thank you for your insights, I know I might be stubborn but I find nutritional intervention too complicated. As an amateur, itâs already complicated to schedule my workouts, I donât see myself calculate all the calories and macros I take or I am gonna turn crazy
Me too and I am not French! When we were on holiday in Le Bourg-dâOisans a couple of years ago, our self-catering had a checklist with 20 different sorts of bread on it, tick the ones you want and its magically outside your door next day at 8am. Awesome!
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Great place for cycling ! https://www.strava.com/activities/3873937701
btw when I get a notification mail, if I click on the link on my iPhone, it opens Safari and I get the {âstatusâ:401,âerrorâ:âUnautorizedâ}
I knew that xert calculates how many calories come from burnt fats and how many from hydrocarbons.
Interesting function, actually, how do they calculate it?
Xert is really bad at estimating this for me
https://www.nfkb0.com/2020/06/17/xert-carbfat-model-from-baron-biosystems-is-not-for-me/
you will find some explanations above ^^
Yes unfortunately at the moment you need to login to Intervals.icu and then go to the forums. I still need to sort that out.
@nfkb Unfortunately, increasing your ability to utilize fat as a fuel source comes mostly from nutrition (some experts say itâs 75% nutrition, 25% training, reference Bob Seebohar). It doesnât have to be complicated, and itâs certainly no fun counting calories, or having to give up bread! The simplest way to achieve whatâs necessary is to increase your protein and fat intake. So before reaching for the bread, think about what protein and fat you want to have with it. Then, simply try to match physical size of the protein with the bread. Example, a lot of athletes eat chicken and rice. Most will fill a bowl with rice then add in some chicken so youâre left with mostly rice and a bit of chicken. Just reverse that thinking and start with as much chicken as you can, then match the physical size of the chicken with rice. Then include some kind of healthy fats (oils, avocado, nuts, etc.). Try to incorporate this into every meal during training. When it comes time for that hard day (a race, hard group ride, whatever), be sure to then load up on that bread. Thus, âperiodizingâ your nutrition for those harder events. Make sense? Have at a look here: http://www.metabolicefficiency.org/
thank you for your answer, I am currently reading Bob Seeboharsâ book. I seek training advices and the book is full of nutritional dogma and anecdatas :-/ I wished I could find more science based strategies.
Nevertheless, I counted calories for a day. It was a day off work so it was easier to train and count calories.
No restricting on nothing I ate what seems quite usual for me
carb 310 g (36% kcal) ; fat 180 g (48%) ; prot 137g (16%)
I weight 63 kg / 139 pounds and I spent roughly 1000 kcal through training that day.
For sure I could cut some carb in there but I feel like at will have to drink olive oil at some point to have my calories needs when training. I am more on the side of finding good training workouts to improve endurance/FATMAX. Shifting my fatmax toward more power output (above 3 W/kg would be great)
tl;dr I feel ok to train hard but lazy to suffer in turning my nutrition upside down for an hypothetical gain.
@nfkb Ha, you certainly donât need to drink the olive oil (but some actually do) as it simply isnât needed. Some better options might be full fat Greek yogurts, nuts, cheese, nut butters and avocado. As far as training advice, thereâs no real magic. Based on the type of events you do (long endurance) and your goal (improve fat burning), Iâd suggest polarizing your training. Make about 90% of your training at 65% maxHR and try to extend one day a week as long as you can. Shorter days you can do over/unders like 4m @ 65% max HR (or power associated with 65%) and 1m @ a power that takes you up to around 80% maxHR. And then about 5% of time you can do VO2 work where youâre spending 12-24m @ VO2. VO2 work is best performed at interval times that YOU prefer. Some prefer shorter intervals, some prefer longer. Stick to what you like. Not knowing your experience level, VO2 work should be about an 8 for RPE (and suggest using RPE over % of FTP as power will come up as you improve). Respiration should be high. HR should fall in the 90-94% range. Rest interval should be about 1:1 or 1:1.5. Hope this helps.
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Thank you for your interest.
