1 00:00:00,040 --> 00:00:03,800 You're listening to episode 275 of the Marathon Running Podcast. 2 00:00:03,800 --> 00:00:08,440 As Shakespeare would ask, to fuel or not to fuel, that is the 3 00:00:08,440 --> 00:00:12,160 question today. This is the Marathon Running 4 00:00:12,160 --> 00:00:16,320 Podcast with Letty and Ryan. Join us for weekly content on 5 00:00:16,320 --> 00:00:19,160 all things running and let us take you from the starting line 6 00:00:19,400 --> 00:00:29,600 to the finish line and beyond. Hey runners, and welcome to 7 00:00:29,600 --> 00:00:33,080 episode 275. My name is Letty. 8 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:35,680 My name is Ryan. And we are back with another 9 00:00:35,680 --> 00:00:40,000 episode that has a little bit of a controversial topic this week. 10 00:00:40,280 --> 00:00:43,200 To fuel or not to fuel? What does that mean? 11 00:00:43,200 --> 00:00:44,640 That's what Shakespeare would ask. 12 00:00:44,640 --> 00:00:47,040 That is the big question, right? You like my Shakespeare 13 00:00:47,040 --> 00:00:48,800 reference? You wanted to squeeze that in 14 00:00:48,800 --> 00:00:49,640 there, didn't. You. 15 00:00:49,640 --> 00:00:52,000 Yeah, I did. And I, I almost said, yeah, it's 16 00:00:52,000 --> 00:00:53,800 going to date me, but it's really not going to date me 17 00:00:53,800 --> 00:00:56,200 because I'm not as old as Shakespeare would be right now. 18 00:00:56,240 --> 00:00:59,440 That's yeah, that's quite older. What runs are you referring to? 19 00:00:59,440 --> 00:01:03,120 So I'm talking about any runs because we live in this day and 20 00:01:03,120 --> 00:01:08,040 age of having a ton of products on the market that tell you this 21 00:01:08,040 --> 00:01:10,720 is your pre workout fuel and this is your post workout fuel 22 00:01:10,720 --> 00:01:13,040 and this is what you're supposed to take while you're running. 23 00:01:13,040 --> 00:01:16,240 And there are tons of opinions out there. 24 00:01:16,360 --> 00:01:19,600 So I wanted to to see whether or not fueling like that is 25 00:01:19,600 --> 00:01:23,360 actually necessary or whether some of it could be 26 00:01:23,800 --> 00:01:27,200 psychological that we do that and so on. 27 00:01:27,360 --> 00:01:30,920 Because as you know, I went to Kenya and those guys didn't fuel 28 00:01:30,920 --> 00:01:33,720 before their long and fast runs in the morning. 29 00:01:33,720 --> 00:01:35,280 Obviously fastest relative for them. 30 00:01:35,280 --> 00:01:38,480 It was easy runs. Anyway, that's basically why all 31 00:01:38,480 --> 00:01:40,720 this came up. And I had a friend of mine 32 00:01:40,920 --> 00:01:43,400 asking me whether I fueled before my runs. 33 00:01:43,400 --> 00:01:47,880 And I personally, unless it's a Sunday morning long run I don't 34 00:01:47,880 --> 00:01:51,760 feel one, I'm too lazy, 2 I don't want to be loud, and 35 00:01:51,760 --> 00:01:56,160 three, I just don't feel like I want to eat anything before I 36 00:01:56,160 --> 00:01:57,720 run. Yeah, I'm kind of interested. 37 00:01:58,040 --> 00:02:00,040 I'm sure there might be some marginal benefit. 38 00:02:00,080 --> 00:02:02,760 My guess would be there might be some marginal benefit to it, but 39 00:02:02,760 --> 00:02:04,720 it's probably not as great as maybe people make out to be. 40 00:02:04,720 --> 00:02:06,840 Exactly. I'm sure at some point it 41 00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:09,960 becomes more beneficial than at others in certain types of 42 00:02:09,960 --> 00:02:13,160 exercises or distances or effort levels or something. 43 00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:14,720 So hopefully get some good information. 44 00:02:14,800 --> 00:02:16,240 Yeah. So what else is new? 45 00:02:16,320 --> 00:02:18,760 It seems like you're sitting next to me, but in reality, at 46 00:02:18,760 --> 00:02:21,840 this time, who are you? Yes, Ryan, at the time this 47 00:02:21,840 --> 00:02:26,000 podcast airs, I will be on my way to Sydney. 48 00:02:26,240 --> 00:02:29,920 I'm going to be on the plane for a whole day because coming from 49 00:02:29,920 --> 00:02:33,520 Florida flying to Sydney, you lose 2 days. 50 00:02:33,680 --> 00:02:36,680 So I'm going to lose the entire day of Monday and some of 51 00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:39,760 Tuesday and some of Sunday. So this day doesn't exist in my 52 00:02:39,760 --> 00:02:41,520 book, which is really weird. Which is why we're pre 53 00:02:41,520 --> 00:02:43,840 recording, right? Into the future So how excited 54 00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:47,600 are you about running in Sydney? Oh, Ryan, you have no idea. 55 00:02:47,800 --> 00:02:50,960 So Sydney, you guys, has always been a place that I've kind of 56 00:02:50,960 --> 00:02:53,720 put on a pedestal because I grew up with cousins living in 57 00:02:53,720 --> 00:02:58,000 Sydney, which we never visited. And I've only seen pictures of 58 00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:02,240 them living in their bungalows with super nice warm climate and 59 00:03:02,240 --> 00:03:05,320 Kangaroos and koalas. And they would send us calendars 60 00:03:05,320 --> 00:03:08,440 every year. So one, Sydney, super excited 61 00:03:08,440 --> 00:03:10,720 about it. Two, it seems like everyone that 62 00:03:10,720 --> 00:03:13,880 I've ever talked to from Sydney is just super relaxed and laid 63 00:03:13,880 --> 00:03:18,000 back and just love the attitude. And three, running culture, 64 00:03:18,000 --> 00:03:21,320 running community and everything will be in the place that I'm 65 00:03:21,320 --> 00:03:24,240 excited to visit. And four, I'm getting a whole 66 00:03:24,240 --> 00:03:26,360 week over there, so I'm very, very excited. 67 00:03:26,360 --> 00:03:28,480 You have no idea. I'm like off the charts excited. 68 00:03:28,520 --> 00:03:33,280 I'm very grateful to you for allowing me to take this amazing 69 00:03:33,280 --> 00:03:35,560 trip. Next time we'll all have to go. 70 00:03:35,600 --> 00:03:37,800 This time was a little bit short for us to all go. 71 00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:40,440 Yes, the planning, I mean, we could have planned better. 72 00:03:40,440 --> 00:03:43,040 We're not the best planners here in this family, but we're 73 00:03:43,200 --> 00:03:45,600 working on it. Yeah, Hopefully we'll get to 74 00:03:45,600 --> 00:03:48,640 come back sometime soon. It'd be nice to go in December 75 00:03:48,640 --> 00:03:51,120 when the weather is outrageously hot there, because that's what 76 00:03:51,120 --> 00:03:53,680 we like. And you'll probably enjoy the 77 00:03:53,680 --> 00:03:55,520 water more for surfing and stuff too. 78 00:03:55,880 --> 00:03:58,440 Yeah, I would be. I always wanted to visit too. 79 00:03:58,560 --> 00:04:01,080 It does look like a cool place. I don't we've, we've flown 80 00:04:01,080 --> 00:04:03,640 through actually, you know, through the airport, but that's 81 00:04:03,640 --> 00:04:05,880 the most we've seen of Australia so far. 82 00:04:05,960 --> 00:04:08,440 Yes, we've just seen overpriced coffee, but that's at any 83 00:04:08,440 --> 00:04:10,400 airport. Are you covering the Sydney 84 00:04:10,400 --> 00:04:13,440 Marathon as media this time? I sure am, right. 85 00:04:13,440 --> 00:04:15,880 And I'm also very excited about that part. 86 00:04:16,120 --> 00:04:19,399 I love the fact that Kipchogi is running this marathon. 87 00:04:19,680 --> 00:04:23,440 I am sure that he's not going to win it because as we all do, he 88 00:04:23,440 --> 00:04:26,040 ages too. And it's not about running fast 89 00:04:26,040 --> 00:04:28,000 anymore for him. Obviously, he's still running 90 00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:31,160 faster than most people in the US, right? 91 00:04:31,160 --> 00:04:35,560 Like our elite field. But that said, he just, you 92 00:04:35,560 --> 00:04:39,200 know, he's like this great Yoda. And I don't know, I hope that I 93 00:04:39,200 --> 00:04:42,080 get to interview him again. I love hear him, hearing him 94 00:04:42,080 --> 00:04:45,880 talk and, and all that. Sifan Hassan is also coming. 95 00:04:45,880 --> 00:04:48,880 She's from the Netherlands and I follow her. 96 00:04:49,000 --> 00:04:52,400 I've been reading up on Australian runners as well. 97 00:04:52,800 --> 00:04:56,400 And then my favorite wheelchair racer, Marcel Huq, is going to 98 00:04:56,400 --> 00:04:58,760 be there too. So I feel like it's like this 99 00:04:58,760 --> 00:05:01,720 great reunion of all these elite runners in Sydney. 100 00:05:01,720 --> 00:05:03,840 So, you know, again, just another perk. 101 00:05:03,840 --> 00:05:06,280 Yeah. So be sure to check out lady's 102 00:05:06,280 --> 00:05:09,200 YouTube and Instagram channels because you'll be able to follow 103 00:05:09,200 --> 00:05:11,400 along while she's in Sydney and hopefully she'll get some 104 00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:14,600 Kipchogee content. Yes, I will be actively posting 105 00:05:14,600 --> 00:05:17,840 as I always do whenever there's a major, so that is that. 106 00:05:17,840 --> 00:05:20,920 But with all that said, Ryan, do you want to hop into our episode 107 00:05:20,920 --> 00:05:25,000 on whether or not to fuel your runs or to become fat adaptive? 