(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Beets found to significantly improve athletic performance while reducing oxygen needs—upsetting a fundamental tenet of sports physiology."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "To understand how beets could reduce the oxygen cost of exercise while improving athletic performance, one must review the biochemistry of energy production (ATP synthase), and the body’s conversion of nitrates to nitrites into nitric oxide."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "The natural flora on our tongue (lingual bacteria) are essential for the athletic performance-enhancing effect of the nitrates in vegetables such as beetroot."

(1 min) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover studies convinced the scientific establishment that nitrate-rich vegetables (such as beets) could noticeably improve athletic performance."

(3 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Young infants, and perhaps those with recurrent oxalate kidney stones, should avoid beets. But most commonly, the chief side effect is beeturia, the harmless passage of pink urine, though not all are affected—akin to the malodorous urine (“stinky pee”) that sometimes results from asparagus consumption."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Beeturia, the passage of pink urine after beetroot consumption, is a reminder that phytonutrients circulate throughout our bloodstream—explaining the connection between “garlic breath,” and the use of garlic as an adjunct treatment for pneumonia."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "If nitrates can boost athletic performance and protect against heart disease, which vegetables have the most—beans, bulb vegetables (like garlic and onions), fruiting vegetables (like eggplant and squash), greens (such as arugula), mushrooms, root vegetables (such as carrots and beets), or stem vegetables (such as celery and rhubarb)?"

(1 min) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "If the nitrates in vegetables such as greens are health-promoting because they can be turned into nitrites, and then nitric oxide, inside our bodies, what about the nitrites added to cured meats—such as bacon, ham, and hot dogs?"

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Nitrites in processed meat form nitrosamines, a class of potent carcinogens found in cigarette smoke, which may explain why hot dog consumption has been associated with the two leading pediatric cancers, brain tumors and childhood leukemia."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "The nitrate in vegetables, which the body can turn into the vasodilator nitric oxide, may help explain the role dark green leafy vegetables play in the prevention and treatment of hypertension (high blood pressure) and heart disease."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "The nitrite preservatives in processed meats such as bologna, bacon, ham, and hot dogs form carcinogenic nitrosamines, but also reduce the growth of botulism bacteria—forcing regulators to strike a balance between consumers risking cancer, or a deadly form of food poisoning."

(3 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Phytonutrients, such as vitamin C, prevent the formation of nitrosamines from nitrites—which explains why adding nitrite preservatives to processed meat can be harmful, but adding more vegetables, with their nitrite-forming nitrates, to our diet can be helpful."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "The levels of nitrosamines—considered the most carcinogenic agents in cigarette smoke—were recently measured in an array of processed meats including chicken, turkey, and pork."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "Frying bacon outdoors decreases the concentration of airborne nitrosamine carcinogens."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "The addition of vitamin C to processed (cured) meats such as bacon may actually make them more carcinogenic."

(2 mins) Transcript. Dr Greger's summary: "In the context of a healthy, plant-based diet, the nitrates in vegetables can safely be converted into nitric oxide, which can boost athletic performance, and may help prevent heart disease."