Feature

Mon 15 Sep, 4:00 pm UTC

Health: How to burn fat better

By Joe Beer

For fitness riders, the question "Why would I want to be able to burn fat?" begs the obvious answer - to get in better shape and look it. But for fit athletes who already have a well-worked lipolysis system, the answer might not be so obvious.

But tapping the body's fat in training increases endurance, reduces the likelihood of 'bonking' and increases fitness. So how exactly do you improve it?

Fat burning tips

  1. Keep the ride intensity under 80% of your maximum heart rate (HRmax) and ride for long periods.
  2. Training regularly, even turbo training sessions, helps use fat as fuel more than any special food, supplement or psychological trick and during a 2-hour endurance ride does not save glycogen but it does significantly decrease the use of fats stored within the muscle fibres.

Dual fuels

Starting with the basics, you have two choices of fuel: carbohydrate and fat. Carbohydrates provide around 1,500 to 2,000 calories when muscles are fully 'carbo loaded'. This 'higher-octane' fuel can help you go long by combining with fat use or it can fuel quick efforts or sustained high-intensity riding on its own.

The fat stored under your skin and within muscles themselves is a very high calorie fuel depot. Even lean riders have over 30,000 calories stored as fat, and there are quite a few fit riders carrying well over 100,000. This is clearly a significantly larger potential fuel source than carbohydrates.

Fat use generally increases steadily as a ride draws out, starting with the use of fat droplets stored in the muscle and then gradually using fat circulating in the blood stream that is coming off the 'chub' stores spread around the body.

Tapping the generous body fat stores saves limited glycogen, but remember even at steady riding levels you will still use carbohydrates.

Build the engine

Training is crucial for optimising your dual fuel burning engine. If you can increase your oxygen carrying capacity and the architecture of fat use by riding regularly you will be many times more efficient than the irregular rider.

Studies show that one effect of training regularly is that less lactate is produced at a given level of effort. For example, unfit people (those whose ability to take up oxygen, expressed as VO2max, is about 25-35ml/kg/min) may have a significant increase in lactate (LT or Lactate Threshold) at 50% of their VO2max. Trained athletes (with a VO2max of 60-70ml/kg/min) are likely to have this same lactate increase at around 70 to 80% of VO2max.

More importantly, data suggest that fat usage may be 80% higher in athletes compared to obese individuals.

Data from well-trained riders in the study (VO2max of 64ml/kg/min) suggests that fat use stops above 87% VO2max, and the peak area is around 45 to 65% VO2max. This equates to around 70 to 85% of maximum heart rate.

If you want to work out the approximate percentage of VO2max you are working at, use this equation:

 %VO2max = (%HRmax x 1.345) -50

For example, riding at 80% of maximum heart rate (HRmax) gives (80 x 1.345) - 50 = 57.6% of your VO2max

Type One 'endurance' muscle fibres were found to be the main area of fatty droplet use.

Interestingly, glycogen storage after fasted sessions, on water alone, was much greater than the feeding during the ride. This suggests these fasted water-only rides up to 2 hours could be used to boost peak levels of fat use by 50% and post-exercise muscle glycogen storage by 200%.

However, for all those pulled in by 'fat burning' spinning sessions, aerobics classes and 'step', be sure you are number savvy. Fat use probably only provides 0.5g to 1g per minute.

This will be greater during later stages of training sessions and in very fit riders (maybe 600 to 800 calories per hour). But a carbohydrate meal 30 to 90 minutes before your ride will greatly turn down your fat burning engine, switching you to burn more carbohydrates.

Have breakfast after the ride then, and if you're going for over 2 hours eat breakfast on the bike in the form of regular carbohydrate foods - about 40 to 60g per hour.

Take a rider with bad meal timing; lack of consistent riding, who's training too hard and fat use will be very poor. However, if you leave two hours between eating and riding, train fasted up to two hours once a week, keep in your steady riding zone (60 to 80%of maximum heart rate) most of the time and stay consistent, then you will be a good fat burner.

User Comments

There are 11 comments on this post

Showing 1 - 11 of 11 comments

  • This article is so ridiculousy outdated and wrong I actually found myself laughing out loud at some points.