108 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:26,600 Can't decide whether or not to do it. 109 00:05:26,680 --> 00:05:29,960 Well, I give you the answer without any further ado. 110 00:05:30,160 --> 00:05:32,720 We're now going to play our conversation with Doctor Patrick 111 00:05:32,720 --> 00:05:36,680 Davitt. All right, so I'm on with 112 00:05:36,680 --> 00:05:39,320 Patrick David. Patrick's thank you so much for 113 00:05:39,320 --> 00:05:41,000 coming on and speaking with me today. 114 00:05:41,760 --> 00:05:45,640 Yeah, it's my absolute pleasure to be back, Letty, love your 115 00:05:45,640 --> 00:05:47,880 podcast, love following everything on social media and 116 00:05:48,360 --> 00:05:51,040 happy to be here to help answer some questions and hopefully 117 00:05:51,040 --> 00:05:55,720 bring some guidance and and wisdom and shed some light for, 118 00:05:56,400 --> 00:05:57,560 you know, a lot of your listeners. 119 00:05:58,040 --> 00:06:00,320 I am sure you will. And with that, I kind of want to 120 00:06:00,320 --> 00:06:03,160 just establish your credibility and background. 121 00:06:03,160 --> 00:06:06,480 So maybe tell us a little bit just about what you do and how 122 00:06:06,480 --> 00:06:09,520 you really know your stuff when it comes to this. 123 00:06:10,080 --> 00:06:12,880 Sure. I'm a tenured associate 124 00:06:12,880 --> 00:06:15,600 professor at Saint Joe's University in Philadelphia. 125 00:06:15,600 --> 00:06:17,680 I run the exercise Physiology program there. 126 00:06:17,680 --> 00:06:21,600 This is my I'm going into my 14th year of full time faculty. 127 00:06:22,040 --> 00:06:25,640 My pH DS in nutritional Physiology and biochemistry. 128 00:06:25,640 --> 00:06:28,360 I did my postdoc at University of Connecticut under Doctor Jeff 129 00:06:28,360 --> 00:06:34,720 Volek studying low carbohydrate diets, ketogenic in, you know, 130 00:06:35,200 --> 00:06:38,920 elite ultra endurance athletes. Most of my research is based 131 00:06:38,920 --> 00:06:43,600 around energy metabolism, fat metabolism, endurance, ultra 132 00:06:43,600 --> 00:06:45,880 endurance. I was a head sports nutrition 133 00:06:45,880 --> 00:06:47,960 for Rutgers football for a total of 6 years. 134 00:06:49,520 --> 00:06:51,280 I'm an accomplished ultra runner myself. 135 00:06:51,320 --> 00:06:55,600 I have 100 Miller Eastern states in 2021 under my belt. 136 00:06:55,760 --> 00:06:58,640 I'm actually can share now. I just signed up for a 200 137 00:06:58,640 --> 00:07:02,640 Miller. You know, so I don't just follow 138 00:07:02,640 --> 00:07:05,440 and read the science. I practice what I preach and I'm 139 00:07:05,760 --> 00:07:08,840 seeing things out on the trail, not just in the textbook. 140 00:07:09,880 --> 00:07:11,720 I love it. So we're in good hands when it 141 00:07:11,720 --> 00:07:16,520 comes to this this topic about being a marathoner and fueling 142 00:07:16,520 --> 00:07:20,520 and the whole notion of fat adaptive versus carb loading 143 00:07:20,520 --> 00:07:21,960 prior to your running and all that stuff. 144 00:07:21,960 --> 00:07:24,920 But before we get into all of that, let's talk about the 145 00:07:24,920 --> 00:07:29,160 definition of what fat adaptive means and what we're going to be 146 00:07:29,160 --> 00:07:32,560 talking about meaning fueling prior to running or not. 147 00:07:33,320 --> 00:07:35,840 Sure. Yeah, the idea of there's a 148 00:07:35,840 --> 00:07:40,560 couple terms, but fat adaptive means your body's ability to 149 00:07:40,560 --> 00:07:43,720 burn fat as a fuel very efficiently. 150 00:07:44,280 --> 00:07:47,320 And part of that efficiency comes with this idea of 151 00:07:47,320 --> 00:07:53,240 metabolic flexibility, meaning as you at rest, almost all of us 152 00:07:53,240 --> 00:07:56,960 are burning predominantly, primarily fat as fuel doesn't 153 00:07:56,960 --> 00:07:59,360 matter, assuming you didn't just eat a huge meal. 154 00:07:59,360 --> 00:08:01,360 But at rest, we're burning mostly fat. 155 00:08:01,600 --> 00:08:05,400 As we increase intensity, our body shifts from fat towards 156 00:08:05,400 --> 00:08:08,200 carbohydrate. Someone who becomes more fat 157 00:08:08,200 --> 00:08:14,440 adapted is having the ability to burn more fat as that exercise 158 00:08:14,440 --> 00:08:17,280 intensity goes up. So let's say you were running, 159 00:08:17,560 --> 00:08:23,520 you know a 7 minute mile and you were burning 50% carb, 50% fat. 160 00:08:23,720 --> 00:08:28,520 If you become more fat adapted now at 7, you know, minute mile, 161 00:08:28,520 --> 00:08:32,880 you'll be able to burn 60% or 65% of your calories from fat 162 00:08:33,240 --> 00:08:36,520 you know, and only 35 or 40% from carbohydrate. 163 00:08:36,600 --> 00:08:41,320 So you're becoming more having the flexibility and ability to 164 00:08:41,320 --> 00:08:46,200 burn more fat as a fuel to fuel, you know, your muscles during a 165 00:08:46,200 --> 00:08:48,880 run. OK, perfect. 166 00:08:48,920 --> 00:08:52,200 And I want to just take one little step back just to make it 167 00:08:52,200 --> 00:08:54,920 super, super clear what we are and what we're not talking 168 00:08:54,920 --> 00:08:59,120 about. Talk about fat burning as we run 169 00:08:59,120 --> 00:09:02,840 as a means of weight loss versus carb burning. 170 00:09:02,840 --> 00:09:05,200 What are we talking about here? Yeah. 171 00:09:05,200 --> 00:09:11,480 So that's a great question and probably the biggest confusion 172 00:09:11,480 --> 00:09:16,600 point I spent when I graduated with my PhD in 2013, I started 173 00:09:16,600 --> 00:09:18,880 my postdoc. We were waiting for the faster 174 00:09:18,880 --> 00:09:21,240 study, fat adapted substrate extradition and trained elite 175 00:09:21,240 --> 00:09:23,520 runners, right? That was like my postdoc. 176 00:09:24,120 --> 00:09:28,200 I spent that whole year obsessed with energy balance. 177 00:09:28,720 --> 00:09:30,840 And when we talk about energy balance, we really mean fat 178 00:09:30,840 --> 00:09:33,480 balance. So when someone says I'm fat 179 00:09:33,480 --> 00:09:39,720 adapted, that's just acute. Like in this moment, what is my 180 00:09:39,720 --> 00:09:44,000 body's ability to burn fat? Most of the time we could 181 00:09:44,000 --> 00:09:47,840 reference it at rest, but most of us are really interested in 182 00:09:47,840 --> 00:09:53,080 that as we exercise the idea of fat loss, which is really when 183 00:09:53,080 --> 00:09:56,800 someone says, Hey, I want to be, you know, I want to lose weight. 184 00:09:57,240 --> 00:09:59,120 I'm hoping a lot of us don't want to lose muscle. 185 00:09:59,760 --> 00:10:03,560 If you have a hundred 150 lbs, sure, you can stand to lose some 186 00:10:03,600 --> 00:10:05,680 some muscle mass. But when we say weight loss, we 187 00:10:05,680 --> 00:10:08,600 really mean fat loss. You can't look at that. 188 00:10:08,800 --> 00:10:12,960 And that's what a lot of people do and it's wrong and I don't 189 00:10:12,960 --> 00:10:16,440 like saying that, but it's wrong to only look at, oh, I'm 190 00:10:16,520 --> 00:10:18,840 becoming fat adapted. I'm burning a lot of fat. 191 00:10:18,840 --> 00:10:20,840 That must mean I'm losing weight. 192 00:10:21,600 --> 00:10:26,560 At the end of the day, the only thing that really matters is 24 193 00:10:26,560 --> 00:10:30,080 hour energy balance. So fat balance. 194 00:10:30,200 --> 00:10:33,680 How much fat did you burn today? How much fat did you take in? 195 00:10:33,680 --> 00:10:37,280 If you burned more fat than you brought in, you just lost body 196 00:10:37,280 --> 00:10:40,600 fat. We don't even really care about 197 00:10:40,600 --> 00:10:44,320 that on a day-to-day basis. It's really a weak basis in the 198 00:10:44,320 --> 00:10:46,680 exercise world. We don't really care about 199 00:10:46,680 --> 00:10:50,240 volume of exercise in one day. We do it for like micro, you 200 00:10:50,240 --> 00:10:51,840 know, like managing your training. 201 00:10:52,120 --> 00:10:55,240 We care about a weekly volume. So the difference is if I'm fat 202 00:10:55,240 --> 00:10:58,560 adapted, it's just my body's ability of burning fat right 203 00:10:58,560 --> 00:11:02,120 now, how many grams of fat per minute am I burning? 204 00:11:02,800 --> 00:11:06,680 If I want to lose fat, It's all about energy balance. 205 00:11:06,680 --> 00:11:09,400 It's all about caloric intake and caloric expenditure. 206 00:11:09,400 --> 00:11:12,280 And at the end of the day, it's not even just that because we 207 00:11:12,280 --> 00:11:17,320 could burn off, you know, 1000 calories worth of or even 2000 208 00:11:17,320 --> 00:11:19,480 calories worth of glycogen stored carb. 209 00:11:19,480 --> 00:11:23,360 And we could say, oh, well, at the end of our day, I burned, 210 00:11:23,400 --> 00:11:27,080 you know, 3000 calories and I only I brought in 2000 calories. 