Pre-Exercise Nutrition Tip

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If your guts are often upset during exercise, take a look at your pre-exercise meal.

For obvious reasons, discomfort can and will impact your ability to perform in sport and exercise training.

One of the most common causes of discomfort for athletes during exercise is gastrointestinal stress. [1]

If you feel 'heavy', bloated, gassy, and maybe feel like you're going to throw up, there can be a number of potential causes. It's certainly worth an audit of any foods/meals you typically consume in the hours prior to exercise. Your guts ability to deal with food is impaired during hard exercise.

In laymans terms, when you're exercising hard, the body is preoccupied with providing fuel and resources to the working muscles. Digestion isn't a big priority, so gut function is 'put to the side' and therefore becomes impaired. Your guts can't deal with much of a workload so in the hours before exercise it's a good idea to only burden it with nutrients that will actually provide fuel for the upcoming work.

Anything that isn't that, or 'fluff' that'll get in the way, should be eliminated.

Fats, fibre and solid protein-dense foods provide the gut with a pretty big burden to deal with, and if it's in an exercise-induced impaired state, it simply might not be able to deal with it.

So what can you do about it?

Reduce and even eliminate fibre, fats and solid proteins from any meals consumed in the hours prior to exercise [2].

Fibre, micronutrients and all that 'health stuff' can wait. The primary role of pre-exercise nutrition is to fuel the machine and nothing else.

It's worth mentioning that the above is only really a consideration, and cause for potential concern for athletes who have really high fueling needs, who do a lot of very hard exercise.

For more information and nutritional strategies to improve your exercise performance, we have an online community that you can access for $5 per week. In our Team FNC Online Community, you’ll have access to our video lesson library that includes athlete and exercise specific videos. You’ll also have a chance to ask questions to our team, be inspired by nearly 100 meals that have been shared and tune in to a weekly webinar.

For more information on how you can sign up to improve your knowledge and understanding of nutrition for the price of 1 coffee a week, follow this link

[1]Training the Gut for Athletes

[2] ‘I think I’m gonna hurl’: A Narrative Review of the Causes of Nausea and Vomiting in Sport

What is Inflammation?

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How do I reduce inflammation?

• Are you sure you actually have an issue with inflammation?

• If you are overweight, take steps to reduce body fat.

• If you are a healthy weight, maintain your healthy weight.

• Exercise regularly.

• Eat a varied diet including whole grains, vegetables, beans/legumes, fruits, nuts and fish, including oily fish like salmon and sardines.

Inflammation, like gut health, is a hot topic in nutrition. Both are areas of developing research in which the experts say more research and time is needed before making specific recommendations. 

Both are also areas in which ‘gurus’ are trying to make money from the hysteria and noise. Be very careful of anyone who claims to be sure about inflammation, dietary causes and dietary treatments. If you are considering spending any money on “inflammation reduction” from anyone who is not your doctor or medical professional, be sure to ask them which measures of inflammation they’re concerned about and exactly how their proposed treatment works for the particular inflammatory processes they believe you have. Then take that information to your medical professional before giving any of your hard earned money to a guru.

Now that the rant is done, let’s try to explain things as simply as possible.

What is inflammation

• A complex biological immune response of body tissues to cellular injury

• The purpose of inflammation is to eliminate toxic agents and repair damaged tissue

• We want inflammation to happen, however we also want inflammation to go away when its job is done.

• The resolution (removal) of inflammation once the job is done is also important. 

  • eg. switching off inflammatory processes when the injury has been repaired.

Inflammation is a ‘friend’. However we can have issues if our friend overstays its welcome. 

Acute inflammation

• A great friend. Goes in and gets the job done. As soon as the job is done, leaves you in peace.

• You get a splinter, the area becomes red and swollen as the inflammatory response heals you. The area goes back to normal as the inflammatory response is turned off after healing.

• Exercise produces an acute inflammatory response and contributes to lower chronic disease risk. Not all inflammation is bad.

Chronic inflammation and auto-immune diseases

• A foe. Overstays welcome, won’t leave and becomes damaging.

Eg: Celiac disease, Inflammatory bowel disease

Chronic low grade inflammation

• The ‘hot topic’ inflammation people are telling you to reduce.

• Widely observed in obesity.

• There is an association between chronic low grade inflammation and: 

  • metabolic syndrome

  • non-alcoholic fatty liver disease 

  • type 2 diabetes 

  • CVD (1)(2)(3)

Gut health

• There is a link between gut health and low grade chronic inflammation 

• Interactions between the GI tract and gut bacteria influence immune function and inflammation

How to maintain a healthy gut to help with inflammation

• Research is still developing and recommendations are tentative, however:

  • Eat a varied diet including whole grains, vegetables and fruits, nuts, and fish. This ensures you are eating fibre, particularly fermentable fibre (prebiotic), antioxidants and Omega-3 fatty acids.  (1)(4)(5)

How do we test for inflammation?

• We know that inflammation occurs in the body tissue, however we generally look at blood to find biomarkers and signs of inflammation. (6)

To give you an example of how many markers of inflammation show up, here is a chart from a review of research on dairy and biomarkers of inflammation. 

Here is the key for the graph if you can see the bars:

• significant anti-inflammatory change (black bars)

• no significant change (grey bar)

• significant pro-inflammatory change (white bars) (7)

The main purpose of the image above is to show how many markers of inflammation show up during these tests. Top researchers are unclear as to which markers are necessary to focus on. In fact it could actually be a combination of markers which determine if there is a level of risk or issue which needs to be addressed. 

An expert group, organised by the Nutrition and Immunity Task Force of the International Life Sciences Institute European Branch, stated -  

“Currently, there is no consensus as to which markers of inflammation best represent low-grade inflammation or differentiate between acute and chronic inflammation or between the various phases of inflammatory responses.”  (6)

Despite this, there are ‘inflammation gurus’ out there claiming that they somehow know you have inflammation and obviously know how to fix it.

Foods with anti-inflammatory properties?

• Rather than focusing on individual foods, it’s better to focus on eating a varied diet including whole grains, vegetables and fruits, nuts and fish. Focusing on one particular food and particular markers of inflammation may be too reductionist at this point.

• Some studies indicate that Omega-3 supplementation (fish oils) appear to reduce markers of inflammation however not all positive results have been replicated in further studies. It could help reduce these markers but we are probably talking about a neutral to slight positive effect. (4)

Best way to reduce chronic low grade inflammation?

• It appears that fat gain causes inflammation, not the other way around. 

• An increase in body fat is associated with an increase in inflammatory material. 

• Flip that and a reduction in body fat is associated with a reduction in inflammatory material. 

• Reducing body fat may have the greatest effect on lowering markers for low grade chronic inflammation.  (8)(9)(10)(11)

This is an attempt to simplify chronic low grade inflammation and help you stay informed. To read a more in-depth review, check out the paper from the British Journal of Nutrition entitled “Low-grade inflammation, diet composition and health: current research evidence and its translation.” (1)

To learn more about how to lose and maintain your weight, contact us today.

1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4579563/

2. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4612317/

3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4243532/

4. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S156816371730003X?via%3Dihub

5. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3575932/

6. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23343744

7. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26287637

8. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC296995/

9. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19238154

10. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12714437

11. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3342840/

Calorie Targets for Athletes

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Working out how many Calories to eat can be a tricky task as an athlete. Your situation is not normal, you don't do 'normal' amounts of physical activity and there is also such a large variation in energy requirements within different sports. A marathon runner is going to churn through more fuel than a jockey.

