vitamen supplements for recovery, performance, and general health

As long as you are eating real food and have no issues such as a lack of intrinsic factor (for B12) you should not necessarily need any supplements.

There are some that may be a good choice however. An oil based Vitamin D3 is something I would recommend for almost every athlete. If living in N.America for example, outside of the summer you are almost never going to get enough sunlight. And even during the summer, clothing and sunscreen limit our exposure. I've even seen triathletes in Texas with low D.

Sports drinks are good if you are working out for longer than an hour. If you are eating around the workout (such as doing a noon training session after breakfast and before lunch) then your meals are probably sufficient.

I will sometimes take a PRO powder before an AM fasted workout.

There are many supplements on the market that may improve performance, but I hesitate to recommend or even take any of them. It is risky. One of my professors who is an exercise physiologist worked for a major supplement company, and does not recommend most supplements due to what he knows. He even spent a full class period talking about the supplement industry and breaking apart their add campaigns and ingredients.

Just recently Sergio Silva lost his gold medal in the Duathlon due to failing a doping test. One of his supplements contained a banned ingredient that was not on the ingredient list. And this is not a unique event, other athletes have lost medals due to mystery ingredients that sneak into supplements.

I am older and recover much more slowly so, for me, I take extra anti-oxidants, vit D, Vit E/C, omega 3's and a healthy amount of glucosamine and plenty of water etc. I eat well but am trying to drop a few pounds so I supplement. None of this boosts my performance, per se, but I seem to recover faster.

Antioxidant supplementation may actually slow recovery since the supplementation could potentially hinder the ability of your own body to produce them. A study done on on a national kayak team found that it's supplementation may actually have delayed recovery.

I've done my own research into taking Glucosamine and there is actually nothing showing it is any better than a placebo.

Not to shoot you down, just trying to inform.

Yeah. I wish glucosamine worked. My mother and her mother both have had knee operations, so I've definitively done my homework. If there was anything more then anecdotal evidence, I would probably be taking it.

Even on this forum in a thread about the subject, someone mentioned giving it to his/her dog and noticing an improvement. That is obviously very promising since the animal has no idea it is taking glucosamine. But the owner does, and is obviously looking for and hoping for improvement.