211 00:11:27,080 --> 00:11:29,120 So I must have lost a pound of fat. 212 00:11:29,120 --> 00:11:30,520 And it's like, no, it doesn't work that way. 213 00:11:30,600 --> 00:11:33,160 You're going to recoup that entire 1000 calories of 214 00:11:33,160 --> 00:11:35,920 glycogen. So it's really fat balance. 215 00:11:35,920 --> 00:11:40,680 And we can only look at that in the in the lab doing body 216 00:11:40,680 --> 00:11:43,040 composition. And if I really you can get like 217 00:11:43,040 --> 00:11:46,320 stabilized subtrate, you can do all these fancy stuff looking at 218 00:11:46,320 --> 00:11:49,560 overall fat balance. But the easiest would be to just 219 00:11:49,560 --> 00:11:53,120 look in a weekly basis. You know, it's not just body 220 00:11:53,120 --> 00:11:55,440 weight if you have a scale or you can go to a place that can 221 00:11:55,440 --> 00:11:59,440 do body composition. If you can't, then start looking 222 00:11:59,440 --> 00:12:01,920 at like pinch, you know, we do skin folds. 223 00:12:02,040 --> 00:12:05,280 Look at the arms, look at the chest, look at the waist, look 224 00:12:05,280 --> 00:12:09,240 at the hips and the glutes. Are you losing weight in those 225 00:12:09,240 --> 00:12:11,640 areas? It's then it's most likely fat. 226 00:12:12,200 --> 00:12:15,280 It's a long winded, but it's kind of an educational component 227 00:12:15,280 --> 00:12:19,880 as well because it's a big misnomer, acute versus chronic. 228 00:12:21,400 --> 00:12:24,600 Yeah, it really is. And the whole reason that we as 229 00:12:24,600 --> 00:12:27,760 runners want to be fat adaptive is because we want to use fat as 230 00:12:27,760 --> 00:12:29,800 fuel. Why is it that we want to use 231 00:12:29,800 --> 00:12:34,520 fat as fuel versus the carbs that we have consumed just 232 00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:38,280 before the run? Sure, great question. 233 00:12:38,640 --> 00:12:42,680 The main reason why you would want to become fat adapted is 234 00:12:43,040 --> 00:12:46,520 because fat is an almost unlimited fuel source. 235 00:12:46,600 --> 00:12:50,240 So we have like 8060 thousand 80. 236 00:12:50,440 --> 00:12:53,600 We have lots and lots of calories, days worth of fat that 237 00:12:53,600 --> 00:12:58,200 we can tap into very easily. We have finite limited amounts 238 00:12:58,200 --> 00:13:01,320 of carbohydrate. So we store that carbohydrate in 239 00:13:01,320 --> 00:13:04,160 our muscle as glycogen. We can store it in the liver. 240 00:13:04,600 --> 00:13:06,720 That's actually going to play a little bit of a role. 241 00:13:07,600 --> 00:13:09,640 So we have a small amount of that stored carbs. 242 00:13:09,640 --> 00:13:14,240 So if we can be more dependent at higher intensities, at a 243 00:13:14,240 --> 00:13:19,160 higher pace, burning more fat instead of carbohydrate, the 244 00:13:19,160 --> 00:13:21,680 theory would be we should be able to last longer. 245 00:13:21,680 --> 00:13:27,160 And we we can be less reliant on consuming dietary, what we call 246 00:13:27,160 --> 00:13:28,920 exogenous coming from outside the body. 247 00:13:29,040 --> 00:13:33,640 We can be less reliant on needing to drink different, you 248 00:13:33,640 --> 00:13:37,920 know, sports drinks, gels, goose, things like that during 249 00:13:37,920 --> 00:13:41,160 our runs. OK, got it. 250 00:13:41,160 --> 00:13:42,720 So that's the reason we're talking about this. 251 00:13:42,720 --> 00:13:46,880 We're not looking at this from a perspective of weight loss. 252 00:13:47,240 --> 00:13:51,920 And so with that, looking at the nutritionists online and 253 00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:54,680 listening to what is said, there's two big trends in the 254 00:13:54,680 --> 00:13:58,760 running nutrition. 1 is that you're being pushed to eat carbs 255 00:13:58,760 --> 00:14:01,400 before every single run. And then the others like 256 00:14:01,400 --> 00:14:05,000 yourself is more using training your body to use fat more 257 00:14:05,000 --> 00:14:07,360 efficiently. So could you maybe explain the 258 00:14:07,360 --> 00:14:10,000 core difference between these two philosophies? 259 00:14:11,280 --> 00:14:15,160 Yeah. So again, a lot of here's where 260 00:14:15,160 --> 00:14:19,000 you have correlation does not mean causation and you have 261 00:14:19,040 --> 00:14:25,040 theory versus practical, like theory versus practice, the idea 262 00:14:25,040 --> 00:14:28,080 of the theories. And I've been in countless talks 263 00:14:28,080 --> 00:14:30,880 where I've been educating, I've been giving workshops, 264 00:14:30,880 --> 00:14:34,520 presentations, I've done big, you know, the great carb debate 265 00:14:34,560 --> 00:14:36,720 at this ACSM conference, things like that. 266 00:14:37,360 --> 00:14:40,440 And most of what everyone is going to talk about, you have to 267 00:14:40,440 --> 00:14:43,200 eat carbohydrate before every run. 268 00:14:44,120 --> 00:14:50,280 They're it's to give you energy. There's two things potentially 269 00:14:51,280 --> 00:14:55,400 wrong with that. 100% if you eat carbohydrate, it will give you 270 00:14:55,400 --> 00:14:57,960 energy. If you put glucose, which is the 271 00:14:57,960 --> 00:15:00,320 carbohydrate that are it convert whatever we eat, it's going to 272 00:15:00,320 --> 00:15:02,480 convert it into almost exclusively glucose. 273 00:15:02,600 --> 00:15:08,720 So sugar, if you put sugar into the blood, the muscles will burn 274 00:15:08,720 --> 00:15:11,920 it. So yes, by eating before any 275 00:15:11,920 --> 00:15:15,440 run, any event, you're going to provide energy. 276 00:15:17,120 --> 00:15:19,560 The misnomer, actually just three things. 277 00:15:19,560 --> 00:15:25,120 The big misnomer with that is a lot of very reputable 278 00:15:25,120 --> 00:15:29,080 individuals, coaches, nutritionists, doctors, pH DS, 279 00:15:30,040 --> 00:15:32,640 they are going to advocate one aspect of that. 280 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:36,560 Well, you need to supply all that energy so that you can 281 00:15:36,560 --> 00:15:39,960 spare that glycogen that's in your muscles, and that is wrong. 282 00:15:40,200 --> 00:15:44,000 That is 100% false. It's like the big thing that I 283 00:15:44,000 --> 00:15:48,760 tout in every podcast I go on the latest edition of of Doctor 284 00:15:48,760 --> 00:15:50,680 William Kramer's Exercise Physiology textbook. 285 00:15:50,680 --> 00:15:53,640 I was a big editor with that. I got them to change that in the 286 00:15:53,640 --> 00:15:56,200 textbook. We do not spare muscle glycogen 287 00:15:57,280 --> 00:16:00,600 by consuming dietary carb. There are tons and tons of 288 00:16:00,600 --> 00:16:03,800 Seminole studies done by you can droop done by the best in the 289 00:16:03,800 --> 00:16:06,840 world giving 200, three, 100 grams an hour. 290 00:16:07,080 --> 00:16:09,600 And we don't see a sparing of muscle glycogen. 291 00:16:10,160 --> 00:16:13,400 You're going to break down that glycogen in your muscle based on 292 00:16:13,520 --> 00:16:16,200 contraction, the intensity. Once it hits a certain 293 00:16:16,200 --> 00:16:18,040 intensity, that's when your body will use it. 294 00:16:18,280 --> 00:16:22,080 So yes, we're providing the fuel before you run, but it's not 295 00:16:22,080 --> 00:16:25,760 sparing muscle glycogen. I think the big misnomer, the 296 00:16:25,760 --> 00:16:29,040 really third one, that's like the big crux, you know, like the 297 00:16:29,040 --> 00:16:34,640 thorn in my side when I hear it is this idea of the difference. 298 00:16:34,640 --> 00:16:36,840 And I've talked about this on your podcast before, training 299 00:16:36,840 --> 00:16:42,040 versus competition, they are going to say you need that fuel 300 00:16:42,040 --> 00:16:48,840 to perform one depending on the intensity and the volume that 301 00:16:48,840 --> 00:16:51,880 you're doing you that's completely false, especially if 302 00:16:51,880 --> 00:16:56,160 your run is an hour or less. If you ate adequately the night 303 00:16:56,160 --> 00:16:58,480 before or the day before, your muscle glycogen should be 304 00:16:58,480 --> 00:17:01,920 totally fine and up to an hour easily. 305 00:17:02,840 --> 00:17:05,040 You're 100% good on a muscle glycogen. 306 00:17:05,040 --> 00:17:06,119 You're not going to run out of it. 307 00:17:06,960 --> 00:17:10,400 So we're not sparing it and you don't really need it is why even 308 00:17:10,400 --> 00:17:13,720 Gatorade doesn't really recommend carbohydrate intake 309 00:17:13,720 --> 00:17:16,560 for any exercise. Bout less than I think it's like 310 00:17:16,560 --> 00:17:20,640 45 minutes. If you do, it's psychological. 