Not eating enough can not only be detrimental to your sports performance but also your health. Low energy availability or 'not eating enough Calories and suffering the health consequences of that' can occur more often in sport than you might think. This is because Calorie requirements to fuel energy demands can often far exceed auto-regulated hunger levels especially when a dedicated athlete adopts a 'clean food only' mindset.

If sufficient energy and fuel for the work required are not available, poor health, illness and injury can result, taking time away from productive training weeks and impairing best performance in competition. If training takes place with limited energy available, work capacity can be impaired and so can the adaptations from training (getting better from training).

Having anything outside of 'an abundance of fuel for the body' as an athlete is sort of like putting your car in 'eco mode'. Sure it’ll drive, and it's more efficient, but it'll never perform as well as 'sport mode'. If you want to perform your best, don't seek efficiency.

You're not a Toyota Prius. Instead, give the body all the fuel it can handle and be a Formula 1 car.

Athlete: Tim Good - Torian Pro 2019

Image: Jess Chia of Essence Images
www.essenceimages.com.au

How do you actually come to a number of Calories to eat?

There are predictive equations out there that will provide you with a ball-park starting point to monitor and adjust from. They're never really going to be anything more than that, so using a complicated formula probably isn't warranted, and you'll find they all end up giving you just about the same answer.

The issue with this is that equations are based on norms or averages. Putting the fact athletes are not normal, even within 'the general population' large variations within individuals needs to be considered.

To work it out, use a simple baseline Calorie formula to make things easier. From there use an 'activity factor multiple', that gives a reasonable starting number. The process would be the same for anyone only as an athlete your activity multiples will be hugely elevated compared to the average.

Step 1: Predict resting energy expenditure.
- This is where you aim to obtain a rough resting energy requirement per day.

23 x BW (in kilos)
23 x 75 = 1725

Step 2: Multiply by activity level
- As mentioned this is the same for everyone, only as an athlete likely with higher energy demands the multiple will therefore often be higher. For most people with general activity levels, a multiple of 1.3-1.4 normally provides an 'about right starting Calorie amount'. 1.6-2.2 can be an appropriate range for an athlete depending on their sport and training load. It takes a bit of 'time in the trenches' as a nutritionist to assess the situation and select an appropriate multiple.

Either way, it's only going to be a start point so don't stress too much about this.

1725 x 1.8 = 3105

Step 3: Monitor and adjust until you find the 'sweet spot'.
In many sports gaining weight that carries no additional strength and disadvantages 'power to weight' is not desirable. The aim is to have as much fuel available without sending weight in an undesirable direction. This means continuing to slowly bump up Calories by ~5-10% each fortnight when your average weekly scale weight stays the same or drops. Of course, if weight loss or weight gain is required you'd factor that in, but essentially the more you can eat and maintain weight the better. Keep bumping it up until notable weight gain occurs. By that point, you've found 'the max Calories you can eat and maintain weight'. Having ample energy available will give the body 'the green light' to do whatever it wants as best as it wants. There will be no 'eco mode', there will be no 'conserving energy by 'half-assing' functions that continue to health and performance. The fuel is there, it's always going to be there, so the body turns up 'full boost', to crank out that peak performance.

An example of how this 'monitor and adjust period might look, is below.

Week 1-2
Calorie target: 3100
Average weekly scale weight: 75.5kg

Week 3-4
Calorie target: 3250
Average weekly scale weight: 75.4kg

Week 5-6
Calorie target: 3400
Average weekly scale weight: 76.8kg

Week 7-8
Calorie target: 3250
Average weekly scale weight: 75.6kg

From the above 8 week 'monitor and adjust phase', with a reasonable level of confidence, 'optimal weight maintenance Calories', or 'max weight maintenance Calories' probably sits somewhere around 3250 Calories per day.

It's finally worth mentioning that the monitor and adjust thing continues. Situations change, training volume and goals change. It'll get easier over time and the required level of reliance on accurate tracking will often reduce as the athlete finds their 'eating routine groove', and gets familiar with eating to their targets.

To learn more about sport and athlete-specific nutritional requirements, contact us today to start working with a sports nutritionist.

5 Competition Day Nutrition Tips

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There are a few key principals that you want to have in place on the day of a sporting competition. Here are 5 Competition Day Nutrition Tips:

1. Hydration

2. Fuel availability (carbohydrates)

3. Promotion of a net positive protein balance

4. Caffeine (optional, but a good idea)

5. Consideration for gastrointestinal comfort.
   

The effects of discomfort, namely gastrointestinal discomfort, is a component of competition day nutrition that should get upmost attention. Regardless of any proposed positive physiological benefit of something, if it makes you 'feel bad' or sick it's probably going to do more worse than good.

'Fuelling', or comp day 'protocols' should be tested, evaluated, and refined during training in the lead up to an event.

Competition day is NOT the time to try new foods, or even the same foods in greater amounts.

Selections should be based upon things that you know 'sit well with you' even in the amounts you intend to consume on the day.

For example, Pre-workouts and energy drinks often bloat many folks. So No-Doz is a safe bet when it comes to comfortable caffeine ingestion and don't go consuming 4 bagels when you normally would only ever consume 1 in a given sitting.

The principals would largely remain the same for an endurance event, but the selections would differ a little. Things like energy gels would come into the mix.

If you’re interested in performance nutrition coaching for your chosen sport, contact us today to start working with a sports nutritionist.

Nutrition for Strength and Power Sports

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To preface this as a 'sort of disclaimer', it's assumed basic considerations like sleep, sufficient protein, stress management, plant intake and the overall healthfulness of the diet are already in place.

With most strength and power sports, relative strength and power to weight ratio is an important consideration to success. Even in sports like powerlifting where there is truth behind the idea of 'weight moves weight', weight class considerations and 'simply not just being heavy & strong' are important. So you want to be 'jacked and lean', & not just jacked if you want to be your/ the best.

With that in mind, power to weight ratio is largely predicated on accruing muscle mass gains and minimising body fat gain whilst practicing the skill of the specific sport. As a result, you'll find that during training phases or 'the off-season', strength & power athletes train more like bodybuilders seeking more muscle with nutrition to support this. For example in the off-season powerlifters and sprinters will dedicate a large portion of their training toward doing high volume resistance training to put on muscle mass. As training performance, optimises training stimulus, which drives adaptations to training (muscle growth), optimising sports (training) performance matters to bodybuilders just as it does to strength athletes.
So considering the aforementioned, most of the same nutrition 'stuff' that applies to bodybuilders trying to put on muscle without getting overly fat also applies to strength athletes. Without going into much more depth mutual considerations include.

1. Sufficient energy availability - slight Calorie surplus to promote anabolism (growing)

2. Sufficient protein - to support training adaptations.

3. Protein timing - to promote positive protein turnover across the day.

4. Glucose/carbohydrate availability to optimise training performance.

5. Hydration for training performance & recovery.

6. Caffeine for training performance.

7. Micronutrients (vitamins and minerals) adequacy for recovery, performance, and adaptations.

8. Gastrointestinal comfort - training performance.

9. Structured dedicated periods of Calorie surplus to gain muscle, and periods of Calorie deficit to drop body fat. Both with the goal of maximising power to weight ratio over time.

The point where things start to differ is when the activities performed begin to lean more towards 'doing the actual sport' and getting the benefits from building the muscle in the offseason through having moire muscle mass to handle more load, and 'be more powerful'.

