ALA for athletes

[monkeyballs]

yes... it is.. never before has the pure R enantiomer been available for anything but research.

Perhaps it has never been available so easilly to the public, but I don't think that the guys at AF are in on the ground floor here. I'm sure that there has been some supplement available that is relativly close the R-ala that is sold here. Maybe not identical, but close.

 

[swimmar]

Wow, some good discussion here.

Monkeyballs, yes, a ketogenic diet for an elite athlete is not a good idea. Personally, I follow a fairly low-carb diet, except for about two hours before and after each workout. Seems to work well for me. As far as eliteness goes, I'm not exactly sure what the criteria would be for that. Only Olympic caliber? Nationally ranked?

Anyways, what got me thinking about ALA is I read some stuff about it possibly increasing the amount of glycogen reserves in muscles, and I went, "Hey, that sounds like a good thing for athletics." Though apparently, it's not that great. Thanks for the response.

 

[fhg43]

Here is my reasoning (sort of an educated guess I have formulated after reading a lot, both studies and anecdotal evidence) about how ALA can help people lose fat.

Many people have questioned just how ALA can help BURN fat. Well, it doesn't.

I was under the impression that ALA helped users lean out by increasing glucose uptake i.e. cells can take in more glucose with ALA than without. So less excess carbs are stored as fat.

Most fat deposition occurs when more carbs than the body can burn are consumed in one meal. The excess glucose circulating, along with the high insulin levels, cause the fat cells to store the excess energy as fat.

Well what ALA does is reduce or even prevent this from happening. The body goes through its usual cycles of burning and sotring fat. However the storage cycle is attenuated, and the time it takes to get into fat burning mode is decreased (ie blood glucose levels fall faster when a meal is taken with ALA).

JC

Well ALA doesn't replace insulin. So insulin will still be present post meal, and some excess carbs will still get stored as fat

At lower intensity your body burns less fat and more glucose. So post-meal your body is still burning carbs and continues to use available glucose. You can't really get back into fat (as primary fuel source) burning mode because you were never in that mode. Your body prefers to use carbs for energy because they breakdown easier than fat and protein. They are also used to create fuel for your brain-your body uses glucose (or another byproduct of carb metabolism) to make neurotransmitters. Your body doesn't need much energy to wander around or sit behind a computer and type an email. As activity level increase the percentage of fat you burn increases-the body is demanding more fuel so it must tap into fat stores to get that energy. There is a "Fat burning" zone BUT the intensity is higher than most people think. Anyway thats a whole new thread....

My point is your body is still storing fat on ALA and there is anecdotal evidence to support this point. As well your body wil always attempt to store some fat-that is a facet of our physiology that is near impossible to override. And yes you do burn fat at low activity levels but less than you think. Glucose is the fuel of choice because it is easy to use.

IMO ALA is going to affect everyone in different ways. The level of insulin one releases can vary from person to person. So ALA may exert a greater effect on insulin resistant individuals like AAS users.

FHG

 

[serge]

No, sorry I'm not going to give you all of those stats. Too much time. I guess I'm just too selfish at the moment. It's late.

All I will say, is that my variables were in controll. My diet has been regimened for the past four years, and so has my training schedule.

Okay, next topic. No. I don't run. But if I did, then anything that would have a benifit on weightlifting would also have a benifit on running. Creatine is perfect example. Weightlifting and running (sprinting) aren't all that different in terms of kinesiology. Also, every anerobic athlete weightlifts, so the idea that ALA would only help weightlifters doesn't have much merit...

As for the issue of sports team sponsership, let me clarify-
I'm not talking about the denver broncos and EAS here, I'm talking about the dutch or north koreans...etc. State funded sports machines. And whatever we know about, they have studied and used for a good decade or so. Creatine was used by amature athletes as early as the late 70s. The earliest I saw it on our shelves was in the early 90's (could have been earlier...I don't know). Chances are nobody here has used (or maybe even heard of) gene therapy to augment their training.

ALA is known about by these various institutions, and to my knowledge, none use it.

I would like to add this. I'm about to hit up a 17aa cycle if my source issues ever work themselves out...I will use ALA as an anti-oxidant and liver protectant. So in this case, yes, ALA does help athletes.

me sleep now

one must consider the doses used in the studies involving human subjects (not fucking rats), i have yet to see one abstract evaluating effects of ALA at a dose higher then 600mg/ed, not to mention 3g/ed; untill such a study is done we have nothing to go on but the anecdotal evidence

 

[macrophage69alpha]

Perhaps it has never been available so easilly to the public, but I don't think that the guys at AF are in on the ground floor here. I'm sure that there has been some supplement available that is relativly close the R-ala that is sold here. Maybe not identical, but close.

