This is the first issue in a series on Extreme Athletes, those who push themselves to the max to achieve their goals and, possibly, greatness.

But, while the information in this series applies very strictly to extreme athletes, it applies just as much to anyone else trying to achieve peak performance for themselves in fitness and athletics, while staying healthy overall.

Also, while we will cover points individual to specific sports, most of the information is applicable to all sports and performance, energy, and recovery as a whole.

In this first article we’ll start with one of the key, over-riding aspects to maximize not only the ability and performance of an elite athlete, but of anyone.

Because, when you put your body through as much stress and pressure as an athlete does, every one of your organs, muscles, nerves, bones, hormones, etc., all play a part.

And, while any weak links will bring down the rest, improving any weak spots in health will help increase the energy production and performance of the overall.

Let’s dive in.

THE SPECTRUM OF ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE

Health and fitness levels exist on a spectrum.

On the left side of the spectrum we have someone with many body organ systems not functioning well, the person is in bed, they have low energy, and their body, overall, is doing very badly.

And on the right side of the spectrum we have someone with excellent health, vitality, and energy.

And then, of course, we have everything in between.

But if we take this right side (excellent health, vitality, and energy) and then add to this both genetics and a very high work ethic — we have an elite athlete.

This is important. If they have a very high work ethic, but not the genetics, they may be able to achieve a very high level of performance, but not necessarily the elite of the elite.

And reversely, if their willingness to work isn’t there, they may have a gift — but without pushing their limits, they’ll never achieve or even find their true maximum potential.

Each of these points are needed to achieve elite athlete status: high health, vitality, and energy; a very high work ethic; and genetic potential.

If any one of your health, your energy levels, your vitality, or your work ethic or genetics are not up to par, you will not achieve the maximum achievable by you.

But now let’s break this down even further.

Because, what are each of these points actually trying to achieve in the end?

And what lowers if one of these 5 points lowers?

Your performance.

Your peak performance.

That’s what it’s all going towards.

And behind performance we have one very key point: energy production. How much energy can our cells both produce and use in any given moment?

There may be learned skills, what to eat, when to feed, how much water to drink, when to raise speed or lower it in a race, etc.

But behind everything is the question: how much energy can our cells produce and use, and for how long?

The more energy they can produce and use, the faster our athlete is, the stronger they are, the better their reaction time and alertness, and the better their endurance.

If we can raise energy production and utilization, we can raise performance.

So how do we do that?

RAISING ENERGY PRODUCTION IN ATHLETES

When we talk about raising energy levels, we’re talking about energy production — can their body, can their cells, make energy?

If they can make high levels of energy, we could have an elite athlete. If the body has a lot of trouble making energy, we get organ trouble, sickness, and general low health.

Everything hinges on energy production.

Now, this isn’t how much energy they have. Maybe they have lots of energy because they just had a so-called “energy drink.”

Now they have ENERGY!

And then they crash.

Because that’s not real energy.

That’s not making energy.

Making energy, producing energy, has to do with our whole bodily system.

Our mitochondria, the tiny organelles in our cells that take in fuel and use it to produce energy, they’re the actual energy production units in the body. But how many of them there are per cell, and how well are they performing?

And what is the state of our nervous system, which must be able to react fast and continuously?

What is the state of our liver, which plays a key role in cellular performance?

How about our electrolyte levels, the conductors along which electrical charges in the nerves flow?

All of these things play a part. And to the degree we can raise these points, whether we’re a runner, biker, bodybuilder, sports athletes, martial artist, fencer, or whomever, we can increase our energy production and so our performance.

Even small tweaks, such as finding any deficiencies in vitamins, amino acids, minerals, recovery, or addressing any possible infection or hormonal disruption can make a big difference in performance.

But energy is key. Can our body produce energy?

To the degree it can, our organs, cells, mitochondria, nervous system, hormones, and gut bacteria are in good working order.

And to the degree it can’t, these same factors need correction.

And it works out that what helps the elite athlete and the sick individual alike are the same things, we just find more things to correct when someone is in poor health and less to correct when someone is in good health.

But wherever we can find a deficiency, hormonally, nutritionally, etc., in an elite athlete, we can make quite a difference.

The first thing an elite or extreme athlete should do to improve performance, beyond taking the full spectrum of vitamins and minerals, taking their PerfectAmino in quantity, eating whole foods, and getting rest and proper recovery — is testing:

1. Get your serum protein levels tested and any other blood tests to see if there is any bacterial infection in the body. If there is, it’s burning up your energy and slowing you down and needs to be corrected.
2. Measure your Resting Heart Rate (RHR) and Heart Rate Variability (HRV). Resting heart rate should be low, and heart rate variability should be higher. If they’re reversed, your body is having trouble with something and we need to find out what it is: infection, deficiency, over-training, lack of recovery time or sleep, too little nutrition or amino acids — something. We need to find it.
3. Test your hormones to ensure they’re balanced and at proper levels.
4. Check your inflammatory markers, liver health, heart health, kidney health. All of these can influence performance, speed, energy production, agility and mental concentration.

This is the first thing to increase overall performance.

Wherever in the above we find something suboptimal, when we fix it, we can get significant increase in energy production and performance.

Remember, in some events, a half a second makes all the difference.