The effect of pangamic acid on maximal treadmill performance

The effect of pangamic acid (calcium gluconate and N, N-Dimethylglycine) ingestion was examined during short-term maximal treadmill performance on 16 male track athletes. The study was conducted as a double-blind experiment with an experimental group (E) whose members each ingested six 50-mg pangamic acid tablets per day and a control group (C) whose members each ingested six placebo tablets per day for three weeks. The placebo tablets were identical to the pangamic acid tablets in appearance. Subjects were tested by using the Bruce treadmill protocol before and after treatment. The following parameters were examined: maximal heart rate (HR), treadmill time (TM), recovery HR at minutes 1 and 3, and pre-test and post-test blood glucose and lactate levels. Pre-treatment data were 183 bpm (E) and 194 bpm (C) for maximal HR, 16.99 min (E) and 16.49 min (C) for TM, 132.13 mg% (E) and 133.38 mg% (C) for post-test glucose, and 64.63 mg% (E) and 76.13 mg% (C) for post-test lactate. Post-treatment data were 181 bpm (E) and 194 bpm (C) for maximal HR, 17.21 min (E) and 16.83 min (C) for TM, 138.88 mg% (E) and 139.13 mg% (C) for post-test glucose, and 70.88 mg% (E) and 66.58 mg% (C) for post-test lactate. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) revealed no significant differences (P greater than 0.05) between groups after treatment. It was concluded that ingestion of pangamic acid does not produce significant changes in short-term maximal treadmill performance.