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McBleezy8 t1_ivcezad wrote

Though interesting the truth is not all substrates are created equally this is especially true for high functioning athletes that require X amount of energy for Y amount of time. Within skeletal muscles carbs can be utilized much faster than fat because the anaerobic conversion of glucose to ATP is more direct and involves less steps than oxidizing fat in the mitochondria. In addition to that fat cannot be taken up as efficiently into muscles during intense exercises. There’s a few reasons for that if anyone is interested I can detail those

Athletes being the key term here. For an average person not working out multiples X a day or numerous times a week the effects might be as negligible as this study claims.

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yangYing t1_ivei7wt wrote

Sorry for a basic question, but - what is 'substrate'?

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tjdux t1_ivelvmr wrote

In general, a substrate is a basic building block or underlying surface.

For this instance they are describing different forms of simple sugars that the human body can metabolize.

Carbohydrates are a basic sugar that the body can easily break down and use as energy, they are an example of 1 type of substrate in this convo. Biology has always considered carbs relatively "efficient" because the body doesn't need to change them to use their energy.

Another substrate would be created when the body converts fat cells into sugars that can be used by the muscles.

The overall point of the study is saying that the sugar the body converts from fat is just as powerful muscle fuel as pure carbohydrates for most people, except high level athletes.

Disclaimer, I'm just a guy who has done a lot of reading on nutrition and weight loss, specific to low carb diets.

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lost_in_life_34 t1_ivd94cw wrote

Athletes have more mitochondria’s and more efficient ones?

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dr_eh t1_ivdiq47 wrote

No they burn more energy and require faster repletion for high-intensity activities.

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lost_in_life_34 t1_iveojps wrote

And they burn more energy cause they have more mitochondria in their cells due to training

Low intensity builds more mitochondria per cell and high intensity trains them to work better

For strength training more muscle mass means more mitochondria to burn fat

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dr_eh t1_ivf0eaf wrote

Source? I'm curious how they measure # of mitochondria.

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-Kibbles-N-Tits- t1_ivfbr69 wrote

“Low intensity” he’s specifically referring to zone two cardio, which every type of athlete has to do a lot of to maximize performance

Just look up “aerobic exercise and mitochondria” https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/zone-2-training-for-endurance-athletes/

I just picked one of the first ones there but yeah, google scholar will take you to better ones if you add stuff like meta-analysis or review to it

Idk if what they said about high intensity was true though

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