Do Carbohydrates Improve Your Exercise Performance?
Carbohydrate intake for performance benefit is all about timing. To support heavy endurance training loads, carbohydrates are are a great tool.
During your workout, carbs are good to prevent the complete depletion of glycogen stores and the subsequent reliance on fat only as an energy source. Note - it's okay to use fat as energy, but it requires us to train and compete at a lower intensity level. If you are choosing to train at a higher intensity level, our POWER or BURST carb blends will support your efforts of 90 minutes or less. If you are completing endurance efforts greater than 2 hours in length, try our RIDE or RUN carb formulas.
Post workout, it is imperative that you take in a recovery drink. For strength-based athletes, a 2:1 carb to protein ratio is recommended to support muscle protein synthesis. For those training in an endurance based sport, metabolic conditioning, or have depleted glycogen levels, a 4:1 carb to protein ratio is ideal. Carbs, with the presence of protein, are necessary to support muscle protein synthesis. This will aid in the repair and growth of muscle at a quicker rate, as opposed to refuelling on a solely protein based drink. Generally, if we use carbs (simple carbs) during and post-workout, we can optimize not only our performance but also our recovery.
There is a great podcast that we've referenced in the past that discusses carbohydrate availability & training adaptation. Professor John Hawley provides science backed information regarding carbohydrates and performance. He recommends the periodization of carbs as the most effective way to improve performance (don't train low carb, don't train high carb, train smart carb).
Carbohydrates and Weight Loss: Exercise alone and/or diet alone are strategies doomed to failure for weight loss. One of the main problems in today's society in regards to low carbohydrate diets is what is actually considered "low carb". By definition, low carb means 25% of your energy or less coming from carbohydrates. The now popular low carb + high fat diets are promoting reduced intakes at much less than what "low carb" actually means. This raises the question: does a low carbohydrate approach drive the weight loss or is it adequate to have just high protein? Varying the carbohydrate content makes very little difference as long as you're energy restricted and you're exercising. In the linked podcast, a study is discussed where participants are put through a 16-week exercise diet; moderate energy restriction (carbohydrates), 3 sessions of aerobic training per week and 3 resistance training workouts per week. On average, the participants lost 8kg of fat and had a slight increase of lean muscle mass. Ultimately, you can maintain muscle mass and lose fat mass providing that your protein intake is slightly above the RDA.
Of the 61 published studies on carbohydrates and performance, over 82% showed a significant performance benefit from using carbohydrates to fuel performance.
Training in a low-glycogen state: Any time you take carbohydrates or energy away from the muscle, you are putting metabolic stress on the muscle, encouraging it to work harder, and challenging it to a greater degree. Though this low-glycogen state may enhance fat metabolism and potentially improve endurance performance, it doesn't always lead to overall performance benefit. When we train low, which most of us generally do during a morning session, our second session of the day goes down in intensity and power by an average of 7-8%. When we fuel appropriately with carbs, our glycogen stores are readily available in that second training session, leading to improved performance.
At the end of the day, it is important to trial and error in order to determine what best suits your training needs and performance. What works well for you will not necessarily work well for the next person. At Gruppo, we are here to support you by providing fuel specific to each step of your training journey. Should you wish to discuss which products will best serve you, feel free to send us a message or book a complementary consult with our CEO, Darcy Haggith.