I already do mostly easy stuff, intervals.icu says my zone repartition is roughly 80-15-5
I do long rides on the week-end, mostly without eating
I do a lot fo workouts like 1h @ fatmax or 3x10 min 25 watts just above fatmax. Most of them early in the morning, fasted.
I do jogs in the fasted state, I sometime swim in the fasted state.
When I do VO2 I do 15x1 min @ max aerobic power or 4x8 min @ 106% FTP -> 92% maxHR
But I guess my genetic is against me since I have seen no progress in fatmax according to met cart test (done fasted)
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I get this question a lot from athletes doing The Absa Cape Epic, which is a long 7 day multi stage mtb race.
Long Slow Distance is often prescribed, BUT careful zone setting on both HR and Power is needed and it is constantly needing to be monitored and adjusted. My advice, ride in Z2 HR, watch your power and try ride the highest power you can without going out of Z2. This power number you can hold for a long period (1-2 hours) we will from this point refer to as your "LOW FTP â. Your âHighâ FTP number will be higher and you burn sugar to hold that Number. The " LOW FTPâ you should only burn FAT to hold it. As you get stronger and fitter by sticking to this Z2 HR you will see a rise in the power you can hold. Most people do this phase of their training poorly, by riding to high a HR and to low an actual power. This method of mine is a grind itâs focussed and itâs draining. Mostly in the beginning you will be low cadence to keep the output HIGH on power and HR low. As you get stronger the cadence can increase. Hope this helps.
Also be patient as this is like training, to become a sprinter. It takes time, consistency and dedication to get it right. It will take a month of doing 2-3 long rides per week like this to see an improvement .
Intervals 3 times a week will help you burn fat, but wonât help you increase you ability to maximise fat as an energy source!
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Thanks a lot, youâre putting word on what I am reflecting for a few weeks. I have listened a lot to podcasts with Inigo San Millan and get this high zone 2 thing. I am on the edge of buying a lactate pro meter ahaha to stay < 2 mmol.L-1
I have started to summarize my strategy here
http://www.nfkb0.com/2020/09/23/training-strategy-for-2021/
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I enjoyed reading your blog. Some interesting thoughts. I can only suggest that you donât âOVERTHINKâ things and keep things simple. Too many athletes will use too much data and get stuck.
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ah ah ah you are right ! Youâve got a good diagnostic ! datawaterboarding as Joel Filliol said one day in his podcast !
But I admit itâs part of my pleasure to plan and think about these hypothesis. A key thing is just to avoid putting the plan upside down every 15 days because of a new idea. A balance between flexibility and discipline I guess
thanks again
PS is it readable for english native people ? I mean I am not used to write blog post in english and try to do it more and more
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Your English writing was fine, I could follow everything !!
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PS I think I have understood something about FATMAX. Itâs a kind of confusion factor between FATMAX, the idea of burning fat, and the zone where mitochondria/TCA cycle work the most. So it not than I need that much to improve fat burning capacities than training in this zone where mitochondria is highly stimulated and then hope for adaptations and growth and aerobic capacity (size number and mitochondria machinery). And with growth of aerobic capacity comes more fat burned for same absolute effort. This is also why itâs better to clamp a workout to RPE and/or HR since when you work close to turn point you are highly likely to drift in another zone where mitochondria canât process the lactate anymore and you fatigue much quicker both short term and long term. So itâs maybe not that much about tinkering with nutrition and fast (also I donât see much a problem of fat availability in studies, more a challenge to get through the beta oxidation process) but more of discipline to work in the right zone.
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Yes, you have understood this absolutely perfectly. Itâs actually very simple to do. Ride low HR monitor it, but try push as much power as you can and donât let the cardio drift to next zone.
Thank you. I know this publication, I have even blogged about it 
Itâs now 4 years in a row that I do a short fast or a fast mimicking diet at the end of my season. Nothing crazy 2-3 days of fast or 5 days FMD in 2018
But I am not sure of the relatioship between fast and fat max/endurance, what do you mean ?