Bodybuilding style training is lower in intensity, (further away from the maximal single effort), and longer in duration (more reps at one time) compared to the action of a single max 'all-in' effort. Due to this, bodybuilding style training is more glycolytic meaning it relies more heavily on glucose availability to fuel muscle contractions. Whereas a single max effort is more reliant on available ATP and creatine phosphate stores. So with that in mind, point number 4 'Glucose/carbohydrate availability' could arguably, in theory, be dropped from the aforementioned list as glucose/carbohydrate availability isn't as relevant as a direct fuel for strength & power sports.

However, while glucose 'isn't the primary fuel' for 'a 10-second sprint', or a '1-rep-max deadlift', having glucose around is a great idea and being in a state of 'low blood sugar' certainly isn't. Glucose fuels the brain which is important for central nervous system activation and therefore the ability to contract muscle fibre's. Even for the reason of 'how you feel' being so impactful on your ability to perform, the notion of avoiding 'low blood sugar', and the fact that carbs won't hinder performance adds more reason to ensure glucose is present come competition day.

As mentioned before high-intensity max efforts heavily involve the PCr energy system. Which is largely predicated on creatine available. Creatine supplementation is needed to maximise creatine storage, with creatine monohydrate being the preferred form. It's got robust evidence to support it's use, its cheap and convenient. Don't bother with any other form of creatine. Monohydrate ticks the boxes. 3-5 grams per day, taken at any time for several weeks will cover you off.

To conclude, training for strength is largely about maximising muscle and limiting body fat to promote a better power to weight ratio. This is achieved largely by training and nutrition protocols not overly dissimilar to that of a bodybuilder, which includes separate phases of gaining muscle and losing body fat whilst doing everything possible to maintain sports abilities.

When the volume of work drops and intensity increases towards single maximal efforts closer to a competition, the provision of adequate fuelling still applies even if there is a lower reliance on glucose.

Make sure you're hydrated, sprinkle some caffeine on top, continue to supplement with creatine monohydrate, make sure you don't eat/drink anything that will upset your guts, and you're good to go.

To learn more about sports specific nutrition by working with a sports nutritionist, contact us today so we can help you become the best athlete you can be in your chosen sport.

General nutrition for sports performance blog post linked below.
https://www.fortitudenutritioncoaching.com.au/blog/fuellingforexercise101

Fuelling Exercise 101 - Why, How, What and When

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FUELLING EXERCISE 101 - WHY, HOW, WHAT & WHEN

If achieving your best possible sports performance for training adaptations or competition is of significant importance to you, how you fuel exercise, training and competition is worth consideration.

Unfortunately simply telling you ‘what to do’, won’t cut it, because fuelling exercise is far more complicated than what a single Instagram infographic can achieve. With that being said, once you have a clear understanding of your own situation and needs, working out what aligns with that, including the when and how much, can be a pretty simple step by step process.

This article aims to break down the things you need to know, into three checkboxes that will cover 99% of people who care about fuelling their exercise.  

Preface: Outside of basic, most important recovery considerations like sleep, sufficient protein, stress management, plant intake and the overall healthfulness of the diet, there are a few main points to address when it comes to fuelling best exercise specific to nutrition.

The 3 checkboxes include.  

1. Hydration. 

2. Caffeine.  

3. Carbohydrate availability with gastrointestinal stress in mind.

There is quite a large caveat to everything here, but fortunately it only applies to a very small percentage of the population, and of that population it applies rarely. If you’re a very high-level endurance athlete, currently in an acute phase of training (not competition) where you’re seeking training adaptations (not best possible performance) then the below still applies, but there are nuances that aren’t covered that are relevant to you and you only. For everyone else who isn’t the aforementioned, the below is all you really need to know. 

Below covers the whys, when it's relevant, and practical hows of the above three points. 

1. Hydration
Preface: Hydration does not have to come from drinking water exclusively. This is why the term ‘fluid’ is used below. 

Seemingly a no brainer this is one big one that often gets overlooked and forgotten that can notably improve your work capacity and performance. Being in a state of poor hydration has been shown to impair sports performance significantly, and even pose risk of severe illness and death [1].

When it comes to hydration the goal is... hydration not hypo or hyperhydration. Yes, overhydration is something to be aware of. There are many proposed ways to control hydration, but the way that works just fine in almost all instances is “listening to your body”... A terrible phrase used by complete nutrition morons very often, yes, but relevant in this situation. Simply drinking to thirst and being aware of “how you feel” (another equally moronic phase) with an awareness of internal and external cues like urine color, is very often sufficient provided you’re able to stay vigilant ' and ‘on top of hydrated' [2].

Having it in the back of your mind is a good idea, especially around exercise because dehydration can really creep up on you. Furthermore, ensuring you start exercising well-hydrated is paramount and deserves extra emphasis, so do your best to avoid feeling like you should be better hydrated prior to an exercise bout. Consider factors like climate, intensity and exercise duration alongside your internal and exercise thirst cues.

Sometimes more quantitative means of hydration intake are a good idea. Dosing 5-10mL per kilogram of body weight 1-2 hours prior to activity is a reasonable start [3]. Applying habitual intake ranges can be a good idea but, of course heavily limited by climate, activity levels, mass of the human and more.

Rates at which we excrete fluid from our body can be measured and calculated as ‘sweat rates’. The use of sweat rates as a guide to fluid intakes has many flaws [2], it's a little inconvenient, invasive at times and full of variables so it should be used to just get a ‘rough idea', of sufficient fluid intakes. Basically determining sweat rates involves measuring body weight, urine output, fluid intake and sometimes more invasive things before and after a bout of exercise. Again many variables can cause issues with reliability, relevance is low and it’s need is rare so I'll leave sweat rates at that. 

Hydration & having carbs in fluid while you exercise.
Hydration gets a little more complicated when whatever you drink during exercise also aims to fuel via 'during exercise carbohydrates' (more on this below). What I mean by this is drinking something with carbs(or 'sugar') in it while you train. Chunking a random scoop of a 'carb powder' like maltodextrin into a shaker with water to a ratio that looks ‘about right’ might be a sub-par idea. The issue is, a carbohydrate concentration that is too great can worsen hydration status and impair nutrient/fuel absorption, both of which impair performance. If the concentration is too great, the body will draw fluid into the gut to dilute it. [5]

This is easily solved with a carbohydrate concentration of 6-8%. Isotonic sports drinks do this really well, that's why they're a ‘sports drink’ and that's why they work, despite what your high school rugby coach said about sports drinks being 'bad'. If the drink has between 6-8g of carbohydrates per 100ml of fluid you're good to go. If you're going to mix it yourself, measure it, don't guess it! 

2. Caffeine 

Caffeine is one of the few supplements that really works [6]… like actually does something helpful. During training your habitual intake is likely just fine and it’s a good idea to save ‘the big dog dose’ for when you really need it like in competition or really hard phases of training. Many may not be aware (including high-level athletes) that the real world amounts of caffeine needed to sit within the ergogenic dose ranges, which basically means the range of caffeine intake prior to exercise that notably improves sports performance are massive! This dose is between 3-6mg per kilogram of body weight [6]. For a 75kg athlete achieving the ergogenic dose of caffeine would require between ~3.5-5.5 regular back coffee or ~2.5-3.5 full-size Monster energy drinks. Again, habitual intake or the intake you 'feel to be sufficient' will do fine during training phases, but if you really want a caffeine kick up the ass, the ergogenic caffeine range 60 minutes or less prior to starting an exercise bout will achieve this effect. 

3. Carbohydrate availability with gastrointestinal stress in mind. 

This is a big one and by far the most nuanced component of fuelling exercise & sport, so it will need to be further broken down into smaller sections. 

