Running Lean with Patrick McGilvray
It’s pretty common knowledge that if you have a faster metabolism - meaning you burn more calories while at rest - you will lose more weight. What most people don’t know is that there are many …
Continue Reading about 86. 7 Surprising Ways to Increase Your Metabolism →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 86 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. And today, I’ve got seven surprising ways to increase your metabolism. I think it’s pretty common knowledge that if you have a faster metabolism, meaning you burn more calories, while at rest, you will lose more weight.
What most people don’t know is that there are many different ways to increase your metabolism other than just running an extra 100 miles every week. Exercise is great, but it pales in comparison to other methods of increasing your metabolism. So today, I’m going to share seven surprising ways.
Some things that may, I hope, surprise you seven surprising ways to increase your metabolism so that you can burn more calories, burn more fat and become a lean running machine. That’s what we’re all about here at the Running Lean podcast.
But first, if you like the podcast, please come check out our Facebook group, the Running Lean podcast community. This group goes hand in hand with the podcast we support each other. For our goals, we encourage each other it’s a really positive encouraging environment. So I want you to come check us out, come join us over there, and join in, in all the fun, we have a lot of fun over there. So just go to Facebook and search for the Running Lean community.
And then here’s another five-star review of the Running Lean podcast. This one is from Jdog07 and Jdog says, “Love growing with this group of runners. I absolutely love this podcast. I appreciate your passion to help runners become fat adapted and become stronger runners. Your podcast makes running so much more fun to learn and to grow. Thank you so much for creating this podcast, it’s helped so much.”
Love that. Love this. And you’re welcome. I love doing the podcast. And I love sharing all this information with you guys. And it would mean a lot to me if you could just take a moment to go over to Apple podcasts, scroll down where it says leave a review and tap the stars and leave a few words of appreciation that would mean a lot to me.
And then lastly, the Running Lean coaching group is open. And I want to encourage you guys to just go check it out. And we’re doing this thing all month long as a group, we’re going through the whole thought-feeling action patterns, these things that are creating habits that have created habits for us.
A habit is just a combination of a thought feeling and an action. And there are these patterns that we’ve created over time. And we can actually change our thoughts we can change how we feel we can change what we’re doing so that we can get better results in all areas of our life. But we’re talking about trying to lose weight and having a hard time about it. You’ve got to look to your thoughts, feelings, and actions, you’ve got to look to your habits.
And then we’re just taking a really deep dive into this topic all month long over in the Running Lean coaching group right now. And we’re learning how to not only create a bunch of awareness of our thoughts, feelings, and actions, a ton of awareness of our unconscious habits, but we’re learning how to change them. We’re learning how to get better results in our lives.
So just come join us over in the Running Lean coaching group. To learn more and to sign up you can just go to runningleanpodcast.com/join. I really hope you’ll join us over there. And each month we’re going to be taking on different topics. So more to come on next month’s topic soon. All right, runningleanpodcast.com/join. I hope to see you over in the Running Lean coaching group.
Okay, let’s get into this topic today because I’ve been having a lot of fun putting this together and doing a little bit of research for you guys. But there are seven what I found surprising, very surprising ways that you can actually increase your metabolism. So what is metabolism? First of all, metabolism refers to all the chemical processes in your body. This is like all the things that your body does just a minute to maintain its function, the faster your metabolism, you know, the more calories your body burns, right.
Metabolism is why some people seem to be able to eat a lot of food without gaining weight, while others seem to eat a lot less and accumulate more weight and more fat more quickly. So the speed of your metabolism is commonly known as your metabolic rate. And it’s basically the number of calories that you burn in a day. So, exercise and metabolism, we all know that exercise burns calories, right?
Running burns calories, and you can burn a lot of calories by running, you can go out there and run 10 miles and burn 1000 calories, or whatever it is. But listen, exercise is a much smaller part of your overall metabolism. So the minimum metabolic rate required to keep you alive and functioning while at rest is called your resting metabolic rate. They also call it your basal metabolic rate, they’re pretty much the same thing.
Okay, there are some slight differences, but we’re just going to call them the same thing for our purposes today. But on average, your resting metabolic rate accounts for between 50 and 75% of total calorie expenditure per day. This is huge. So the average resting metabolic rate for women is somewhere around 1400 calories. And for men, it’s around 1600 calories.
So just by like being you just by hanging around and not doing anything, if you were to just lay down all day, just lay in bed all day, lay on the couch watching Netflix all day, you’re still gonna burn around 1500 calories a day, just by doing nothing, right. So that’s kind of cool.
And if you can do a few things to increase your resting metabolism. So if you can do some things that will improve that 1500 calories or whatever it is for you, we’re all a little bit different. By the way, you’ll become a better calorie burner, you’ll become a better fat burner, you’ll become leaner, and you’ll become more fit, you’ll become healthier. Okay?
So this is why we’re talking about this today is because the more if you’re trying to lose weight, and you’re trying to become you know, a better, more efficient fat burner than increasing your metabolism will absolutely help to get you there. So, here are my seven surprising ways to increase your metabolism other than just like running a million miles.
Alright, so number one, my number one surprising way of increasing metabolism is to eat more food. You’re probably like what? So is it the number one thing people do when they’re trying to lose weight is they eat less. And this has been the gold standard for weight loss for many, many decades. And, you know, we all understand this, if you eat less food, you will lose weight. And this all has to do with calorie expenditure, right?
What is a calorie? A calorie is defined as the amount of heat energy needed to raise the temperature of one gram of water by one degree Celsius. That’s it, it’s a unit of heat energy, okay. You can also think of it as the unit of measurement for the amount of energy your body gets from the foods that you consume.
So as you’re eating food, you can think of that as energy. And we can assign numbers to the amount of calories you’re burning and the amount of energy. Okay, so your body needs calories to function, right? We all know this stuff. But your body uses these calories in three there’s like three main processes that your your your body will use calories.
The first is your basal metabolic rate or resting metabolic rate. So this is the number of calories that you need to just cover your basic functions, right? Your brain has to function your kidneys have to function your heart has to, you know pump blood through your body, your lungs have to work your nervous system has to work all these things just working requires calories or requires energy. Without energy without calories coming in this stuff will stop functioning at some point. So that’s number one. Basal Metabolic Rate.
Number two is digestion. So your body will actually use a certain number of calories just to actually digest and metabolize the foods you eat to process, the foods that you eat. So this is known as the thermic effect of food or TF.
And then the third way that calories function in your body is through physical activities. So this refers to the number of calories needed to fuel your everyday tasks and workouts. So just sitting at your desk, driving your car, going for a walk, all these things require more calories than just your you know, basal metabolic rate. And the more physical activity you do, the higher your caloric need, typically, okay.
Generally speaking, eating more calories, taking in more calories than your body needs, will cause you to gain weight. And eating fewer calories than your body requires will cause you to lose weight. Generally speaking, this is called the energy balance theory.
And it’s supported by lots of scientific research. We all know that this does work however restricting calories too much, or for too long, will slow down your metabolism. So regularly, eating fewer calories than your body needs can cause your metabolism to become slower.
Several studies show that low-calorie diets can actually decrease the number of calories the body burns burn by as much as 23%. And this effect is known as metabolic adaptation or starvation mode. You’ve probably heard this term before. So starvation mode is basically your body’s way of warding off potential starvation and death.
So research shows that consistently, eating let’s say fewer than 1000 calories per day, leads to a significant drop in metabolic rate that sticks around long after you stop dieting. What’s more, is this lower metabolism can persist for long periods of time and can be very difficult to get back to normal.
Okay, so, you know, researchers believes that this lower metabolism may explain why more than 80% of people regain the weight. Once they go off their calorie-restricted diets. This is how they lose weight on shows like The Biggest Loser, right? They go on these massive calorie-deprived diets. And they lose a ton of weight, these people lose like hundreds of pounds or whatever.
But 93% of the people on that show regain all the weight back. It’s why they don’t ever have a reunion show on The Biggest Loser because there would only be a couple of people that show up. So cutting calories. You know, eating less, will help to lose weight in the short term, but it is definitely not sustainable. You’ve got to maintain a certain number of calories coming in, in order to keep your metabolism up.
So how much should you be eating? Well, a good rule of thumb for how much to eat if you’re trying to lose weight, is just to start with your body weight and 10 times that and in the number of calories you eat per day. So let’s say if you weigh 150 pounds, start with a daily caloric intake of around 1500 calories per day. And then you can adjust up or down depending on how fast or slow you’re losing weight.
The bottom line here is that if you’re going to lose weight by calorie restriction, which you can, it’s possible, but don’t restrict your calorie intake too much and definitely don’t do it for too long. So this is a real problem for a lot of people who go on these calorie-restricted diets and you know they lose weight, but it’s very hard to maintain that because your metabolism just slows down and slows down and slows down to match what you’re taking in. So the answer is to eat more food. Hooray!
But the type of food that you eat actually matters. And this brings me to point number two. So number two is to eat fewer carbohydrates. So all calories are not the same and our bodies certainly don’t process all calories alike. So a recent $12 million year-long study at Harvard showed that people on a low carb diet could actually eat more calories than those on a high carb diet without gaining weight.
Dr. David Ludwig was the principal investigator in the study. He’s an endocrinologist at Harvard says our study adds to the literature that suggests metabolic benefits for reducing processed carbohydrates in our diets. We found that diet had a major impact on metabolism, people consuming the lower carbohydrate diet and our study burned 250 calories per day more than those on the high carb diet.
That increase in the metabolism could spontaneously cause a 20-pound weight loss over three years without eating any less. If the low-carb diet reduced hunger and food intake as well, the weight loss would be greater. So what’s happening here? Well, there’s a relationship between carb intake, insulin, and weight gain.
So insulin is a hormone produced by the pancreas that helps keep blood sugar levels steady. And Dr. Ludwig says that insulin plays a role in weight gain when a person eats too many carbs. So after eating processed carbs from sources of specially refined carbs, like white bread cookies, cake, your insulin levels spike.
Next, insulin traps more calories in your fat cells causing weight gain. So you literally gain fat, your fat cells just get bigger and bigger. But the rest of the body still needs calories, so you remain hungry. And this cascade of events can make you more likely to overeat and slow your metabolism.
And Dr. Ludwig says that study participants who had been producing the most insulin, so the high insulin screeners saw the biggest effect on the low carb diet. The theory is that on their normal diets, the participants’ bodies worked in overdrive to produce insulin leading to an extra two extra stored calories and a slower metabolism.
So on the low carb diet, these high insulin creators were burning 400 more calories per day with those compared with those on the high carb diet. So the bottom line, eat fewer carbs, and you’ll increase your metabolism, eat more carbs, especially refined carbs, and you decrease your metabolism. That’s fascinating to me.
Number three is to lift heavy things. So an increase in muscle mass means you will burn more calories at rest. So it requires more energy for your body to carry around muscle than it does to carry around fat. So the more muscle mass that you put on, the more your metabolism increases.
So just having more muscle on your body will increase your metabolism and you don’t have to, you know, obviously, you have to do something to get more muscle. But once it’s there, you just become more efficient at burning calories. So your metabolism becomes increased just from having more muscle and it stays that way as long as you maintain that muscle mass.
So weight training will help you to maintain your metabolism, especially as you’re losing weight. So one thing that a lot of people get wrong is they try to lose weight. You know, maybe they’re doing the calorie deprivation sort of thing to lose weight calorie restriction, but they’re not doing any kind of weight training. And so they end up a lot of people end up losing muscle mass.
As they lose weight, a lot of the weight that they’re losing is actually muscle, which is not good because this just is going to make weight loss even harder for you because you’re losing muscle. And the more muscle you have helps to increase your metabolism. So you’re losing muscle, which just that alone will decrease your metabolism.
And if you’re doing the low carb thing, then that’s going to decrease your metabolism too. So, in one study 48 overweight women were placed on a diet of 800 calories per day, along with either no exercise or aerobic exercise or resistance training, weightlifting. After the diet, the women who did the resistance training, maintained their muscle mass, maintained their metabolism, and maintained their strength.
The others lost weight but also lost muscle mass and experienced a decrease in metabolism. So very simple way to increase your metabolism and get more muscle, lift heavy things. Do some sort of resistance training. And it doesn’t have to be some crazy convoluted thing where you’re spending 12 hours a week at the gym, you can do a full-body workout twice a week, and that would be sufficient to increase your muscle mass and maintain it, especially really, it only takes about one weight training session per week to maintain muscle mass.
But if you want to build more muscle, you need to do at least two weight training sessions a week, full body twice a week, 30 minutes each time all it really takes. And you can definitely increase your muscle mass and therefore increase your metabolism.
Alright, number four. The fourth surprising way to increase your metabolism is to eat more protein. So when you eat food, you burn calories. Every time you eat anything, your body has to use some energy, some calories in order to digest absorb, and process the nutrients in the food. So your body burns energy just by eating food, which is pretty cool, right? This is called the thermic effect of food or TF.
And different foods have different TF. So when you eat fat, this will increase your metabolic rate by up to 3%. Eating carbs can increase your metabolic rate by up to 10%. Like eating protein increases your metabolic rate up to 30%. So eating more protein means you are burning more calories, just by eating more protein means you are actually increasing your metabolism.
So the more protein you eat, the more your metabolism is increased. And eating more protein helps to build and maintain muscle mass which further increases your metabolism. So eating more protein is definitely something I recommend people do. It’s we’re focused on the wrong thing.
I think a lot of times when it comes to diet so many people are focused on just eating less in general. And instead what if you’re eating more? What if you’re eating more protein? How would that affect your weight loss? I think it would help would definitely help.
So now before I get into the last three items on my list, I want to take a pause here and talk about a common scenario. I talk to people every day who’ve been trying to lose weight for years, and nothing seems to be working. It’s really frustrating. I hear from so many people that are you know, they’ve been doing everything and it’s not working for them. And so when I asked, you know, most people, when I ask them, What are they doing? What, what it turns out, they’re doing this they’re cutting calories.
So they’re eating a lot less food for long periods of time. They’re eating a diet high in carbohydrates. So you know, they’re they’re following the advice of like, eat lots of healthy grains, you know, eat all the vegetables, eat all the fruits, you know, so they end up eating a lot of carbohydrates. They’re not doing any kind of resistance training.
So they’re not lifting anything heavy, they’re not building muscle, or they’re doing it wrong. They’re not lifting heavy enough weights. And so it ends up being more of like a cardio workout. And so they’re not building and maintaining muscle mass, they’re losing muscle. And then the fourth thing is that they’re not eating enough protein.
And I especially see this in women, women seem to have a really hard time eating enough protein. Okay. So what most people do when they’re trying to lose weight is they cut calories, eat a lot of carbs, don’t do any resistance training, and don’t get enough protein. Does this sound familiar? Is this you? Have you been doing this? Have you tried this? Does it work?
So many people take this approach to weight loss and they wonder why things aren’t working. But listen, every single one of these things slows down your metabolism. So if you were to do nothing else, if you were to just take one thing away from this discussion today, here’s what I want it to be for you do these four things: eat more food, lower your carbohydrate intake, especially refined carbohydrates, lift weights, do it properly, make sure it’s heavy enough and eat more protein.
You do these four things. I promise you, you’re gonna start to see better results, you’re gonna feel better. You’re gonna have more energy, your metabolism is gonna be higher and I think you’re gonna find that losing weight becomes easier. Okay, that was a little rant I went on there.
Back to my list, number five. Number five on my list of seven surprising ways to increase your metabolism is to drink more water. Yes, just drinking water can actually speed up your metabolism. A study found that water plays a role in increasing your resting metabolic rate through a process called water-induced thermogenesis.
So drinking about a pint of water can temporarily boost your metabolic rate by up to 30%. And this increase in metabolic rate seems to last for like 30 to 45 minutes. So drinking water, which is completely calorie-free, by the way, causes you to burn calories. What, how cool is that? So they did this study on overweight adults, and they show that when they drank half a liter of water, around 30 minutes before a meal, these people lost 44% more weight than those who did not drink water. So just this one thing accounted for 44% more weight loss, just drinking half a liter of water about half an hour before a meal. I mean, to me, this is a significant, significant finding.