    Anyway I really don't have the time to explain this because quite frankly it's bloody obvious but DO NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT train fasted and the most effecient way of burning fat is high intensity intervals, as it raises the metabolism and allows you to retain muscle, therefore you're a fat burning engine all the time. What little fat you may or may not burn actually DURING exercise is totally irrelevant, all the juicy stuff like adaptation happens when you are NOT exericising. God, I feel like I'm writing a GCSE sports science answer.

  • Virtuoso says "God, I feel like I'm writing a GCSE sports science answer." which is probably the level of his education in the field of sports physiology.

  • I feel this article at least overcomplicates the issue. For any recreational rider who wants to burn fat/lose weight by far and away the most important thing to concentrate on is Calories consumed < Calories burned = weight los and fat loss. I agree with Virtuoso that Fat you burn actually during exercise is not particularly relevant. The body has large energy stores as fat and glycogen and as long as you are using up these energy stores you will lose fat as long as calories consumed is less than calories burned over any reasonable period of time. Whether you are burning fat or glycogen during an actual ride is not that important as there will be as Virtuoso calls it adaptation. Please note the above applies to the vast magority of cyclists. Proffesionals and the like may want to look deeper into the subject but I find many once or twice a week recreational cyclists who want to lose weight get bogged down and confused by articles such as these which are over complicating the issue for them

  • Sorry Pat but virtuoso is right. I was reading papers disabusing people of the fat burning myth 10 years ago.

    Plenty of stuff on the Internet. Try googling for Lyle Mcdonald

  • Also, its so easy to overload on fat calories; beer, many "organic" wheat cereals, peanuts, oil, dressing, sugar, salt.

    DIET very low on fat is the key after a good workout. I am tired of watching all those cyclists eating peanut butter sandwiches, and all kinds of mix nut bags etc. The amount of oil, fat in the mixed nuts is outrageous. Do a test, cut the peanut, salad dressing, eat smaller meals and try not to eat about 3 hours before bedtime.

    The results are superb, workouts is only PART of the equation toward a lean body.

  • I Can't believe you guys are saying this about Joe Beers article, I agree 100% with the article Joe is the "proof in the Pudding" he's competed at the highest level in triathlon and is a very succesful coach.

    You critics of Joe's article need to read guys like Stu Mittleman and Dr Philip Maffetone and get your bodies using fat as its primary fuel.

  • It's still quite interesting to see how people even so called experts, top coaches still don't understand how our bodies work in converting energy to propel us forward on a bike. No matter how much all you guys argue there is ONLY one fuel your body uses to contract muscles that is "ATP" (adenosine triphosphate). So making the statement of "Build the engine" and "Training is crucial" (for fat burning) is really not correct and even the author states this by giving percentages zones to train in, trained or untrained you will always be in the correct area.

    Another point of contention boost muscle glycogen storage by 200% on no food and just water alone?? How is it possible to store more then 100%? Unless your test subjects started at depleted levels. The body only has limited stores in the skeletal muscle and most of it in the liver both have limitations to how much can be stored, how can you fit twice as much in a limited space?

    There are so many different ways to train and just as many different methods to lose weight I guess the big picture is getting people thinking about their training.

  • I read this just after eating a Wispa and I came to the conclusion that I didn't understand a word of it. So an ignorant fat git I remain.

  • Sadly is part of the problem we are all unique, you all know people who can ride all day on a mars bar/peanut butter sarnie, if I don't get carbs (mars bars) about once an hour I just loose it to the extent that I can't even hold the bike up!

    However discussion of the subject is useful, and personally I found the atrticele inspiring, after all - what you really need is motivation to get out and on the bike, and then do some work to some kind of consistent plan!!

    Thanks again for inspiration/motivation article.

  • Virtuoso,you say never,never,never ride fasted. Well here in Spain there are quite a few pros who will do an hour on the indoor trainer fasted and at no more than 60-70% max of their heart rate.

    And many do blocks of 2 or 3 days with only an intake of 700 or 800 calories and low intensity training (but plenty of kms). They feel shit while doing this ,but getting the weight down is so important to them. And they get results!

    I myself feel that a mix of long steady hours mixed with some intensity and shorter rides with intervals works for most of us.

    When you get so that you are doing 14 hours a week training the weight just falls off.

  • I tried searching for Lyle MacDonald and all I could find was Ronald MacDonald. Damn

  • 1

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