The body has three fuel sources available, protein, carbs and fats. But fuelling isn't the primary function of all three and in an exercise setting one of them heavily fuels the work while the others don’t contribute much at all. 

Protein serves primarily as a building block, or 'bricks within the structure of the human', but thanks to some complex metabolic stuff, protein can be converted into fuel for ATP regeneration (the fundamental energy currency) when really needed. So now that we know protein isn't really a source of fuel, that leaves carbs and fats.     

Fats are a few things including a fuel source, and a pretty often used one. But fats don't really fuel exercise... The role of fats in the context of fuel is primarily centred around everyday existence. Fats are utilised within the mitochondria of the cell, through the citric acid cycle (also known as the Kreb cycle), but as mentioned they're almost always not the predominant fuel of hard exercise/activity, especially anaerobic (without air (very intense work)) activity because they can’t be oxidised (used) fast enough to regenerate ATP at a sufficient rate, to fuel really hard activity. [9,10]. It’s undeniable that higher carbohydrate diets promote best performance [11]

So if you're planning on doing exercise, glucose (carbohydrates) is your friend. (Thanks for that one Charles P). The idea of eating fats prior to activity to fuel exercise is almost always a fallacy (unless you’re that high level endurance athlete in training blocks I mentioned before) unless the body has no glucose available (due to prolonged carbohydrate restriction and glycogen depletion (glycogen = the bodies 'storage tanks' of carbs)). The body will always preferentially use glucose when exercise gets hard, provided it is available, and for good reason. 

So in short, if planned exercise is going to be hard and you want to perform your best, you want glucose to be available when you need it. [7]  

So what does glucose availability really mean?   

Carbohydrate availability doesn't always absolutely mean you 'need' to eat carbs or 'sugar' (fundamentally the same thing once it’s floating in the blood) prior to exercise and very often doing so will make very little. Pre-exercise carbs go from 'not really needed', to 'why not do it’, to 'an absolute need to perform optimally' depending on the type, duration, and intensity of exercise.

What glucose availability simply means is whether the body has glucose available at it's disposal when it's required, which means keeping 'the glucose storage tanks' away from empty. When I say storage tanks, as mentioned before I'm referring to glycogen which is present in the liver and muscle. Some extra glucose is also present and available in the bloodstream, more so after carbohydrate ingestion [9,10]. If there are carbohydrates in these ‘tanks’ the body has fuel to use. The problem is, glycogen runs empty if you don't top up what you previously used. The more activity you do the emptier it gets and the more you need to keep it topped. 

So now that you’re aware that you need to eat carbs to fuel best exercise performance, the question now becomes a case of dose, type, and timing of carbohydrate. Unfortunately it’s not a matter of covering one at a time, in the aforementioned order. While there is a hierarchy starting at dose, all three factors heavily integrate and influence one another, so I’ll do my best to break it down.

Let's start with the thing that matters to all who do exercise... the dose. 

The dose

As mentioned the dose of carbohydrates needed to continually fuel exercise comes down to the demands for it within the umbrella of situational Calorie ceilings. Carbohydrate needs are not simply a factor of matching intake with use because we need to consider Calories and of course where they’re coming from. While you can manipulate Calories through protein and fats, as they probably should stay fixed throughout various total Calorie intake fluctuations, for the purpose of this article we’ll assume both protein and fats are sufficient and not beyond. If a Calorie deficit is present because you're in a dedicated fat loss phase, your carbohydrate dose will likely fall slightly short of ‘optimal sports performance requirements’ in order to create that deficit of energy required for fat loss to happen. If gaining weight is the goal, a surplus of Calories and carbohydrates relative to usage applies.

Carbohydrates are not essential to survival and baseline human function, which means protein and fats need to be covered first. But who wants to 'function at baseline', especially if you’re into sport and exercise? Once sufficient protein and fats are present within the diet to ensure optimal function and health, the rest of your ' Calorie budget' can and should be dedicated to carbs if you want to best fuel exercise. So just to be clear, total carbohydrate dose is limited by how many Calories you have to work with only after protein and fat needs are dealt with. Most of the time, dealing with protein and fats still leaves a massive amount of left over Calories for the good stuff (carbohydrate). At this stage you might realise that carbs and fats are almost fixed with total energy needs being a case of manipulating carbohydrates, meaning carbs and Calories go almost hand in hand. While there are limitations to this, more or less this is a great way of going about it. 

So now we know what our underlying limit to carb intake is we can get to the point and work out how much rice, and pasta we can eat. So who gets how much?

General recreational gym-goer, CrossFit dad, daily jogger, Sunday cyclist with the lycra boys. 

Yeh, so you train for general health, fat loss and enjoyment. Your exercise intensity is challenging and indeed hard enough to warrant a decent hit of carbs. But you don't exercise for hours and hours and relative to athletes you don’t 'really' exercise that hard. Carbs yes, but your requirements can likely be achieved through simply eating “healthy” as per the general government guidelines ranges. Which basically means sufficient fruits (2 serves, totalling ~ 300g), vegetables (5 serves, totalling ~400g) [8], beans, legumes, and whole grains will cover you off without the need for anything additional. Eating a varied, healthful wholefoods diet with heaps of whole grains and fibrous plants will likely do the job. For most general folks exercising mostly for health, total carbohydrate requirements might fall between ~1-4g per kilogram of body weight per day. 

Gym bro, trying to get jacked?

You train really hard, bodybuilding style and there is nothing more important in life than getting jacked, so you can impress your mates and absolutely zero chicks. In reality, your training isn't that glycogen depleting and nowhere near that of certain other sporting endeavours. With that in mind if you’re trying to gain muscle mass, it’s a good idea to be in a surplus of Calories. Growing muscle can become quite an energy intensive process, especially when combined with the positive metabolic adaptations to overfeeding. Calorie and therefore carbohydrate needs can become pretty significant warranting the use of yummy, high Calorie per bite foods to viably meet high carbohydrate demands. For muscle growth once sufficient protein & fats have been dealt with you probably have enough room within your Calorie needs to consume anywhere between ~2-6g per kilogram of body weight in carbohydrates. 

You're an athlete, who takes sports seriously. You might even be a pro. 

The range of carbohydrate needs with in this category is broad because the amounts of exercise athletes do varies so much depending on how 'high level' they are, the sport they do and how much they train. The needs of a professional ultra-endurance runner during a race far exceeds someone like a crossfitter even if they train multiple times a day by several-fold. Athletes in hard training blocks, doing hours and hours of training per day may need up to if not more than 12g per kilogram of body weight as carbohydrates [11].

For our 75kg athlete mentioned before who was shocked at the idea of necking 3.5 full-sized Monster energy drinks before his mountain bike race, this equates to a very significant 900g of carbs per day. This is a lot of food, which will require food selection that can be easily consumed in great amounts with higher Calorie yields like sports drinks, bagels w jam, ‘sugary’ cereal, and white rice with maple syrup all over said rice, to viably meet needs. If you think it's possible to do it through wholemeal bread and baked potato, you're straight-up kidding yourself. Unless of course, you want to perform like shit because you've got about 20 kilos of food sitting in your gut, and you like the idea of coughing up blood because the several hundred grams of dietary fibre has completely fried your insides. So if you're an athlete with these massive needs, 'sort of liking junk food' probably won't cut it. You need to love the thought of CocoPops for breakfast and Weis fruit sorbet for dessert, not only is meeting needs important for your performance but also your health with low energy available in sports (LEA, or RED-S) being such a prevalent, very damaging and unrecognised issue. [12]

Okay, so we know roughly who needs what amounts of carbohydrates. Does timing matter?

