A contradiction to the "normal"

[Eric J]

Great article on the benefits of training carb depleted from a study in the 2010 Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise Journal as well as the Journal of Applied Physiology.


http://www.everymantri.com/everyman_triathlon/2011/01/four-reasons-to-think-twice-about-eating-carbohydrates-before-a-workout.html#tp

[GinnySellars]

Hi Eric
Nice to see your name here! I hope training is going really well.
This is super interesting for me. I've been talking to people with different experiences.

My own 'gut' feeling is that perhaps this is a trained effect, and there are some 'growing pains' along the way.
I find that even when I'm NOT exercising, if I have very low carbohydrate diet, such as veggies and a protein source, for a meal, I feel shaky and have trouble thinking. I think perhaps my body doesn't know how to break down other fuels as well, so I get low blood sugar.

During exercise, it's the same. Unless I'm going VERY easy, like a long walk in the park, I feel shaky pretty quickly if I'm low carb. For instance, even after a decent breakfast, if I do an indoor brick for 2-3 hours, I get very antzy after about 45-60 minutes, and will get off the bike unless I have some carb intake of some sort.

An athlete on our team is experimenting with fuel, as she has a complicated metabolic system. She has had GREAT success skiing or cycling for 2-3 hours with water only. In fact, she has more energy and feels stronger without the intake of sugar.

I would suggest that a person training 2-3 hours, who does not take in fuel right after exercise would have a longer recovery period from that training. Since the body would be requiring fuel to feed the brain, and glycogen stores would be low, and blood sugar low, the body would have to break down fat and protein to get that energy. Unfortunately our body does not break down fat alone....so the protein has to come from somewhere. You may get some muscle breakdown if this was a regular pattern.

I'd like to read the actual articles that say there is "no performance" decrease. This is an interesting concept as they are talking about untrained individuals. There was some research done that looked at putting sugar in the mouth, but not consuming it, and performance for endurance activity improved, they think because it tells the brain there is sugar in the system, and that the brain doesn't not need to conserve and shut down activity due to low blood sugar. Andrew...do you have that article?

So my thoughts are as follows:
- it takes fuel to make energy. This can be from sugar, fat, protein. Fat and protein take longer to break down, so for short hard activity, you'd be fine if you had plenty of muscle glycogen. For longer activity, it would have to be at a very low level to break down fat fast enough. At some point you run out of glycogen, and need blood sugar from food.

- unless you are trying to lose fat, I'm not sure that I see the point in low carb. I think the recovery would be longer, and you may stress the immune system and be more at risk for picking up a bug if you restrict carbs during and immediately after exercise.

It's all interesting stuff. I'd love to hear the experience of others training with different foods, high/low carb etc.

[Eric J]

I think that if we look at this in the light of endurance sports, one must take in fuel at some point during a race and long training session, that is a given.  Lets look at this from the perspective of training then go to the race.

During winter training normall time on the on the traininer is 3hrs then maybe an hour run after that.  At some point you will have to take in some fuel to replace what has been lost and that fuel source would be mostly carbs (i.e. carbo pro or a gel).  What i am taking from the article is that one should try to prolong the "need" to take in carbs until you are at that "point" of feeling that you really need something.  The main point of this being that you are training the body to find fuel from other sources (i.e. fat) and since fat is the most abundant source of fuel, it woudl make sense to "force" the body to use that the best that it can.

I agree with that this is something that is "trained" and "engrained" into the body.  One must train the body to function on what the body has for stored fuel first before relying on what is shoved in the mouth.  Its kind of along the same lines that (this is just in my opinion) that an endurance athlete must learn to train with and through fatigue.  The body will eventually "accept" the fact that it is normal to be fatigued when training and thus adapt to the situation and all of a sudded, fatigue is just a normal part of the training experience.  If the body is forced to train even when the mind says "no", the body will eventually catch up and say "ok, this is normal".  Come race day when you are rested, your rested state if that much better and when fatigue does set in on race day, teh body just accepts that fact as that is what it has become used to.  Kinda like evolution.  You put a human in a situation for long enough, the body adapts.

So, if we can train the body to not rely on the carbs entering the body through the mouth before and during training and potentially:

#1: Increase activity of the biological mechanisms responsible for building and repairing lean muscle tissue.

#2: Increase ability to preserve and ration valuable carbohydrate stores.

#3: Increase fat utilization during exercise.

#4: Increase the activity of the enzymes responsible for metabolizing carbohydrates during high intensity exercise, such as racing.


come race day, the body will be a more efficient machine with the energy that it has stored and use the carbs that are ingested more efficiently.

I am really not coming at this from a scientific perspective as i am certainly not qualified by any means, but more from an inqisitive point of view.  I can accept the fact that one can teach the body to function even when the mind says no, as the mind is the limiting factor in the question of "can i keep going", not the muscle.  So, even though the mind says "FEED ME CARBS NOW", the body can still function and WILL find other sources of fuel when forced to.