If you’re not convinced that you should be drinking more water, I hope you’re being convinced now. And cold water seems to be even better because your body has to use more energy to heat up the water before it can process it. So just you know drinking cold water, especially about half an hour before a meal will help you to lose weight to help you to increase your metabolism.
So how much water should you be drinking? Well, a good rule of thumb is just to take your body weight and divide it in half. And this is the minimum number of ounces of water you should be drinking each day. So for me, I weigh 175 pounds, if I divide that by two, that’s 87 and a half ounces of water per day, or around five and a half pints of water, that would be a minimum. And for those who follow the metric system, five and a half pints would equate to about 2.5 to three liters of water. It’s like 2.7 liters of water.
So if you’re getting, you know, a couple to three liters of water a day, I think this is totally sufficient. I think this is awesome. At a minimum, right. So just you know more is fine. But a lot of this is going to be detrimental for a lot of different reasons. But you know, drinking more water will help to increase your metabolism.
There’s another beverage that helps to increase your metabolism. Can you guess what it is? It’s my favorite, my favorite beverage. So number six, the sixth surprising way to increase your metabolism is to drink more coffee. That’s right, coffee has been shown to increase your metabolism. This is such good news. makes me so happy. Love my coffee.
So a study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition shows that caffeine can increase your resting metabolic rate by as much as 11% with larger doses having a greater effect. Okay, so most of this increase in metabolism is actually caused by an increase in fat burning. So not only does coffee increase your metabolism, but it’s directly related to burning more fat specifically.
Now, here’s something I thought was kind of interesting. This effect on metabolism from caffeine seems to be less pronounced in people who are obese. So one study showed that caffeine increased fat burning by as much as 20% in leaner people while the increase was only about 10% in obese individuals, so okay, the leaner you are, the greater the increase in the metabolic rate from caffeine.
But either way, there’s still an increase in metabolism just from drinking coffee, which I think is really cool. And it doesn’t have to be just coffee it can be you can get the same effect from other natural sources of caffeine like green tea, black tea matcha, which is just powdered green tea, right? So, coffee is good for you.
Coffee increases metabolism. Coffee increases fat burning coffee makes life good in general. So if you’re a coffee drinker, you’re my people. You’re with me on this. If you hate coffee, or you’ve never had it before, then you’re missing out. I’m just telling you just start drinking coffee. Give it a shot. It’s a bit of an acquired taste. But I love it. Love it. Love it, love it.
Okay, and number seven on my list of surprising ways to increase your metabolism is to get a good night’s sleep. Sleep will increase your metabolism. What? I know these things, some of these things sound like counterintuitive, but it’s so true because we Just keep thinking of like, Oh, you wanna increase your metabolism, go run more, go exercise more jump up and down. You know, if somebody told me Oh, you want to increase your metabolism, go sleep. It’s like what, that doesn’t make any sense, but it’s true.
Sleep is how we rest. It’s how we recover. It’s how we rejuvenate. And most of us are not getting enough sleep. The consequences of sleep deprivation are being increasingly recognized by science like we are a sleep-deprived society. Currently, we sleep on average, about 6.8 hours, this is the average person’s 6.8 hours of sleep a night, as opposed to nine hours of sleep a century ago. Let’s bring those days back. Right.
So around 30% of adults report sleeping less than six hours per night. This lack of adequate sleep is making it very difficult for us to maintain metabolic and hormonal equilibrium. Without adequate sleep. Our bodies just don’t function properly, our bodies are kept in a highly stressful state. That when you’re stressed out, the stress hormone cortisol is increased blood sugar is higher insulin is higher. And lack of sleep is directly linked to a major increase in the risk of obesity.
And this is partly because of the negative effects of sleep deprivation on your metabolism. So Michael Breus. He’s a PhD, author of Beauty Sleep, and the Clinical Director of the sleep division for Arrowhead Health in Glendale, Arizona. He says if you are sleep deprived, meaning that you’re not getting enough minutes of sleep or good quality sleep, your metabolism will not function properly.
On average, we need about seven and a half hours of quality sleep per night, he says. And if you’re getting this already, you know another half hour is not going to help you lose 10 pounds. But if you’re a five-hour sleeper, and you start to sleep for seven hours a night you will start dropping weight. This is fascinating.
So exactly how the lack of sleep affects our metabolism has a lot to do with our nightly hormones. So there are two hormones that are key in this process and they are ghrelin and leptin. Ghrelin is the hunger hormone that tells you it’s time to eat. And when you’re sleep-deprived, you have more ghrelin, so you end up being more hungry, and you end up eating more food.
Leptin is the hormone that tells you to stop eating is the satiety hormone. So when you’re sleep-deprived, you have less leptin, and you end up eating more food. So you’re eating more, plus your metabolism is slower when you’re sleep-deprived. So getting a good night’s sleep will directly increase your metabolism. I think this is awesome.
So, everybody, I’m giving you permission to sleep more. I’ve been really focused on sleep lately. And I gotta tell you, I feel so much better when I get seven half, eight hours of sleep. If I get eight hours of sleep, I feel good. I don’t, I can’t really sleep more than that. I don’t know about nine hours of sleep. I really know it’d be hard for me to do that right now. Because I just wake up and I’m like, Okay, I’m ready to go. Because I feel good. I feel rested when I wake up in the morning.
And I think my metabolism is really efficient like I’m burning plenty of calories, even at rest. So I mean, everything seems to be functioning properly for me. So I’m in a good place with my sleep. And I would encourage you to do what it takes to make sure you’re getting a good night’s sleep. Make sure you’re sleeping in a cool dark room. Make sure you’re not doing screens right before you go to bed. You know that blue light can disrupt sleep.
If you sleep with someone, make sure they don’t, you know, bother you or like keep waking you up all night long. Hate those people that do that. So getting a good night’s sleep is so important just it’ll absolutely help to increase your metabolism.
So quick summary. There are many ways you can increase your metabolism and promote healthy weight loss and improve fat burning all while supporting your goals as a runner, so number one, eat more food. Number two, eat fewer carbs, especially refined carbs. Number three, lift heavy things. Number four, eat more protein. Number five, drink more water especially cold water. Number six, drink more coffee, or green tea or macho black tea. And then number seven, get a good night’s sleep.
Well, I hope you found something interesting and something helpful from this podcast today. I had a lot of fun putting this together. And be sure to join us over in the Running Lean coaching group for this month of August. We’re taking a deep dive into our habits into those thought-feeling action patterns that are creating the habits.
They’ve created habits that are not serving us, we’re trying to learn how to create new habits that do serve us, we want to change our health and our fitness in our, in our mindset. And we’re doing all of that over in the Running Lean coaching group. So just go to runningleanpodcast.com/join.
And if you did get something out of this today, if you could consider sharing this with a friend, I would so appreciate that. Love you all keep on Running Lean, and I’ll talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
Recently, I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how to fuel your runs as a low-carb runner. It might be because we’re back in marathon season and your runs are starting to get longer. I …
Continue Reading about 84. Fueling Strategies for Low-Carb Running →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 84 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today we’re going to be talking about fueling strategies for low carb running. Recently, I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how to fuel your runs as a low carb runner. And that might be because, you know, all of a sudden we’re back in Marathon season, I know, where does the time go?
And maybe our runs are starting to get longer. I think it’s partly that. And I also think there’s some fear around this idea of like, I’m just afraid I’m going to bonk when I get up into these higher mileage runs.
And so, you know, and I get that totally because I was also very skeptical about fueling for these longer runs without using carbs without carb loading the days before a run and without using gels during a run.
Because that’s just the way I did it for like the first 15 years or so of my running. And it kind of worked, you know, and so I was thinking there’s just no other way to do this, right? Well, today, I’m here to tell you that there is another way.
And I’m going to share my thoughts and my experience around this topic, and offer up several different fueling strategies that you can try if you want to, you know, perform at your best as a low carb runner.
And I’m hoping by the end of this episode, you feel a little less fearful about those long runs and feel a little more confident about this low carb approach to running this fat adapted approach to running Cool.
Alright, so if you’d like this podcast, please come check out the Running Lean community on Facebook. This is a group that goes hand in hand with the podcast. It gives you a chance to ask questions and feel supported. It’s a fun, positive group of runners just search for Running Lean community on Facebook, and join us we’re always doing fun stuff over there. So come check us out.
And here’s a recent five star review of the Running Lean podcast actually, I’m like, this is not recent. This is from awhile back. But I just found this I just saw this review and I was like, Oh, this is cool. I need to share this.
And this is from SBerger2020. And this person writes, “Running motivator with great info. I love listening to this podcast, I’m training for a triathlon and I couldn’t be happier with the topics to achieve those goals. Plus, I get lean in the process. Thank you for putting the amount of effort you do on this podcast, Patrick.”
Well, you’re welcome. And hey, if you ever want to share a little love, and you enjoy the podcast, it’s simple. All you got to do is open up Apple podcasts, you know, find the Running Lean podcast, scroll down, tap the stars leave a few comments. And that would mean the world to me would love that.
And just so you guys know the Running Lean coaching group is open. And this is a fun group of people. We’re all working towards similar goals. We’re trying to lose weight, improve our health, improve our running performance, become that badass person that we’ve always wanted to be and learn how to make it last.
Alright, so this is a monthly membership program. So you can you can join us any time. When you’re ready. I want this to be available for you. It’s always there for you when you are ready. So come and join us. You get the weight loss training course for runners. That’s a self paced online program that you can go through also another self paced program is the achieving the impossible course about goal setting, creating an extraordinary life by going after unrealistic goals.
We do weekly live coaching calls via zoom. So we do a big group zoom once a week. And you get the support and encouragement of people that are doing very similar things that you’re doing all right. Most importantly though, you get accountability.
We’re gonna like check in on you and see if you’re sticking to your plan. See if you’re moving towards your goals, we want to help you stay on track. So this is a big big part of what we do in the group. Okay.
I also have a private members only Facebook group that goes along with this and we we do some some coaching and training and teaching in there as well. And this month, August we’re talking about the thought, feeling, action pattern. These things that sometimes they keep us stuck. You know, we don’t even know we’re doing it, but we have these thought feeling action patterns that are responsible for either moving us closer to our goals or moving us further away.
And we need to learn how to harness the power of our own thoughts and feelings so that we can do what we want to do. And we can start achieving the things that we want to achieve, whether it’s weight loss, or big running goals, whatever it is for you. We want to help you get there.
And understanding your thoughts, feelings and actions and learning how to control that stuff is key, it’s key. So come and join us just if you want more information, you can look it up at runningleanpodcast.com/join.
Okay, let’s talk about fueling strategies for low carb running. So if you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that I talk a lot about how awesome it is to be a fat adapted runner. Right? So fat adapted running just means you have changed your main source of fuel from sugar to fat, you know, you’re not burning carbs for energy, as much, we always are burning some glucose or glycogen for energy, we’re always burning some fat for energy.
But the ratios are much different when you’re fat adapted, much higher, burning much more fat. So some of the benefits of becoming a fat adapted runner, you have, basically the hunger issue goes away, right, you’re just no longer hungry all the time, no GI distress.
When you’re running, you become bonk proof, you can basically feel like you can run all day, and I’ve done up to eight hours of straight running without any fuel at all. So I can attest that, you know, now I haven’t gone 24 hours or anything like that.
But you know, you just feel like you can just keep going, it’s amazing. You always have plenty of fuel onboard, you know, you’re carrying around your own fuel source, you’re burning your own body fat, which is amazing. So you don’t have to carry fuel with you don’t have to carry all the gels and goos and blocks and all that other stuff or, or like pizzas or hoagies, whatever you take with you on your long runs, people take all kinds of stuff.
Some other benefits is obviously you’re burning fat. So you you tend to lose weight much more efficiently than if you’re eating a bunch of sugar and stuff like that. You have better focus and concentration you can like perform better when you’re out there running, you can think more clearly. And running is just easier. Okay.
But I think there’s a misconception that you always have to do your runs on fuel because I’ve talked a few times I’ve you know, talked on the podcast here about doing a marathon or a 50k on fuel. And I just want you to know that we don’t have to do everything on fuel. That’s not like necessarily the optimal way to go for everybody. Okay.
So when we talk about running sans fuel we’re kind of talking about running in the fasted state. So what does this mean? Why? Why do we? Well, you know, why would we run in the fasted state? Well, the fasted state just means you haven’t had any food, or, or quote unquote, fuel for, you know, 12 hours or so. Right?
In the definition of fasted could be different for different people. But that’s kind of the general rule of it. So when I say I’m running faster, that means I had dinner the night before I wake up in the morning, I might have some coffee, and then I go for a run. That’s what I mean by running in the fasted state. So it might be 8 or 10 hours. Usually, it’s about 10 to 12 hours of having no food. Alright, so that’s what we mean by running in the fasted state.
But why would we do this like Why run in that fasted state? Well, there’s a lots of reasons why we do this, it helps to boost your fat burning. So just being in that fasted state will lower your blood sugar and lowers your insulin, which will increase fat burning. So you you can burn fat more efficiently when you’re fasted as opposed to having fuel.
You produce alternative fuel sources like ketones while you’re in that fasted state and ketones you can use as fuel on we’re going to talk about that later on here today. You actually get an increase of energy when fasting people think you like you have a loss of energy but you don’t you you get a you produce more adrenaline, you have more energy, not less, you can actually train harder.
You can have more intense workouts you can run harder, so you don’t lose energy actually get an increase of energy, which is kind of cool. Running in the fasted state helps to decrease inflammation. So sugar, and specifically insulin is very pro inflammatory.
And if you want any proof of this, just like, if you’re doing like pretty low carb, just eat a bunch of sugar, and watch the scale go up the next day, like three pounds, I did this recently, I ate a bunch of carbs. And I gained three pounds over the course of a day and a half, basically.
So when we eat sugar, it raises our blood sugar insulin gets raised in, try to bring that blood sugar down. And insulin is very pro inflammatory. So you can actually decrease inflammation, which is a good thing when you’re running, you know, especially if you’re doing long distance type of running, right.
So you get a decrease in inflammation when you’re running in the fasted state, you get more growth hormone produced when you’re running in the fasted state. Which growth hormone is awesome, because it helps to increase bone density helps to increase muscle mass and helps you to recover faster from these longer harder workouts.
So fasting, basically, you know, running in the fasted state allows you to train harder, recover faster, it speeds up the fat adaptation process. So if you’re trying to become fat adapted, if you’re making that transition to from being like more of a sugar burner to being a fat burner, then one of the keys to fat adaptation is like you’ve got to force your body to start using your own body fat for fuel.
And one of the best ways to do this is just not eat anything at all and then go run. That way your body like it will use up whatever glucose is available, whatever glycogen is available. And then it’ll have to like go into your fat stores, or the stored body fat for fuel, which is cool, right?
Because this process of switching from burning, you know, glycogen mostly, or glucose to fat, it takes several weeks, you know, the fat adaptation processes is not super simple. It’s like uncomfortable. But when you’re running fasted, it actually helps to speed up the process, right? It helps helps to shorten the uncomfortable adaptation period. So anyway, there’s all these amazing benefits of running in the fasted state.
But do you have to do all your runs fasted? And the answer is no, you don’t. And there’s different ways that you can fuel for running, you could just go to sugar, you could just go like eat goos and carb load and you know, do your Fettuccine Alfredo the night before, or whatever it is. But that is not recommended. Because you’re going to like totally throw off your whole fat adaptation game when you do that.
Okay, so we want to think of alternative fuel sources, right? And so here’s something I want you to consider, like, when should you think about fueling for your run? So I think you can do a lot of your runs on fuels and I think you should, I think it’s very, you know, advantageous to do that. To do a lot of your runs in that fasted state, because you’re going to tap into a lot of natural processes that your body has, you know, that fat adaptation, the fat burning, the growth hormone, the adrenaline, all those things, take advantage of that stuff. Why not?