311 00:17:21,599 --> 00:17:24,800 There's no physiological benefit to consuming carbohydrate before 312 00:17:24,800 --> 00:17:26,920 even a lift. If your lift is less than an 313 00:17:26,920 --> 00:17:29,360 hour, it's like you're going to lift, you know, and trying to 314 00:17:29,360 --> 00:17:30,720 improve your run, your power output. 315 00:17:32,200 --> 00:17:35,240 So it's just I constantly hear the other, the 4th. 316 00:17:35,240 --> 00:17:37,480 If I had to throw a fourth one is they're saying you need to 317 00:17:37,480 --> 00:17:40,440 eat before your runs because if you don't have that energy, 318 00:17:40,760 --> 00:17:42,920 you're going to where are your, where's your body going to get 319 00:17:42,920 --> 00:17:44,520 this? And I've heard this and I've, 320 00:17:45,160 --> 00:17:48,520 I've only corrected one person just because I thought obligated 321 00:17:48,520 --> 00:17:52,280 and then others it's I don't know if, if you don't eat before 322 00:17:52,280 --> 00:17:55,440 a run, your body doesn't have energy, which is also false. 323 00:17:55,600 --> 00:17:57,240 Where is your body going to get it from? 324 00:17:57,400 --> 00:18:00,920 And they say muscle and that couldn't be further from the 325 00:18:00,920 --> 00:18:02,920 truth. So just disclaimer here. 326 00:18:03,480 --> 00:18:07,920 You will not waste muscle and burn muscle if you don't eat 327 00:18:07,920 --> 00:18:10,200 before a run. You can go out on a three hour 328 00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:12,360 run. You are not going to waste your 329 00:18:12,360 --> 00:18:16,320 muscles unless you are a burn victim or you start going out 330 00:18:16,320 --> 00:18:19,520 and you're running, you know, past your marathon, you're doing 331 00:18:19,520 --> 00:18:21,520 an ultra and you're eating nothing. 332 00:18:22,240 --> 00:18:25,960 Your body will not burn more energy from protein. 333 00:18:28,240 --> 00:18:31,800 OK, so taking a step back because that's a lot. 334 00:18:32,240 --> 00:18:37,240 So yeah, what is the reason why some nutritionists then 335 00:18:37,240 --> 00:18:41,280 recommend to eat carbs if your muscle glycogen doesn't get 336 00:18:41,280 --> 00:18:44,520 spared? And then is there anything that 337 00:18:44,520 --> 00:18:47,520 we can do to spare it? Because obviously, you know, we 338 00:18:47,520 --> 00:18:52,920 have these intense runs. We do take gels and hope that we 339 00:18:52,920 --> 00:18:57,920 have, I believe, more glycogen left in our muscles in, for 340 00:18:57,920 --> 00:19:06,080 example, a marathon. Yeah, so can we spare muscle 341 00:19:06,080 --> 00:19:07,560 glycogen? Here's where you get into the 342 00:19:07,560 --> 00:19:12,200 idea of if you become fat adapted, you will be able to 343 00:19:12,200 --> 00:19:16,640 burn more fat at a higher intensity, which means you'll 344 00:19:16,640 --> 00:19:20,840 rely less on carbohydrate. So the theory there would be you 345 00:19:20,840 --> 00:19:25,520 would spare some muscle glycogen because you're using more fat 346 00:19:25,720 --> 00:19:29,920 towards the total contribution of energy in your runs. 347 00:19:30,080 --> 00:19:36,320 Once you get to 9080 five 90%, you know, VO2 Max intensity, 348 00:19:36,320 --> 00:19:39,000 like once you get above lactate threshold, which is going to be 349 00:19:39,000 --> 00:19:41,880 a little lower than that. There's no doubt even if you are 350 00:19:41,880 --> 00:19:45,400 a ketogenic, you're eating less than 50 grams a day, you're 351 00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:48,000 still going to burn some carbohydrate above that 352 00:19:48,160 --> 00:19:51,360 intensity and that carb is going to almost come exclusively from 353 00:19:51,640 --> 00:19:55,040 glycogen. So can we spare it? 354 00:19:55,200 --> 00:19:57,440 Sure. When someone becomes very, very 355 00:19:57,440 --> 00:20:02,080 fat adapted. I I think paying attention to 356 00:20:02,080 --> 00:20:06,760 trying trying to spare glycogen is you're going down the wrong 357 00:20:06,920 --> 00:20:09,360 Rd. in my opinion based on everything I've read. 358 00:20:10,600 --> 00:20:15,920 The flip side of that is we want to make sure that we have enough 359 00:20:15,920 --> 00:20:17,560 glycogen. We want to make sure that we 360 00:20:17,560 --> 00:20:20,840 have enough energy. That's why we we supplement. 361 00:20:21,120 --> 00:20:23,200 That's why we take the gels and the goose. 362 00:20:23,720 --> 00:20:26,960 It's not necessarily because we're hoping that we have some 363 00:20:26,960 --> 00:20:29,840 glycogen left at mile 20, right. Everyone talks about like the 364 00:20:30,320 --> 00:20:33,800 either the proverbial wall or the physiological wall, like, 365 00:20:33,960 --> 00:20:37,840 you know, whether that actually we want to try and preserve your 366 00:20:37,840 --> 00:20:41,600 body doesn't preserve glycogen. You can either slow down to try 367 00:20:41,600 --> 00:20:45,320 and preserve it or the reason that we hit, you know, besides 368 00:20:45,320 --> 00:20:47,680 the psychological component, and we've talked about that before 369 00:20:47,680 --> 00:20:51,520 on your podcast. If you want to continue to run 370 00:20:51,520 --> 00:20:56,040 at the intensity and pace at mile 1620 towards the tail end 371 00:20:56,040 --> 00:20:59,120 of the marathon, that's where you then get into, well, you 372 00:20:59,120 --> 00:21:01,960 have to supplement with dietary carbohydrate. 373 00:21:02,280 --> 00:21:05,520 Why? Because your muscle needs X 374 00:21:05,520 --> 00:21:08,760 amount of calories per minute, when you're running at blank 375 00:21:08,760 --> 00:21:12,240 pace, it's going to get that from muscle glycogen and then it 376 00:21:12,240 --> 00:21:13,680 has to get it from somewhere else. 377 00:21:14,320 --> 00:21:17,280 It can get it from stored fats in the muscle. 378 00:21:17,840 --> 00:21:21,800 It can get it from taking sugar up from the blood, which is 379 00:21:21,800 --> 00:21:25,400 going to be a primary source. It can take some fatty acids up 380 00:21:25,400 --> 00:21:31,080 from the blood. So the big thing about which 381 00:21:31,080 --> 00:21:35,560 kind of gets to the point of the talk is forget about glycogen 382 00:21:35,560 --> 00:21:37,760 sparing. We can talk about glycogen 383 00:21:37,760 --> 00:21:43,440 replenishment, things like that. But the real end of the equation 384 00:21:43,440 --> 00:21:46,560 that I think listeners are really interested is other than 385 00:21:46,560 --> 00:21:48,760 the glycogen, because you can't really modify that. 386 00:21:48,920 --> 00:21:51,440 As long as you consume enough carb throughout a day leading 387 00:21:51,440 --> 00:21:56,000 into a big race or an event or a really long workout, you're 388 00:21:56,000 --> 00:22:00,520 going to have that glycogen. If you're going out and running 389 00:22:01,040 --> 00:22:04,800 a long distance, if you're going to go out and do interval work, 390 00:22:05,080 --> 00:22:07,800 if you're going to go out and actually today's race day, 391 00:22:09,320 --> 00:22:13,280 you're going to want to consume dietary carbohydrates to 392 00:22:13,280 --> 00:22:16,720 maintain blood sugar so the brain stays happy. 393 00:22:16,960 --> 00:22:19,280 And the reason that you have to maintain it is because the 394 00:22:19,280 --> 00:22:22,960 muscle will continually keep pulling that sugar out of the 395 00:22:22,960 --> 00:22:25,760 bloodstream. Here in lies, and I'm going off 396 00:22:25,760 --> 00:22:27,640 on a tangent, but this is super important. 397 00:22:28,040 --> 00:22:31,000 Herein lies why you want to become fat adapted. 398 00:22:31,800 --> 00:22:35,960 If you are more fat adapted, you don't have to drink and eat as 399 00:22:35,960 --> 00:22:40,920 much of that goo and the gels because you're burning less 400 00:22:40,920 --> 00:22:43,760 total carbohydrate at that same pace. 401 00:22:44,320 --> 00:22:47,760 So you don't have to consume as much dietary carbohydrate. 402 00:22:47,760 --> 00:22:50,440 Does that make sense? It should preserve. 403 00:22:51,440 --> 00:22:55,800 It should preserve the energy. It's potentially should reduce 404 00:22:56,400 --> 00:22:59,640 'cause you'll have much less crashes if you're if you're much 405 00:22:59,640 --> 00:23:03,360 more fat adapted and it should decrease your reliance on 406 00:23:03,360 --> 00:23:07,720 dietary, you know, sugar consumption, especially later 407 00:23:07,760 --> 00:23:09,640 in, in the race or in a long, long run. 408 00:23:10,520 --> 00:23:14,520 OK, it does make a lot of sense and it also makes a lot of sense 409 00:23:14,520 --> 00:23:17,080 now thinking back. I went to Kenya this year and I 410 00:23:17,080 --> 00:23:21,320 watched these athletes running their hour long runs, which you 411 00:23:21,320 --> 00:23:25,080 know for them it's a half marathon and nobody ever ate 412 00:23:25,080 --> 00:23:30,280 anything unless it was a Sunday morning work or Saturday morning 413 00:23:30,280 --> 00:23:32,560 workout where they were going. Marathon peace. 