Going Primal while endurance training.....bad idea? page 2

[Karma]

I have been training for endurance sports, coaching several endurance athletes and taking classes from the US Olympic Triathlon team nutritionist for several seasons. There is some merit to the "fat burner" idea, its called metabolic efficiency. I have my caloric needs down to about 100 calories per hour for upwards of 10 hours of running (50 miles). There's no way I could go that far and that long without being able to tap my fat reserves. I know its not 100% primal, but I do use a corn based "super starch" solution to avoid insulin spikes and sugar crashes while training and it works really well. People make choices every day, if you choose to be an endurance athlete and be primal there are some trade offs you may want to consider that will boost your performance and you can call those you 20% if you want to. Like adding white rice to the mix (its a pretty clean source of glucose) or considering something like Generation UCAN (super starch I mentioned). Purist will lash out at me for suggesting you consider grains, but if you are considering endurance athletic pursuits, you are not fully committing to the 100% primal philosophy anyways. Be comfortable with that and you will do better. I just make sure that on a day-to-day basis all my athletes stay really far away from processed foods, sugars and wheat and they do pretty darn well. On race day using what's available on the course is not a big deal, it won't kill you. In training I try to get folks to eat real foods,often using the squeeze tubes of baby food rather than gels. Check this out - Bob Seebohar on UCAN for Triathletes - YouTube

[Catherine]

Karma, have you looked at Allen LIm's feedzone cookbok? if so, wondering what you thought? There's a lotta rice in there! (granted, the cookbook is in no way paleo or primal, but it does acknowledge gluten free).

[Karma]

Karma, have you looked at Allen LIm's feedzone cookbok? if so, wondering what you thought? There's a lotta rice in there! (granted, the cookbook is in no way paleo or primal, but it does acknowledge gluten free).

Been eating Allen's rice cakes for years, good stuff! The book is great for natural high carb dishes. Main reason I got it was the Gluten free factor too.

[Mainer]

This members speaks with knowledge::

Check out Phil Maffetone's "the Big Book of Endurance" (some content available on his website). It is all about aerobic base and close to primal diet and philosophy.

This member does not. This is total BS and exactly why you have to be careful on who you take your advice from in this forum:

I guess that last statement saves your post... because this whole fat burner carb burner discussion is total nonsense.

Check out the book, it's a long read but well worth it. You can train for endurance events without carbs as long as you know how to train. For a few years I didn't, kept bonking while mtnbiking. Tried the "consume paleo approved carbs such as sweet potato" etc and didn't work. I accept everyone is different but you can't argue with Phil's results, he has trained several successful athletes including 6 time Ironman Mark Allen.

[UpACreek]

Maffetone's method really does work. I competed in a 340 miles kayak/canoe race last week (72 hours) with less than 150g carbs per day. I didn't have alot of a push at the end, but my aerobic pace was good enough that I didn't really need one.

[Mainer]

Maffetone's method really does work. I competed in a 340 miles kayak/canoe race last week (72 hours) with less than 150g carbs per day. I didn't have alot of a push at the end, but my aerobic pace was good enough that I didn't really need one.

Glad to see someone else on the board who has tried his methods.

2 hr 40 min mtnbike ride up and over a few mtns this past weekend with Heart Rate Monitor and Dr. Phil's training philosophy. I hadn't been on the bike for a month or so due to family obligations, despite that I did well. At the end I even had enough to sprint to the finish even though I didn't need to, should focus more on the cool down period at that time. I am very excited to keep up with this new way of training.

[primal pete]

I love that despite replying honestly to the op I have been accused of

1) being against the PB

2) lacking knowledge, without having refuting any of my claims directly and with supporting counter evidence

these fat burner threads pop up every week and invariably people link tightly controlled studies showing that there is no difference in weight loss of overall calorie intake is the same, regardless of different macro nutrients, such as this:

Ketogenic Low-Carbohydrate Diets have no Metabolic Advantage over Nonketogenic Low-carbohydrate diets | BodyRecomposition - The Home of Lyle McDonald

I linked a secondary source because he explains the study very well in layman terms, but if you want to read it yourself, it's right there in the title.

People seem to love entertaining whether they can do low carb endurance training without asking if they should or if it's optimal. Primal =/= low carb

[clint2]

I am new here and would like to introduce myself. I am an avid distance runner(halfs and full marathons). I believe this is not a one size fits all deal. My training was suffering since nov of last year. I recently went to a keto diet and my performance has improved drastically. Would this work for everybody? I dont believe it would, but it is definetly working for me