Beetroot juice looks like the sort of thing invented after someone lost a bet at a farmers market. Deep red, earthy, and very good at staining a white countertop. Yet the interesting part is not the beet. It is a tiny ion inside it called nitrate, and a laboratory surprise that changed how scientists understood blood vessels.
For runners, that chemistry raises a practical question: can a concentrated beetroot shot actually make a run faster? Sometimes, by a little. The details matter.
The experiment that should not have worked
In 1980, pharmacologist Robert Furchgott was studying how acetylcholine affected strips of rabbit aorta. The results were maddeningly inconsistent. Sometimes the chemical relaxed the blood vessel. Sometimes it did not.
The difference came down to whether the delicate inner lining of the vessel, the endothelium, had survived preparation. When it remained intact, the vessel relaxed. When it had been rubbed away, it contracted. Furchgott eventually demonstrated the effect with a wonderfully physical “sandwich” experiment: he placed a vessel strip with an intact lining against one without it. The healthy lining released a signal that made the neighboring muscle relax.
Scientists called the mystery signal endothelium-derived relaxing factor. It turned out to be nitric oxide, or NO: a gas, a free radical, and one of the simplest signaling molecules in the body. That was strange enough to help earn Furchgott, Louis Ignarro, and Ferid Murad the 1998 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
How a beet becomes nitric oxide
Beets do not contain a little tank of nitric oxide. They contain nitrate, written NO3−. After you swallow it, nitrate enters your circulation and is concentrated in saliva. Bacteria on the tongue convert part of it to nitrite, NO2−. After you swallow again, the body can convert some nitrite to nitric oxide, especially where oxygen availability and pH favor the reaction.
Nitric oxide helps regulate blood-vessel tone and blood flow. In exercise studies, nitrate supplementation can also reduce the oxygen cost of a given workload and affect muscle contractile function. Those are mechanisms and biomarker findings. They make a performance benefit plausible, but they do not guarantee a faster race.
What the performance evidence actually shows
The broad evidence is promising but not magical. A 2025 umbrella review combined 20 systematic reviews representing 180 primary studies and 2,672 participants. Nitrate improved time-to-exhaustion tests, with larger effects when participants took at least 6 mmol, about 372 mg of nitrate per day, for more than three days. Several other outcomes improved, but many did not, and most of the included reviews were rated low or critically low in methodological quality.
That distinction matters. Time to exhaustion asks how long someone can hold a fixed effort in a laboratory. A race asks how quickly a runner can cover a distance while pacing, turning, competing, and wondering why the final mile is longer than the first four. Better laboratory endurance is not automatically a faster 5K.
A useful reality check came from 70 recreational runners who took either 70 mL of nitrate-rich beetroot juice containing about 4.1 mmol of nitrate or a nitrate-depleted placebo 2.5 hours before competitive 5K trials. Beetroot juice did not beat placebo. In a separate study of 14 male recreational runners, three days of 8.4 mmol per day did not significantly improve overall 10K time, although 10 of the 14 runners were individually faster and the first half of the run was quicker.
So the honest conclusion is not “beetroot works” or “beetroot is useless.” Average effects are small, protocols vary, and individual responses vary. Recreationally active people may be more likely to benefit than highly trained endurance athletes, who often start with a well-developed nitric-oxide system and leave less room for improvement.
A practical beetroot protocol for runners
If you want to test beetroot nitrate, test a defined dose rather than judging the product by how red it is. The International Olympic Committee’s sports-supplement consensus describes an acute dose of 5–9 mmol, roughly 310–560 mg nitrate, taken two to three hours before exercise. Multi-day use may also help, particularly when a single dose does not produce a clear response.
| Decision | Practical approach | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Choose a product | Look for nitrate content in mmol or mg, not merely “beetroot” on the front | Beet products can contain very different nitrate amounts |
| Start with | 5–9 mmol (about 310–560 mg nitrate) | This is the range used in many performance protocols |
| Time it | Two to three hours before the key session | That allows nitrate, nitrite, and nitric oxide availability to rise |
| Trial it | Use it before a tempo, time trial, or hard workout first | GI tolerance and individual response matter |
| Keep normal oral hygiene | Avoid adding antiseptic mouthwash immediately around the dose | Oral bacteria perform the first conversion from nitrate to nitrite |
High-nitrate foods include beets, arugula, spinach, lettuce, and celery. They are useful foods whether or not they move your race clock. For a controlled performance experiment, however, a standardized product is easier to measure than a salad. Trial any concentrated supplement in training, not for the first time on race morning. Beetroot can cause harmless red urine or stool, and some runners report stomach upset.
Where PEREGRUNE fits
PEREGRUNE Runner Multivitamin is your daily micronutrient foundation, not a concentrated pre-race nitrate shot. We include beet as one food ingredient within a 210 mg blend per two-tablet serving, but we do not standardize that blend to nitrate or claim it as a nitrate performance dose. If you want to test the protocol studied in runners, choose a separate product that tells you exactly how much nitrate it provides.
FAQ
Does beetroot juice improve every runner’s performance?
No. Studies show small average effects, meaningful variation among people, and several null results in actual running time trials. Training status, habitual diet, dose, timing, and oral bacteria may all influence the response.
Is more nitrate better?
Not necessarily. The IOC consensus notes no greater benefit from about 16.8 mmol than from 8.4 mmol in one dose-response study. More can also mean more cost and a greater chance of stomach trouble.
Should I stop using mouthwash?
No. Oral health comes first. The narrower point is that antiseptic mouthwash can suppress nitrate-reducing bacteria and alter the nitrate-to-nitrite pathway. Do not redesign dental care around a race supplement; if you are experimenting, avoid introducing an extra antiseptic rinse right around the dose.
The bottom line
Beetroot nitrate has real chemistry and credible evidence behind it, but the likely payoff is modest. Think of it as a measurable experiment, not a shortcut: use a standardized dose, take it two to three hours before a hard effort, test it in training, and judge it by your own repeatable results. Your aerobic engine still comes from months of running. The beet may help polish it.
Dietary-supplement disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes and is not medical advice. Supplements can affect people differently. Consult a qualified healthcare professional if you have a medical condition, take medication, or have questions about whether a concentrated nitrate product is appropriate for you.
Sources
- Nobel Prize: Furchgott’s “sandwich” experiment
- IOC consensus statement on dietary supplements and the high-performance athlete
- Dietary nitrate and exercise performance: umbrella review of 20 meta-analyses
- Nitrate-rich beetroot juice and competitive 5K performance in recreational runners
- Beetroot juice and 10K performance in recreational runners
- The oral microbiome, nitric oxide, and exercise performance