414 00:23:32,840 --> 00:23:36,720 Nobody ever ate anything before their run until after they were 415 00:23:36,720 --> 00:23:38,720 done. So that makes a lot of sense 416 00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:42,600 too, now I'm thinking about it. What's even more fascinating in 417 00:23:42,600 --> 00:23:46,320 that population is they they habitually eat a higher 418 00:23:46,320 --> 00:23:51,200 carbohydrate diet. But again, this is where you get 419 00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:54,240 into like theory and practice and sort of mistaking, you know, 420 00:23:54,240 --> 00:23:58,120 not seeing the forest through the trees where training versus 421 00:23:58,120 --> 00:24:00,920 competition. They're periodizing. 422 00:24:00,920 --> 00:24:07,480 They are running specific runs in a fasted state or in a lower 423 00:24:07,480 --> 00:24:09,840 carbohydrate state. And they're doing that for 424 00:24:09,840 --> 00:24:13,360 specific reasons because the body will adapt in a beneficial 425 00:24:13,360 --> 00:24:15,720 way afterwards. There are tremendous 426 00:24:15,720 --> 00:24:21,800 physiological benefits to doing certain runs or workouts in a 427 00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:26,720 low carb or a fasted state. Yes and then come race day, they 428 00:24:26,720 --> 00:24:30,960 have their fueling station every 3 miles, every 5K, they're 429 00:24:31,000 --> 00:24:34,160 drinking it. And I think, you know, when they 430 00:24:34,160 --> 00:24:37,680 do it in Kenya, obviously it's in practice, how to grab the 431 00:24:37,680 --> 00:24:40,160 bottles and everything. But then when they have their 432 00:24:40,160 --> 00:24:43,760 marathons here and they're going super fast, they eat a lot. 433 00:24:43,760 --> 00:24:48,840 Mm hmm. So I mean, I guess with that, it 434 00:24:48,840 --> 00:24:54,440 makes sense that we as amateur leisure runners, we consume food 435 00:24:54,440 --> 00:24:57,560 a lot of times also just to practice and see what our bodies 436 00:24:57,560 --> 00:25:00,320 can handle. But do you think it's because of 437 00:25:00,320 --> 00:25:03,840 the running industry and products that so many people, so 438 00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:07,560 many nutritionists are in that trend where they're pushing for 439 00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:11,160 you to fuel everyone, even if they're shorter runs? 440 00:25:12,640 --> 00:25:16,640 Yeah, I think it's a combination of two things. 441 00:25:16,640 --> 00:25:21,600 One, there's no doubt there's there's a big industry push 442 00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:24,360 behind things. And then two, I think there's 443 00:25:24,360 --> 00:25:29,200 just become an indoctrination of this is the way it's always been 444 00:25:29,200 --> 00:25:30,960 done. This is the way that we always 445 00:25:30,960 --> 00:25:33,320 think. You know, all of countless 446 00:25:33,600 --> 00:25:36,760 athletes that I've worked with and they're going to different 447 00:25:36,760 --> 00:25:39,800 places and they're mentioning to their coach or their strength 448 00:25:39,800 --> 00:25:42,200 coach or their nutritionist, blah, blah, blah. 449 00:25:42,200 --> 00:25:45,600 I didn't eat before this morning's workout, before this 450 00:25:45,600 --> 00:25:47,680 morning's lift. And they like have, you know, a 451 00:25:47,680 --> 00:25:51,120 hissy fit and they, they go crazy and it's like, show me 452 00:25:51,120 --> 00:25:56,000 your data to support why they needed before this lift to eat 453 00:25:56,600 --> 00:26:00,040 less than an hour. And there's many lifts that are 454 00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:02,160 left that are an hour or left or less. 455 00:26:02,320 --> 00:26:04,680 And then you get into a lot of runs that are, you know, an hour 456 00:26:04,680 --> 00:26:09,280 or less and it's even Gatorade is not recommending. 457 00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:10,560 So here's where you get into this. 458 00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:12,360 You're saying where does this come from? 459 00:26:12,840 --> 00:26:17,040 Again, even Gatorade is showing if someone goes out and a lot of 460 00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:19,080 people are going out, oh, I'm going to go and do a 30 minute 461 00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:20,880 run. I'm going to do a 45 minute run. 462 00:26:21,200 --> 00:26:25,120 Even Gatorade is saying you do not need carbohydrate for that 463 00:26:25,120 --> 00:26:28,640 run. That is different than should 464 00:26:28,640 --> 00:26:31,160 you eat before? Should you have breakfast 465 00:26:31,160 --> 00:26:33,920 beforehand? So like those are the two 466 00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:37,000 different things. Even in the stance where it's, 467 00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:39,760 oh, I don't see them consuming anything during the workout or 468 00:26:39,760 --> 00:26:42,120 during that run. Should they eat something 469 00:26:42,120 --> 00:26:44,880 beforehand? My answer to most questions is 470 00:26:44,880 --> 00:26:48,440 it depends. Is this like a race day, super 471 00:26:48,440 --> 00:26:52,240 tempo interval workout? Yeah, you might want to eat 472 00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:57,120 something beforehand if it's a long slow run, if it's like a 473 00:26:57,120 --> 00:27:03,440 recovery run, things like that. The literature is showing no you 474 00:27:03,560 --> 00:27:07,560 you can definitely do fasted or extremely low carb, you know, 475 00:27:07,800 --> 00:27:10,680 runs or workouts in that state. OK. 476 00:27:11,120 --> 00:27:13,040 And so I guess then with that, we've already kind of 477 00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:15,920 established that the one run that you do want to fuel 478 00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:20,480 definitely is your race, but what about these workouts that 479 00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:23,880 you do during the week? Is it helpful at all to do your 480 00:27:23,880 --> 00:27:26,640 tempos and your intervals not fueled? 481 00:27:26,640 --> 00:27:33,040 Or should you more try to actually hit the paces and 482 00:27:33,040 --> 00:27:36,040 fueling will help you for that? Or will fueling even help you 483 00:27:36,040 --> 00:27:39,640 with that? So again, the answer is it 484 00:27:39,640 --> 00:27:42,920 depends because we're going to, we, we might recommend both. 485 00:27:43,760 --> 00:27:48,760 Part of it is when is race day. So if race day is within the 486 00:27:48,760 --> 00:27:52,960 next three weeks, I would, I would never recommend that you 487 00:27:52,960 --> 00:27:57,200 try a fasted interval or race pace or like tempo run workout, 488 00:27:57,760 --> 00:28:00,560 like without eating a breakfast or even something beforehand. 489 00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:05,160 The the idea would be the further out it is, the more you 490 00:28:05,360 --> 00:28:09,480 can try those high interval, you know, Sprint days, hill days, 491 00:28:09,480 --> 00:28:12,200 stuff like that. Again, if they're less than an 492 00:28:12,200 --> 00:28:14,000 hour. Here's where you get into this. 493 00:28:14,280 --> 00:28:16,520 Well, yeah, it's really high intensity and all these 494 00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:18,280 different things. And it's like, yeah, but those 495 00:28:18,280 --> 00:28:20,480 workouts aren't lasting much longer than an hour. 496 00:28:20,480 --> 00:28:22,240 Many of them are only lasting 30 minutes. 497 00:28:23,080 --> 00:28:26,960 So physiologically, you shouldn't need to consume any 498 00:28:26,960 --> 00:28:30,040 carbohydrate beforehand. And again, remember we were 499 00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:33,280 talking about like, oh, fat adapted versus fat loss. 500 00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:39,240 We have to take into context, I'm assuming that most of the 501 00:28:39,240 --> 00:28:42,880 time you're eating properly, you're, you know, you're eating 502 00:28:42,880 --> 00:28:46,720 enough calories, you got enough sleep, like the day before those 503 00:28:46,720 --> 00:28:51,320 workouts, you got enough, you know, energy and you topped off 504 00:28:51,320 --> 00:28:53,720 your glycogen stores. So you should be OK. 505 00:28:54,320 --> 00:28:56,520 Would it be beneficial to do some of those intervals? 506 00:28:56,920 --> 00:29:00,080 Sure. Would I recommend it if I don't 507 00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:02,280 want you to be fasted before every run? 508 00:29:02,400 --> 00:29:05,800 Well, I'm going to recommend consume something before those 509 00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:09,120 interval, you know, hill workouts, your race pace runs, 510 00:29:09,120 --> 00:29:11,840 things like that more than I will. 511 00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:14,880 Your long slow distance, you know, unless you're going out 512 00:29:14,880 --> 00:29:20,080 for a few hours and even then it's stillwell, you know, teeter 513 00:29:20,080 --> 00:29:23,600 something in an hour into it. Does that make sense? 