By Allison Fahrenbach | Published on October 4, 2017
Everyone wants to cut, remove or limit carbs – and not just sedentary, overweight folk, either. Active, hard working, hard training people do, too. It’s a shame, because active people who are already lean have the least to gain and most to lose by going low-carb.
If you train hard, this energy source is your best friend because it will enhance your performance, physique, body composition and overall sense of wellbeing.
Fuel your improvements
This is the first and foremost reason why it’s important to consume adequate carbohydrate intake. Intense training is what provides the stimulus needed for you to make progress with your physique and if you cannot train intensely, you can’t make intense gains. Carbs provide the fuel.
Cutting carbs too severely can leave you feeling lethargic, fatigued and miserable. Regardless of whether your goals involve performance, strength or aesthetics, it’s wise to consume the majority of your carbs around your training window. That means consuming them as part of the last meal you eat before training, during training and immediately afterwards to maximise your workouts. How much you consume will depend upon your daily calorific requirements and the length and intensity of your workouts.
Typically if your training lasts longer than 1.5 hours, then try taking some during training. Anything shorter than that, and consumption before and after will be sufficient.
Be the boss of lean muscle
Carbs are known to be “protein sparingâ€. This means they protect the protein you eat from being converted to glucose to serve as an energy source. The last thing you want is for valuable protein to undergo this conversion, because there aren’t adequate carbs to fuel your training.
Without adequate carb intake, your body might be placed into a muscle-wasting state, which can have a negative impact not just on how you look or feel, but also on the overall health of your metabolism.
You want protein to be available to sustain lean muscle tissue and the best way to prevent your body being forced to use protein for fuel is to consume carbohydrates, specifically in and around the time of your training.
Find your chill
They are essential in the proper functioning of the central nervous system (CNS), which is impacted by your training just as the rest of your body is, and its ability to function optimally and recover appropriately is essential to your progress.
Your CNS is responsible for generating muscular contractions in all types of training, so when you aren’t properly fueled, or fully recovered, eventually it can tire out. When your CNS is tired, you don’t have the ability to generate force or power as usual, and chances are you’ll feel fuzzy-headed and uncoordinated.
Eating carbs helps combat this. The human brain uses blood glucose as its main fuel source, and it doesn’t have a stored supply in the same way the muscles and liver do. This is why low-carb diets make you feel like you’re in a brain fog, impairing your CNS function and affecting training.
Consuming carbs helps facilitate proper CNS function, and also affords your nervous system time the to recover from hard training.
– RELATED: Which Carbs Should You Eat During The Day? –
Destroy squat ravaged legs
Insulin has received a lot of negative attention in recent years, but the truth is at certain times, spiking insulin has its uses. One of these times is in the post-workout window.
Releasing insulin post-workout acts as an anabolic hormone, helping to drive protein into the worked muscle tissue for enhanced muscular growth and faster recovery.
Therefore, fully replenishing your muscle glycogen levels as quickly as possible after workouts is important for growth.
Abs left wanting
A lot of hard working athletes avoid carbs in an attempt to coax their body to burn fat, but the truth is that carbohydrate needs to be present
in order to enable fat metabolism. In other words, you need carbs for fat to be successfully used as energy.
If a low level of carbs exists, a substance known as pyruvate begins to build up. Pyruvate is formed during glucose metabolism and plays an incredibly important role in the energy process. If glucose is absent, pyruvate can’t do its job properly.
When pyruvate can’t do its job, fat has nowhere to attach in the body’s mitochondria, which slows the metabolism and halts – or extremely lessens – the body’s ability to utilise fat for fuel.
The final word
Carbs also provide dietary fibre, help boost your mood, bolster heart health and can help you to focus and enhance your memory.
A good rule of thumb is to eat around 1g per lb of bodyweight per day of carbohydrate to start. Depending upon your training, body, metabolism and goals, you can go as low as 0.5g per lb of bodyweight, or up to around 1.5g or so per lb of bodyweight.
Strive to get most of your carbohydrates from nutrient-dense whole foods to ensure that you optimise body composition, health, wellbeing and recovery.
Allison Fahrenbach is a natural pro figure athlete, trainer, nutritionist and owner of AFS Training.