But there’s times when you might want to think about fueling for your runs. Okay. And so when when should you think about fueling for your run? So of course, that depends on you and your goals, as everything it depends, right. So, you know, I’ve done two marathons and a 50k, within the last nine months or so, totally unfueled.
And, like, is this the way everybody should do it all the time? I don’t know. Maybe you could try it. Maybe not. This season we just started marathon training, you know, one or two months or so ago. So for this upcoming marathon in October, I’m practicing with some different fueling strategy. So I want to try something different.
And I want to try some different fuels. And this is kind of why I’m talking about this today, because it’s very much on my mind, I’m experimenting with all these cool things right now. So back to the question like when should you start thinking about a fueling strategy for running?
Let me I’m going to go into a higher level really quickly here. I want to look at a higher level of fat adaptation and then I’ll come back to this question. I’m not doing this on purpose. I’m just trying to like I want to make sure we understand what we mean when we talk about being fat adapted, okay.
When you’re fat adapted, you’re much more efficient at using fat for fuel. Alright, we’re always burning, both glucose and fat. We’re always burning some glucose or glycogen, glycogen is just glucose that’s stored in your muscles. And it can be used by your muscles directly within the muscle that it’s stored in, okay?
And so we’re always burning some glucose and fat, but the ratios change, when you’re fat adapted, you’re definitely gonna be burning more fat more efficiently. Your body produces plenty of glucose on its own, to fuel your muscles while you’re running, even at higher intensities.
And there’s this kind of myth out there that like, well, if you want to run faster, you have to use carbohydrate as fuel. And you don’t. I mean, this is like old school thinking. And you know, it does work. If you’re carb adapted, you can definitely use carbohydrates for more intense intensities of running. But you don’t have to do that.
So there’s been some studies done. And the one that kind of comes to mind is this faster study was done a few years back. And they showed that. So they had two different groups, they had a low carb group of athletes and a high carb group of athletes. So they were this group of ultra endurance athletes that were, you know, some of them had been on a high carb diet for many years, and some of them have been on a low carb diet for many years.
And they noticed that in the low carb group, you know, the peak fat oxidase oxide, oh my gosh, the peak fat oxidation was 2.3 fold higher than it was in the high carb group. Okay. So basically, what they’re saying is, the people in the low carb group were burning 2.3 times more fat more efficiently than the high carb group. Okay.
Basically, the conclusion of the study is this compared to highly trained ultra endurance athletes consuming a high carb diet, the long term fat adaptation results in extraordinarily high rates of fat oxidation, whereas muscle glycogen utilization and repletion patterns during and after a three hour run are similar. So that was the conclusion.
And basically, what it means is this: even elite Ultra marathoners who were running hard for three hours, you know, the low carb and the high carb performances were very similar. And my takeaway is that you can absolutely run faster and run harder, and you don’t need to carb load and suck down all the gels to do it, you can do it as a fat adapted athlete. Okay.
So the main thing that I want you to take away from this right here is that, you got to understand that when you’re fat adapted, and you eat a bunch of sugar, or carbs, all of that fat burning is put on hold while you’re metabolizing, the carbohydrate load. This is very important to understand.
And I talk to weight loss clients about this all the time, who are like, oh, you know, I just want to like, you know, eat some sugar and eat some carbs is that okay if I do that every now and then? I’m like, I’m not recommended because when you’re metabolizing, the carbohydrate load, all the fat burning is being put on hold. Right.
So as a fat adapted runner, I don’t want to fuel with carbs because it shuts down this very efficient fat burning engine that I’ve worked so hard to build, maintain. So today, my body’s running like a clean burning Tesla engine. And adding carbs into the mix is like putting gas into that Tesla motor, just it doesn’t work, it’s gonna cause all kinds of issues, it’s just totally not going to work at all.
Okay, so getting back to the question at hand, when should you start thinking about fueling your runs? So now that you understand why you want to stay fat adapted and take advantage of that clean burning engine source, that clean burning fat burning engine that we’re talking about? Let’s talk about fuel.
I suggest just as a general rule that you do most of your runs fasted up to a certain point. So what point is that only you can answer that and I want to encourage you to do a little experimenting with this and test the waters in push yourself and see what you’re capable of.
Go longer and longer without fuel. What is that going to be for you? 12 miles? 14? 16? 18? I don’t know. But figure it out. I think it’d be super fun to try.
You can always take something with you in case you need it. And I’m gonna give you some suggestions on that in a second here, but, but I want you to see what you’re capable of, I want you to see what it’s what it’s like to run for 12 or 16 miles, without any fuel at all, and see, you know how that feels for you as an individual?
And if you like that feeling, why not just keep it going? Do you know what I mean? Like, why not just take advantage of that if it works pretty well for you, okay. And I find that when I’m running fasted when I’m running without fuel, and I get to like mile 12, or so I actually feel like I have more energy, like my energy levels begin to increase, because the longer I’m out there, the more efficient my body is, is burning fat. And why wouldn’t I want to keep that going?
You know, when I see other people around me, if we’re doing a 20 mile run, and I get to mile 12 or 14, other people are starting to fade, their energy is like starting to decrease. Mine is increasing. I mean, it’s not like I can sprint all of the sudden, running is still hard. Okay, but I feel like I just have plenty of juice, and I can just keep going plenty of gas in the tank, I can just keep going.
Okay, so what is that right distance for you? Only you can figure that out. But I want to encourage you to try it and figure it out and see how long you can go without fueling yourself. But fueling is definitely an option. So let’s get into this a little bit here.
One of the things I need to say before we get into like what types of fuel to try, you have to practice these fueling strategies before your race, right? Nothing new on race day. That is our mantra when it comes to long distance running. We never do anything new on race day. I learned this the hard way.
During my very first marathon back in geez, was it 1990 or 2006? I ran my first marathon and I had heard somebody talk about, you know, having like caffeine during their marathon and it helped them. It gave them a boost of energy. And sugar was good, you know? And I was thinking, hmm, I think I was at Starbucks or something.
And I saw this like package of chocolate covered espresso beans. And I thought, well, that’s perfect. I’ll just take these with me on my marathon. This could be awesome. So I stuck a bunch of these chocolate covered coffee beans in a baggie. I put them in my pocket. I had never tried this during a run before. Okay.
And so I’m out there running. I don’t know I got to mile, I was at about 14. And I’m like, Oh, I’m gonna try a little energy here. So I reached into my pocket I grabbed this baggie of these coffee beans. Okay, first of all, they had totally melted like the chocolate was just all over the place. It was a huge mess. And I couldn’t even like stick my fingers in there without like getting totally messy.
So I’m like, trying to like dig the coffee beans out of the plastic bag with like my tongue, like shoving this bag in my mouth trying to get these coffee beans. So I eat a bunch of these. Now melted chocolate drenched coffee beans. And I started chewing on these things.
And I just started coughing like crazy because all those little bits of coffee beans got like stuck in my throat. And were super irritating to my throat and I went into this coughing fit for like the next couple of miles. It was horrible. And I honestly don’t think I got any kind of benefit from doing this. But this was just a good experiment. And a good lesson for me of like, don’t do anything new on race day.
Had I tried this in a training run, it would have been super clear that this is a stupid idea. Okay. But instead I was just like, Oh, what the hell, let’s give it a shot, you know? So that was a terrible idea. Okay.
But anyway, you want to make sure that you’re practicing, you know, your fueling strategy several times before your race. And I suggest trying a few different options here from some of the stuff I’m going to talk about here, try a few different things and see what works best for you.
Okay, so with this in mind, you may want to pick a distance like any run over like 15 miles, you know, or 12 miles, whatever it is, pick a distance and then just start practicing your fueling plan on these longer runs. Alright, because the only way you’re going to know what works for you is if you try some things, okay? There’s no right or wrong way to do it.
Find something that works for you. Try it a few times on these longer runs. And then you know, just go with that, you know, then you know that it’ll work for you on race day. Okay. So for me, I’m trying a bunch of different fueling strategies right now. So I’m trying on on anything like 10 miles and over, just to see like, hey, what works, what doesn’t and so far I’ve had some pretty good results.
So some of the options I’m going to talk about here, some of the different products and fuel options, and I’m going to talk about some of the criteria for me is that I want to make sure that I maintain fat burning as much as possible, because I want to take advantage of that I don’t want anything that’s going to shut down the fat burning engine while I’m running.
Okay, so I’m very careful about which fuels I’m choosing and the ones that I’m sharing with you today are the ones that I know are, are not going to shut down that fat burning process. Okay, so some of the things I’m looking for, make sure there’s no sugar in there, make sure there’s no weird ingredients, I want to make sure that this product will at least maintain or improve that burning.
Some of these actually help you improve that burning, which is cool. You’ve got to be able to take them with you on your runs. Some are better than others from that perspective. They have to taste good. And they have to have been like field tested like things that have been around for a while they’ve been proven to work. So let’s get into this.
Here are some fueling strategies for low carb burning. The first one that I love and I use this all the time is MCT oil. MCT oil is medium chain triglycerides. And these are naturally occurring fats that are found in things like coconut oil and palm oil. MCT oil itself is typically made from coconut oil, and this is the one you want to use right.
Don’t use stray coconut oil because that also contains the long chain triglycerides, we want to stick with the medium chain triglycerides because these are more readily available as fuel. Okay. MCT’s behave differently compared to LCT’s. So instead of having to be broken down and digested by the body, the MCT’s are sent directly from the gut to the liver, where they can be used as a source of energy by the body. Or sometimes they’re quickly turned into ketones ketones is another type of fuel I’m going to talk about in a minute.
But because of this fast turnaround, the calories from MCT are less likely to be stored as fat so you’re not storing the fat from the MCT you’re actually using it as energy. So MCT’s have been around forever. People use these all the time for mental clarity, your brain loves MCT’s as a fuel source.
And some of the benefits of using MCT’s for running is that helps to improve energy output. So they’ve done some studies that show that consuming MCT’s pre workout maybe 30 to 45 minutes before a workout can help people increase their total energy output during the training. MCT has helped to increase fat burning. So they’ve done some research. And they suggest that fatty acids like MCT oil as a pre workout fuel, give you you know a little bit more bang for your buck from a fat burning perspective.
So they they did this study where they actually took cyclists and cyclists were actually able to easily tap into fat as a fuel source while maintaining a high level of performance output. And once they were fat adapted their bodies were able to burn fat as a cleaner source of fuel kind of like what I was talking about earlier, without having to tap into muscle glycogen.
So it actually helps to, you know, spare muscle glycogen meaning that you you’re going to have more muscle glycogen available for longer periods of time. Another benefit of using MCT oil is that helps to reduce lactate buildup in athletes. So during exercise, you know rising lactate levels can negatively impact your your performance right?
MCT may help to reduce lactate buildup. So they did this study where they took athletes who took about a teaspoon and a half of MCT with food before cycling and they had lower lactate levels and found it easier to exercise compared with people taking long chain triglycerides. So pretty interesting stuff.
But definitely you’re going to notice an energy performance. I use MCT oil every day I just add a little bit to my coffee in the morning and it gives me energy for hours. So how to use MCT is like one to two tablespoons around 30 minutes before a workout is recommended. But here’s the thing with MCT is you’ve got to build up to that.
Because they can be a little bit harsh on your gut, like some people have stomach issues, when they first start doing MCT oil. So start with like a teaspoon a day, and then work your way up to a tablespoon or two. And the the energy boosts that you get from MCT oils lasts for several hours.
So if you’re out there running, you know, 15 miles or so you probably don’t need to re-up your MCT intake. But if you’re going to do a marathon, or anything that’s going to be longer than that every two to three hours, you can do another tablespoon or two of MCT oil. So there’s a very clean source of fuel directly just gives you energy without, you know, a bunch of calories and stomach issues and all that other stuff. So experiment with it. Try it this is a good is a good, very well proven fuel strategy for low carb burners.
Another thing that I’ve tried in the past and have had some pretty good luck with is just something very natural, it’s nut butter. So there’s a brand called Justin’s.And Justin’s makes these little packets of nut butter, you can find these in the grocery store, they’re in the same aisle with all the peanut butter and almond butter and stuff like that.
And the packets are cool, you can take them on a run just like you would a gel packet, okay. But here’s what they do, they give you fat and protein. So the fat gives you some energy, right. So you can actually your body can actually make energy from the fat that you eat, as well as your stored body fat.
So the fat that you eat, and that becomes, you know, metabolized is called free fatty acids. And you can actually derive energy from fat as you consume it, which is awesome, especially if you’re a fat adapted athlete, you’re much more efficient at burning fat in general, you can derive fat energy from these free fatty acids very easily.
And then protein. Protein helps to prevent muscle breakdown during endurance activities, it helps to boost glycogen storage. So your body you know, glycogen is is glucose that your body is storing in muscles. Protein helps to increase the glycogen storage. And it helps to reduce muscle soreness and promote muscle repair. So during long distance activities, fat and protein are recommended.
As you know, fuel sources to help support muscles help you to feel less sore help you to promote muscle repair, glycogen storage, and then the fat gives you the energy. Okay, so in a little packet of the Justin’s almond butter, for example, there’s 19 grams of fat, 6 grams of protein, and then a few grams of carbs, like 5 grams of carbs, and that’s from almonds.
And they also make a peanut butter as well. Just make sure that when you guys are using something like this to check the ingredients because most peanut butters or almond butters – and Justin’s especially has a bunch of different flavors, they all have sugar in them. So you want to just go for the classic almond, or classic peanut butter packets and those don’t have any sugar in them at all, there’s a couple of carbs from the from the nuts, but that’s about it.
So how to use nut butter, just take one packet every, you know, take one about 30 to 45 minutes before your workout or your long run and then once every 60 minutes or so. So I used these during a 50k a few years back, I use just a few packs of this almond butter. And I really didn’t need very many of these things. A few of them was okay.
Here’s the thing with these things you got. It’s not like a gel like it’s not super thin. It’s very thick. It’s not super easy to get down. Like to get them out of these packets and actually get them down. Like it requires a little bit of effort. I had to like stop and like, yeah, like it’s almost like you’re chewing the peanut butter or the almond butter. You know, it’s like a lot thicker than you would expect it to be. So this is one of those things where you definitely want to experiment with it. But it’s a great option for sure because it gives you that fat and protein for fuel.
Alright, another fuel option would be using exogenous ketones. So what are we talking about here? So ketones are little bundles of fuel that your body makes when you burn fat, right? We’re all producing ketones all the time. Everybody is like if you’re burning fat, you’re producing some ketones, okay, and just some people burn more when you’re fat adapted, it means you’re probably producing more ketones, which is fine like you, you know, this is a good source of, of energy for your body and for your brain.
So on a standard diet, when you’re eating a lot of sugar, your cells will use, you know, glucose for energy. But if you’re eating a low carb diet, you know, you’re keeping your carbs low enough. So your body, you know, you don’t have a lot of that glucose to use for energy, you know, you’re going to burn more fat as your main energy source. And this is what it means to be fat adapted.
So when you’re fat adapted, your liver actually breaks that down into ketone bodies, and then sends those ketone bodies through your bloodstream to fuel your cells. Okay? There’s three main ketone bodies that your liver makes when it breaks down fat.
The first is beta, beta hydroxy butyrate, BHB. The second is acetyl acetate. And the third is acetone. Acetone is actually created as a byproduct of acetyl acetate. But let’s not talk about those second two, we’re just kind of focused on BHB beta hydroxy butyrate.
So when you burn fat, you generate BHB. And that leads to the creation of ATP through the Krebs cycle. And this gives you energy, right, so just what you just need to know about this is that being fat adapted means you’re probably producing some BHB. And you’re getting energy from that, okay?
