Today Debbie talks to Dina Griffin from eNRGperformance.com about training and nutritional strategies. The traditional approach to diet during training has emphasized the consumption of carbs, and it has generally been assumed that the only source of energy for the body is through carbohydrates. Dina points out that you can teach the body to become a fat burning machine, and that there are many more calories stored in fat than in the body’s limited stores of carbs.
The body learns to burn more fat by consuming more fat. This isn’t an attempt to eliminate all carbs from the diet, simply to add fat calories to what you are eating. Getting your nutrition from whole foods is valuable rather than stocking up on simple sugars in gel form. She also doubts the value of fasted workouts, especially for women.
They also talk about training approaches, and whether high intensity is better than the long, slow endurance sessions that have been the norm. Again, the better option is a middle ground rather than an all-or-nothing approach. Debbie points out that athletes generally do too much HIIT, or too much endurance training. What’s important is to balance those kinds of workout, the same way you balance carbs with fat in your diet.
What is metabolic efficiency?
Simply defined, the concept of metabolic efficiency is the ability of the body to burn its internal fat stores while preserving its limited carbohydrate (glycogen) stores. On average, athletes have 80,000 calories of fat to use as an energy source. In contrast, stored carbohydrate provides 1200-2000 calories (depending on gender and size). The more we can teach the body to burn fat better, the more it can tap into this vast ‘opportunity’ of stored energy.
How do become better fat burners as endurance athletes?
A huge contribution to becoming a better fat burner starts with daily nutrition patterns (not just what you eat before, during, and after exercise). It all comes down to learning how to put together foods together that stabilize blood sugar levels. By controlling blood sugar and insulin levels, there are various cellular adaptations that occur to enable enhanced fat burning. Proper aerobic training certainly makes a difference in how well the body can burn fat, but we now know that daily nutrition patterns have a significant influence.
There are various nutrition strategies to learning how to burn fat better, which are explained in Bob Seebohar’s book “Metabolic Efficiency Training: Teaching the Body to Burn Fat”.
How should we fuel before during and after an endurance training (bike 4 hours) workout?
Starvation training (or fasted workouts) are not necessary or recommended, particularly for longer workouts. Depending on an athlete’s training cycle (for example, base vs. competition cycle), an athlete could fuel with a “metabolically efficient meal” prior to a 4-hour workout. This is one that is very different than the classic sports nutrition guidelines that promoted very high carbohydrate meals prior to a workout (such as a bagel with cream cheese, juice, and a banana; or even taking a gel prior to the workout). Instead, an athlete could use a 1:1 or 2:1 ratio of carbohydrate to protein prior to the workout, or use the hand model or the periodization plates as a model for how to put together meals that stabilize blood sugar and yet still provide quality source of carbs and overall energy to support the workout. Smoothies or egg-based breakfasts with fruit and avocado are examples of meals that can be tailored to the individual’s food preferences and used prior to a workout.
As an athlete becomes more metabolically efficient, the need for a high amount of simple sugars and a frequent dose of those simple sugars is reduced. Athletes can still decide to use simple sugars like gels or energy chews, but the need for these calories is much less than before fat adaptation. Some athletes can use “whole foods” successfully like rice cakes (a la Feed Zone Portables) or homemade energy bites. Athletes are also doing really well using formulas like Generation UCAN, which supports the principles of metabolic efficiency.
Post-workout, we do not necessarily need to ingest simple sugars within a 30-minute window as was once taught. We want the fat burning process to continue! We can opt to have a metabolically efficient snack, but still include a quality source of carbohydrate (such as fruit, sweet potato, or GenUCAN superstarch). Depending on when our next workout is, we can have this snack within a few hours or whenever the athlete starts to feel hungry. We certainly have to look at an athlete’s training schedule/block as part of the consideration of when and what is appropriate for recovery nutrition.
How do we lose weight?
Again, controlling blood sugar is fundamental to this process, but we do not need to do any fad diets or ultra low carb eating just to promote weight loss. We do not want to underfeed (or cut calories too much), particularly for athletes who are in high training volume and intensity training cycles. We also need to be careful of reducing carbohydrates too much, but this needs to be considered on an individual basis. There are many other variables to consider that affect weight loss such as sleep, stress, and lifestyle.
Hand model
The hand model is one of several nutrition strategies to teach individuals to learn how to control blood sugar. Open both hands and imagine your plate of food modeling one hand full of fiber-rich carbohydrates (vegetables, fruits, perhaps some whole grains) and the other hand representing one or more pieces of protein. This 1 hand of carb and 1 hand of protein would represent a 1:1 ratio of carbohydrate to protein. This would be a simple way to balance blood sugar in a meal without having to count grams of carbs, protein, and fat. There may be times when we need a 2:1 or even 3:1 model of carb to protein, but this is where nutrition periodization principles come into play (in addition to the goals of the athlete). By the way, the amount of food in the hand should be from the base of the palm all the way to the fingertips, not just the palm!
Periodization- plates
The periodization plate is another nutrition strategy for implementing metabolic efficiency and nutrition periodization principles. This uses a visual representation of a plate of food whereby we section out the types of foods (vegetables, fruits, proteins/fats, whole grains, sports nutrition products) depending on the energy needs of the athlete (which are determined by the training cycle). For someone looking to lose weight and who is in a base training cycle, half the plate may be full of vegetables and the other half may be full of a protein that has some fat in it (such as salmon or dark meat chicken).
