My bulking cycle went great but stalled a little when I had an ulcer flare up and I had to stop eating and training for a week, last week. I lost 10 pounds that I didn't want to lose but I will put it back this week. So far I have put on the 10 pounds I was looking for and still have no love handles or belly fat and will finish the week at 207. Pics by Mar 1.
Boy I sure wish I had said, "You burn fat in the fire of carbs" but I stole it from Wilson 6 because it was so easy to explain why you need carbs. In honor of one of this or any boards truly great contributors, I'll repost Wilson 6's post. Why Atkins and CKD is not for the athlete.
fat and carbs (post #6)
I don't know how I let myself get sucked into this one…………
If all you do is walk or jog, then fat is a great energy source. However, any aerobic or resistance exercise performed at higher intensity is going to require carbs, either from muscle glycogen or from the blood in the form of glucose. There ain't no way around it. When muscle glycogen runs low, one relies on blood glucose. If blood glucose is low, you're done. This has been studied ad nauseam.
As far as fat vs carb metabolism goes, this business of CO2 confuses me. If you take a single 6 carbon fatty acid (C6-H12-O2) and a single unit of glucose (C6-H12-O6) and oxidize them both aerobically the outcome is still 6 units of CO2. In fact, it requires 5 units more of oxygen to burn the fat versus the carbohydrate. Now, you do get 45 ATP for each 6 carbon fat burned vs 39 ATP for each unit of glucose burned, BUT you can't go anaerobic with fat (producing lactate) and that's why you're limited in terms of exercise intensity. Remember, fat burns in the fire of carbohydrate.
The trick to insulin production from carbs and avoiding low blood glucose is to time your carb intake shortly before exercise (less than 20 minutes). When you start exercising, the insulin response is shut off. It is only if you consume simple sugar an hour out, then start exercising intensely, will you run into trouble. Again, this has been studied extensively. Regardless, a good meal with complex carbs a few hours from your training session, or the night before, if you train early will do because your liver and muscle glycogen stores will be able to sustain the exercise bout.
If you don't believe me, then try going on 60 grams of carbs per day total for a couple of days, get up first thing in a fasted state, suck down some fat (flax seed oil or whatever) then hit legs heavy. It will be an easy workout since it will last just few minutes before you pass out or come close.
W6
Note: this was BEFORE Glucorell R and why it's so much easier to train and use Glucorell R because now you don't need to limit carbs to hold down insulin. The Glucorell R will do it for you while allowing you the carbs to train.