ATP is an energy source, adenosine triphosphate. This is a high energy molecule that your body stores for use as energy. But your body can only use a very limited amount of ATP. This is like used for explosive things that you can do for maybe 10 or 30 seconds total. And so for longer distance activities like running, you need a different source of fuel.
So when you run out of ATP, your body can use energy from glycogen circulating glucose free fatty acids. In this case, we’re talking about BHB or ketones, okay? So when you take exogenous ketones, exogenous – this means you’re getting them from outside your body. Endogenous would mean you’re creating them yourself.
But we’re talking about taking exogenous ketones, your your body can actually use that energy immediately, which is super cool. It doesn’t have to like go through a process of, you know, digesting and all these other things, right. So when it comes to endurance exercise performance, exogenous ketones will give you long lasting energy.
And it has a couple of other benefits too, which is that helps to increase your mental clarity and focus helps you to burn more fat more efficiently, decreases hunger and decreases inflammation. So I’ve been experimenting with exogenous ketones, and I have to tell you, I love them. I love taking these things. How to do it, well take a scoop of these, like it’s just a mix, you mix into water, or I mix it into a protein drink or something like that. Take it about 30 to 45 minutes before a workout, and then they suggest maybe a half a scoop for each additional hour.
So you know if you’re doing an ultra or or you know, you want to do a competitive marathon, you want to run fast. You know, another half a scoop each hour that you’re out there running is is perfect. So you don’t have to do a ton. There’s two types of ketones, exogenous ketones, there’s ketone salts and ketone esters.
And here’s the difference. So ketone salts is BHB is attached to a mineral. So it’s like sodium, potassium and magnesium. They’re longer lasting than ketone esters. They’re less potent, but they last longer. And they you can actually you can tolerate the taste of them. Okay? Ketone esters are attached to an alcohol molecule. They’re shorter lasting, they’re more potent, but apparently, the taste is almost unbearable.
The main difference between the two is the duration. So ketone esters give you a shorter, larger like spike in ketones while the ketone salts give you a longer lasting more moderate spike. Ketone esters apparently are terrible, like really terrible, and I’m just not even bothered trying them.
The ketone salts that I’ve tried, they last longer, they taste fine. They’re more it’s like the one you’ll find if you go if you just do a little search on Amazon or something for exogenous ketones, most of what you’re gonna see is ketone salts. Just try to avoid the ketone esters, I don’t think you’d like that too much.
Another source of fuel that, and this has kind of been my go to for my low carb running these days, which is s-fuels. So s-fuels is a product that’s made for people like you and me who are long distance endurance athletes who like are trying to do the low carb thing, you know, they understand exactly where we’re coming from.
And so they’ve created products that help us to, you know, maintain fat burning, enhanced fat burning for long distance events. So, they have two different products. One is called Train and the other is called Race Plus. And the Train product is for athletes who, you know, are doing, it’s a little bit lower intensity.
So this is this is good for the everyday runner who’s out there doing training runs, or even if you’re doing a, you know, lower intensity marathon race or long distance event be perfectly fine for you. Okay.
The main ingredients here, they use collagen peptides is protein MCT. So there’s MCT oil in this product. There’s l glutamine, which is an amino acid. So this is one of the building blocks of protein. And it has electrolytes, so sodium, calcium, potassium. So, these ingredients are formulated in a way that helps you to burn fat more efficiently. It gives you some fuel like from the MCT’s, it gives you some protein from the collagen peptides.
And then you get this L glutamine which helps to reduce inflammation and, and minimize, you know, protein or muscle loss during exercise. Okay, so and then it’s got electrolytes in it too. So it’s a really good product. And I’ve been using this for my longer runs my 10 mile-ish runs so far.
You just mix it in with water, it has, it’s a very, it has a water like consistency. It’s very tasty. And I love it. And so far, it’s been really good. It’s been I think it helps me on these longer runs that just stay in that fat burning mode and just enhances that fat burning mode. A
nd then they have another product called Race Plus. And it basically has the same ingredients as the the Train product, but it has something called highly branched pre jet pre digested cyclic starches, which is a carbohydrate source. Okay, this is a very low kind of glycemic carbohydrate. It’s like 15 grams of carbohydrate per serving.
And it’s like a slow burning type of carbohydrate that allows you to still, it does give you some carbohydrate burning, but it also helps to with fat oxidation, in other words, like you can still burn fat, but you’re burning some carbohydrate as well. So it kind of helps you to do both. And I haven’t tried this product, honestly, I just don’t do much at the higher intensities. So I’m just like, I don’t know, I really don’t need it.
But apparently, the the people that use it, the elite athletes and stuff like that, that are fat adapted really love it, because it does give them a little bit of a, a boost because of the carbohydrate in there without shutting down fat burning. And that’s the important part here. We want to make sure you’re doing both efficiently. Okay.
Then there’s another product that a lot of people have been talking about recently, which is, and I have not tried this one. And this is the next one on my list of try, which it’s been around for a while. And the key ingredient is something they call super starch. So super starch is a corn starch kind of derivative. And it’s a complex carbohydrate that doesn’t spike your blood sugar. It delivers a slow and steady release of glucose into the bloodstream.
So it’s not going to crank up your blood sugar and not going to crank up insulin and it’s not going to shut down fat burning off together. It might slow it down a little bit. But it gives you this stable blood sugar and stable steady energy. And supposedly it’s a very good product for long distance running. Again, I haven’t tried this one but people love this. All right.
They have a couple of different products. They have an energy powder, which is something you can do beforehand. So just like 30-45 minutes before your workout. Do this powder. And then you can add, you know, another serving of this every 60 to 90 minutes. Okay?
They also have a product, which this is interesting is energy gels, they’re called Edge Energy Gels. And so you can do a pouch 30 minutes before an exercise, and then do one every 60 minutes or so for workouts that are like over nine minutes long.
And this is kind of cool, because it’s a pouch of like, it’s like a gel that you can take with you. That is a very slow burning carbohydrate. But it doesn’t shut down the fat burning process either. So this is one I’m definitely going to be trying and I’ll get back to you guys on that.
So those are the main fuel options for low carb running, I think these are all very viable. And none of these will shut down the fat burning, they will all help you to stay fat adapted while you’re running and take advantage of all the benefits of being a fat adapted runner. And there’s one more that I wanted to mention, this is an element. This is not really a fuel. It’s an electrolyte mix, but it’s product, lMNT. It’s by elemental labs. And if you’re out there running, especially in this heat, you have to like replenish your electrolytes. It’s just so important.
And this is a great product, no sugar, it’s just sodium, potassium, magnesium, low flavoring, little stevia tastes great. People love it. And it works really well. So whether you’re doing a fasted workout or you’re using some of these other fuels, make sure you’re getting your electrolytes in somehow. Okay, and element is a great way to do that. All right, cool.
Well, be sure to join us over in the Running Lean coaching group for August because we’re taking a deep dive like I was mentioned earlier into these thought feeling action patterns, how they show up for you how you can change them so you can start getting the results that you want around weight loss around running around your health and fitness goals. So just go to runningleanpodcast.com/join and join us in the Running Lean coaching group would love to see you in there.
And I hope you got something out of this episode today. And if you did, please consider sharing it with a friend I love you all keep on Running Lean, and I’ll talk to you soon.
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If you’re like most runners, you probably don't fully understand the importance of protein in your diet, and you might not be getting enough. Protein is one of those topics that can divide people …
Continue Reading about 74. The Ultimate Guide to Protein for Runners →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, sports nutritionist, Master life coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 74 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. And today I’ve got a fun topic for us. It is the ultimate guide to protein for runners. Yeah, it’s fun. I said that protein is fun.
Here, here’s the deal. If you’re like most runners, you probably don’t have a good understanding of the importance of protein in your diet, and you probably aren’t getting enough, that’s gonna be my guess most people I talk to are not getting enough protein.
Protein is one of those topics that can actually divide a lot of people, especially in the health and fitness community. So everybody’s got an opinion, right? So I wanted to take a sort of a comprehensive look at protein from a couple of different angles, including some new research on the topic.
So in this episode of the podcast, I’m going to be answering questions that I get asked most often about protein, like, how much protein should I be getting? How does protein help promote weight loss? How does protein help with my running? What are the best sources of protein? How long after a workout should I take protein? What about protein supplements? Do you recommend these? Guess what if it has to do with protein?
And if it has to do with any of these questions I just went over, I got you covered. That’s why this episode is titled The Ultimate Guide to protein for runners. But before we get into that, be sure to come and check out the Running Lean podcast community on Facebook.
I created this group so that you would have a voice. So I do this podcast each week. And it’s just me talking into this microphone. The Facebook group gives us a chance to connect and have a conversation. It’s a place where you can ask questions and get answers and have fun. Have I mentioned that this is a fun group of like-minded runners? Well, it is, just go to Facebook, search for Running Lean community and come join in on the fun.
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Let’s talk about protein. Okay, are we cool? Everybody ready for this? All right. So what is protein? Protein is a long chain of amino acids. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within the human body including you know, there’s like metabolic reactions that happen with protein, there’s DNA replication.
Protein responds to different stimuli. It provides a structure to cells and organisms within the body. It helps molecules, you know, it helps transport molecules from one location to another in the body. Protein makes up everything in your body basically, right? Everything in your body is made of proteins. Proteins are the building blocks of organs, muscle, skin, hormones, and tissues, your body has to have protein.
To maintain the human body, we have to eat protein, okay, we don’t make protein internally. So protein is considered one of the essential nutrients that we have to have, that our body does not make. Fat and protein are two of the essential nutrients that we need.
Funnily enough, carbohydrate is not an essential protein or a nonessential nutrient. We don’t have to eat carbohydrates, we do need glucose. In order to survive, our brains need a certain amount of glucose, our muscles need a certain amount of glucose, but our liver provides all the glucose that we need.
So technically, we don’t really need to eat carbohydrates are not considered an essential nutrient. I’m not saying don’t eat them, I’m just saying we don’t need them. Okay. But protein is the other part of this is like we have to eat it. We don’t produce that from within our bodies. So we will die if we don’t eat protein or fat, okay?
So we don’t want to die. So we need a protein. Alright. Alright, and a podcast, we’re done. Just eat some protein. Okay, so why is protein important for runners? Well, protein plays a role in improving your running. So if the protein is key to building muscle, and repairing muscle tissue, then if you’re not getting enough protein, you won’t be recovering as well.
After those hard workouts, you won’t be able to repair the muscle damage that you do during those super long runs, or those super tough workouts, okay, you’ll just be continually breaking down muscle and not preparing it not rebuilding it properly. So for runners, protein is key. I mean, it’s key for everyone, but runners probably need more protein than the average person.
And here’s something cool when you train in the fasted state. So I’ve talked about this a lot like when you don’t eat before you go for a long run, this can actually help you to utilize protein more effectively. So training in the fasted state helps to optimize hormones, including growth hormone, and testosterone, which we all need.
But producing these hormones actually promotes protein synthesis, and therefore will help to repair muscles and help to grow muscle. So training fasted actually has this amazing benefit, where it’ll help you to utilize protein better, okay, so as a runner, we absolutely need to get enough protein.
I’ll talk about how much protein we eat and stuff like that in a minute. But just know that we break down muscle more than the average person, the sedentary person. So what about weight loss? Like what’s protein’s role in weight loss? So protein plays many roles in weight loss, not just in building lean muscle, that’s part of it.
Protein helps you to lose weight by actually turning off hunger signals. So researchers at the University of Kansas Medical Center discovered that adding more protein to the trial, the clinical trial, patients’ diets, when they added more protein, especially if they did this at the first meal of the day, literally decreased the signals in the brain that stimulate appetite and stimulate appetite, and lead to overeating.
So people were not eating as much, and they weren’t as hungry, because they were just all they did was increase the amount of protein they were eating. So that’s cool. That helps you to lose weight because you’re not going to be hungry all the time.
Another cool role that protein plays in weight loss is that you actually burn more calories just by digesting protein than you do by digesting carbs or fat. So this is called the thermic effect of food. And when you eat carbohydrates or fat, and protein, when you eat any food at all some of that food Some of the energy from that food goes to digesting that food, okay?
So when you’re eating fat, 0-3% of the calories from fat, go to digesting fat. So in other words you don’t need, you don’t use a lot of calories to digest fat because it can be easily absorbed by your body. Carbohydrates, 5-10% of the calories from the carbohydrates that you eat, go into breaking that down and digesting the carbohydrates.
So let’s even on the higher end of that, you know, let’s say 10%. So if you’re eating 100 calories of carbs, then you’re actually only going to absorb 90 calories of that, okay, so that’s cool. But protein, the thermic effect of protein, when you eat it, 20-30% of the total calories from the protein you eat goes into digesting it. This is amazing.
So at the higher end of that, you know, if you’re eating 100 calories of protein, only 70 calories actually get absorbed by your body. So you actually, you know, burn more calories when you’re just eating more protein, which is cool.
Another study they did at the Copenhagen University Hospital and was published in the Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that over the course of a five-year study, no macronutrient reduces the amount of belly fat for study participants more than protein. And that these results were mostly from animal-based sources of protein.
So just looking at a macronutrient, when they increased protein, then these people just lost more belly fat. So this is cool. These are big findings, they’re very important findings, okay, so protein actually, will definitely help you if you’re trying to lose weight. Now, if you’re not getting enough protein, this can lead to all kinds of problems. Okay.
So let’s think about this. Runners who are striving to lose weight, sometimes, they can be working out a lot, and then like really reducing the number of calories they’re eating. So they’re trying to do some sort of calorie-restricted diet. And they can be very protein deficient because they’re just not getting enough calories.
In general, they’re running all the time. And because they’re not eating enough food, basically, they’re not getting enough protein. And this, this can be a problem. Okay, so a couple of reasons.
Number one, when you reduce your calories, too much over a too long period of time, you put your body into this, starvation mode, which will lower your metabolism. And we don’t ever want to do that, right, we don’t want to lower our metabolism, we always want to increase our metabolism, right.
But not only that, you risk cannibalizing muscle, which means your body will start breaking down muscle to be used as energy because you’re not getting enough energy. Right. So that’s, that’s a problem with the calorie-reduced diets. Like we don’t want to go that route for sure.
But insufficient protein intake can also lead to loss of muscle. So you’re going to lose that lean muscle that you want to need for running. But if you’re not getting enough protein, you know you really risk losing muscle. And with that loss of muscle, your increase of injury goes up.
Especially things like stress fractures, stress fractures can be prevented by training properly and not overdoing it. You know, run, build up your base your long miles build that slowly is one way to make sure you prevent stress fractures and shin splints and stuff like that. But the other thing is making sure you get enough protein because you need to support muscle growth and strong muscles will help build you know help to support your skeleton and connective tissues and all that and will help to prevent injuries.
You also risk without enough protein, you risk other micronutrient deficiencies, so you’re not going to be getting enough of the vitamins and minerals that your body actually needs. So what’s the solution? What do we do? Hey, why don’t you just get enough protein?
So this leads me to like how much protein should we be eating or getting in our diet? You know? So if you look at the US Dietary Guidelines or the RDI, the recommended daily intake, suggests .4 grams of protein for every pound of body weight. This is way too low. And this is not just me saying this to you if you do a little research on these doctors, and sports nutritionists.
Anybody in the health and fitness field will tell you that this is not a recommended amount. This is like the minimum that you would want. Okay? So .4 grams of protein for every pound of body weight. So for me, I weigh 170 pounds right now, that would only be 68 grams of protein a day.
For me, this is not going to work for me at all I’m telling you right now. And they’re not taking into account my active lifestyle, or my, my running goals, or the fact that I do a lot of weight training, or that I’m trying to maybe build some muscle and become more muscular. And so this also assumes that a 170-pound sedentary person, like maybe a sedentary woman should be eating the exact same protein amount as me, that just doesn’t make any sense.
Okay, so just know that these, you know, RDI’s, the recommended daily intakes are very low and kind of the minimum. Okay. So the US military did a study on protein, and they published it in the Journal of Nutrition. And they found that higher-protein diets are actually associated with lower BMI, lower levels of visceral fat, and an improved cholesterol profile compared to protein consumed at the RDI levels.
