Personal Trainer’s Guide to Vitamins and Minerals

As a personal trainer, you get a lot of questions from clients about everything from the latest fitness trends to what to eat. While fitness is your forte, you should be prepared to answer fundamental nutrition questions. 

These include questions about nutrients, what they do, and which foods to eat for a healthy balance. You cannot recommend specific diets for clients, but you can educate them about nutrition, nutrient-dense foods, and healthy choices. Here is a quick guide to brush up on your knowledge of vitamins and minerals, plus a cheat sheet to share with interested clients. 

The Essential Vitamins and Minerals

Vitamins and minerals are essential nutrients. This means our bodies need them to function normally and for optimal health and disease prevention. Children need them for proper development. Vitamins are molecules of varying sizes, while minerals are individual elements, like iron or calcium. 

The Fat-Soluble Vitamins

Vitamins A, D, E, and K are fat-soluble. This means they dissolve in fat rather than water. 

• Vitamin A: helps with eye health, white blood cell production, bone repair, cell growth; good sources include leafy greens, tomatoes, pumpkin, sweet potato, cantaloupe, milk, eggs, fortified foods

• Vitamins D: helps with calcium absorption, bone health, inflammation reduction; accessed via exposure to sunlight, and food sources include fortified dairy foods, fortified juice, fortified breakfast cereal, egg yoks, beef liver, fatty fish, cod liver oil

• Vitamin E: helps with antioxidant action, immune function, blood clot prevention in the heart; food sources include sunflower seeds, wheat germ, almonds, peanuts, beet and collard greens, spinach, pumpkin, red bell pepper, avocado

• Vitamin K: helps with protein production, bone health, blood clotting; found in dark green leafy vegetables, soybean and canola oil, fermented soybeans

When you digest foods with these vitamins, they are absorbed through the intestinal walls. They do not travel easily through the blood and usually require protein escorts to move to where the body needs them.

Your body stores excess fat-soluble vitamins in fat tissue and the liver. Because they can be stored, your body can access and use vitamins A, D, E, and K as needed. This also means it is possible to overdose on these vitamins. They don’t simply pass through the urine and leave the body. 

The fat-soluble vitamins play many important roles in the body: 

• They build and strengthen bone tissue.

• Vitamin A is essential for vision and the health of cells in the eyes. 

• Vitamin E helps the body absorb and store vitamin A. 

• Vitamin A and E are antioxidants that repair damage caused by free radicals. 

• They support the immune system and help it function optimally. 

• Vitamin K is essential for development and growth. It also makes the proteins that help blood clot. 

Water-Soluble Vitamins

The water-soluble vitamins include the following: 

• Vitamin C

• Vitamin B1 (Thiamin)

• Vitamin B2 (Riboflavin)

• Vitamin B3 (Niacin)

• Vitamin B5 (Pantothenic Acid)

• Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine)

• Vitamin B7 (Biotin)

• Vitamin B9 (Folic Acid)

• Vitamin B12 (Cobalamin)

These vitamins dissolve in water, not fat. The body easily absorbs them into the blood stream from the foods you eat. They circulate throughout the body, moving easily to different tissues and organs. 

Because they dissolve in water, your kidneys flush out much of the excess amounts you consume. You need to replenish water-soluble vitamins more often than fat-soluble vitamins for this reason. 

There are some exceptions, though, and it is possible to consume too much of a water-soluble vitamin. For example, you can hold a store of vitamin C for a few days. Your liver stores years of vitamin B12. The B vitamins and C have many important functions: 

• B vitamins help the body get energy from food. Many of them are coenzymes that work with enzymes to metabolize food. 

• The B vitamins are also needed to make red blood cells. 

• Several B vitamins are necessary for the production of proteins and building cell structures. 

• Collagen, a structural protein, needs vitamin C. 

• Vitamin C is necessary for healing and iron absorption. 

Major Minerals

Unlike vitamins, minerals are single elements, many of them metals. They exist in soil, which is how they get into plants. People then consume minerals either directly through plant foods or by consuming animals that ate plants. 

