Training Tip Tuesday You will hear coaches from across the land talk about starting out slow to get warmed up and to not burn out before the end of your event, but do you know why? Research has shown time and again that during the first 30 minutes or so of our event, we burn almost nothing but straight muscle and liver glycogen, carbs, if you will. These are the high energy fuels our body stores after processing carbohydrate meals. Our other fuel source, fat, is considerably less efficient, but unlike the finite amount of glycogen our body stores, we have almost a limitless amount of fat. Yes, even the thinnest, fittest person has an abundance of fat to burn. Problem with fat is that it must have some glycogen to burn, and it produces a relatively low amount of energy. When you take off for an endurance event, you should be taking off slow and easy, ‘conversational pace’ so you do not blow through your stored glycogen too fast and not have enough to facilitate the burning of the fat. What we want to get to is to Fat Burning Mode, which happens about 30 minutes into the training session. After 30 minutes or so the body starts to burn fat more efficiently and in great quantities, thus saving our precious finite amount of muscle glycogen to get us closer to the finish line. Now, there is a great deal more science to this, Lactic thresholds, going anaerobic or staying aerobic, but when you hear that you should take off slow and easy for an endurance event, the reason is so you have enough fuel to finish the event. Coach Rick
Posted on: Wed, 25 Sep 2013 03:48:00 +0000
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