg) and by the turn of the year I was experiencing a level of recovery I had never experienced before.

At Tribal we distinguish a quality session as strength training, anything sustained above Zone 3 and anaerobic intervals. Why is this important? Each athlete has a capacity determined by their constitution and lifestyle for how much of this quality work they can complete in each week and still have the recoverability to make the training worthwhile- It has long been a Tribal recommendation that it’s possible for an individual to complete between 1 and 4 of these sessions weekly.

Personally, I always found that 3 quality sessions a week was my personal capacity when I was feeling really good, a month after taking CurraNZ I found a desire to get in 4-5 quality sessions each week, a 50% rise on my personal work rate.

Other benefits have included an increased willingness to train early in the morning; greater application and desire to work in each session and without the expected increased training soreness usually associated with added workload.

After 6 months, my basic running speed is up, I’m climbing stronger than ever on the bike and have a radically improved bike efficiency factor, and, I am consistently swimming and strength training 3 times a week.

All in all, feeling really positive and am now a staunch advocate of supplementing with CurraNZ and the performance boosting effects of the New Zealand Polyphenol, anthocyanin.

BLACKCURRANTS, and specifically CurraNZ sports performance research, will be featured on Channel 4’s new Superfoods documentary on Monday, July 6 at 8.30pm.