Metabolic efficiency is something i have been talking about for years and performing on myself since 2008 for Ironman training. I started training and racing by the MAF heart rate back in 2001 and then with Mark Allen’s team training program. Around 2009, after a USAT seminar with Bob Seebohor, future Metabolic Effeciency Specialist, with fasting before workouts and drinking “Bulletproof” coffee. I learned early on in my triathlon and endurance sports career, that LESS is MORE. That includes what you eat and drink before, during and after your workout but also how you train.
Metabolic Efficiency was the focus of the first podcast I co-hosted with Jon Smith – called FIT FAT FAST. Can you train in a fasted state? It depends.
To become fat adapted, one needs to change not only how, what and when they eat but also other lifestyle factors need to be addressed as well as STRESS, SLEEP and DIGESTION/GUT HEALTH. Yes…every STRESS response is a blood sugar response. Read all about it in my book LIFE IS NOT A RACE and in my manual ‘The WHOLESTIC Method’.
So can you FAST before a workout? It depends if you are a fat burner or a sugar burner. If you are a sugar burner, then we need to train you to become fat adapted and metabolically efficient. You have to train your body to use fat as its main fuel source in order to workout fasted as I often do first thing in the morning. I can wake up, have my water and “fat” coffee and go for a 2 hour bike ride or run with steady energy.
We have stored body fat in our body… don’t you think we should use it for fuel instead of having to eat and re-fuel so often for a workout session? Becoming fat adapted and exercising in a fasted state is so much easier as you don’t have an uncomfortable full belly or have to take time eating food (usually processed and high in sugars).
Once you use up your stored glycogen fuel source in your liver and muscles in a workout as a long run or bike ride, you will hit the “wall” and “bonk”- feeling as the tank empty. That is if you are sugar burner and training above your anaerobic threshold or testing fat burning rate (RQ value). How do you access the stored fat in your cells for energy to continue on? Metabolic flexibility is the ability to switch from sugar burning to fat burning but a sugar burner can’t switch back and forth…only a fat burner can burn both sugar and fat for fuel! Think about the most efficient method at keeping a camp fire burning…would you want to burn kindling wood or logs?
If you start following a low-carb, moderate protein and higher healthy fat food plan, you begin to train your body to burn fat for fuel (the logs vs. kindling in the fire). When we workout in a fasted state, along with a low-carb food plan, we train our muscles to use fat for energy/fuel. We then can preserve the stored muscle glycogen when we need it- for that sprint up the top of the hill or to the finish line. The major BUT here is it DEPENDS…you can’t just go out tomorrow without eating and ride two hours. We must train the body first with how, when and what we eat …then progress into fasted morning workouts.o
For example, I can wake up in the early morning (4:30 AM) and go lift weights with treadmill intervals in between, go train clients (standing watching form!), run/walk with a client and lunch time masters swim workout with only fuel from a fat coffee, Axe Keto Protein shake and some Keto O/S mixed in.
Follow me to part two…