Prefix to this timing and type section: Dose is king!
The higher the required dose, the longer the carbs will need to get past the blood and into the gut. It gets a little more complex because different carbs need different times to be available for use. As you can see all variables need to be considered, therefore the recommendations below regarding timing and type are rough broad ranges. An understanding of dose first, and time frame second will dictate the type. 

Carb timing

Remember I mentioned glycogen, and how it's stored within the muscle and liver? Well if you deplete glycogen through exercise and then eat carbs to replete glycogen but don't exercise after that, muscle glycogen will still be full for ages and ages. However the body uses liver glycogen at rest which means even after an overnight fast where you've slept in bed doing nothing, liver glycogen stores become depleted. One of the main roles of liver glycogen is to regulate blood glucose concentration or the amount of glucose in the blood (blood sugar) [10]. This may indeed be impaired a little bit when you wake up, but for many instances, what's in the muscle is sufficient to fuel exercise. 

Carbs in the hours prior to exercise. (pre-workout)

General recreational gym-goers, CrossFit dad, daily jogger, Sunday cyclist with the lycra boys. 

For most folks there is more than enough glucose available in the muscle to fuel any exercise you do, so a reasonably high level of exercise performance can be achieved even in a fasted state after a nights sleep. But it doesn't hurt to eat more carbs and it might help you exercise harder even if it's mostly placebo, so having carbs in the hours before exercise is a good idea and something I would advise if it’s practically feasible, but I wouldn’t lose sleep over it (literally). If you have to be in the office by 8am and have no time to eat before your 6am gym session, don't worry about waking up at 4am to eat, the glucose you synthesised from carbs feedings the day prior has you covered. If you really want some glucose prior to exercise, maybe even because you just like it, and feel good when you do. Just drinking a bottle of sports drink upon waking is a good idea, and something that’s recommended for hydration after a full night of sleep.

Gym bro, trying to get jacked?

Unfortunately for Gym bro, most of the time the above still applies. You probably don’t need carbohydrates in the hours before exercise to perform reasonably well. But as mentioned carbohydrates in the hours prior to exercise has benefits within and outside of glucose availability, and are certainly worthwhile if feasible [10]. Carbohydrate ingestion in the hours prior to exercise, even if muscle glycogen is already full, offers performance benefits via the central nervous system [11] which I think in the context of someone who has a respectable interest in maximising training adaptations is worthwhile considering. Even the notion of ‘carbs before training makes you feel good’ alone makes it worthwhile nailing, especially if you need every helping hand you can get to make it through some tough sessions. So again, while pre exercise carbohydrates are not a ‘do or die’ factor, here is the thing though… The whole purpose, and idea of bodybuilding is to stand out, so meeting ‘baseline needs’ doesn't cut it. With that said, consuming carbohydrates in the hours prior to exercise now matters a whole lot more. They’re a fantastic idea and absolutely worth it, if you’re serious about getting the most from your hard efforts in the gym. 

You're an athlete, who takes sports seriously. You might even be a pro.  

You use a lot of carbs, and you're about to use a shit load more so you need every 'storage tank' of carbs fully topped up prior to the exercise or you might ‘run out of fuel’. Granted even elite level athletes will need to exercise for several hours to get close to depleting stored glycogen, so in that light, carbohydrates in the hours prior to exercise are still only a big factor for endurance sports. Yes, for these endurance, long duration folks, you can turn to fats for fuel, but it's at this point where the duration of exercise is so long the intensity will probably be low enough where fats can actually be oxidised fast enough to regenerate ATP as a sufficient rate in those who are well trained.
So does this mean pre exercise carbohydrate is only a consideration for athletes about to run for ~3 or more hours? No, because as mentioned previously liver glycogen depletes even at rest, so you’ll want to ensure you’re ‘topping the tanks up’.
Furthermore carbs aren't just stored in the muscle and liver, we can store smaller amounts in the blood. As mentioned, elevations in blood sugar concentration when starting exercise has its own central nervous system related performance benefits.
Carbohydrates in the hours prior to exercise are worthwhile and again just a great time to eat carbs in general from a practical perspective. 

Intra workout carbs. 

Anyone who trains hard for less than an hour.

While the athlete's fitness, along with exercise type, and intensity are important factors. It's still heavily secondary to duration. In short, exercise that lasts longer than an hour can benefit from some 'during exercise' carbohydrate ingestion, but 'intra' carbs for exercise that lasts less than an hour probably won't help much at all [11]. But again we ask the practical question; does that mean carbs during exercise is bad if you train less than an hour? No, but there probably isn't a massive need for it in order to maximise performance. This almost certainly covers off the 'average Joe' category and more or less most recreational gym-goers interested in muscle growth.

Anyone who trains hard for more than an hour.  

Pretty much the only time when drinking carbs whilst exercising helps to a notable extent is if you're training for more than ~60 minutes. For exercise lasting 1-3 hours, ~30-60g per hour is the upper end of what 'you can handle' (more on this later). For exercise that spans beyond 3 hours up to ~90g of carbohydrates per hour can be consumed.[11]

Post-workout carbs

Here's the thing, pre-workout carbs starts when the last bout of exercise finished... Which means post-workout carbs are actually pre-workout carbs. Keep that in mind when you read this section if your brain hasn't already exploded from that concept. 

Anyone who trains once a day. 

If you exercise once a day or not that frequently, just eating carbs over the day after your exercise session gets you the replenishment you need. You have plenty of time to replete glycogen, there is no rush, so timing really doesn't matter. This covers off 'general recreational gym-goer, CrossFit dad, daily jogger, and Sunday cyclist with the lycra boys'. 

I train once a day but I'm a 'gym bro, trying to get jacked', I need carbs after training don't I?

I know it's cool to post about the fact you ate a whole box of CocoPops post-training (shit I was that asshole), but you probably don't you need carbs to maximise post-workout anabolism. But what about that thing... you know "something to do with carbs putting stuff into cells". If the objective is muscle functional adaptations for endurance sport, growth for performance or aesthetics, or muscle retention during fat loss, the goal is to create a net positive balance of protein turnover on average over time. Which means muscle protein synthesis or building (MPS) exceeds muscle protein breakdown (MPB). In a nutritional sense this is a factor of protein ingestion, carbs don't boost MPS, but it's been said carbohydrates post exercise arrests MPB. However, post exercise carbohydrates still probably aren’t needed with research showing MPB is maximally suppressed through protein alone. So post-workout carbs probably matter less. [13]

But that 'driving nutrients into cells thing'? Yes, carbohydrate ingestion increases blood sugar concentration which triggers the beta cells of the pancreas to secrete insulin. Insulin acts as an Uber driver who drives the sugar around ‘the town’ to the cell entrance (the night clubs).Upon arrival said sugar is greeted by the bouncer who has come to the club entrance to let sugar in. This bouncers name is GLUT4, and his job at the club (the cell) is to let the sugars in. This process of him leaving the inside of the club (the D floor) to greet guests at the door is called 'GLUT4 translocation'. This is a valid reason to need carbs post-training, but exercise alone causes GLUT4 translocation [14].  

So does this mean post-workout ingestion of carbs helps grow muscle? Maybe, but probably not a whole lot. Does this mean post-workout carbs don't matter? Probably not needed to maximise adaptations to the previous exercise bout. But if you're a big guy/girl who has a lot of Calories to work with, and therefore carbs to play around with, having a decent chunk of your daily targets post-exercise is a great idea, even on a practicality level. 

