Fueling My Body

I've been reading up the past few days on glycogen stores and how to ensure we have enough fuel to do a proper workout. The reason for this is that I was noticing a huge amount of fatigue during my daily run.

When I began to assess what might be causing this problem, I realized that my calorie intake has been decreasing a little lately. I was also doing double workouts on some days...running and then a round of WiiFit in the evening. Overall, I think my poor body just wasn't keeping up.

From what I have read, when we eat carbohydrates our body uses what it can at the moment and then stores the rest away. It converts the food into glycogen and packs that glycogen away in our liver and muscles for later use. Our body can hold about a half a day's worth of glycogen at one time.

Eating small, frequent carbohydrate meals will give your body a nice constant supply of glycogen for you to use throughout the day. You don't want to eat too many carbs at one sitting because whatever can't be stored as glycogen is then stored as fat. Don't restrict, but don't overdo. Low carb dieters tend to complain of fatigue. This is because they aren't filling their reserves. What is worse is that they will then try to exercise, too, which will very quickly deplete what is left of their glycogen stores. This is partially good because the body will then turn to their fat stores for energy, but the body will also start converting protein for energy, which can have an adverse affect on our muscles.

So, what I decided to do was take a few days off from exercise and just recharge myself a little. By the end of two days, I was able to run a good 4.5 miles...and still feel like I could run some more. I am now making sure I feed myself after I run, too. This has given me the energy I need to recover for my next workout. More energy also means a better, longer, and more effective workout. The duration of a workout really is key when it comes to weight loss. I feel like I finally have the energy to make each of my workouts really count.