514 00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:30,920 But with that, the reason why we would not want you to only stay 515 00:29:30,920 --> 00:29:35,880 fasted before all of your runs even be is because on race day, 516 00:29:36,000 --> 00:29:39,440 if you're not going to do that, well, then you're introducing 517 00:29:39,440 --> 00:29:41,320 something on race day that you didn't train. 518 00:29:41,760 --> 00:29:44,560 So we want your gut and we want your digestion. 519 00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:48,560 We want your brain and all the hormones and the satiation and 520 00:29:48,560 --> 00:29:51,840 and the sensitivities of what this feels like to have all this 521 00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:56,000 during this type of workout. We want you to get acclimated to 522 00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:58,120 that before you actually go and race it. 523 00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:01,840 So there's a training aspect, like a nutritional training 524 00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:04,720 aspect. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 525 00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:08,520 That's so important, you know, practicing things before your 526 00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:11,520 big day. And then I guess we've already 527 00:30:11,520 --> 00:30:14,360 talked about it by race, but race day fueling, you highly 528 00:30:14,360 --> 00:30:17,000 recommend it. How does it differ? 529 00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:21,080 Say, for example, if I did my marathon training cycle, fat 530 00:30:21,080 --> 00:30:25,600 adapted until, you know, the last couple weeks and then it's 531 00:30:25,600 --> 00:30:30,360 marathon day versus my friend who is the exact same as I am, 532 00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:32,360 who did not do that and fueled everything. 533 00:30:32,560 --> 00:30:36,440 How does my carb consumption during the marathon differ from 534 00:30:36,440 --> 00:30:38,280 hers? And maybe you can talk about the 535 00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:42,440 sparing glycogen in in that sense a little bit. 536 00:30:43,080 --> 00:30:47,520 Yeah, so I I forget your what is it? 537 00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:50,040 Your miles may vary. Why MMV? 538 00:30:50,440 --> 00:30:53,040 You read all the time like people will write on Reddit and 539 00:30:53,040 --> 00:30:57,960 all these blogs and and forums like why MMV, your miles may 540 00:30:57,960 --> 00:31:00,320 vary. We can see a lot of stuff in the 541 00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:04,760 lab, but at the end of the day, nothing beats you trying things 542 00:31:04,760 --> 00:31:07,040 out. The theory and really what 543 00:31:07,040 --> 00:31:10,680 should happen would be you versus your friend. 544 00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:14,680 Let's say you're both similar weight, similar fitness, similar 545 00:31:14,680 --> 00:31:19,240 pace. She's high carb for everything, 546 00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:22,480 doing the same workouts, but you are, you know, teetering in a 547 00:31:22,480 --> 00:31:26,440 tapering in like super low carb or fasted runs. 548 00:31:27,040 --> 00:31:29,200 The idea would be, and this is the literature's pretty 549 00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:33,520 conclusive on this, that during the marathon, if you're both 550 00:31:33,600 --> 00:31:37,200 trying to run the same time, you'll both be running at the 551 00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:40,720 same pace, you will be burning less carbohydrate than she will, 552 00:31:41,200 --> 00:31:44,720 so she will be more reliant on carbohydrate throughout that 553 00:31:44,720 --> 00:31:48,200 race. The idea would be later on, it's 554 00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:53,480 not necessarily glycogen because the theory and there's not a lot 555 00:31:53,480 --> 00:31:57,520 of literature on like those specific studies that look at, 556 00:31:57,520 --> 00:32:00,800 there's tons of stuff that look at glycogen depleted and we just 557 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:02,880 consume carb, but they're very regimented. 558 00:32:02,880 --> 00:32:05,600 It's like every 15 minutes we're going to give you a bolus of 30 559 00:32:05,600 --> 00:32:08,520 grams of carbohydrate and see how your time tile performance 560 00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:12,080 look at glycogen breakdown. To my, to my knowledge, I 561 00:32:12,080 --> 00:32:16,720 haven't read a study that is going to have you fasted someone 562 00:32:16,720 --> 00:32:19,520 else fasted and now you're going into the race you're both 563 00:32:19,520 --> 00:32:23,840 running and it's going to look to see, well, how does your 564 00:32:23,840 --> 00:32:28,080 muscle glycogen vary 20 miles into the race? 565 00:32:28,440 --> 00:32:31,200 The theory would be you are going to overall. 566 00:32:33,600 --> 00:32:39,920 Well, again, I'm, I'm very hard pressed to say glycogen sparing 567 00:32:39,920 --> 00:32:42,240 is a thing. I've just went down the rabbit 568 00:32:42,240 --> 00:32:50,880 hole and 98 out of every 9998 out of every, you know, 10,000 569 00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:54,560 papers and studies indicate you do not spare muscle glycogen 570 00:32:54,800 --> 00:32:59,080 even for a faster study. We had the best ultra runners in 571 00:32:59,080 --> 00:33:04,040 the world, 10 high carb, 10 ketogenic, pre and post a three 572 00:33:04,040 --> 00:33:05,920 hour treadmill run. We did muscle biopsies. 573 00:33:06,040 --> 00:33:09,320 They both had the same glycogen to start and they both had the 574 00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:12,840 same glycogen to finish. So a lot of it is going to boil 575 00:33:12,840 --> 00:33:18,640 down to your fuel availability in the fuel supply in the blood 576 00:33:19,160 --> 00:33:21,680 to the muscle. So you should need to consume 577 00:33:21,680 --> 00:33:24,280 less carbohydrate per hour than she should. 578 00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:27,960 That's like the main, if I, if I would recommend something, it's 579 00:33:28,480 --> 00:33:32,040 well you should be able to get away with the same performance 580 00:33:32,040 --> 00:33:35,640 at 30 grams an hour versus her 45 or 60. 581 00:33:36,840 --> 00:33:39,200 But then what if I take the same amount? 582 00:33:39,240 --> 00:33:41,520 Will that make me more efficient then? 583 00:33:42,400 --> 00:33:44,560 It shouldn't. OK. 584 00:33:45,960 --> 00:33:49,920 Because that's, that's the interesting part where all those 585 00:33:49,920 --> 00:33:53,040 over feeding carbohydrate studies looking at 200 grams an 586 00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:55,360 hour, you're not sparing muscle glycogen. 587 00:33:56,160 --> 00:34:00,280 Almost all the literature is showing 60 grams an hour is 588 00:34:00,280 --> 00:34:04,960 really where the world is like capping out that once you go 589 00:34:04,960 --> 00:34:07,760 above it. Yes, there are studies to show 590 00:34:07,760 --> 00:34:10,400 there is a performance benefit in a time trial, things like 591 00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:12,480 that. But there are just as many other 592 00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:15,080 studies showing, no, we showed no difference at 90 grams per 593 00:34:15,080 --> 00:34:18,960 hour versus 60 grams per hour. The problem that exists in the 594 00:34:18,960 --> 00:34:24,400 literature is, and this is very true for our fasted and low carb 595 00:34:24,840 --> 00:34:29,400 research, is they will give you, you and her are doing these 596 00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:34,920 different diets and you're doing that for a few weeks, 2 weeks. 597 00:34:34,920 --> 00:34:37,560 And now all of a sudden they're going to have you both race and 598 00:34:37,560 --> 00:34:39,920 they're going to say, oh, your performance didn't go up. 599 00:34:39,920 --> 00:34:42,760 And it's like, well you've only done it for two weeks, 3 weeks. 600 00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:45,960 But most of the literature to my knowledge, no you would not see 601 00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:50,760 a benefit going from 30 to that 60 grams if you are in that more 602 00:34:50,760 --> 00:34:53,480 fat adapted state. OK. 603 00:34:53,760 --> 00:34:57,200 So then you as an expert in this, what is your 604 00:34:57,200 --> 00:35:00,160 recommendation? What is the benefit of really 605 00:35:00,160 --> 00:35:02,440 running fat adaptive? Does it really matter? 