Anyone who trains multiple times a day or has two very hard bouts of exercise close to each other in terms of time proximity.

This is when timing matters. Why does it matter? Because you have limited time to replace the glucose you previously used. Those storage tanks within the muscle and liver need to be refilled before your next bout of activity. The closer to the end of the workout you ingest carbs the greater the rate at which you'll replenish glycogen [16]. Adding caffeine to the mix may enhance this rate even more.[15] If this is you, get those carbs in fast, but carb timing is 3 dimensional and goes hand in hand with 'carbohydrate type'. (see below)

Carbohydrate type

When we refer to the 'carbohydrate type', we’re technically talking about different saccharides, combinations of, or the difference between simple sugars and complex carbs. In layman's terms we’re talking 'quick' vs 'slow' carbs.

You might have heard about the terms 'high and low GI', you might have seen food marketing based on this thing called 'GI'. As you may have guessed GI basically refers to the 'quickness' of the carb. Lower GI carbs typically represent themselves as high fibre plants and grains whereas higher GI or 'quick' carbs present themselves in the form of 'whiter, junkier, sugary, style carb-dense foods. It's important to note that carb-dense foods fall on a continuum within this range so it’s not exactly a matter of quick or slow, but more so how quick/slow.
The difference on a slightly more technical level refers to how rapidly the food empties the stomach, the rate at which it's absorbed through the intestinal wall, how rapidly it enters the blood, how quickly it increases blood sugar concentration and therefore and most importantly how quickly it can be available for use or storage. Any carbohydrate we ingest is basically glucose by the time it gets into the bloodstream. Any carbohydrate that is already that or something very close to it, doesn’t need much ‘processing or breaking down’, within the ‘processing plant’ that is the digestive tract, so it’s a relatively quick process. If something enters the gut in a ‘very unprocessed’ state, a lot of ‘stuff’ needs to happen before it is ready for the blood stream, which takes time.

At the end of all this ‘processing’ that occurs in the gut, the single overarching limiting factor of how quickly we can ingest carbs for use, is how rapidly the cell can use them. At the muscle cell level, the upper-end rate of carbohydrate oxidation is around ~2g per minute [16]. But almost always the actual limiting factor is the gastrointestinal part of the process. (more on this later)

The tricky part here is, appropriate selection of a carbohydrate-dense food source depends mostly on timing but also dose. The goal is to a) have the carbohydrates ready for use when it’s time to exercise, and b) consider the cross over of dose and time frames to avoid the occurrence of uncomfortable amounts of food just sitting in the gut during exercise and the performing impairing gastrointestinal stress that come with that.

If we remember that pre workout nutrition starts when the last workout ended we realise that much of this rides on how far away your next exercise bout is, and how quickly you need to repleat the ‘carbohydrate tanks’ to ensure fuel is available.

So let's cover what is appropriate when.

'Mega quick carbs'
When: Less than 60 minutes before the workout, during the workout (if exercising for ~<1 hour) or when massive amounts of carbs are needed.
Sports drink, or something ‘really sugary’ like energy gels and maybe lollies (if you’re okay with being ever so slightly suboptimal). These are the food sources that can be available for use by the contracting muscle as soon as possible. They’re nothing but carbohydrates and come with no baggage in the form of fibre, protein and fat, that’ll slow things down. If you need glucose, you need it quick, then this will do the job in a way that will least likely cause gastrointestinal stress because it doesn’t pose much workload on the gut, as minimal ‘processing’ is needed to get it ready for the bloodstream. 

'Quicker carbs'
When: ~1-3 hours before exercise, upper end of time frames if larger dose is needed.
Sugary cereal, bagels with jam, white rice with maple syrup. ‘The whiter carbs’. These foods contain mostly carbs, very little to no fibre and not much of anything else (Protein & fats), their surface area is often relatively low compared to their Calorie content, so they’re Calorie dense. Due to the aforementioned their ability to very quickly pass the gut, get into the blood, and be available for use makes them appropriate for those who need large amounts quickly. If you’ve just finished hard exercise and have another one coming up very shortly these tick the box. But they’re almost always not appropriate as during exercise carbohydrates. So if intra exercise carbs are needed you’re best sticking with sports drinks (which will also provide hydration) and things like ‘energy gels’. 

'Slower 'healthy' carbs'. 

1 hour before exercise at the very least, only if the dose is very low, but most often several hours are needed between ingestion and exercise with these ‘slower, healthier carbs’.
This category covers high fibre whole grains and plants in the form of fruits and veg. So basically ‘healthy eating’. These foods have relatively higher surface areas and require more processing to be converted into a form that's compatible with the working muscle cell. They’re low Calorie per bite and physically difficult to ingest in large amounts. So if you need a lot of carbs quickly these are not for you. Most folks can stomach the ‘most people’ requirements of carbs that is probably around 1-4g of carbohydrates per kilogram of body weight through exclusively ‘healthy carbs’ without the need to swap things like sweet potato for white rice. 

After the workout....
As mentioned before, post exercise is just another word for pre exercise, but often many hours if not days pre exercise. If you need glucose fast, refer to the timing part. If you need large amounts of glucose fast, refer to the type part, with timing in mind. If you don’t need glucose that fast, then post workout carbs isn’t a big concern. Simply just eating enough carbs over the next ~24 hours is all you need to do. If you have heaps of time but a lot of carbs to refill, then you might want to start now, and often with things that require very little work from the gut. 

Why is carb type and timing important?

Availability for use, rates of gastric emptying, intestinal absorption and GIS.
As mentioned before the rate at which glucose can be ingested is limited by the amount that's needed and the rate it can be used. But beyond a certain reasonable point the delivery of the fuel to the bloodstream is the limiting factor. What I mean by that is the gut, or how quickly carbs can go from you mouth to floating in the blood.

Why does this relate to gastrointestinal stress (GIS)?
An estimated 30-50% of distance runners experience intestinal problems [18]. While less-so a concern and prevalence in other sporting endeavours, it’s still very much something to consider because no one likes being all bloated and gassy when they exercise, and it’s occurrence will likely limit ability to perform. The gut doesn’t like being overworked and forced into overdrive. If you give it too much to process, too fast it’ll get angry. If you give it something that doesn’t require much ‘processing’ you can get away with giving it a lot and it won’t get angry. Furthermore the gut, gets ‘less workers’ during exercise, that's because the body is a little more focused on the task at hand being… the exercise itself. When I say workers I’m talking blood flow. During exercise blood flow to the gut is reduced which therefore means the work capacity of the gut is significantly impaired. During prolonged hard exercise blood flow can be reduced to the gut by up to ~80%. [19]

If you’ve got food in the gut waiting to be processed while you’re exercising the stomach starts to ‘bitch and moan’, by going into a state of gastrointestinal stress. Obviously this makes you feel like shit, which even practically speaking certainly impairs your exercise performance potential. Furthermore, that fuel you’ve got sitting in the gut there probably won’t get absorbed into the blood to its full extent, so now you’ve got fuel you ingested being ‘ejected’ from the body unused. What I mean here is malabsorption.

Outside of a few obvious things like eating a sufficient fibre intake to promote healthy general gastrointestinal function and health (‘gut health’) mostly from plant matter, getting enough sleep and managing stress. Avoiding NSAIDs close to exercise [4] and staying hydrated (with a 6-8% carbohydrate concentration if the fluid itself contains them) are worthwhile considerations in avoiding GIS occurrence during exercise. 

