Dear Lyle,
I take a supplement called Ripped Fuel by Twinlab. I heard that it can affect a woman’s ability to reproduce. Is this true?
Answer:
Oh good an easy one finally. To answer this let’s look at the ingredients in Twinlab’s Ripped Fuel:
MaHuang: this is herbal ephedrine. It acts as a beta-agonist meaning that it stimulates a variety of processes in the body including calorie burning, fat burning, heart rate blood pressure, etc. I can’t even imagine a way that this could alter reproductive function in women. In mean of course it can cause a short term inability to ‘get it up’ (I sadly speak from experience) but that’s a different issue entirely.
Guarana (or is it kola nut): Either way both of these are herbal forms of caffeine. Caffeine is probably the most (ab)used drug in the world. If it made women sterile, we’d know about it.
White willow bark (I think this is still in there): this is a herbal form of aspirin. Again, like caffeine it’s been used for centuries without any problem that I can see.
Chromium picolinate: This is a mineral involved in glucose metabolism. There was one study a while back suggesting that very high dose chromium (like so high that it’s unrealistic to consider that a human could take enough) caused some chromosomal damage in cells.
L-carnitine: this is an amino acid involved in fat metabolism. This can’t have any effect.
So looking at the ingredients, I can’t see any way that this product could affect reproductive function. Maybe if you took like 10 times the recommended dose and had a stroke or something but you’d have bigger problems. Sounds like more scare tactics to me.
About the author
Lyle McDonald+ is the author of the Ketogenic Diet as well as the Rapid Fat Loss Handbook and the Guide to Flexible Dieting. He has been interested in all aspects of human performance physiology since becoming involved in competitive sports as a teenager. Pursuing a degree in Physiological Sciences from UCLA, he has devoted nearly 20 years of his life to studying human physiology and the science, art and practice of human performance, muscle gain, fat loss and body recomposition.