What is Magnesium?
Crucial to over 300 different processes in your body, including helping it to use other vitamins and minerals, magnesium is often overlooked with regards to testosterone.
A deficiency in this powerful mineral can not only send your testosterone levels on a downward spiral but it could crash your entire life.
The list of serious side effects of deficiency is too long to list in this post but here are a few to give you an idea how devastating it can me.
- Hormone Imbalance
- Cardiovascular Maladies
- Anxiety Issues
- Sleep Problems
And of course all of those just mentioned can directly affect your testosterone!
Magnesium Deficiency is Common
Since it’s not often talked about in health communities most people do not realize it’s a serious and quickly escalating problem. (1)
It’s actually been estimated that upwards of 68% of Americans are at least mildly deficient. (2)
Soil degradation and incomplete modern diets are partly to blame but our bodies need for the mineral actually increase as we age.
Exercise also increases your body’s need for it since it plays a vital part in inflammation control, stress management and clearing out cortisol.
How Much Magnesium Do I Need?
According to the Linus Pauling Institute, males need the most and the recommended allowance continues to climb until 31 years of age when it reaches 420mg each day. (3)
Thankfully magnesium is fairly common in foods and we do not need to supplement with that much to get our levels back into the green.
By supplementing with at least 40 mg per day (100mg per day is recommended by the Linus Pauling Institute but if you make an even halfass attempt at healthy eating I feel that much is not needed), you should be able to get the rest of your daily needs from your diet. (3)
Will Magnesium Increase My Testosterone?
Having more magnesium in your body then it needs will not increase your testosterone. But if you are one of the 68% who is mildly deficient… even if you are only occasionally deficient, it could have a huge impact.
How big? Upwards of a 24% increase to be a little more exact.
There was a month long study done on both athletes and sedentary men and that’s exactly what happened on average. This increase was both in free and total testosterone levels.
Athletes actually saw the largest average increase which is likely due to magnesium’s role in inflammation and stress reduction. It also suggests that exercise in addition to supplementation will give the best increase in testosterone levels. (4)
It’s important to note why the free testosterone levels increased since we all want more free T in our body’s to give us the biggest edge.
Magnesium, much like boron, binds to Sex Hormone Binding Globulin or SHBG and it’s this action which likely gives the big increase in free testosterone. (5)
Another case study published in the International Journal of Andrology tested 400 senior men for magnesium levels in their blood.
They found that men with higher Mg levels actually had both elevated testosterone and IGF-1 levels which suggests there is a double anabolic benefit to magnesium supplementation! (6)
Foods High in Magnesium
- Whole Grains
- Spinach and Most Leafy Greens
- Quinoa
- Oatmeal
- Beans and Lentils
- Dark Chocolate
- Avocado
- Swiss Chard
- Bananas
- Pumpkin Seeds
- Nuts
Supplementing with Magnesium
Extreme deficiency is rare but it’s almost a certainty you will experience mild deficiency at some point as nobody in today’s world has the ability to eat a perfect diet every single day.
Supplementing with magnesium is an absolute must to keep your testosterone elevated. I recommend taking at least 30 mg per day in addition to supplementing with Zinc and B6 which forms the ZMA complex for maximum testosterone boosting benefit.
Also keep in mind it’s not just how much you take but how much your body actually absorbs. Taking a Vitamin D supplement has been shown to increase magnesium bioavailability. (7)
Strangely enough, the opposite is also true. Magnesium supplementation has also been shown to increase Vitamin D absorption! (8)
Pure shilajit with fulvic acid can also help increase absorption rates.
References:
- Dietary M intake in a national sample of US adults. Ford ES, Mokdad AH. – Link
- Dietary M and C-reactive protein levels. King DE, Mainous AG 3rd, Geesey ME, Woolson RF. – Link
- Linus Pauling Institute » Micronutrient Information Center – Link
- Effects of Mg supplementation on testosterone levels of athletes and sedentary subjects at rest and after exhaustion. Cinar V, Polat Y, Baltaci AK, Mogulkoc R. – Link
- Mg effect on testosterone-SHBG association studied by a novel molecular chromatography approach. Excoffon L, Guillaume YC, Woronoff-Lemsi MC, André C. – Link
- Magnesium and anabolic hormones in older men. Maggio M, Ceda GP, Lauretani F, Cattabiani C, Avantaggiato E, Morganti S, Ablondi F, Bandinelli S, Dominguez LJ, Barbagallo M, Paolisso G, Semba RD, Ferrucci L. – Link
- Effects of dietary vitamin D on magnesium absorption and bone mineral contents in pigs on normal Mg intakes. Pointillart A, Denis I, Colin C. – Link
- Without Magnesium, Vitamin D is Ineffective – Dr. Mercola – Link