606 00:35:02,640 --> 00:35:05,040 And then for people who are interested in trying it out, 607 00:35:05,280 --> 00:35:07,960 who's a good candidate and who's not a good candidate? 608 00:35:09,440 --> 00:35:15,040 I mean, if you feel amazing, I'm probably not going to ask you to 609 00:35:15,120 --> 00:35:19,720 try anything unless you come to me and you say, hey, I'm running 610 00:35:19,720 --> 00:35:22,560 a four hour marathon. I, I just, I've run ten of them. 611 00:35:22,560 --> 00:35:24,360 I can't break 4. I want to break four. 612 00:35:24,720 --> 00:35:27,200 I've run 10. I can't qualify for Boston. 613 00:35:27,360 --> 00:35:30,000 I want to qualify for Boston. Well, OK, let's try something 614 00:35:30,000 --> 00:35:32,880 different. So I would almost recommend it 615 00:35:32,880 --> 00:35:35,880 for anyone to try it out. Depends on how many marathons 616 00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:40,840 you run a year. Try anything to find out if it 617 00:35:40,840 --> 00:35:45,040 works for you. You know, what's the benefit of 618 00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:47,160 it. I mean, the number one benefit 619 00:35:47,440 --> 00:35:53,840 is you're you, you the most of the literature supports if you 620 00:35:53,840 --> 00:35:57,720 are doing random runs and things like that, people throughout 621 00:35:57,720 --> 00:36:02,160 their day and even during a lot of those runs, they feel as 622 00:36:02,160 --> 00:36:04,480 though they have a great amount of energy. 623 00:36:04,960 --> 00:36:08,840 And a big part of that reason is there's you're much less likely 624 00:36:09,040 --> 00:36:13,800 and prone to crashing like sugar crashes if you're not just 625 00:36:13,840 --> 00:36:18,680 pounding sugar throughout the day and even during those runs. 626 00:36:18,760 --> 00:36:21,400 So there's that aspect. And then a big part is you're 627 00:36:21,400 --> 00:36:23,800 just, you should just, you're less reliant on buying all this 628 00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:26,320 product, whether money is an issue or not. 629 00:36:26,320 --> 00:36:32,920 So the main benefit of becoming fat adapted is less reliance on 630 00:36:33,800 --> 00:36:36,760 buying supplements. As someone who gets a lot of 631 00:36:36,760 --> 00:36:40,720 supplements for free, random research studies, I've tried a 632 00:36:40,720 --> 00:36:44,600 lot of different things out. It's annoying to consume. 633 00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:46,920 I'm going to consume this, I'm going to consume that, I'm going 634 00:36:46,920 --> 00:36:50,320 to consume that. So I mean, you might say, well, 635 00:36:50,320 --> 00:36:51,880 that's oh, that's not a real benefit. 636 00:36:51,880 --> 00:36:54,640 And it's like, all right, well, talk to the talk to me after 637 00:36:54,640 --> 00:36:58,120 you've cut out or you're taking, you know, 5 different 638 00:36:58,120 --> 00:37:01,720 supplements throughout the day and you're dependent upon it and 639 00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:04,480 you can drop those and you feel the same. 640 00:37:04,840 --> 00:37:09,240 I think the other thing is to bring up by you becoming less 641 00:37:09,240 --> 00:37:12,920 dependent on buying and consuming products throughout 642 00:37:12,920 --> 00:37:17,920 the day before your runs, during your runs, even if it doesn't 643 00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:21,080 improve your performance. We just saved you money and now 644 00:37:21,080 --> 00:37:24,080 you don't have to consume these things like that alone. 645 00:37:24,080 --> 00:37:27,800 Everyone's looking for, well, why will I see an improvement in 646 00:37:27,800 --> 00:37:32,680 my marathon time? Maybe not, but it's that's 647 00:37:33,160 --> 00:37:34,920 everything we've talked about is performance so far. 648 00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:38,440 There are definitely health benefits to being metabolically 649 00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:42,880 flexible and fat adapted well, tremendous from a cardiovascular 650 00:37:42,880 --> 00:37:46,360 standpoint. You know, fasted runs, the 651 00:37:47,520 --> 00:37:51,560 improvement in inflammatory responses you get into like 652 00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:53,680 everyone's going to produce. You don't have to be on a keto 653 00:37:53,680 --> 00:37:57,440 diet if you just do 1 long run. If you go out for an hour or an 654 00:37:57,560 --> 00:38:00,720 hour and a half two hour run, you're going to produce more 655 00:38:00,720 --> 00:38:03,000 ketone bodies than you and I have at rest. 656 00:38:03,320 --> 00:38:04,920 We all have ketone bodies in our blood. 657 00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:07,840 Those provide, those are signal molecules. 658 00:38:07,840 --> 00:38:09,800 They're going to trigger your mitochondria, they're going to 659 00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:12,480 trigger your brain, nervous system, cardiovascular system. 660 00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:15,960 There's a lot of benefits from a health standpoint to becoming 661 00:38:15,960 --> 00:38:19,440 fat adaptive. Can you talk about a few of 662 00:38:19,440 --> 00:38:22,440 those more because I was just trying to look at it from a 663 00:38:22,440 --> 00:38:25,560 fueling perspective and I never even thought about asking you 664 00:38:26,440 --> 00:38:29,440 all these other benefits about that just in regular life. 665 00:38:29,880 --> 00:38:34,760 Yeah. So fuel partitioning your body's 666 00:38:34,760 --> 00:38:40,960 ability of if you introduce high carbohydrate, your body's 667 00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:47,360 tolerance for that is going to be higher when you mix in fasted 668 00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:50,600 or low carb runs. So by becoming more fat adapted, 669 00:38:50,600 --> 00:38:54,600 your tolerance for you just ate a lot of sugar, OK, your body's 670 00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:57,160 going to be able to switch. Now when that sugar goes away, 671 00:38:57,160 --> 00:38:59,960 your body very quickly can shift back to fat. 672 00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:03,640 If someone is continue, if they're not very fat adapted, 673 00:39:03,640 --> 00:39:06,760 meaning they're not metabolically flexible, they're 674 00:39:06,760 --> 00:39:10,440 not going to be able to shift when they introduce a lot of 675 00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:12,880 these, you know, dietary sources. 676 00:39:12,880 --> 00:39:16,160 So if you eat a lot of sugar and fat, someone who's not fat 677 00:39:16,160 --> 00:39:19,240 adapted or metabolically flexible, their body doesn't 678 00:39:19,240 --> 00:39:23,000 know what to do with that as much and their body's going to 679 00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:26,200 store it just like our bodies if we're fat adapted, but their 680 00:39:26,200 --> 00:39:28,320 body is now going to store it ectopically. 681 00:39:28,440 --> 00:39:30,720 You're going to start storing that fat in places that you 682 00:39:30,720 --> 00:39:32,760 don't want to store it. Now you're going to increase 683 00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:36,600 visceral fat, which increases, you know, atherosclerotic plaque 684 00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:40,160 development, it increases inflammation, things like that. 685 00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:44,920 The other aspect will be if you're not fat adapted as you 686 00:39:44,920 --> 00:39:47,440 teeter, It's funny because we're talking about becoming fat 687 00:39:47,440 --> 00:39:51,520 adapted, but then someone who's fat adapted typically can handle 688 00:39:51,520 --> 00:39:55,640 carbohydrates very well. So an individual who's not, 689 00:39:56,160 --> 00:39:59,400 they're not going to be able to. And one, they're very reliant on 690 00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:04,000 those carbohydrates, but two, by continually consuming more of 691 00:40:04,000 --> 00:40:06,360 those carbohydrates, you can induce, you know, insulin 692 00:40:06,360 --> 00:40:10,040 resistance and things like that. Super interesting. 693 00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:12,880 Yeah. Thank you for talking about 694 00:40:12,880 --> 00:40:14,560 this. I feel like I learned a lot and 695 00:40:14,560 --> 00:40:18,360 our listeners probably did too, because it's such a broad topic 696 00:40:18,360 --> 00:40:21,800 and all we know out there is that we have these split 697 00:40:23,080 --> 00:40:26,240 nutritionists giving information as to whether to fuel or not 698 00:40:26,240 --> 00:40:27,880 fuel every run. So thank you. 699 00:40:27,880 --> 00:40:30,040 I appreciate that. Yeah, absolutely. 