So, you know, even the US military is like, Hey, you guys need to be eating more protein than what the, you know, the US Dietary Guidelines are recommending or whatever, are is not enough. Okay. So there are a lot of different protein recommendations out there.
And what I found, because I wanted to give you guys something that was easy for you to just kind of figure out and a good place for you to start. But like, so the sports nutrition organization that I’m licensed through the National Association of Sports Nutrition, recommends 1-1.5 grams of protein for every pound of lean body mass. So for this, you have to know your body fat percentages.
And it’s very, it’s pretty accurate, I would say this is a good place to go. Other trusted sources say to shoot for .8-1.1 grams of protein for every pound of your ideal body weight. So if you are if you currently weigh 200 pounds, but you want to weigh 150, then aim for.8-1.1 grams of protein for every 150 pounds, okay?
Now, here’s, I’m just throwing these numbers out there, but I got a much simpler formula for you. Okay, a much simpler way of figuring this out. And all of these things come to roughly the same number. But this is just an easier formula, I want you to think of protein as a percentage of your calories.
So around 30% of your calories from protein is what is recommended. For most people, this is the optimal number to optimize fat burning. So if you’re an extreme endurance athlete, or you’re a weightlifter bodybuilder, you might want more, you might want to go to like 35%, but like 30%, I think is a really great place for most people, especially runners. To begin, like, start there, you can, you know, adjust that up or down.
But let’s go with 30%. Okay, so, to figure 30% of your calories, this is an easy formula for you to do, all you have to do is multiply the total number of calories you eat each day by .075. Okay, so here’s how this works. If you’re somebody who eats about 1500 calories a day, times .075, that equals 112 grams of protein.
All right, now we’re getting somewhere as this seems much more normal, like where you should probably be. If you have a 2000 calorie diet, times .075 equals 150 grams of protein. Now, for me, I eat a lot. I work out a lot. I’m trying to build some muscle here. I’ve actually put on five pounds of muscle over the last 10-12 weeks, so I’m feeling good about that.
But for me, I eat around 2800 calories. So times .075 equals 210 grams of protein a day. Oh my gosh, that’s way different than the 68 grams of protein that the recommended daily intake suggests for somebody like me, right?
And some people say, well, what can’t you eat? You know, isn’t it a problem, like isn’t too much protein a problem? Is this something we need to be concerned about? And the short answer is no. You really don’t need to be concerned about it. You would have to be eating way, way more protein than I just mentioned, for a very long period of time.
And listen, I just did it as an experiment where I was eating basically nothing but protein, I was eating a very high protein, all carnivorous diet basically for about 40 days. And I was probably in the 200 to 220 grams of protein a day, and I didn’t have any issues at all. Honestly, I couldn’t eat more than that.
It’s just too much food, like, it’s really hard, it’s hard to overdo it with a protein, okay. But yes, there is also a concern, that too, eating too much protein will force your body to turn some of that excess protein, the protein that you’re not utilizing, it’ll turn some of that excess protein into glucose.
So there is this process that there’s your body does, it’s called gluconeogenesis. And this is a metabolic process that creates glucose from noncarbohydrate sources, namely fat and protein. This happens in your liver. So glucose gets created from fats and proteins. Now, here’s something interesting. Glucose can get created from fats. So the triglycerides that are floating around in your bloodstream can actually be used to create glucose that your muscles need that your brain needs.
And the way it works is a triglyceride is literally three fatty acids. That’s the tri part of it. And three fatty acids on a glycerol backbone. That’s what a triglyceride is. The glycerol part of it, it sounds like glucose, glycogen, that kind of thing, right? It’s very similar. So your liver can actually take a triglyceride and turn it into glucose that your body can use as fuel, which is totally cool.
Your liver will only use protein to make glucose as a last resort. So it’s going to use fat from your system first. And that can be turned into energy. This is one of the pathways that becoming fat-adapted really takes advantage of right because you’re you can create energy from fat.
So and then here’s something I think is fascinating. Glucose created from a triglyceride cannot turn back into a triglyceride. In other words, when your liver takes the triglyceride and turns it into glucose, it can’t then be stored as fat again, it has to be either burned as fuel or excreted in you know, urine or stool or whatever. So this is kind of a cool thing.
So your body will actually produce all the glucose that you need. And that extra glucose since has been created from a triglyceride can’t go back to becoming a triglyceride, so it won’t be stored as fat. Again, I think this is totally cool.
So because of this process, you know, your liver can use protein and turn some of that protein into glucose, which will raise your blood sugar, but this is the last resort, this is not going to happen until after it’s kind of used up the triglycerides that it needs. Okay, so it’s not something you really need to worry about too much, you would have to be eating way, way, way excess protein for you know, long periods of time.
Okay, so let’s talk about some high-protein foods. So foods that I would definitely recommend to get enough protein in your diet, okay. So there are basically there’s like two types of proteins out there. There are complete proteins and incomplete proteins. And you can kind of bulk these into like two different camps.
One is like, most animal proteins are considered complete proteins. And then most plant-based proteins are considered incomplete proteins. Okay. So I’m just going to say you know that animal protein are favored as a more high-quality source of protein, okay. So most plant proteins are what are considered incomplete. They don’t contain all the essential amino acids required for protein synthesis.
Okay, complete proteins have all the essential amino acids that our bodies need. So animal-based proteins like meat, poultry, fish, eggs, milk, and cheese, are all considered complete proteins. There are a couple of sources of plant proteins that are considered complete proteins, although they’re not as high quality or as easily absorbable.
Quinoa and soy would be the two key no’s – very, very high in carbohydrate though that’s something to be careful of. But soy is actually a really good quality, complete plant-based protein. So if you can tolerate soy, some people are allergic to soy, but if you can tolerate it, this would be the go-to for somebody on a plant-based or vegetarian diet.
Well, vegetarians can do like whey protein, which is awesome. But here’s the thing. As human beings, we work on the all or nothing principle when it comes to protein synthesis. So, really only complete proteins can be utilized, right? Partial proteins or incomplete proteins can’t really be utilized properly.
So if you’re somebody on a plant-based diet, you’re probably gonna have to combine different protein sources, and maybe supplements to be sure you’re getting all of the amino acids that your body actually needs to function properly. So and I’ve said this before, you know, plant proteins are designed for building and growing plants.
Animal proteins are designed for building and growing animals, we are animals and we prefer, we just prefer as human beings, animal-based proteins, okay? Nothing wrong with being a vegetarian or vegan if you want to go that route, but just make sure you’re getting the right types of proteins, right. And you may have to combine a few different things to get there.
So here are some high protein foods that I recommend eggs, obviously, an amazing source of protein, especially the whites, but eggs are just like so perfect. That’s like a 65% fat, they’re 30% protein, and then just a tiny little like a 5% carbs or something. And eggs, eggs are just the perfect little package. Right?
Now one egg is like six grams of protein. So you know, you eat four eggs, you know, you’re up to 24-25 grams of protein. This is awesome. This is gonna get you, you know, a great deal of ways towards your protein goals for the day. So eggs, an awesome source of protein.
One of the best sources of protein is chicken breast, eight ounces of chicken breast is like 70 grams of protein. So for most of us, if you can eat a couple of chicken breasts a day, boom, you’re good, like you’re pretty well covered, right?
Beefsteak, you know, eight ounces of steak is like 68 grams of protein.
Canned tuna is an amazing source of protein, four ounces of canned tuna is like 27 grams of protein.
Salmon, I love salmon and highly recommended it, you know, there are so many good health benefits from eating salmon, four ounces of salmon, 25 grams of protein.
Here’s a good plant base, there are two good plant-based sources of protein I’m gonna talk about one of them is tofu, and the other is tempeh base. So tofu, obviously made from soy, and four ounces of tofu can have anywhere from 8 to 15 grams of protein. And this depends on how firm it is. So the more firm the tofu is, the less water content and the denser it is, and the higher the protein content. So I always opt for the super firm is the most firm, whatever they call it, the firmest type of tofu that you can get.
And then tempeh is another soy-based protein. It’s made from soybeans. It’s fermented though, and so it’s a fermented soybean block. And so it’s very dense like there’s not a lot of water content in there. But the fermentation actually helps to break down the phytic acid in the soybeans, making the starches and the temporary in the temporary actually easier for you to digest.
So this is one of the best plant-based sources of protein, and four ounces of tempeh is 23 grams of protein. I know it’s amazing, right? Cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, and a cup of each of these have around 23 grams of protein. Lentils, a cup of lentils, when it comes to you know beans, legumes, I don’t know what that is. It’s a bean or legume, whatever.
Lentils are very high in protein, 18 grams of protein for a cup. But one thing with this one thing here is that 28 grams of carbs in a cup of lentils. So you’re kind of like, you know, that’s very high in carbohydrates. So I’m mostly talking about lower carbohydrate forms of protein here, but that one’s just pretty high in carbs.
Almonds, a quarter cup of almonds, seven grams protein, awesome. Here’s one, broccoli or Brussels sprouts, two cups of broccoli or Brussels sprouts gonna give you seven grams of protein. So there are all these amazing sources of protein out there.
Obviously, this is not a comprehensive list. These are just a few things that came to mind that are kind of high in protein. Definitely, you know, you can just Google this and you’ll find all kinds of other options but at starting adding some of these things into your diet and you know, one thing you can do if you’re somebody that’s leaning more towards a low carbohydrate approach, just like, lower the carbs and replace those carbs with protein.
Here’s the other thing to keep to consider. Protein is very filling, it’s very satisfying to eat, it’s filling, it fills you up, it keeps you full for longer, and you’re not going to be as hungry. You know, it also shuts down those hunger signals. So eat more protein, there are so many good benefits from this.
Okay, well, what about protein after we work out? So most people believe that you need to consume some protein right after a workout like you’ve got about 30 minutes, and you better get some protein in. Yeah, you know, get that shake, go on, or whatever. And so this is kind of a standard that’s been around for decades, you know.
But there’s some recent research that suggests that a larger window after your workout is fine. So according to the International Society of Sports Nutrition, consuming protein anytime, up to two hours after your workout is ideal for building muscle mass. So, you know, anytime up to about two hours is going to be ideal after that. It’s not terrible. But it’s just the ideal window is going to be up to two hours after a workout, right?
This works out perfectly for me, because I’m usually not that hungry right after a workout like I’m not eating, you know, right after I’m done with a heavy lifting session or a long run. I’m just not hungry right away. And I usually wait an hour or two, before I eat anything anyway. So it’s totally fine. So just know that you don’t have to slam down some protein, right? When you’re done running or lifting weights or whatever, you can wait up to two hours totally fine.
Okay, what about protein supplements, should we be supplementing with protein. So, you know, I talk a lot about eating real food. And I think this is probably the best way to go. For most people, getting your protein from whole foods is probably best. But I do believe there is a place for protein supplements.
So for example, some women find it difficult to get 100 or 120 grams of protein per day from eating food, because they would have to eat a lot of protein, a lot of chicken or a lot of eggs, or a lot of steaks and they just can’t do that just can’t eat that much protein, okay? Totally fine.
In this case, a protein supplement can be perfect, you know, take a protein supplement one or two scoops of protein usually there it’s like 20 to 25 grams of protein in a supplement. And you know, you could do that a couple of times a day. And that’s going to give you like half your protein requirement for the day, you know, and then you can eat real food to make up the rest, and then you’re good and you’re not stuffing yourself with food.
So a couple of the types of protein supplements that I recommend. The first one is whey protein, whey protein is dairy-based, but it contains all of the essential amino acids and it is quickly absorbed by your body. So this is like the gold standard when it comes to protein supplements is whey protein, this is like the best thing that you can take as a supplement, okay.
Second to that would be soy protein. So if you don’t do dairy, and you want like a plant-based then soy is going to give you it actually does contain all of the essential amino acids. And it’s been looked at been linked to some pretty impressive health benefits. So soy protein is actually pretty good when it comes to a plant-based protein supplement.
There are a couple of other plant-based protein supplements that do not contain all the essential amino acids, they’re pretty good but they just don’t contain all of the essential amino acids so that would be pea protein. It just doesn’t have all the amino acids that you need. And hemp protein.
Hemp protein is made from hemp seeds that have a lot of fiber, omega threes Omega six fats like these, these two like pea protein and protein, they’re fine, but they’re just not complete. They’re not going to give you everything that you need. Okay. Alright, so that is everything I have to say about protein at this time.
I hope you guys got something out of this. I hope you learned something I learned a lot just by putting this together and going back to a lot of the sources that I use and just kind of piecing it all together for this episode. I had a lot of fun doing this.
So if you got something out of this today, I would love it if you would share this with a friend that would mean a lot to me. Alright, until next time, love you all keep on Running Lean and I will talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
This is part one of a two-part podcast series called “Becoming a Lean, Fat-Burning Machine and Making It Last For Life”. As a Sports Nutritionist and Weight Loss Coach for Runners, I help runners …
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there and welcome to episode 72 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray. And today, I’ve got part one of a two part podcast series that I’m doing called Becoming a Lean, Fat-Burning Machine and Making It Last For Life.
As a sports nutritionist and weight loss coach for runners, I help runners transform themselves into lean, efficient fat burning machines so they can end the yo yo dieting and finally get to their ideal weight. This subject is near and dear to my heart since I gained over 40 pounds in just a few years when I was training for marathons and ultramarathons training for and running marathons and ultra marathons and still gained like 40 pounds.
This did not make sense to me at all. What the heck is going on here? Well, I eventually figured it all out. I dropped those extra pounds, I learned how to keep them off for good this time. And now, I help as many runners as possible to do the same. So in this eye opening two part series, I’ll show you exactly what it takes to become a lean, fat burning running machine and most importantly, how to make it last for life.
But first, if you haven’t already done so, come check out the Running Lean community on Facebook. This is a group of runners who share similar health and fitness goals. You can ask questions, get help and feel supported. Listen, we all need to feel supported, especially when it comes to doing hard things like losing weight or training for a marathon or qualifying for Boston.
Having this community to lean into is so helpful. You’ll find encouragement, inspiration and even motivation from when you’re just not feeling it. Just go on Facebook and search for Running Lean community and join us.
And here’s a recent five star review of the Running Lean podcast from Erica and she says, “My weekly treat. I look forward to Patrick’s podcast each week, my treat over the weekend is to pop in my air pods and go for a run. While I take in the invaluable information of real life experiences. Tough but much needed honesty, encouragement and inspiration that Patrick provides. These podcasts cover a wide range of everyday obstacles you come to in life as you try and navigate your journey to being a stronger runner. And a healthier and happier you.”
Thank you, Erica, that was very cool. Thank you for sharing. And you can share the love too if you enjoy this podcast, it would mean a lot to me if you would just take a moment to leave a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify or wherever you listen. I just would love that it just makes me feel good to know that this message is resonating with you guys.
And listen, I also know that all this talk about diets, sports nutrition, weight loss, becoming a fat adapted runner, all these things – it’s awesome. It’s super helpful. But it also can feel a little overwhelming. You probably want to know just like how do I get started? How do I make all of this work? Well, I got you covered as a one on one coach. I can help you make sense of all of this and help you apply these principles to your own life.
Listen, we’re all very different. We all have different metabolisms, different body types, different genetics, different goals, different likes, different dislikes. And there’s just not one approach that works perfectly for everyone. If there was, that would be amazing. It would make my job a whole lot easier, but there is not.
So the way coaching works is we work up a metabolic profile for you. We clearly define your health and fitness goals. Then we put together a plan that is specifically tailored to help you reach those goals. And it’s not just about diet and nutrition either. It’s about becoming the healthiest human being that you can possibly be physically, mentally, even emotionally.
I work with people who’ve been struggling with weight their whole life and they’re ready, finally ready to change for good. I work with runners who are tired of bonking all the time. They’re ready to stop hitting the wall at mile 18, so they can finish strong for a change.
