Even if you think that people who risk their lives to scale Mt. Everest, just to say they’ve done it, might be crazy and even stupid, you can’t help but admire their physical stamina.

That’s why when the company First Endurance claimed that their new and improved Optygen HP was supposed to include an ingredient that helped the Sherpas of the Himalayas to first climb Mt Everest, we were definitely all ears.

But rather than take First Endurance’s word for it, we decided to investigate Optygen HP to see what it could really offer.

Background

Optygen HP claims to be specifically designed for endurance athletes to help increase not only their stamina, but also improve their muscles’ explosive strength.

In addition, Optygen HP was supposed to have one ingredient that could help your body utilize oxygen and deliver it more readily to muscles that are working hard. This ingredient is also promised to be able to increase your aerobic threshold so that your body produces less lactic acid buildup.

Since lactic acid can be the ruin of so many endurance athletes whose bodies genetically produce more of the anaerobic byproduct than others, Optygen HP could be a lifesaver if it really could work.

History

The key ingredient in Optygen HP is Rhodiola Extract, the extract of a perennial plant that grows in high altitude climates of the Northern Hemisphere like the one of the Himalayas.

However, this plant has not been shown to increase your body’s ability to perform endurance workouts, and is actually used to help stave off depression.

This is because Rhodiola actually affects the levels of serotonin and dopamine in the body, helping improve your mood and ability to cope with stress. For this reason, it has been used in the Siberian tundra for hundreds of years to help them manage the severe cold and bleak winters.

Ingredients

Even though Rhodiola doesn’t exactly help you improve your endurance levels, at least it might help them a little bit; after all, those who are in a bad mood are much less likely to workout at their top levels.

But we didn’t find anything else in Optygen HP’s formula that suggested it might be a good pre-workout supplement.

Our Opinion

Because First Endurance made such big claims about Optygen HP and then included no ingredients to follow through with these promises, we can’t recommend this pre-workout supplement.