700 00:40:30,200 --> 00:40:31,480 Yeah. If we had to give a 701 00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:34,320 recommendation, if someone was saying all right, because like 702 00:40:34,400 --> 00:40:37,720 my, my, my word of 2025 is action, right? 703 00:40:38,200 --> 00:40:40,240 David Goggins always says we have too many theorists, not 704 00:40:40,240 --> 00:40:42,080 enough practitioners. It's like, all right, what's the 705 00:40:42,080 --> 00:40:44,000 take away? If you want to put this into 706 00:40:44,000 --> 00:40:47,280 action, the idea would be hopefully you don't have a 707 00:40:47,280 --> 00:40:52,080 marathon coming up within let's say 10 weeks minimum, like 8 708 00:40:52,080 --> 00:40:54,040 weeks. But if you're 10, if you're like 709 00:40:54,040 --> 00:40:57,120 beyond 10 weeks out, give it a try. 710 00:40:57,640 --> 00:41:02,080 First thing would be just on a random, not even a long, but a 711 00:41:02,080 --> 00:41:05,440 slower run. Try to not eat anything that 712 00:41:05,440 --> 00:41:06,600 morning. You can drink water. 713 00:41:07,480 --> 00:41:11,400 If you're not going out for more than like an hour, you probably 714 00:41:11,400 --> 00:41:13,320 don't really need to drink electrolytes. 715 00:41:13,440 --> 00:41:16,920 You could drink some water, but try it on one of those runs. 716 00:41:17,600 --> 00:41:20,920 Start implementing it maybe two days a week. 717 00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:25,200 We probably would never recommend it, you know, seven 718 00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:28,720 days a week because you're hopefully doing some interval 719 00:41:28,720 --> 00:41:30,160 works. But if you're someone going out, 720 00:41:30,160 --> 00:41:32,400 hey, I'm training for a marathon and I'm not really doing a lot 721 00:41:32,400 --> 00:41:34,880 of speed work and things like that, you could probably do a 722 00:41:34,880 --> 00:41:38,880 lot of your runs in the fasted state and you would see some 723 00:41:39,160 --> 00:41:43,840 great benefits from it. Any downfalls or downsides to 724 00:41:43,840 --> 00:41:46,560 this? When somebody is getting used to 725 00:41:46,560 --> 00:41:49,800 it from coming from high carb, are they going to feel sluggish? 726 00:41:49,800 --> 00:41:53,080 How is that going to feel to suddenly run without fueling 727 00:41:53,080 --> 00:41:56,440 beforehand? Yeah, you could become sluggish. 728 00:41:56,440 --> 00:42:01,800 You probably, I mean you if you be, if you feel sluggish on a 729 00:42:01,800 --> 00:42:06,640 longer, you know, and this is where when we say long, you 730 00:42:06,640 --> 00:42:11,320 can't do miles, you can look at distance, but should you feel 731 00:42:11,320 --> 00:42:16,760 sluggish by shifting to a fasted state before, you know, an hour 732 00:42:16,760 --> 00:42:20,000 run, you shouldn't because physiologically your body has 733 00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:21,840 what it needs. A lot of that is going to be 734 00:42:21,840 --> 00:42:26,560 psychological or that first run, yes, maybe you will because your 735 00:42:26,560 --> 00:42:30,880 body is trained and your muscles are waiting for that pre 736 00:42:30,880 --> 00:42:35,040 exercise meal to supply them with energy during that run, 737 00:42:35,040 --> 00:42:38,080 regardless of what that run is. So 100% you might feel some 738 00:42:38,080 --> 00:42:41,480 sluggishness, sluggishness when you first implement it. 739 00:42:41,960 --> 00:42:45,680 You might the big limitations of like any of the if you want to 740 00:42:45,680 --> 00:42:48,000 go and do like some sprints, let's say you're going out and 741 00:42:48,000 --> 00:42:50,440 you're on a road or you're on the trail and all of a sudden 742 00:42:50,440 --> 00:42:53,320 you hit a hill, you know, and you're like 3 miles in, 4 miles 743 00:42:53,320 --> 00:42:55,000 in and you want to like run up that hill. 744 00:42:55,240 --> 00:43:00,120 You might not have that energy as much if it's later on in the 745 00:43:00,120 --> 00:43:05,800 run. So you know, but do not confuse 746 00:43:05,800 --> 00:43:10,080 everything that we've said today with a caloric deprivation diet. 747 00:43:10,600 --> 00:43:15,080 What we are not recommending is person A and person B, you and 748 00:43:15,080 --> 00:43:19,480 your friend, she's consuming high carb before every run as a 749 00:43:19,480 --> 00:43:21,600 meal and she's consuming carb during her run. 750 00:43:21,760 --> 00:43:25,120 You are running fasted and you're not consuming during your 751 00:43:25,120 --> 00:43:27,320 run. Both of you are eating the same 752 00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:28,840 amount of calories during the day. 753 00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:32,720 You're still compensating later in the day with those calories. 754 00:43:33,400 --> 00:43:36,960 So the benefits aren't from cutting out calories, it's from 755 00:43:37,320 --> 00:43:40,640 doing your exercise bout in the fasted state. 756 00:43:41,160 --> 00:43:44,520 Because when you do that, it's going to trigger all these 757 00:43:44,520 --> 00:43:47,400 chemicals to be released and it's going to tell your muscles 758 00:43:47,400 --> 00:43:52,240 to adapt after that run, build more mitochondria, be better at 759 00:43:52,240 --> 00:43:54,840 transporting fat, be better at, you know, doing all these 760 00:43:54,840 --> 00:43:56,400 things. So we are not saying caloric 761 00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:58,480 deprivation. Perfect. 762 00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:02,400 Thanks for clarifying that. Thank you, Patrick. 763 00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:04,720 I really appreciate your time with this. 764 00:44:04,720 --> 00:44:08,520 And if somebody wants to look you up and find you, how can 765 00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:11,440 they do that? I mean, they can shoot me an 766 00:44:11,440 --> 00:44:14,960 e-mail Pat at patdavitt.com social media. 767 00:44:14,960 --> 00:44:19,880 I'm Patrick Davitt, PhD, Instagram, TikTok, you know, I'd 768 00:44:19,880 --> 00:44:24,240 be happy to answer most of my, my social media is just me 769 00:44:24,240 --> 00:44:26,480 walking and running in the woods, giving motivational 770 00:44:26,480 --> 00:44:30,120 quotes and things like that. So, but occasionally I'll drop 771 00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:34,280 some Nuggets about nutrition or sleep or things like that. 772 00:44:34,280 --> 00:44:37,360 But yeah, I'd be happy to answer any questions that they had. 773 00:44:37,360 --> 00:44:39,720 It's always a pleasure. I love talking about this. 774 00:44:39,720 --> 00:44:44,360 I know I can stay on for hours and hours and hours, but we got 775 00:44:44,360 --> 00:44:48,440 to cut it short and it's been a pleasure and I appreciate every 776 00:44:48,440 --> 00:44:50,680 time I'm on. Hopefully we, if there's 777 00:44:50,680 --> 00:44:54,040 anything that's not clear, definitely reach out to Letty or 778 00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:57,480 definitely reach out to myself. Perfect. 779 00:44:57,480 --> 00:45:03,280 Thank you so much. Thank you, Patrick for coming 780 00:45:03,280 --> 00:45:05,240 on. I'm super grateful for all your 781 00:45:05,240 --> 00:45:08,520 information and I look forward to hosting you again very soon. 782 00:45:08,520 --> 00:45:11,840 When we talk, a little quick preview about electrolytes, and 783 00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:14,920 maybe we'll even let the listeners know just exactly what 784 00:45:14,920 --> 00:45:18,240 to put into your own recipe so you can make your own. 785 00:45:18,240 --> 00:45:21,080 Yeah, I think that's it's, it's really good if someone has time 786 00:45:21,080 --> 00:45:24,040 and motives to do it. If you kind of learn what you're 787 00:45:24,040 --> 00:45:26,680 eating and how you're how it's made, it's probably the best way 788 00:45:26,680 --> 00:45:28,200 to do it. Exactly. 789 00:45:28,240 --> 00:45:31,400 Big fan of that. If you guys like this content, 790 00:45:31,560 --> 00:45:36,320 we also of course invite you to hop onto our YouTube channel and 791 00:45:36,480 --> 00:45:39,560 everywhere else that were present and give us a like. 792 00:45:39,560 --> 00:45:43,720 Let us know that you enjoy this because we are surely enjoying 793 00:45:43,720 --> 00:45:45,480 it, but it's always nice to get good feedback. 794 00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:47,920 And with that. Have a great week of running. 795 00:45:51,040 --> 00:45:53,600 Thanks for tuning in. For more information, go to 796 00:45:53,600 --> 00:45:59,320 www.marathonrunningpodcast.com or check us out on all channels.