I work with runners who just want to qualify for Boston finally they know in their heads they can do it but they just can’t seem to dial in their nutrition and drop those last 10 or 15 pounds they need to run faster. I work with people who just have an unhealthy relationship with food, they do a lot of stress eating, a lot of emotional eating, and they’re ready to take back control of their thoughts and feelings around food and maybe stop obsessing about what they’re eating all the time.
Whatever your health and fitness goals, I’m here for you, I can be your guide, and show you the way to help you to become the most badass version of yourself yet, yet. So to learn more and apply for coaching, just go to runningleanpodcast.com/apply.
Alright, so I did a similar podcast series around this time last year. So this was episodes 19, 20, and 21. And I thought it was time to revisit this and provide an update because I’ve learned so much in this past year, I’ve helped so many runners become efficient fat burning machines, helped so many people lose weight and improve their running and improve their health.
And I wanted to spend a little bit of time over these next two episodes to share a lot of new information with you guys. So if you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, some of this will be a review, you may have heard some of this before, but I think a lot of it’s going to be new and new and improved just for you. Okay, so lace up those running shoes, pop in those air pods and let’s get into this.
So the problem as I see it for a lot of runners is that a lot of runners are just carrying around too much body fat. A lot of runners are what would be considered overweight or even in the obese category. And we all have this idea of what runners look like – these skinny, super lean, no meat on the bones kind of person, right? This idea of like these elite marathoners, right.
But that is far from reality. A lot of runners just struggle with their weight and they have a hard time losing weight. Maybe they keep gaining weight year after year, like I you know, and running isn’t working to stay lean anymore. It’s just not keeping the weight off anymore.
And, you know, most runners that I know and a lot of the runners that I work with are coming to me because they’re they’re kind of addicted to sugar and carbs, you know, they love their doughnuts, their beer, their pizza, their goos, their gels, their sports drinks, all this sugar, right.
And this is a problem. This is a big problem for a lot of people. You know, running is great. It’s good for you. It keeps you in good cardiovascular shape, it builds endurance, it helps with stress relief, it’s good for your mental health, it’s good for your overall health, right? But running alone is just not a very good way to lose weight.
Even runners who look good on the outside, like you would look at them and go that person is pretty, pretty decent looking and they don’t look, you know, overweight, a lot of runners are what is considered trophies. You know, they’re thin on the outside, but fat on the inside. This was definitely me, you know.
I’ve worked with many runners who have steadily gained weight, they can’t lose that weight. Their doctors have told them that they’re pre diabetic or maybe even diabetic. They maybe even have moved into the obese category. A lot of times doctors will put them on diabetes medicine, like Metformin. And these are people who are runners, and they run regularly.
They’re running marathons, and they’re being put on diabetes medicine. Some of these doctors will tell them that they need to get their blood sugar under control, or they will have to go on medication. So they might be pre diabetic. Or they might suggest that they switch their diet, they stop eating all the sugar and the carbs, they switch them to like a low carb diet, right?
So a lot of these people might look okay on the outside, but they have something very different going on inside right? Inside they’re unhealthy. You know, they’re overweight. They’re at risk for a slew of metabolic diseases like Type Two Diabetes and insulin resistance, heart disease, high blood pressure, even obesity.
And here’s the thing, like a lot of people are just not talking about it. Because it’s like, oh, I’m a runner, so I’m healthy. I can just eat whatever I want. And for a lot of us, that’s just not the case. And this isn’t just an opinion. I get messages from people every single day about this. So here’s a few.
Here’s one. This guy says back in my 40’s, I was 170 pounds and running marathons in two hours and 30 minutes. That’s fast, you know, and he says now I’m in my late 50’s And I weigh in at 213 pounds. Oh my gosh, in 10 years, this person has put on 43 pounds, that is crazy.
Another one is, I’m killing myself running this month to meet a goal and I’m up four pounds, WTF. Here’s another one, I ran my first half marathon and full marathon in the past year, I gained weight training for both. And I’m so confused, and I’m exhausted from the battle of trying to get back to my original weight without ditching my love for running.
You guys, these are just messages I get from people all the time. Here’s somebody that’s like, you know, been training for a marathon, ran a half and a full marathon and cannot get back to their original weight, they gained a bunch of weight.
And then here’s what I got just a few days ago, I was training for my first marathon in 2019. And I ended up gaining around 30 pounds, which was super frustrating, because then it just made running even harder. You know, and I’ve talked about this before I work with someone who’s been on a daily run streak since 2007. This person has like more than 5000 straight days of running. And when I say run streak, this person is running like at least three miles a day.
And in the process gained over 50 pounds. That’s crazy. And if you’ve ever like ran a marathon or half marathon, or you’ve watched one, you’ve probably noticed this trend, right? Sure the people in the front, the leaders, a lot of them are pretty lean and pretty fit. But most of the people you see would be considered, you know, overweight.
And it’s not a judgment. And I’m not shaming anyone here because this was me too. For sure. I was one of those people that was like, you know, fat as a runner as a marathon runner as an ultra runner. You know, I’ve been running marathons and Ultras for like, 15 years now.
And prior to that, before I got into running, I was very overweight, 230 pounds, fat, sick, I drank too much. And I had this big wake up call in 2003 when I was diagnosed with cancer. And at that moment, I decided I had to change my life, I had to get healthy. So I started running and changed my diet. And it really did change my life.
And I went, you know, basically I started eating more vegetables, right? I just went like vegetarian. And then I went plant based, you know, for like 10 years. And this worked for a while. But I slowly started to gain the weight back again, even though I was still running marathons, and ultramarathons. And I was training all the time.
And this picked up pretty quickly. You know, in the last few years here for me, you know, I started gaining weight, like crazy. So I started running more to try to run it off, you know, and it just wasn’t working. And I was still running a lot, you know, one to two marathons a year.
Several Ultras, every year, I would work out at the gym like three times a week. I was walking all the time, doing yoga, very active lifestyle, and still gaining weight. And by the time I had put on over 40 pounds, and I was up to almost 200 pounds again, I was like, I’ve got to do something about this, you know.
So I did, I changed a bunch of stuff that I was doing, you know, but really the biggest change was with my diet. I’m going to talk more about that in just a second. But I was able to drop those 40 pounds in a very short amount of time. And I’ve been able to keep it off effortlessly. And today, I’m 54 years old, I’m 165 pounds. I’m leaner and stronger than I’ve ever been in my life. Like I feel amazing. I have a ton of energy all the time. Running is amazing. I’m still running because I love it.
I’m running because I love it, not because I have to run to try to maintain my weight. And that’s like the biggest issue right? There’s like, running alone is just not enough. It’s not enough. So the biggest problem I see really is that, you know, people use running as a way to try to lose weight and it’s just not a very effective weight loss strategy.
Okay, we’ve been told for over 40 years now that in order to lose weight, and stay healthy, you have to just eat less and exercise more. This is called the energy balance theory. And it’s called a theory because it’s just that – it’s a theory. So the energy energy balance theory says that it really doesn’t matter what you eat as long as you burn more calories than you consume. You’re good. Right?
That’s it. That’s the end of the story. Just burn more calories in your eating and you’ll be fine. This is fine if you’re like a combustion engine, right but we’re not combustion engines. The human body is much more complex. There’s a lot more going on here that has to be addressed.
Even a combustion engine will break down with the wrong kind of fuel. Have you ever put diesel gasoline or diesel fuel into a gasoline engine and see what happens? The whole thing starts smoking and just explodes, like it does not operate properly. And I think that’s kind of what’s happening here.
We’re putting the wrong kind of fuel in our body, it does matter. Calories do matter a little bit, you know, calories play a role, for sure. You know, you can’t eat 4000 calories a day, and not exercise and expect to lose weight so that’s just not going to work, right?
But it’s not just about calories. Okay? And it’s not, it’s not like running is terrible. Like you shouldn’t run or anything like that. Don’t get me wrong about that, running is amazing. It’s so good for your cardiovascular health, for your mental health. It’s a great way to like release endorphins and dopamine and feel good running actually makes you feel happier.
But as a weight loss strategy, just not very effective. So what’s going on here? What’s this whole energy balance theory, why isn’t it working? So it’s not just about the calories in versus calories out, right? In order to lose weight, what do you have to do? You’ve got to burn the fat, right?
That’s what we’re trying to do when we talk about losing weight, we’re not talking about losing muscle, we want to lose the fat. Okay, so in order to lose weight, we’ve got to burn fat. The part that most people don’t understand is that in order to get into fat burning mode, you have to remove the body’s preferred source of fuel, which is sugar, so your body will burn sugar first, and as long as there’s sugar available to burn, you will not be very efficient at burning fat.
Okay, the goal here is to transform your body to change your body from a sugar burner to a fat burner. Okay, so the main regulator of this process in your body is a hormone called insulin, when you eat sugar, or carbohydrates, so sugar is just a concentrated form of carbohydrate. It’s like a pure form of carbohydrate.
Okay, so when I talk about carbs, I’m talking about sugar. When I talk about sugar, I’m talking about carbs all the same thing. When you eat carbs, your blood sugar goes up. Insulin is then released to bring your blood sugar down. Blood sugar goes down. Everything’s cool, right?
But here’s the problem. Insulin has all these other effects on the body. So when insulin is elevated, your body is put into this state of fat storage mode. So insulin is like the security guard that keeps the fat inside the fat cells. And as long as insulin is present, the fat is going to stay right where it is. Okay.
So all of that energy from the carbohydrates that you’re eating, it can’t all be used right away. So insulin sends signals telling your body okay, store some of this energy as fat, we’re going to use this later. Okay, and then we’re going to lock it up in here, and we’re going to hold on to this fat and we’ll use some of this later for fuel. This is fine as the way our bodies are designed to work.
But when insulin is elevated all the time, your body is constantly in this state of storing fat. And now we’re getting to the gist of the problem, you’ve got to get your body out of that fat storage mode and get your body into fat burning mode. Okay?
So insulin is high, you’re storing fat, the fat cannot be used for fuel, we got to bring the insulin down so that you can start burning the fat. And don’t just take my word for it. There’s a fantastic book out there that lays all of this out, it explains the science in great detail. It’s called The Obesity Code by Dr. Jason Fung. Awesome, awesome book.
So it’s not just about the calories you’re eating, it’s more about what types of calories you’re eating. So when you’re eating a diet that’s high in sugar, and high in other highly refined carbohydrates like flour. This is going to keep you in that fat storage mode because insulin is always going to be high.
So when we remove those problematic carbohydrates from your diet, this helps switch off the insulin signals and helps to get your body into the fat burning mode. All right. My whole coaching program is built around helping runners become fat burning machines. Okay.
Everything we do is like we want to be burning fat. Fat is a great source of fuel for running, and it’s how you lose weight. But here’s the problem. Here’s what it looks like for a lot of runners. A lot of runners will eat a very high carbohydrate diet, right?
So they’re eating pizza and ice cream and donuts and you know drink a lot of beer and stuff like that. So you’re just like consuming carbs all the time, your body is just full of carb energy. And so carbohydrates get turned into glucose, which gets stored in your muscles as glycogen, you know, so glycogen is great. This is what fuels you know, running and things like that.
But the problem is, if you’re fueling up on carbs all the time, your glycogen is like always topped off. And so a lot of that energy has to get stored as fat. So typical runners eat tons of carbs, and they’re just, you know, a lot of the energy they’re eating is getting stored as fat. Okay.
And then, you know, in the days leading up to a long run or a race you like do carbo loading. So you’re eating even more carbs, you know, pasta, spaghetti dinner, you know, and all this. And then, you know, before your run, before you head out the door, you’re fueling up with, you know, pancakes, or bananas, or what other other carbs that you need energy drinks in order to top off, you know, your carbs stores are even more.
And then while you’re running, you’re sucking down the goos and the energy drinks and all this sugar. And you’re using carbs as fuel while you’re running. And then when you’re done running, what do you do? You replace all those carbs, you burn with more carbs, more pancakes, and, you know, more energy drinks, and recovery drinks and all this stuff.
And you’re only ever burning carbs, you’re just like in carb burning mode all the time. And a lot of that energy cannot be burned, so it gets stored as fat. So you’re burning carbs, you know, almost exclusively. And storing a lot of that energy is fat, and you never get into the, into the fat you never get into fat burning mode. Right.
This is why you can run a million miles and still be overweight. This is why you gain weight a lot of times when training for a marathon or an ultra marathon is because you’re just overloaded with carbs. Okay. And again, like my whole program here is to help you become a more efficient fat burner.
And the two reasons are number one, fat is an amazing source of fuel for running. So fat delivers more energy per gram than carbs, like you get nine calories of energy per gram of fat. Whereas from carbs and protein, you only get four calories of energy. So this is more than twice the amount of energy from fat.
Also, your body can only store a small amount of carbohydrate in the form of glycogen in your liver and in your muscles. So it works out to something like 100 grams or so of glycogen in the liver and around 400 grams of carbohydrate in the form of glycogen stored in the muscles.
On average, you know, the average runner can probably store around 2000 calories of total energy in the form of glycogen in the body. Once that’s depleted, you have to keep adding more or you’re going to bomb this is when you hit the wall because you’ve run out of fuel.
Whereas your body can store an almost unlimited amount of energy in the way of fat. So I’m pretty lean, I have around 15% body fat, which equates to around 20 pounds of fat on my body. And if you wouldn’t know that by looking at me, but there’s about 20 pounds of fat on me, which is good as healthy, right?
That’s over 9000 grams of fat, or, like 81,000 calories of stored energy available at any given time, like I could not run enough to blow through all that energy. So not only does fat provide more than twice the energy of carbs, but you’re carrying around an almost unlimited supply of fat all the time, even for the leanest of us right.
So when you become a fat adapted runner, meaning you’ve adapted your body to burning fat more efficiently, you’re burning fat as your main source of fuel. When you do this, when you make this switch, you become virtually bonk proof. Because you always have plenty of energy on board. You just can go okay, so that’s number one.
Like these are why I’m talking about fat burning, why it’s so important. Number one is fat is an amazing source of fuel for running. Okay, and the second reason why it’s so important to become a fat burning machine is because there’s this amazing side benefit to burning fat, you lose weight.
When you start burning fat instead of all the sugar, you’re actually able to lose weight. You’ll burn through the extra fat that you have on your body. It is very, very difficult to lose weight while eating a high carbohydrate diet. Okay? If you ditch the sugar, ditch the refined carbs, like flour, and lose weight, it’s going to become so much easier for you.
And here’s a question I get a lot from people. It’s like, don’t I need carbs for running? And like, yeah, a lot of people have been, you know, coming to me with this, and I just need the carbs to run. I need the carbs to run. And this is kind of old school thinking it goes back to like the 70s.
There was a guy, Professor Tim Noakes, who wrote a book. This was like the runner’s Bible it’s called the Lore of Running and he talked about it. He wrote a whole section in there about carbo loading, for running and how you need the carbs to run, and how carbs are so great as fuel for running, and not too long ago.
But it was many years ago that he did this, but he completely had an about face around all of this. He’s like, you know, carbohydrates are a problem for a lot of people. And he totally changed his tune. He’s like, you know, runners really don’t need carbs to run, they can really fuel themselves very, very efficiently, with fat instead.
And they will reduce all these metabolic issues. He was a tofi. He was one of these guys that was thin on the outside, but fat on the inside. He had run like 70 marathons and was diagnosed with type two diabetes.
And so he did this thing, he was at a book signing, and he very dramatically, like, tore out that chapter from his book on carbo loading and said, This is irrelevant. Now I’ve learned that there’s a better way to go.
So just, you know, he tore it out of the book, I think that’s really cool. So, you know, it’s kind of old school thinking, you know, it goes back for, you know, 40-50 years or whatever. And yeah, carbs will give you fuel for running, but they have this big side effect, they make you hold on the fat, like they’re storing fat. And some people can handle this, some people can handle a high carbohydrate diet, you know, there’s something like maybe 15% of the population who can tolerate a very high carb diet.
