LCHF Running: How to Get Started

Thanks to Prof Tim Noakes at @AskProfNoakes for this guide for how to get on the road to being a runner who doesn't rely so heavily on carbs for fuel.  I'm surprised I didn't stumble across this podcast before today, but there it is.  I've downloaded the back catalogue and the shows are all very short, so it shouldn't take long to catch up and then be waiting for more.

I've asked a question about the amount of carb he recommends is good for an average runner and what that is based on; hopefully it'll get answered at some point, but I imagine he gets a *lot* of questions!

Are we there yet?

It's been 16 days since I started on a "very low carb" diet of under 50g carbohydrate a day.  In theory, it takes 2-3 weeks of constantly low insulin knocking about to flip that fat burning switch.  So, am I adapted yet?  How can I tell?  Has my carbohydrate level been low enough?  All of the data that drives the 50g threshold comes from studies that have been on men, so it might be that due to my different absolute body-weight and/or hormone profile, I might need to go even lower with carbs to adapt.  If I don't know whether I have or haven't adapted, I don't know if 50g was low enough (though, to be fair, most days it's been very comfortably under 50g and, on average, around 6% of my total caloric intake).

Having not noticeably had ketone-smelling breath, I'm not sure whether I have adapted or not.  I've been drinking a lot of coffee so it could be hard to tell whether my breath is that sort of smelly through the coffee smell.  And that's not the be all and end all of it either, so I have no idea.  The only real way to find out is have a gas analysis test.

Possibly a problematic amount of alcohol over the 2.25 weeks in there for adaptation?

And that's exactly what I'm planning to do.  Cadence Performance in Crystal Palace do RMR and Steady State Fuel Analysis testing (along with a whole bunch of other exciting things) and I'll hopefully be going in next weekend at the beginning of December to get strapped into some contraptions and analysed.  That should help me to understand whether I've got there to being fat adapted by then, and if not then I'll have to think about lowering the threshold for carbohydrate and/or examining what I'm eating in a bit more detail.

This weekend, however, I have to drag myself around a half marathon in an indeterminate fuelling state.  This will be... interesting.  My pace has been low since I started back after surgery and it's not really got any better in the last couple of weeks.  The longest I've run for is 90 minutes and that was 2 weeks ago.  I'm thinking I'll not be breaking any PBs on Sunday but I'm more worried that I may actually bonk if I'm not adapted enough yet.  And that would be very miserable indeed as I wouldn't want to crack and eat a banana; the insulin spike would strike fear into me.  However, if I make it around the course and I don't bonk, that would be rather a successful outcome indeed.  We shall see!

Recovery/adaptation week

This week is an adaptation week.  When my body gets to think about all the stuff I've asked it to do over the previous 3 weeks and make some changes to reflect that.  Well, not really, but that's the approximation.  It means that the amount of training this week is significantly reduced and I get two whole days of rest!  It's also meant no running from Monday to Friday, instead of the two work-day runs I've started to get used to and really quite enjoy (er, OK, who is this person and what have they done with the real me?).

 The view of Coach Rich is that we'll get better return on investment if I don't race Thames Turbo this coming Monday and train through the bank holiday weekend quite hard.  It's a hard decision in one way for me as I'm obsessive in collecting sets and this means I don't get to collect the set of 4 Thames Turbo races this year.  It also means no benchmark.  But in other ways it's an irrelevant benchmark this year and I am far better off following the plan to get some quite challenging sessions in over the weekend.  I'll end up with a really tough brick session on Tuesday of a 4.5 hour hilly bike ride, followed by a 90 minute run.  After having done my longest training run three days beforehand, a lap of the IM UK bike course and run course a couple of days before, and another 2 hour ride and 2.5km swim the day before it.  I'll be knackered and that's the whole idea.  FUN!