Have you ever wondered what the hype is around Montmorency Tart Cherry Juice?
The Montmorency tart cherry is a type of sour cherry which has been discovered to contain a natural source of phytochemicals and anthocyanins. These have been linked with numerous health benefits, including anti-inflammatory and antioxidant capacity, enhanced sleep, improved recovery and a decrease in post-exercise soreness and damage. It's been suggested that consumption of tart cherry juice before and during strenuous exercise may reduce inflammatory markers in muscle.
So does this mean you should start taking tart cherry juice for all the training sessions you do? Well in short, no. Not all types of exercise or training will cause enough muscle damage and soreness to warrant drinking tart cherry juice. So far, studies have only shown that endurance events with components of inclines (uphill/downhill) are of high enough intensity to cause significant muscle damage or soreness for the supplement to benefit. If you are just doing a heavy weights session in the gym, you won't reap any benefits and it is best to rely on your recovery meal for muscle repair instead.
