194. Energy Metabolism Unveiled

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[00:00:25] for podcasters, I feel like having the option of making video podcasts is definitely something So 194 of the marathon running podcast in this episode, we're going to talk about metabolism and running. This is the marathon running podcast by Lettie and Ryan from We Got The Runs. Join us in our running community for weekly content that is motivational, educational

[00:01:43] and inspirational and let the marathon running we learn about it the better we can utilize information to make us faster and better. I remember in college I used to look up Gatorade and when they started that for a little history I did go to University of Florida and University of Florida I think was the

[00:03:02] place where they invented Gatorade and they noticed that like if they didn't

[00:03:05] give their athletes just plain water but they gave them electrolytes also and they realized, oh, you're losing like potassium and sodium and these other elements as well as the water that's coming off in the sweat. So in order to like make sure that you're being at your peak performance, we need to replace that by providing that in a drink that you can drink. And so I think that's how they originally came up with it.

[00:04:20] But it's just, it's interesting anyway, an interesting concept. It makes sense.

[00:04:23] Yeah, yeah. And I mean, even just with the Gatorade, see how far they have come with that in Atlanta, Georgia, John Pemberton, who made the original formula in his backyard. His recipe contained cocaine in the form of extract from cocoleaf, which inspired the cocoa part of the beverage's name. The cola comes from the colon, which contains caffeine, another stimulant. So I wonder if it, you know, I originally, maybe

[00:05:41] they had cocaine and caffeine, I the Department of Health Sciences. He's also the program director of the Exercise Physiology. He's a director of the Human Performance Lab of St. Joseph's University. He's studying nutrition in depth and has become to be an expert in this field exactly, so we're super lucky to have him on today. So before we get off to another tangent, do you want to get into it?

[00:07:02] Yes, let's do that. And without studying the endurance athlete, ultra endurance athlete. I've done 50 miler, I've done the Eastern States 100, 100 miler, so it's a little about me. That's a little and it's a lot. And we are definitely in good hands here. I'm super excited for this conversation today.

[00:08:22] And perhaps let's kick it off with a definition

[00:08:25] for you to give us in regards to energy metabolism.

[00:09:25] cells have a sodium potassium ATPase pump, this little pump that moves sodium and potassium in and out. So we need energy all the time. Most of what we talk about in the running

[00:09:30] world in the exercise world primarily relates to our skeletal muscle. So in order for me

[00:09:37] to talk right now, I have to contract muscles, you know, in my tongue, in my lips, in my

[00:09:43] lungs to push the air in and out. And he studied on, that's Hans Krebs, and my mentor at grad school studied under him. So anyway, he had a textbook that he made himself for advanced nutrition. It was a two semester class, and it was called keeping your brain happy.

[00:11:01] So why we want to fuel our, we really say muscles, but why we want to be able to supply energy to the working muscle. So the muscles, especially when you get to a higher intensity, are going to use more carbohydrate than they will fat primarily because carbs can give us ATP that energy at a faster rate. So they'll give us more ATP per second or per unit of time.

[00:12:22] Actually, those are really the two main reasons.

[00:12:25] I feel like there was a third, when I when we say the word deplete, we have to think, well, to be broken down and supply sugar glucose into the blood. So the liver can help maintain that blood glucose. The reason for storing it in the muscle

[00:15:00] is 100% pure energy.

[00:15:02] Once that sugar and glucose gets into the muscle

[00:15:05] and it's stored as glycogen,

[00:15:06] or really just once it gets in,

[00:15:07] it's never coming back out. If you run and you're not supplying constant sugar in a drink or bar or whatever, and then you're also depleting it and then you go for another run and you're now running in a depleted glycogen state, yes, your body over time will adapt to burning more fat. It's going to send all these signals and now your muscles are going to adapt to increase

[00:16:21] the amount of fat that it can transport, the night sizzle. Gifts from the wellness and beauty department are always a nice touch. And you have to grab those chocolate dipped strawberries. Make whole foods market your Valentine's Day destination.

[00:17:40] Okay, yeah, that makes sense.

[00:17:43] And so then what about not depleting yourself food for an entire day, but just in the morning much carb. So if you didn't need anything and you don't have a race coming up, and this isn't a very high intensity workout, which those only happen 20%, then your body is going to adapt 100%. Should you feel bad? Now, here's where you have to take this into the context

[00:19:02] of your own life. Do you have a really burning machine when it comes to marathon day? Will that I guess in the later miles make us better? Once your liver is depleted of the glycogen can you then handle the aid station. Suppose you're having like GI issues from whatever goo or gel or whatever you had at the last aid station. The idea would be if you're that type of individual who only fuels your forming your metabolic enough, it's just the key is finding out what is enough. And a big part, back in like 19, it was like 1908, it was the Boston Marathon. They showed, hey, these runners don't look so good. And they tested their blood glucose and they showed that they were low. And then these runners do look good and their glucose was good.

[00:23:00] So it's like that initiated this whole widespread, well, then let's just keep giving them glucose.