Most of us though, cannot. Most of us are what is considered carbohydrate intolerant. That means that when we eat carbs, we put our body into this fat storing mode that we just cannot lose weight and we gain weight incessantly.
So if you’re a part of that 15% or whatever that number is great. Eat all those sugary gels. You want carbo load with pasta before your races, eat all the bread, drink the beer and enjoy. Like you’re you’re one of the few, okay. But for the rest of us who have tried that, and it doesn’t work, or maybe it used to work when we were younger, it’s not working anymore, we need to take a different approach.
So I’ve been following a pretty low carbohydrate diet for a while now. And I have to tell you, I’ve never bonked, I’ve run several marathons, I even ran a 50k without the need for any goos or gels. I don’t use calories for my runs, and it feels amazing. Honestly, I feel like I can run all day. I’ve run two marathons and 50k all on zero calories just using my own stored body fat as a source of fuel. That’s it.
And it’s not just me that thinks this is a better way to go like there are a bunch of new elite runners, even elite ultra runners who are turning to a low carbohydrate approach to fueling for running. Tim Olson, years ago, he won the western states 100 miler following this low carb diet and he was one of the first people to do something like this and people are like, what is this guy doing?
Zach Bitter held the world record for running the fastest 100 miler up until recently. His record was broken recently, but he ran 100 miles in 11 hours and 19 minutes. Holy smokes, this guy is fast. And he does basically a very low carb diet. And, you know, he’s setting records and he still holds the record for the 12 hours, you know, running the most miles in 12 hours.
Mike McKnight this guy is known for winning like 200 mile races like this is his, you know, preferred distance is that – 200 miles. And just for kicks, he ran 100 miles on zero calories just to show that you can do it as a fat adapted runner, you know.
Dave Scott six times, six time Ironman champion. He now trains athletes on a low carb approach. Even Michelle Hearn, Michelle Hearn is so awesome. She’s a registered dietician, and she’s the author of a book called The Dietitians’ Dilemma. So she had this dilemma where she was working as a diet registered dietitian in hospitals.
And she was forced to, to give diabetic patients, you know, orange juice and bagels and sugary breakfast and pancakes with syrup and all this stuff. Like this was what she was told to give these people. And it was just making their diabetes worse, and they would just have to up their insulin that they were giving them and all kinds of problems. She was just like, this is crazy. Something has to change. If you guys want to read a really interesting book, it’s very eye opening, Dieticians’ Dilemma.
But Michelle Hearn is also an ultra runner. And she recently ran a 50k in like 3 hours and 56 minutes, like she’s super, she’s badass. And she does like a carnivore diet, like she is just like a zero carb person. So she’s really cool.
I think something like 4 of the top 11 ultra runners in the world back in 2020, we’re following some sort of a low carb approach. And they were doing it not because it was like, weird, or you know, fringe, but they were doing it because it enhances their running performance. They were performing like, these are some of the top runners in the world. And they’re following this approach. Because it’s good for running. It really is amazing, right?
So a big question a lot of people ask me is like, how do you make the switch? Like, how do you switch from being a sugar burner to a fat burner? Like I get it, Patrick, I want to be a more efficient fat burning machine, right? How do I do this?
So really, the, the, the way you get started is pretty easy. It’s not. It’s simple, but it’s not easy. I’ll say it that way, you’ve got to stop eating the most problematic types of carbohydrates. This is mainly sugar, and flour. These are probably two of the most unhealthy things you can eat.
Sugar and flour are in everything. And it’s really hard to get away from this stuff. But if you can, then you will absolutely begin to change the way your body works, you’re just going to feel amazing, I promise you. Sugar, flour, and vegetable oil, these things are really bad for you. Try to stay away from those three things, okay? If you could just make this one change, it will help you so much, you’re gonna you’re it’s gonna go a long way to becoming healthier.
And, you know, like I said, it’s a simple thing to do, just stop eating sugar and flour. But it’s not easy, because in order to become fat adapted, you reduce your carbohydrate intake, and then you’ve got to train your body to adapt to using fat for fuel, this is the part that people don’t like.
Because fat is not as easily accessible as fuel. At first, it takes a little while for your body to adapt to this. And it can take anywhere from like two to six weeks. And a lot of people who start with they’re like, this sounds like a great idea, I’m going to do this. And then they start, they cut out the sugar, and they start running and they keep running and then all of a sudden running becomes hard. And it’s uncomfortable.
And a lot of people just quit, they can’t hang, you know, running is gonna be hard for a few weeks. And what I need to say to you guys right now is that if you want to do this and you want to give it a shot, you got to stick with it, you have to stick with it, because the results of the things that you get on the other side of this adaptation process are amazing, okay.
But it is uncomfortable. And it feels like you have no energy because you don’t, your body is not used to using fat for fuel. So you have to train it to do that. And the way you do it is you just go out there and run.
And I work with my clients on this and believe me they have issues like it’s, it’s challenging, you know, but it’s a little different for everyone. Okay, everyone’s a little bit different. Everybody has different metabolisms, different fitness levels, different goals and stuff. So, you know, I work with my clients and put together a very personalized plan that works for them.
And some people can get through this tough part pretty much unscathed, like they can handle the first few weeks and get through that tough period. Other people it takes a little bit longer, but we tweak things and we’re always trying to make it a little bit easier. There’s a few things you can do to kind of alleviate some of this discomfort you know, during those first few weeks.
But I will say this, and I tried this a few years ago on my own it was very hard. I had a very hard time doing this. And most people trying to do this on their own just can’t do it. They just give up because it kind of sucks. Learning is hard for a while. But I promise you, if you stick with it, the resort the rewards are like so worth it, it’s truly life changing.
So some of the things you can experience when you become a lean fat burning running machine, when you try, you know, transform yourself from a sugar burner to a fat burner, obviously, you lose weight, because you’re going to give your body a chance to actually start burning the fat instead of storing it right, you won’t feel hungry all the time, you’ll feel more full and more satisfied for longer you won’t be, you know, obsessing about food all the time.
Because when insulin is high, it kind of jacks up your hunger signals and your satiety signals. So when we can bring insulin levels down, those things start working properly, okay, you’re not going to need to eat every, you know, one to two hours, like when you’re eating a high carb diet, because you’re like, I’m hungry all the time. Right?
That’s, that’s not normal, right? You can go 8 or 10 or 16 hours without food, and you’ll be fine, you know. And you can kind of get off of that, you know, addictive response that we have to sugar and carbohydrates. You can still have them here and there. But you won’t feel like you need them, you won’t be obsessed about them.
Some of the things you can experience when you become more efficient at burning fat is you don’t really need to bring fuel on the long runs, right? I always take water and electrolytes with me, but I don’t have to bring goos. I haven’t had a goo and a year and a half.
You know, you don’t have to have sugary carbs with you every 30 or 45 minutes during a run I do all these long runs up to 50k. So up to 32 miles so far, unfueled, you know, with just running on my own body fat, zero calories, right? You don’t have GI distress from all the sugar that you’re eating right. A lot of people have GI problems when they’re eating a lot of sugar.
You basically have limitless fuel on board, right? So you become virtually bonk proof. There was this couple Meredith Loring and Sammy Innokin. And they were rowers. And they set a record by rowing from California to Hawaii in a rowboat, in 45 days. And they did this on zero sugar, zero carbs, they follow a low carb diet. And they did this without all the sugary fuel, you know what I mean?
So like, there’s just unlimited things you can do. You know, when you make this switch, you will improve your body composition, for sure. Because you’ll be preserving lean muscle mass, you’ll you’ll be able to build and keep more muscle tissue, you’ll be able to increase your power to weight ratio, which means you can be a more powerful runner, a faster runner, you’ll have more sustained energy throughout the day, you won’t be crashing from these, like when you have to eat a bunch of carbs in the afternoon.
Or you know frappe or a Jamba Juice from Starbucks in the afternoon. Because you’re just like, I need some energy, you know, and then you come crashing down and you take a nap after that like that just goes away. Also when you’re burning fat, you have more mental clarity, more mental focus, better concentration, because your brain actually needs fat to work properly.
And a lot of people experience this, they’re like Patrick, I don’t have this brain fog anymore. Like I didn’t even realize I was so foggy in my brain. But now I feel you know, like, everything is more clear to me now. And listen, you’re just gonna feel better about yourself, because you’re becoming healthier overall, you know, so you’re optimizing your health and your happiness.
And you know what? Running becomes more fun when you lose weight and you and running is lighter. Like if you’re 30 pounds overweight, carry around a 30 pound weight with you and run with it. This is really hard to do. You know, I imagined myself carrying around one of those 45 pound weights from the gym, you know, trying to run with that home. I got up but I was running with that not that long ago, throw that weight down and start running and how much easier is it going to feel? Oh my gosh.
So here’s a little secret for you guys. This is not really all about weight loss or even being able to run all day without bonking. Those things are awesome, though. But this is about becoming the healthiest human being that you can possibly become right? It’s about becoming fit and healthy and not just for a little while.
Not just you know, for a month or two, but this is like, what this is what we want for the rest of our life. Being healthy is not some destination you’re trying to get to, it becomes a way of life. It’s about Running Lean for life. So here’s the thing, the most challenging part of all of this is how do I make it last for life? How do I sustain this? Making it last.
This is like the biggest challenge that I help my clients with. This is the biggest challenge with any kind of diet, any kind of lifestyle change, the number one issue people have with sticking to any kind of healthy eating program losing weight, whatever it is, anyone can follow a diet for like, a minute, anybody, you know, follow weight loss program for a few weeks, or maybe a month or two, but several years? Most people just can’t do it. Most people give up, they quit, it’s too hard.
So this is a huge, huge part of what I do. This is why I’m a coach. I give people the tools and I teach them exactly how to make it last for life. This is the work that we really do together. I’ll help you break all those old habits and establish new healthy habits that just become part of how you live your life going forward and becoming healthy becomes who you are. It’s who you are. And it’s what you do. Making it last is so important.
It’s such a big topic that I’m doing a whole other podcast episode on just this part of it. Okay. So, you know, be on the lookout for part two of this discussion, which is going to be all about how do we make this last for life. Listen, I’m always striving to become more, I’m always striving to become healthier. I’m always striving to become, you know, to learn and grow. And I want that for you too.
I want you to become the most healthy, most badass version of yourself yet. Because I’ve done it. I know what it feels like. It’s amazing. I’ve done it for myself, I help other runners just like you do this every single day, and I want you to want this for yourself.
I want you to do this because you are worth it. Your health for the rest of your life is so worth it. I want you to make being healthy, just part of who you are what you do. Okay, so making it last. That’s all coming up in part two. So if you haven’t already done so be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you get part two of the discussion as soon as it comes out.
All right, I talked a lot today. I hope you got something out of this episode today. And if you did, please consider sharing it with a friend. I love you all, keep on Running Lean. I’ll talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
I hear a lot of runners talk about strength training, and honestly, not all of what they say makes sense. For example, runners tend to think they need to do a lot of reps with super light weights …
Continue Reading about 67. The Myths and Benefits of Strength Training for Runners →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 67 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, a health and fitness expert and certified personal trainer. And as a certified personal trainer, I talk a lot with my clients about the benefits of strength training. So today, I’m going to go through some of those benefits.
And also kind of I want to dispel some of the myths around strength training, especially for runners because I hear a lot of people, a lot of runners, especially talking about strength training. And honestly, not everything I hear makes a lot of sense.
For example, runners tend to think they need to do a lot of reps with super lightweights or they’re going to get too jacked, you know, they’re going to get too muscley. Right, and it’s going to hinder their running performance. Really? Is that something you’re concerned about?
I get it though because I’ve bought into a lot of these ideas over the years. And I’ve come to realize that there’s just a lot of information out there that we believe to be true. We believe it’s based on facts, but it’s just not true. Okay, so in this episode of the Running Lean podcast, I want to help clarify some of these things bust a few of these myths and misconceptions that runners have around strength training and what it can and can’t do for you.
I also will outline the many, many benefits that strength training actually does provide, especially for endurance athletes. If you haven’t already done so please come check us out on Facebook, we have this amazing podcast community on Facebook called the Running Lean podcast community. It’s a group of runners who all share similar health and fitness goals.
Join the group, you can ask questions, get help, and feel supported. Listen, we all want to feel supported, especially when it comes to doing hard things like training for a marathon or losing a bunch of weight. And having a community like this to lean into is so helpful. You’ll find encouragement, inspiration, and even motivation for when you’re just not feeling it. So just go to Facebook search for Running Lean community and join us.
Okay, let’s get right into this topic here. Because I’m excited about this. The myths and benefits of strength training for runners. So first off, I’m going to go through a few of these myths that are very common among the running community and things that I’ve heard for many years. And I’ve just come to realize that some of these things are not true.
And we need to understand what’s really going on, I really want to focus on the importance of strength training, especially for endurance athletes. Okay, so the first myth I’ve heard for years and years and years, and I kind of bought into this too early on in my running days is that I’m a runner, so I don’t really need to do strength training, running is enough.
And this one, I’ve just got to tell you, you know, no, running is not enough. Okay. So, as a healthy human being, as an athlete, especially though, we have three main kinds of systems that we need to improve, okay, we’ve got our endurance system, our strength system, and our explosive power system.
All three of these are required for optimal human health and fitness, okay, but especially for us runners, right? You’ve got to build your endurance, you’ve got to build strength, and you need to build up your explosive power. Most long-distance runners only focus on one thing though, endurance, and that’s it.
They might focus on maybe getting a little bit faster, but they kind of leave a lot on the table, right? Just because you can go long distances and run far doesn’t mean you’re as strong or as fitter, as healthy as you can be. And when you only focus on one system, like endurance, you never improve other areas and you’re actually not going to be as fit or as powerful as a runner as you could be.
Okay, so we all know that to build endurance, we need to run more, right, we just keep increasing our distance, we keep increasing the time that we’re out there running. And that’s how we build endurance, you know, you, you go longer and then you back it off a little bit. So your body can adapt and recover.
And then you go longer, again, you build up that cardiovascular system, you build up that aerobic system. Great, we all understand how to do that, right? To build explosive power, you can do things like plyometric exercises, box jumps, single-leg jumps, lateral jumps, HIIT training, these are all ways of building explosive power.
Also, things like sprinting, and I’m not talking about, you know, speed work, where you just go a little bit faster, I’m talking about all-out sprinting, or explosive step running, like running up steps, right, just until you just can’t go any further. It’s like, you hit that lactic threshold really fast. Okay, that’s, that’ll build explosive power.
And then to build strength, we need to do some sort of resistance training, we need to do some sort of resistance exercise where we lift heavy things, we progressively overload our muscles, so that our muscles can adapt and grow and get stronger. And it’s not just enough to go out there and run a lot to get stronger legs, let’s say, like, you can do that.
And you will improve the strength in your legs by running. But even more effective would be to do some sort of resistance training. But when you have all three of these systems, you know, when you’re building into all three of these systems – endurance, explosive power and strength – you’re going to be a much stronger, much more powerful runner, you will be able to go farther and faster. And also, you’re just gonna be a much more healthy human being over. All right.
Everything I talk about here is like, I want to be the healthiest, most badass version of myself possible. I’m always working on improving my health, and my fitness, always. And I’ve realized that in order to do that, I can’t just go run a million miles. Like, that’s part of it. But if I only focus on one thing, I’m just leaving so much behind. And so I’ve really made it a point to start focusing on building strength. And it’s so powerful.
And I’ll get into a lot of the benefits about this as we go through this, but just know that you do need to do strength training, you know, running is not enough, just running a million miles is not enough. Okay. Another thing I hear from people because I work with a lot of people who are, you know, maybe in their 40s, or 50s, or 60s, you know, and a lot of people have said this, to me, it’s like, I’m getting too old to do strength training, I’m too old to do this.
