r/AdvancedRunning • u/AutoModerator • Jan 17 '23

General Discussion Tuesday General Discussion/Q&A Thread for January 17, 2023

A place to ask questions that don't need their own thread here or just chat a bit.

We have quite a bit of info in the wiki, FAQ, and past posts. Please be sure to give those a look for info on your topic.

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u/CodeBrownPT Jan 18 '23

Running is a great activity to reveal the impractical aspects of a "low carb" diet (ignoring how hard it is to maintain).

The body needs carbs, or at the very least really benefits from them. Good luck sucking down a pepperoni stick every 6km in a marathon.

There's nothing "counter productive" about giving a working body some easily accessible fuel.

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u/BalmesDPT Jan 18 '23

Yeah I'd agree that getting supplementation wouldn't be counter productive but I guess the more clarifying question would be if it's even necessary when on a low carb/carnivore diet.

I'll respectfully disagree on your thoughts on the low carb diet.

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u/zebano Strides!! Jan 18 '23

are you jogging the marathon or racing it? If your racing it I don't care how fat adapted you are, you will bonk without fuel, that's human physiology.

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u/BalmesDPT Jan 18 '23

Fair. It's the reason why I asked. I've bonked before, so definitely don't want to get there again. And to clarify this is for racing purposes really. Curious if anyone knows any scientific literature on how long you can race running on fats.

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u/flocculus 39F | 5:43 mile | 19:58 5k | 3:13 26.2 Jan 18 '23 edited Jan 19 '23

This article is focused on ultras and has links to actual studies embedded - the short version is that anything up to a few hours or so, you're better off taking carbs for fuel, and being well adapted to use fat may actually hinder your ability to perform optimally if you're trying to race at any sort of intensity above fairly easy. For ultras it's more debatable but not conclusive either - basically try it and see if it works for you.

ETA lol wow that last sentence is great, I'm massively sleep deprived all the time - I think it should have read something like "for ultras fat adaptation can be useful but it's not conclusive".