[00:23:06] And then in the 60s, they started testing glucose in the muscle, glycogen. They're they're just going insane. They're like 200 they're going like nuts And there's still tons of studies for like the last 20 years Asker you can droop is like one of the big he was the director of the Gatorade sports science Institute brilliant scientist and most of his literature shows You know if we give you like Glucose because you can buy like site of sport is like pure multiple dextrin just pure glucose

[00:24:23] You can burn approximately 60 grams in an hour more fat in the muscle and then be able to burn more fat at that same running pace. That's super interesting. That also makes me wonder a little bit about the different be a trial. A lot of it's trial and error. We have recommendations. There's tons of studies that we've been doing, like thousands and thousands of studies over

[00:27:01] the last 100 years.

[00:27:04] The recommendation is we have general nutrition intake. the war and take up the glucose. Now you lower your glucose back down and then you start running and the running alone now starts taking glucose out of the blood and your blood glucose can drop even lower. Doesn't happen to a lot of people, but if it does happen to you, you're gonna bonk within 10, 15 minutes if you do something like that. So it's like, well, why are you even taking that sugar in the first place? So when you say, should I take a sucrose,

[00:28:25] mixed fructose glucose, should think, you know, I've been taking notes. This is all really interesting data. So I'm loving this.

[00:29:41] I guess, I guess, yes, trial by error, right?

[00:29:44] Because obviously we want to fuel our long runs going to shift things. So as you start to get fatigued, you're going to go out on it, even if you're running low intensity, there's an aspect of fatigue that you're going to like, get to, your brain's going to start shifting things towards just general survival mode. Like the only thing your brain cares about is keeping it alive. In the biological world, we use like the term home 15 minutes. And it's like, I know I don't. So most of the literature is based on that type of controlled, randomized, controlled trials in the laboratory on a treadmill or on a bike. And the idea is it's every 15

[00:32:20] minutes they're giving you this amount. And in the glycogen, no matter how much sugar you

[00:33:40] throw at it from the blood. All right, so then instead faster pace, your muscles are gonna break down and go into the glycogen whenever they feel the need that they need that super fuel. We store a finite amount of it over time, yeah, deplete it, you can replenish it and store it a little bit more, but you can only pack so much sugar into your muscle because your muscle has to store water with it. But we don't spare it.

[00:35:00] So every podcast I ever go on,

[00:35:02] I love dispelling that myth

[00:35:04] because all of the sudden you just like can't run anymore. Because what would start to happen is once that glycogen gets low, now you're not able to maintain that pace because you can't generate the energy that fast to keep your muscles contracting.

[00:36:20] So you would just slow down.

[00:36:21] But because the brain cares about survival, that slowing down many times can come with different gels in depth. I've tested UCan since about November. I feel great using it. It might also be that, you know, for the first time, I'm really regularly using a gel worse before I would just kind of take whatever was in the pantry. But I'm kind of more on a regimen right now. But I know that you can talk about having their slow release carbs versus their being

[00:37:43] quickly least carbs. And since you have studied UCan, maybe you can talk to us a little bit about

[00:38:43] doesn't slosh around in your stomach, and then it just sits in the small intestine, which doesn't slosh around, and it gets broken down very, very, very slowly.

[00:38:47] So I put elite runners.

[00:38:49] I tied triathletes, ultra endurance marathon runners.

[00:38:51] They ran three hours on the treadmill, and they did it three times.

[00:38:55] They either took water, they used generation U-KIN, or they used a maltodextrin, which

[00:39:00] is pure glucose and absorbed faster than almost any other sugar on the market.

[00:39:05] They each came in three times, and what've talked in the past of this idea of consistency. You've got to be consistent with your training runs, you know, and it's that consistency that's going to lead to you probably toying the line on marathon day

[00:40:22] and running the pace that you want because you've, you have a proven track record

[00:40:25] of miles and bouts under your belt.

[00:41:24] that's around, if you're running, that's around like 70. If you wear like a continuous glucose monitor, if I was working with an athlete, the invention of CGM's, that's like a game changer

[00:41:30] because I can personally dial you in and have you run out on a fasted run or give you something

[00:41:36] like the Live Steady you can and then watch your glucose and ask you, hey, how do you feel? Let me

[00:41:41] know when you start to feel tired and then I am not paid by a generation you can. I have never been paid by

[00:43:02] generation you can. The study that I've done in the research lab, Okay, perfect. Now I appreciate your transparency. So I appreciate your time. Yeah, no, I, I, I, it's an honor and a privilege. I hope to bring nothing but value to your show. I support your success and hope to bring nothing but value to your listeners. Perhaps you can let our listeners know how they can find you if they want more information.

[00:45:41] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you can go. I have a drop us a note on Instagram or wherever. And I guess at this point, we want to thank our sponsor, Generation You Can. If you are tired of the spike in crash or if you have some GI distress, why not give him a try? Because you know Emily Sisson, Sarah Hall, Emma Bates, Carrot Amato, all those top runners use YouCan.

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[00:47:03] If you want to use MRP as a code for 20% actually, you know what? I wanted to be a reporter and journalist and author and all that stuff up until I was 15. Until you moved out of the country, huh? Where all of a sudden, you know, I wasn't as quick anymore. I couldn't just crack those jokes because the English vocabulary wasn't quite there yet. So it definitely is

[00:48:24] impressive that you can even do a podcast now after learning the language, your third language.