And I just have to say like this one is not true at all, you’re never too old to do strength training, even if you’ve never done it before in your life. Especially for endurance athletes who are over the age of 40. We especially benefit from strength training, because as we get older, our strength tends to decline faster than our endurance, like our endurance seems to be pretty good. And we can kind of maintain that as we get older, but our strength declines pretty fast.
And when you engage in high-intensity strength training, it actually kind of produces an anti-aging effect, because what you’re doing is you’re preserving lean muscle mass, which is very important. We want to stave off sarcopenia, which is you know, losing muscle. It optimizes certain adaptive hormones so that you, you know, get stronger, you build more lean muscle mass.
And the reason this is important is because as you get older, you know, sarcopenia is a real problem. Osteoporosis is a real problem. And one of the most common causes of death in the elderly population is not having strong bones and muscles, not having a strong muscular, skeletal muscular system, and people fall down.
Falling down is one of the leading causes of death in the elderly population because they fall down, they break a hip or something like that, and all of a sudden they become said theory. And then when you’re sedentary, everything declines very rapidly, right? You totally lose muscle mass, you lose bone density and bone strength.
And, you know, your quality of life just goes downhill pretty fast, you know. So if you can maintain your muscle strength, if you can maintain your bone density, you’re much more likely to live longer and thrive even as you get super old, right.
So strength training will actually help increase muscles, right, we know that, but it also will help increase bone density and can help prevent osteoporosis. A study published in the journal, endocrinology, and metabolism this study was called the effects of resistance exercise on bone health.
And basically, they say, based on the available information resistance exercise, either alone or in combination with other interventions may be the most optimal strategy to improve the muscle and bone mass in postmenopausal women, middle-aged men, or even the older population. So studies have confirmed this, this is not just speculation, and as you get older, you definitely want to maintain some sort of wrist resistance exercise.
One of the best ways to stave off aging, and to build and maintain a good strong skeletal muscular system is to lift heavy things, keep doing some strength training or start doing it. Listen, I’m 54 years old. I’ve been doing this for a long time, I’ve been doing strength training for a long time. And right now, I’m the strongest I’ve ever been.
I am in really, really good shape. I feel amazing. My running is amazing. My strength regimen just keeps improving. I’m starting to see a lot of muscle growth and muscle definition like I’ve never seen before. So even at my ripe old age of 54 years old, I’m still making massive improvements. Okay, so you absolutely can do this. It doesn’t matter how old you are.
I recently saw some video, I think it was on Instagram of some 95-year-old woman doing deadlifts. And that was pretty badass, you know, she was like in super great shape. And that was impressive, you know, so it doesn’t matter how old you are, at any age, you’re never too old to do strength training. Alright.
Another common misconception people have is that strength training just takes too long. It takes too long. Listen, I get it looks like you’re already running four days a week or six days a week. And now you want to add strength training to that too. I mean, come on, I don’t have time for that. Nobody has time for this, right.
So there is a little bit of truth to this, because if you’re doing it wrong, it may take too long. So I used to do strength training, like three or four times a week, and I would go for an hour or an hour and a half each time. And for years I did this and my results were never all that great, right? I really wasn’t getting a lot of results.
And the thing is, I was doing it wrong. Okay, I was going there and I wasn’t doing a good effective strength training program. So what I was doing was just kind of going through the motions putting my time in, you know, it was more of a cardio workout than anything else, right.
So to spend that much time at the gym doing strength training, unless you’re a professional bodybuilder, and this is like what you’re doing for a living, I would say you don’t need to spend that much time at the gym. A well-written strength program, the programs that I write for my clients only require twice a week.
And about 20 minutes each time 15 to 20 minutes each session, you get a whole-body workout twice a week, and it is a kick-ass program and very effective. Very, very effective. I am seeing amazing results in myself and in my clients. I’m getting bigger arms, bigger legs, more muscle definition, and I feel more powerful.
I’m definitely stronger because I’ve been tracking all this from just doing this, like 20 minutes a week, twice a week. That’s it. I have time for that you have time for that. So strength training does not take too long. If it’s taking too long. You’re not doing it right. Okay, we need to back off the amount of time we’re doing it and make the most of the time we’re lifting.
So that requires you to get get a little bit heavier with the weights. It’s got to hurt it’s got to be hard. But you can do it and do it without spending a lot of time at the gym. Okay, this one is interesting. So a lot of people think that you have to do strength training on your rest days.
So the days that you’re not running are the days that you should do your strength training. And I used to believe this, and I used to think this was a really smart way to go, like, you don’t want to, like, you know, go run a lot and do some sort of heavy, heavy lifting on the same day, right. And until recently, I used to believe this and used to practice this, but I found more and more evidence that this is actually not a very good idea.
Here’s why. Because when you do your strength training on your rest days, you’re effectively destroying all the benefits of a rest day. Okay, so let’s say, for example, you run four days a week, like Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. And then on Mondays and Wednesdays, these are supposed to be your rest days. Very critical rest days, you know, for a hard-running schedule, you need those rest days, right.
But now you’re putting in a couple of heavy lifting days, well, you’re gonna have a much harder time recovering from your runs, because you’re not giving your body the time it needs to recover on those rest days. Also, because you’re doing your strength training, and then the next day you’re running again, you’re gonna have a hard time recovering from your strength sessions, because you’re not giving yourself time to recover on those rest days.
Okay, so the suggestion here, then this may go against everything you thought you knew. But the suggestion is to do your hard strength training days on the same days as your hard running workouts. The idea here is that you want to make your hard days hard and make your easy days easy.
So this will actually help you to work harder on those hard days because you’re going to recover faster, you’re going to reduce your risk of getting injured, and you’ll be more you’ll have more energy and you’ll be more rested and recovered for those hard workout days. And then on your rest days, treat it as a true easy day, a true rest day, and you’ll recover much better. And you’re going to get stronger, and you’re going to improve both your strength training and your running if you do it this way.
Okay, so and then there’s a preference, some people decide to do their strength training before their running. And some people like to do it in the opposite order, they like to run first and then do their strength training. Really, this is kind of a personal preference, really up to you.
Personally, I like to do the strength training first and then run. But do you know, do whatever works for you. But try to keep your hard days hard, and your easy days easy. And you’re gonna start to see some definite improvements in both places, for sure.
All right, now this one is fun. And I love this because I hear this all the time. And it cracks me up. I need to do super light weights with a lot of reps so that, you know, I build endurance. And here’s the thing, your endurance system, you’re already working in the endurance system, right?
You do not need to do a bunch of reps with super lightweight, this is not doing you much good at all, honestly. And I see people do this all the time. They’re like, you know, they go to the gym, they pick up those five-pound weights, and they’re just doing these arm curls or something. And they can do like 100 reps. And yeah, it is true.
It does help to build some cardiovascular endurance, but you don’t really need to be working on that at the gym with weights in your hands, okay, you work that work on your cardiovascular endurance out on the roads running, right? You don’t lift weights to build endurance, you lift weights to build muscle.
You don’t need more endurance training. What you need to do is increase your lean muscle mass so you can become a stronger runner and doing a lot of reps with very light weights is just like going out and running a bunch more. Right? There is a cardiovascular component to it, but there’s no strength component to it.
So you want to develop muscles you want to get stronger and the only way you can do that is to overload your muscles. You got to put more load than your muscles can handle so that they adapt to those stressors. You want to overload your muscles so that they get super stressed, send signals to repair and grow so that it can accommodate more stress the next time.
And if you could do this properly, and you do this consistently, you will build muscle and you will get stronger. You just never tax your system enough by lifting super light weights and doing a million reps. Your muscles never need to adapt. And I totally get this because I kind of did this for years, I was doing some sort of strength training for years, and I wasn’t getting results.
And I’m like, what am I doing wrong? Maybe I need to go and, and do even more. Because I was in this mindset of like, I’m a runner. So I need to do lightweights with a million reps. And it just never worked. And never, I never got any results from that, you know. So the same thing applies here.
You know, when we keep doing the same amount of weight each time we work out at the gym, right? You’re never going to progress, your muscles will never grow because they aren’t being overloaded. And here’s the thing, the reason we don’t want to do this is because it sucks and it hurts, it’s hard. Overloading your muscles means you’re going to have to get to failure. And that’s painful. It’s really, it’s painful. If you do it the right way.
If you’re doing strength training the right way. You should be just cooked at the end of the workout. Okay. So the whole lightweights with a million reps is not a thing, just stop doing that it’s not really doing you much good at all. Okay.
Another myth I hear is that, if I do strength training, it will actually hurt my running performance. And this one, I mean, I would hope you guys understand by now that this is definitely not true like strength training can only help your running performance, right? Being stronger overall, having a stronger, you know, muscular system definitely makes you a better endurance athlete.
Building strength helps you to maintain good running form helps you to maintain consistent power, especially as we get into these longer endurance activities and you start to fatigue towards the end, right like towards the end of a marathon, or an ultra marathon when you need that extra strength and power.
You know, if you’ve not built up your muscular system, you’re not going to have that extra power that you need. And you’re going to fatigue and you’re going to kind of crash and burn, okay. Strength training is actually essential. If you want to be a successful endurance athlete, okay, putting your muscles under intense stress stimulates muscle growth, right, you build more muscle, you build more lean mass, you get stronger, and you will be able to achieve peak performance in running.
Only if you improve your muscular strength, right, you absolutely must include strength training if you want to become a stronger runner. Strength training will make you a more powerful runner. Because here’s the thing, when you build more muscle, and you reduce your body fat, that means you’re going to increase your power to weight ratio making you a more powerful runner. How awesome would it be to be lighter with carrying around less body fat and stronger, carrying around more muscle mass, this will only help your running performance? Okay.
Another myth that people have – this is my favorite one. This is the last myth I’m going to talk about here. But this is a good one. If I lift heavy weights, I’m going to bulk up too much. So heavy weights will make me bulk up too much. Light weights will get me toned. And this is awesome. I love this.
Like I hear people say this all the time. I don’t want to get all big and muscle-bound. So I’m just going to lift light weights. I’m afraid I’m gonna get too jacked. I’m going to be too big and muscley and jacked and it’s going to hurt my running performance or whatever. I think this is so amazing.
Because if you want a real honest answer to this, go to a gym and tell one of these big huge bodybuilders that you don’t want to lift weights because you’re afraid you’re gonna get too big. They’re just gonna laugh you out of the gym. Do you know why? Because as it takes a long, long time, for them to get huge like that.
It takes years of very hard work and dedication, they’ve got to show up at the gym constantly. They’re eating like 4 or 5000 calories a day. Honestly, if you’re an endurance athlete, you don’t need to worry about getting too big, heavy weights will not bulk you up. The only way you can build muscle is if you lift heavy weights regularly.
You’ve got to do it the right way, right, you’ve got to lift heavy weights, overload the system, adapt muscles grow. Right, if you’re doing it the right way, you’re going to be fine, right, you’ll build more lean muscle, your muscles will get bigger, very slowly, takes a very long time, months, months and months.
And listen, if you start to get too big, if you really start to get too muscley, all you have to do is back off on the weight training, just you know, maybe go down to once a week, that’s all you really need to maintain your muscle mass anyway, once you’ve built a solid base. So if you’re doing this properly, you should begin to lose body fat because carrying around muscle will help you to lose, lose weight. I’ll tell you more about that in a minute.
But your muscles will start to show because you’re losing body fat, and then you’re building some muscle and so your muscles will start to show through your skin a little bit better. And this is what we mean when we say we want to look toned, we want to see some muscle definition, we want to see those muscles, right?
Being toned is a function of both increasing muscle size and decreasing excess body fat. So this is what gets you that toned look. But you have to do it the right way, you have to actually build muscle. And you can’t build muscle by doing this super lightweight and a million reps, right? It’s just not gonna work.
So I think this is so funny, people are worried they’re gonna get too big. And it’s kind of like a brand new runner coming to you and saying, yeah, I don’t really want to train for a marathon because I’m afraid I’m going to do like a two and a half hour marathon. And you know, I just don’t want to run that fast. You’re just gonna be like, yeah, good luck with that.
So here are some other benefits of strength training, I’ve talked about a lot of benefits, you know that you increase your power to weight ratio, right, we can get stronger bones as well, from increasing our strength, we can prevent injury. Some of the other benefits of strength training are that you actually increase your lactic threshold.
So strength training isn’t, is an anaerobic exercise. In other words, if you’re doing it properly, you’re not in that, you know, aerobic zone, like when you’re out there running a 10-minute mile or whatever your anaerobic like, you can only lift a certain amount of reps if you’re doing this properly until your body is just like cooked, yours is done, right.
So this is like training at or above your anaerobic threshold, right? When you do this regularly, your body can actually increase its ability to handle like lactic acid and remove it from your system, which will increase your lactic threshold or the point at which you experience fatigue.
Okay, so this means that when you increase your lactic threshold, you’ll be able to work out harder for longer. This will enable you to run faster and run faster for longer periods. So it helps to increase your speed and endurance. Okay, so that increase of lactic threshold is an amazing benefit of strength training.
Another one that I mentioned earlier is that strength training will boost your metabolism. So muscles just carrying around muscles will increase your resting metabolic rate because muscle takes more energy to carry around than fat does. So just by carrying around more muscles, you are burning more fat, you’re burning more calories, right? It increases your overall metabolism.
And if you’re you know, following a more of a low carbohydrate diet and you’re already kind of an efficient fat burner, this will actually make you an even more efficient fat burner. And if you’re wanting to be a fat-adapted runner, this will help to speed up your fat adaptation process. So strength training will help to speed up that process of you know, turning yourself from a carb adapted athlete to a fat-adapted athlete, which is amazing.
So, because of this boost in your metabolism, it helps you to lose weight. So increasing your lean muscle mass strength training makes it easier to lose weight. Isn’t that awesome? I love that.
Strength training also helps to fight depression. And I think this is a really cool area of study. And I want to do a little more research into this, because studies have shown that doing an aerobic exercise like, you know, high-intensity strength training can actually boost your mood, and make you feel better, gives you a bit of a pick me up, and even helps to fight off depression, which I think is really, really cool. So if you want to feel good, you want to be just happier, do some strength training.
Also, strength training helps to reduce the risk of certain diseases, gains strength and gains in bone density, attained by doing high-intensity anaerobic training, like strength training, can actually reduce your risk for diabetes, heart disease, and other cardiovascular diseases.
So this is a really cool thing to just know that as we engage in regular, intense anaerobic strength training, that it has all these other amazing health benefits for us, not just stronger muscles, you know, obviously, we get bigger muscles, and we look good, right? And this is important to you will look good naked. So that’s, that’s an important benefit as well.
But also, you know, you’re going to help to stave off other diseases like heart disease. Also, strength training will help to protect joints because it builds stronger muscles and helps to build stronger connective tissues. Right, so we’re talking tendons and ligaments here.
So when you build up your muscle strength and your muscle mass, your joints will be better protected, meaning that you’ll have greater protection against injury, which is really important, especially for us endurance athletes, and especially as we get older.
And then lastly, just doing strength training get boosts your energy, consistent. anaerobic exercise increases your body’s ability to store glycogen, which is what your body uses as energy. And even if you’re not eating a lot of carbs, your body still produces glycogen and can store it. So when you’re consistently doing strength training, you actually become more efficient at storing glycogen, which will give you more energy for your next bout of intense activity or training. Right. So this will improve your athletic endurance and your performance overall.
So, bottom line, get out there and do some strength training, lift some heavy things. And listen, it has to be hard, it should be very hard, it should be very taxing to your system, you should get to that anaerobic threshold, you should just be, you know, cooked at the end of your strength session. Okay, it doesn’t have to take a long time. But there are so many amazing health benefits, especially for runners.
Okay, so if it’s hard, and it feels terrible, and it hurts, that’s good. That means it’s working. All right, you guys, that’s all I got for you today. As always, lots and lots of love. Keep on Running Lean, and I’ll talk to you soon.
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