Essential Blood Tests Every Female Athlete Should Know: Unlock Your Performance Potential

What blood tests are important to have done for female athletes? Decoding the science behind blood tests for female athletes. All to often we hear “Have you had your bloodwork done?” but don’t know what to do about it? Let’s simplify the science and explain what bloodwork is helpful to test and why.

Introduction

The best way to ensure your health as an athlete and an individual is to understand your body. The more you know, the better you will preform in life and sport. Knowledge is power!

A lot of the way you feel can be attributed to your vitamins, minerals and hormones (also known as biomarkers in our blood). Anything from a lack of energy to feeling down could be due to your Biomarkers being out. As a coach my first port of call for an athlete that is feeling incredibly tired, lacking appetite or just feeling generally unbalanced is a visit to their GP to run some tests. This being said, one set of tests may not indicate a problem right away, periodic tests can show us a baseline and give us a map to our body’s . A female’s Menstrual cycle, training habits and stress play a big role in Biomarkers, so it is important to keep this all-in mind.

Below is a list of some of the important biomarkers to keep in mind when running blood work as well as why.

Complete Blood Count (CBC)

This is a very commonly known blood test and tests many aspects of your body’s blood health. Insight can be gained on your cell’s oxygen carrying capacity by looking at hemoglobin and hematocrit. Having a look at your white blood cell count also provides information on the state of your immune system (remember white blood cells help fight infection).

Iron

I’m sure we have all hear this one, especially in females and endurance sports, here’s why! Iron is an important mineral in the transport of oxygen to our cells as well as oxidative phosphorylation (basically important for ATP production- ATP is important for skeletal muscle contraction in aerobic sporting performance). These are important characteristics or the aerobic exercise metabolism and endurance performance .

To simplify that- Iron makes up part of the hemoglobin molecule in red blood cells, hemoglobin is responsible for transporting oxygen around the body. This makes it critical for athletic performance.

So why is it important:

⦁ When your body does not have enough Iron, it struggles to transport oxygen efficiently

⦁ This decreases performance

⦁ Did you know- you can have low levels of iron without being anemic…. This will still affect your performance

What signs to look out for:

⦁ Decreased performance

⦁ Changes in mood (negative state of mind)

⦁ Shortness of breath

⦁ Increased fatigue

What can I eat to try to increase Iron levels?

⦁ Spinach

⦁ Lentils

⦁ Red meat

⦁ Tofu

What are optimal iron levels?

When testing iron, the biomarker commonly tested is Ferritin, Ferritin levels should be higher than 35 µg/L .

Risk factors of Iron deficiency:

⦁ Female

⦁ Vegetarian/vegan diet

⦁ Heavy menstrual cycle

⦁ Endurance exercise

Vitamin D

Vitamin D has been highlighted as a very important nutrient in females due to its role in bone health, injury prevention and immunity. A fun fact is that Vitamin D levels also have an effect on Iron levels .

Why is it important:

⦁ Reduces risk of stress fractures and chronic musculoskeletal pain

⦁ Improves Oxygen absorption

⦁ Helps the body absorb calcium

How do you increase Vitamin D?

⦁ Foods high in Vitamin D- salmon, mushrooms, tuna, cow and plant milk

⦁ Sun exposure

What are optimal levels of Vitamin D?

According to research levels around or greater than 50ng/mL of OH-Vitamin D are required .

Vitamin B12

Vitamin B plays a role in maintaining cellular functions and facilitating metabolic pathways in the body. Vitamin B does not directly provide energy but acts as part of the energy metabolism process .

What are optimal levels of Vitamin B12?

According to research the proposed optimal range is 500-1300pg/ml. Higher vitamin B12 ranges have been associated with increased reflexes and cognitive function and decreased depression, weakness and confusion.

Sources of Vitamin B12:

⦁ Eggs

⦁ Nutritional yeast

⦁ Fortified cereals

⦁ Supplements

Hormones

Hormones can make up a whole topic of their own, for now let’s talk about thyroid hormones in a nutshell. Keep an eye out on our next blog post for more information on the female athlete triad, which will dive into REDs (relative energy deficiency in sport) and LEA (Low energy availability).

LEA (Low energy availability) is a state that can be caused by hormones being unbalanced. Two commonly tested thyroid hormones to look at when assessing LEA and thyroid function are TSH and Free T4. It must be noted that Thyroid function needs to be tested on multiple occasions in order to diagnose a problem, thyroid hormone also fluctuates thru ought the menstrual cycle, so this must be kept in mind. Below is a diagram that sums up these levels .

Risk factors:

⦁ Nutritional factors- insufficient energy intake and iodine, selenium and vitamin D deficiency

⦁ Strenuous exercise

Thyroid dysfunction is a complex condition and is not always linked to low energy availability in athletes, so it is important to work with your GP to interpret and understand your results.

Summary

Knowing what bloodwork to test as a female athlete can be tricky, here’s the important biomarkers to have a look at in your bloodwork:

⦁ Complete Blood Count provides information about the blood's ability to carry oxygen, immune system function, and overall health.

⦁ Iron- This can affect energy levels, oxygen carrying capacity, mood and so much more.

⦁ Vitamin D- This assists in immunity, bone health and oxygen carrying capacity.

⦁ Vitamin B- This in short helps with energy availability due to its role in cellular function

⦁ Hormones- Thyroid function plays a big part in performance, energy and absorption

Long story short, when these biomarkers in the blood are within the correct parameter’s performance will improve, if any one of these levels is out, your performance may suffer.

If you feel something is off with your energy levels, mood, performance or body composition, it may have to do with any one of these factors, so pop into your GP for a visit and get your bloodwork checked.

I hope that helped! Ladies keep an eye out for my next blog post on the female athlete triad.

Until Next time!

Coach Stacey Wilkinson

@staceyhyslop1

@wattfarming