A Dietary Strategy for Optimizing the Visual Range of Athletes

Abstract

Visual range is quantified by assessing how far one can see clearly (an ability crucial to many athletes). This ability tends to vary significantly across individuals despite similar personal characteristics. We hypothesize that the primary driver of these differences is the individual response to scattered short-wave light in the environment moderated by the dietarily derived retinal pigments lutein and zeaxanthin.

Figure 1

A schematic illustrating the primary hypothesis of the manuscript: increasing retinal L and Z increases visual functions that are a benefit to athletes, particularly visual range.

Figure 2

The absorbance spectrum of L and Z compared with the spectrum of skylight and blue haze (21). Notice the strong overlap between L and Z absorbance and the blue haze spectrum.

Figure 3

Macular pigment optical density data sampled from various regions across the United States (measured using the same stimulus conditions and model of instrument). Note that a good proportion of these data came from samples collected over 20 years ago. There is some evidence that, since L and Z supplements were introduced to the market, and awareness has increased, so too has MP density (more recent averages tend to be higher (29)).