So there you have it, fuelling exercise 101 for best sports performance. The best thing to do from here is refer back to your situation and determine where you sit on each continuum. Then from there you can determine your requirements (dose) and fit type and timing into your eating, training and ‘life’ routine. Do the basics well, sprinkle a bit of caffeine on top, stay hydrated and you’re pretty much the whole way towards best fuelling exercise through a bit of extra trial and error. So do be prepared to try a few dose, time and type combos to get an idea of what works best for you and what you can and can not tolerate.

Key take home points.

1. Hydrate to thirst, in a proactive manner, especially in and around exercise with an awareness of internal cues. Consider climate, exercise duration, sweat rates & avoid hyper-hydration.

2. Aim to maximise fuel availability prior and during exercise. Start exercise in a glycogen depleted state and replace what you use. Consider carbohydrate dose, timing & type. 

3. High level endurance athletes in certain training blocks may benefit from some training in low glucose availability. Carbohydrate availability is needed in most instances. 

4. Carbohydrate dose meets demands as a linear relationship, with an overarching cap based on situational Calorie ceilings. Most folks do fine w 1-4g/kg, some athletes may need 12+g/kg.

5. Failing to meet energy requirements can lead to health and performance decrements (LEA & RED-S). The use of ‘junky’ foods makes meeting higher carbohydrate requirement feasible.

6. Carbohydrates in the hours before training are often a very worthwhile thing. Their benefit differs depending on the situation, but they’re not worth stressing over in most instances.

7. Caffeine is effective, use the ergogenic dose (3-6mg/kg when appropriate). This is a high intake so consider the tolerability of the ingestion methods (pills, coffee, energy drinks etc)

8. If exercise is less than <60 minutes during exercise carbohydrates are not needed. 30g/hr appropriate for 60-120 minutes, 60g/hr 120-180 minutes and 90g/hr if exercising for >2.5 hours.

9. Consider carbohydrate to fluid ratio in ‘during exercise’ carbohydrate drinks. Concentrations beyond 6-8% may cause gastrointestinal stress, malabsorption, & dehydration.

10. Gastrointestinal capacity is impaired during exercise. Consider the tolerability of foods you ingest in and prior to exercise. Consider rates of gastric emptying & intestinal absorption.

11. Carbohydrate type relate to rates of absorption, & GI & are mostly dictated by how quickly fuel availability & replenishment is required.

12. Pre exercise nutrition starts when the last exercise bout ended. Consider dose, and time frames when deciding on timing, and type of carbohydrate ingestion after exercise.

Mackenzie Baker

FNC Coach and Sports Nutritionist

To learn more about sports nutrition or fuelling for exercise, contact us today to work with a sports nutritionist who can help you maximise your training and performance.

References:

[1] A. Jeukendrup & M Gleeson, "Sport Nutrition," Third Edition pg 235-237

[2] Martin D. Hoffman, Trent Stellingwerff & Ricardo J.S. Costa (2018):

Considerations for ultra-endurance activities: part 2 – hydration, Research in Sports Medicine

[3]  Goulet ED (2012): Dehydration and endurance performance in competitive athletes.

[4] Ricardo J.S. Costa, Martin D. Hoffman & Trent Stellingwerff (2018):

Considerations for ultra-endurance activities: part 1- nutrition, Research in Sports Medicine,

[5]  A. Jeukendrup & M Gleeson, "Sport Nutrition," Third Edition pg 241

[6] International society of sports nutrition position stand: caffeine and performance. Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition  7, Article number: 5 (2010)

[7] J. A. Romijn, E. F. Coyle, L. S. Sidossis, X. J. Zhang, and R. R. Wolfe (1995) Relationship between fatty acid delivery and fatty acid oxidation during strenuous exercise

[8] National Health and Medical Research Council (2013) Australian Dietary Guidelines. Canberra: National Health and Medical Research Council.

[9] Hargreaves M1, Hawley JA, Jeukendrup A.(2004) Pre-exercise carbohydrate and fat ingestion: effects on metabolism and performance.

[10] Murray B, Rosenbloom CA, (2018) Fundamentals of glycogen metabolism for coaches and athletes

[11] Louise M. Burke, John A. Hawley, Stephen H. S. Wong & Asker E. Jeukendrup (2011): Carbohydrates for training and competition, Journal of Sports Sciences,

[12]  Mountjoy M, Sundgot-Borgen JK, Burke LM, et al. Br J Sports Med 2018;52:687–697.

[13] Greenhaff PL1, Karagounis LG, Peirce N, Simpson EJ, Hazell M, Layfield R, Wackerhage H, Smith K, Atherton P, Selby A, Rennie MJ. (2008) Disassociation between the effects of amino acids and insulin on signaling, ubiquitin ligases, and protein turnover in human muscle.

[14] Ivy JL, Kuo CH, (1998) Regulation of GLUT4 protein and glycogen synthase during muscle glycogen synthesis after exercise.

[15] D. S. Battram, J. Shearer, D. Robinson and T. E. Graham, (2003) Caffeine ingestion does not impede the resynthesis of proglycogen and macroglycogen followingprolonged exercise and carbohydrate supplementation in humans

[16] Ivy JL1, Katz AL, Cutler CL, Sherman WM, Coyle EF.(1998) Muscle glycogen synthesis after exercise: Effect of time of carbohydrate ingestion.

[17] Hawley, J. A., Bosch, A. N., Weltan, S. M., Dennis, S. C., & Noakes, T. D. (1994). Glucose kinetics during prolonged exercise in euglycemic and hyperglycaemic subjects.

[18] Prado de Oliveira, Burini, Jeukendrup 2014. Gastrointestinal Complaints During Exercise: Prevalence, Etiology, and Nutritional Recommendations

[19] Steege, R. W., & Kolkman, J. J. (2012). The pathophysiology and management of gastrointestinal symptoms during physical exercise, and the role of splanchnic blood flow. 

Creatine: FAQs and Myths

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In high school, there was one gym bro who took creatine. At the time we all 'gave him crap' for being on steroids (we thought creatine a steroid at the time). 

Turns out creatine firstly isn't an illegal substance, but it's actually the most well studied and confirmed effective sports supplement there is. 

Fundamentally the powerhouse of the body is ATP. Intramuscular stores of creatine help fuel the re-creation of more ATP during high-intensity bouts of activity to maintain the presence of ATP. However, creatine supplies are limited and do run-out as we use them up. While we can get some creatine from our diet, supplementation is required to ensure levels stay 'topped-up'.  

We know creatine helps you perform better in sport and exercise, which obviously matters if you're an athlete wanting to beat everyone else. But this increased performance also means a more appropriate stimulus to enhance the adaptive response to training. Creatine can also help recovery which allows more 'quality' training stimulus to be provided over time again leading to greater adaptations. 

What might surprise you is that creatine does more than just 'get you jacked'. The benefits of creatine are not exclusively sports related, with evidence showing use in lessening the development of chronic illness and disease.

So we know it works. Now down to the practical stuff.

Is creatine safe? 
Studies have shown a needlessly high dose of more than 10 times optimal requirements for 5 years to be safe in multiple population types and ages. 

Will I gain weight and get bloated?
You'll almost certainly gain weight. The key word being 'weight' and not fat. Creatines mechanism of action is increased intramuscular phosphocreatine, glycogen and hydration which all contribute to mass but not fat mass. The weight gain is a by-product of the means by which creatine is effective and don't worry this won't make you look 'puffy'. 

What type of creatine is best?
Just good old cheap monohydrate does the job, there is no need to purchase any more expensive, 'fancy-named' ones. Monohydrate is most commonly used in creatine research with other forms being no better or potentially ineffective. 

