Tim Sharpe, a Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine (HNFM) adjunct faculty member at University of Western States (UWS), recently had the distinction of his paper “Evaluation of the Efficacy of LactiGo™ Topical Gel as an Ergogenic Aid,” being ranked as the most viewed paper on ResearchGate under the category of “medicine.” Sharpe was also the most read author in the United States in August, with more than 50,000 reads since debuting in June.
The paper is based on a study Sharpe and co-author Chad Macias did using a carnosine gel on athletes. Carnosine is a compound of two amino acids, most commonly found in red meat. There are hundreds of peer-reviewed studies that show the potential for carnosine as having profound impact in many areas, including anti-aging, pain, a variety of medical conditions and sports performance. Sharpe and Macias learned of a transdermal carnosine gel (LactiGoTM) and decided to try it on athletes at the Institute for Human Kinetics. Their athletes earned four gold and one silver medal at the Rio Olympics.
In June 2016, they published a peer-reviewed study to examine the supplement in more detail.
“We had eleven professional soccer players perform two different tests designed to test first maximal aerobic capacity (lower intensity) and second to test more anaerobic performance (higher intensity),” Sharpe said. “We compared their performance before using the gel and after using the gel. The performance increases seen were very impressive, averaging around five percent in the lower intensity testing and around four percent in the higher intensity testing. Maximum improvements of up to 15 percent were seen.”
The paper was first published on June 1, 2016. Since then, Kansas University did their own double-blind placebo-controlled trial showing similar results. Sharpe and Macias are planning to conduct two more studies on LactiGoTM planned for publication within the next eight months.
UWS HNFM student Jennifer Warstler Kryvicky helped with the statistical analysis for the paper. She is currently conducting her own double-blind placebo-controlled study on LactiGoTM gel as her capstone project.