We need some minerals in large quantities. These are the major minerals and include: 

• Calcium

• Chloride

• Magnesium

• Phosphorus

• Potassium

• Sodium

• Sulfur

One of the most important roles of these minerals is to maintain electrolyte and water balance throughout the body. Chloride, potassium, and sodium are most important in doing this. 

Calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus are essential for healthy, strong bones. Sulfur is a necessary component of many proteins, including those that make up structural tissue, like fingernails and skin. 

Although we need these minerals in large quantities, it is easy to get too much of some of them, especially sodium. There is no need to add table salt to any foods for nutritional reasons—except perhaps to get the added iodine. Foods naturally have plenty of sodium and chloride. Eating too much salt in processed foods is a major health issue because it causes high blood pressure. 

Excess amounts of some of the major minerals can also cause deficits in the others. Too much sodium causes calcium to be excreted from the body. Excessive phosphorus limits the ability to take in and use magnesium. 

Trace Minerals

Trace minerals are more numerous, present in lower amounts in food, and needed in much lower amounts in the body. The trace minerals include: 

• Chromium

• Copper

• Fluoride

• Iodine

• Iron

• Manganese

• Molybdenum

• Selenium

• Zinc

Despite the small amounts required, each trace mineral is essential to normal functioning. A deficit in any one of them can cause health problems. For instance, too little iron can cause anemia and fatigue because it is responsible for carrying oxygen throughout the body for energy. 

The trace minerals fill a wide range of niches in the body. Zinc helps blood clot and helps the immune system function. Copper is an important component of several enzymes. Fluoride strengthens teeth and iodine is part of thyroid hormones needed for energy production. 

As with the major minerals, trace minerals interact with each other. Too much or too little of one can cause issues with another. For instance, too much manganese can worsen an iron deficiency. Too much zinc inhibits copper absorption, which can cause a deficiency. 

Some of your clients could be vulnerable to an iron deficiency. Share this ISSA post on iron supplementation with clients you think could be at risk. 

Tips for Getting Adequate Nutrients

Getting enough of each vitamin and mineral in your body requires thoughtful eating and careful supplementation as needed. Of course, it’s always important to talk to a doctor before taking any type of dietary supplement. 

A Well-Rounded Diet

According to the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, most people can get all of the essential minerals and vitamins through a healthy diet. Healthy eating includes consuming a wide range of foods, especially a variety of vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds. A varied diet is the best way to get an adequate intake of your nutrients for a few reasons. 

One is that whole, healthy foods provide a range of nutrients, like fiber and antioxidants, that benefit your health. Not all nutrients fall under the category of vitamin or mineral. Your body can also absorb nutrients better when they come from foods. 

Vitamin and Minerals in Supplement Form

Start with a healthy diet, and add dietary supplements when necessary. Vitamin and mineral supplements were never designed to replace healthy foods, but they can fill gaps for some people. For example, if you have a client who is dedicated to avoiding the sun, they might benefit from a vitamin D supplement. 

Here’s more information about taking a multivitamin versus eating a healthy, well-rounded diet. 

Talk to Your Doctor About a Blood Test

Your clients shouldn’t start taking dietary supplements just because certain vitamins and minerals are purported to provide benefits. It might seem like more of a good thing is worthwhile, but the evidence from research doesn’t bear this out. Studies show that, in many cases, vitamin supplements do not benefit health. 

There are exceptions, of course. For instance, some people are genetically predisposed to pernicious anemia, which means they get low in vitamin B12. Encourage your clients to talk to their doctors about supplements. A review of their symptoms and a blood test can indicate any deficiencies and vitamin or mineral supplements that could help. 

If you love answering your client’s questions about food and nutrition, consider adding nutrition coach to your list of credentials. ISSA’s Nutritionist Certification is a self-paced course to prepare you to work with clients as they improve their nutrition. 

Download this FREE guide here!

References

Vitamins and Minerals. National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. (2018). Retrieved 12 August 2022, from https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/vitamins-and-minerals.