How much/ whats the dose?
You can load it to saturate stores faster, but for the sake of simplicity 3-5g a day does the job, but it might take several weeks to see any notable improvements/ effects. Timing across the day also doesn't matter.

How do I take it?

Add a scoop to your morning water, pre or post workout shake, in a smoothie or even in your oats or yogurt.

Creatine, it's good for sports performance, it's good for getting jacked, it's good for recovery, it's good for health and it's damn cheap. Cheap enough that if new research came out drinking all existing creatine research proving it to be ineffective it wouldn't matter a great deal, and the placebo would be worth it anyway.

To learn more about how nutrition can improve your performance in the gym or would like us to bust some supplement myths, contact us:

https://www.fortitudenutritioncoaching.com.au/contact

[reference] International Society of Sports Nutrition position stand: safety and efficacy of creatine supplementation in exercise, sport, and medicine    

Post Workout Caffeine

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You might hear a PT say, "don't drink coffee after training because it will stimulate the release of stress hormones and stop you from recovering from training, which is bad because you want rest and digest mode". 

While there may be an element of truth to this. There are a few things wrong with it. 

The level of difference is so small it's not worth even mentioning in almost all situations. If you train first thing and like a coffee after, go for it! You have bigger things to worry about. 

We know consuming caffeine pre-training is a good idea to drive better training outcomes leading to 'better' adaptations. However, caffeine takes several hours to clear the blood levels after ingestion. So even if you didn't drink a coffee after your morning workout, the one you drank before it is still lingering for after you finish well into the 'post workout window'. 

Post-training caffeine might be a good strategy for athletes. Caffeine has been shown to promote greater rates of glycogen resynthesis after exercise when ingested with carbohydrate. Basically, this means if you train hard, then drink coffee and consume carbohydrates together you'll store more glucose in your muscle and at a faster rate. While this isn't massive for training adaptations and certainly not important for most folks. It is worth noting for best recovery, especially if you're doing repeated bouts of hard competition level activity within very close time proximity of each other. [1,2]

Take home points. 
Drinking coffee, and consuming caffeine after training isn't something to be afraid of. It may even be a great idea for certain situations.  

[1] High rates of muscle glycogen resynthesis after exhaustive exercise when carbohydrate is coingested with caffeine.

[2] Caffeine ingestion does not impede the resynthesis of proglycogen and macroglycogen after prolonged exercise and carbohydrate supplementation in humans.

Carbohydrate Requirements for Athletes

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High-level athletes are often the most disciplined people you'll meet.

6 hours of training 6 days a week isn't an uncommon thing, and it's often accompanied by a 'laser focus' style of strict nutrition. 

Because the energy requirements of such high amounts of training are so great. You'll need to eat a lot of Calories and a lot of carbs to avoid states of low energy availability relative to requirements in order to perform your best and not impact your health. 

So what are these requirements, how much carbs do you actually need to eat if you train multiple hard hours day?

5-8g of carbs per kilo of body weight per day. [1] 
For a 75kg athlete, the range is 375g- 600g of carbs a day

Once you know what 600g of carbs looks like in terms of physical food. You'll realise that achieving such high requirements through exclusively 'clean foods' isn't viable.

To consume 600g of carbs you'll need to eat...  

6.2 kilos (raw weight) of sweet potato. [3]
Or
1.2 kilos of (raw weight) rolled oats. [3]

... I think it's safe to say that's not really viable on a consistent daily basis. 

So if you're training 6 hours a day and eating only 'clean carbs' to hunger satisfaction or even fullness. It's logically doubtful you're getting even a small portion of your carbohydrate requirements on a regular basis. You're likely in a state of chronic low energy availability which can have massive implications. This state and it's negative outcomes is termed RED-S (relative energy deficiency in sport) [2]

Health consequences of RED-S include bone, metabolic, endocrine, menstrual, cardiovascular, immune health and more. 

Performance consequences of RED-S include injury risk, impaired judgment, cognition, strength endurance performance and more. 

The magnitude of the above consequences can be utterly shocking. 

So if you want to perform your best and not negatively impact your health you might want to eat some 'junky' carbohydrate dense foods. There are many ways to easily consume high amounts of carbs. Typically calorie dense, super tasty, low fibre foods are great. 

For example, 680g of Coco Pops will give you 600g of carbs. 

While still a massive amount. It's far less than the aforementioned 'clean carbs', and you need to consider taste, and the fibre content to get a better idea of actual ease of consumption comparisons. 

So if all of the above is relevant to you. You might want to consider;

Swapping the oats for white rice, and putting honey and jam on top of that. Drinking fruit juice and full-calorie cordial with your meals. Swapping the whole grain bread for bagels with jam, and maybe having a full tub of sorbet for dessert. 

Thinking you 'need to eat only clean' might not only be causing you to perform sub-optimally but it might be seriously harmful to your health. 

Want to learn more about how to improve your performance in training?

[1]  https://jissn.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12970-018-0242-y  

[2]  https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/52/11/687

[3] http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/science/monitoringnutrients/afcd/Pages/foodsearch.aspx

Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport

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What is RED-S?

Red-s stands for relative energy deficiency in sport.

In simple terms it is under-eating and the impacts can be severe in athletes who are burning heaps of energy through training and competition.

A more in-depth explanation is: RED-S refers to the physiological effects of chronically low energy (Calorie) availability, relative to requirements, which includes large reductions in resting metabolic rate and severe health implications.

RED-S started as a focus with female athletes but the same issue is being seen in male athletes and potentially this could extend to general population.

What are the health implications and dangers of RED-S?

RED-S can negatively affect many aspects of health including:

• menstrual function

• bone health

• immune function

• cardiovascular health

• psychological health

• growth and development

• increased injury risk

What are the signs of RED-S to look for?

Some of the signs of RED-S are:

• decreased strength

• decreased endurance performance

• decreased training response

• impaired judgment

• decreased coordination

• decreased concentration

Consider RED-S as a possibility if you are trying to lose weight but despite restricting food intake, despite reducing your calories you are not losing weight AND you are exercising a lot or you are an athlete.

What can you do if you suspect Red-S?

When a large disparity between actual resting metabolic rate and ‘healthy’ metabolic rate is identified, the course of action to solve it, is much the same as ending a planned diet. Working out estimated maintenance calories, taking into account how activity levels, then consistently consuming roughly that amount of calories.

For those who suffer severe health effects of RED-S, slowly increasing calorie intake under the guidance of a qualified medical professional may be necessary.

Bottom line; if you exercise a lot and trying really hard to diet, consider if you may be eating too little and under-fuelling your body. If you feel like crap, you’re showing signs of poor health, you notice changes in your menstrual cycle, libido, mood, training performance, strength, coordination - you may be suffering from low energy availability and/or RED-S.

Strongly consider increasing your calorie intake and speaking to a medical professional.

Does RED-S refer to a broken metabolism?

The idea of a permanently damaged metabolism or starvation mode has been debunked, however acute down-regulation of metabolism known as ‘metabolic adaptation’, or ‘ adaptive thermogenesis’ is accepted to be true.

The reason that it’s accepted as an adaptation rather than damage is that metabolic rate will return to a healthy, ideal baseline at some point after returning to maintenance eating, eg - eating enough Calories to maintain body weight and support individual activity levels.

If you want to read more about fuelling exercise, training and athletic performance, check out our blog on:

If you are an athlete, aspiring athlete or looking to boost your performance, we are here to help. We can help you work out your energy requirements and implement strategies with your nutrition to support all the work you are putting into training and exercise.

Reference:
https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijsnem/28/4/article-p316.xml