NOPE...

 

[Lumberg]

I was under the impression that ALA helped users lean out by increasing glucose uptake i.e. cells can take in more glucose with ALA than without. So less excess carbs are stored as fat.


Well ALA doesn't replace insulin. So insulin will still be present post meal, and some excess carbs will still get stored as fat

At lower intensity your body burns less fat and more glucose. So post-meal your body is still burning carbs and continues to use available glucose. You can't really get back into fat (as primary fuel source) burning mode because you were never in that mode. Your body prefers to use carbs for energy because they breakdown easier than fat and protein. They are also used to create fuel for your brain-your body uses glucose (or another byproduct of carb metabolism) to make neurotransmitters. Your body doesn't need much energy to wander around or sit behind a computer and type an email. As activity level increase the percentage of fat you burn increases-the body is demanding more fuel so it must tap into fat stores to get that energy. There is a "Fat burning" zone BUT the intensity is higher than most people think. Anyway thats a whole new thread....

My point is your body is still storing fat on ALA and there is anecdotal evidence to support this point. As well your body wil always attempt to store some fat-that is a facet of our physiology that is near impossible to override. And yes you do burn fat at low activity levels but less than you think. Glucose is the fuel of choice because it is easy to use.

IMO ALA is going to affect everyone in different ways. The level of insulin one releases can vary from person to person. So ALA may exert a greater effect on insulin resistant individuals like AAS users.

FHG

Thanks FHG for helping me understand a bit better. HOwever I have some issues:

1) If we are to believe ulter, while ALA does not replace insuling completely, it does in effect supplant it to a great degree. basically with ALA you will need significantly less insulin to shuttle your dietary carbs into your muscles.

2) isn't there a fat burning zone at rest? meaning when the body has consumed all the carbs from the previous meal? also a lot of bbers recognize the fact that lower-intensity cardio actually burns more fat than high-intensity cardio. how do you reconcile this?

JC

 

[swimmar]

also a lot of bbers recognize the fact that lower-intensity cardio actually burns more fat than high-intensity cardio. how do you reconcile this?

? I didn't think that was the case. There was a study done some number of years ago that showed that more glycogen than fat was burned at high intensity work, while more fat than glycogen was burned at low intensity work. However, people didn't understand the difference between proportions and absolute amounts, and thought that low intensity was the way to go for fat loss.

 

[Lumberg]

AHA-so you are saying buring more calories is more important that WHAT you are using to fuel the exercise. makes sense.

JC

 

[Ulter]

Perhaps it has never been available so easilly to the public, but I don't think that the guys at AF are in on the ground floor here. I'm sure that there has been some supplement available that is relativly close the R-ala that is sold here. Maybe not identical, but close.

Why don't you think the guys at AF are on the ground floor here? You're gonna hurt their feelings. Why wouldn't they be on the ground floor, do you see anyone else selling NYC or Tyler's Liver Detox here?

AF was first and right now AF is the ONLY r-ALA there is in America.

As Macro has said repeatedly you can't compare ALA to r-ALA.



"We're finding - and others are, too - that the R(+)-form - the natural form - is much more powerful than the racemic mixture ... Hopefully ... companies are going to be producing on more of a clinical scale the R(+)-form of lipoic acid, because we're finding very significant effects using this, as opposed to the racemic mixture."
Dr. Tory Hagen, in Mitochondrial Decay in Aging.

"We have presented in this study new information indicating that this enhancement of glucose metabolism is sterospecific, with the R(+)-enantiomer being much more effective than the S(-)- enantiomer."
Dr. Ryan Streeper and colleagues, in The American Journal of Physiology.

"Lipoic acid sold in a health food store is a synthetic mixture, a racemic mixture. And R[+]- is the natural form and S[-]- is an unnatural one ... And in our hands R[+]- works and S[-]- doesn't."
Dr. Bruce Ames, in Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence.

"R[+]-LA [that is, R(+)-lipoic acid], and not a racemic mixture of R[+]-and S[-]- LA, should be considered a choice for therapeutic applications."
Dr. Lester Packer and colleagues, in Free Radical Biology and Medicine.

"The S[-]-enantiomer … part of the racemate, which is present as about a 50% impurity, needs to be eliminated."
Dr. Guido Zimmer and colleagues, in Methods in Enzymoogy.

 

[THeMaCHinE]

Nandi12 -- thanks for your perspective on this thread. In my experience, your thinking has always been very solid.