Podcast Episode #79: What Does Your Body Use First For Energy – Carbohydrate, Protein or Fat?

In this podcast episode, soy milk choices, uric acid in your foods, bilateral breathing during swimming Are rice cakes okay? Beer versus wine for losing weight how to choose your chicken and what does your body use first for energy, carbohydrate, protein or fat?

Welcome to the BenGreenfieldFitness.com podcast. We provide you with free exercise, nutrition, weight loss, triathlon and wellness advice from the top fitness experts in the nation. So whether you're an Ironman triathlete or you're just trying to shed a few pounds, get ready for non run of the mill cutting edge content from BenGreenfieldFitness.com.

Hey podcast listeners, this is Ben Greenfield and this is actually the last week in which we're going to be doing primarily listener Q and A. We'll be returning to our interviews with health, fitness and nutrition experts from all over the country next week and we'll be kicking that off with an interview of the author with the author of Suicide by Sugar, Nancy Appleton. We'll also be featuring an interview this February with Carolyn Dean as Well as with Dr. Richard Cohen. So lots of good interviews coming your way. And the reason that I'm going to be able to return to devoting more time to this podcast is that we're officially launching the Rockstar Triathlete academy over@rockstartriathlete.com this week. On Thursday we're going to be opening that up to charter members and it's everything from private member forums to Coach Q&As twice weekly call ins with triathlon coaches and experts and lots of insider tips and tricks and just a perfect little community for triathletes to learn the sport. Kind of geared for beginner all the way up to advanced triathletes. That website is a dollar to join as a charter member with all the bonuses that we're offering to the new charter members this month as well. So you can go check that out@rockstartriathlete.com and I'm very excited about bringing that to you. So in today's podcast episode I'm going to be responding to listener questions and before I get to those questions, just a couple of things. If you have a question, email ben@BenGreenfieldFitness.com you can Skype Pacific Fit if you'd like to leave an audio question. You can even call toll free to 877-209-9439. And I do have a line that's devoted to listener call in Q&As and then also please just write a mental note to yourself or a physical note. Leave us a ranking in itunes if you get a chance. If you haven't done that yet, it really helps support the show. It helps us to continue to grow. That, as well as the opportunity to make donations to the show, which you can do at the bottom of any of the show notes, really, really helps me to be able to bring this show to you on an ongoing basis. So we've got some really great questions this week. And actually the question on carbohydrates, I think is really good just because it hasn't. Hasn't been answered very well anywhere. And I'm going to answer it today for you. So let's go ahead and move on to this week's listener questions.

Listener Q and A.

The first question for this week comes from listener Curtis. And Curtis says, I'm 59 and I'm finally getting back into shape, but gout is making it mighty painful at times. I know there are many foods that a person should stay away from in order to control uric acid levels, but many of those foods are also foods that I need to assume and other things that I have going on. I've been running and walking through the pain, except at times it's too much. Are there any herbs or supplements that reduce uric acid? And can the already built up crystallized uric acid be eliminated? Well, that's a great question, Curtis. And first of all, for those of you out there who are trying to understand what's going on with Curtis, uric acid is basically something natural in our bodies. It's the byproduct of the metabolism of a class of chemicals known as purines. And a lot of times those are found in high protein containing foods like meat. But a lot of times, and especially people with gout, the body doesn't have the proper enzymes to actually deal with these purines. And so uric acid builds up and it ends up crystallizing. And this leads to things like kidney stones, stones, high blood pressure, joint pain. It can even lead to diabetes and atherosclerosis. And so it can be kind of an issue. And a lot of times it manifests itself in soreness in the feet, which is referred to as a gouty, arthritis, just because of that crystallization of uric acid in those areas. And it can be treated with prescriptions. There are also certain forms, foods that people with gout are generally advised to stay away from. A lot of those foods would include, like, I mentioned meat pretty. And that that would include like poultry and seafood. As well, there's some vegetables that tend to be a little bit higher in uric acid. Asparagus is one, spinach is another. Cauliflower, some of the cruciferous vegetables. Most any yeast products, especially baked goods, beer, alcohol and coffee can be a big problem, as can just about any food that's fried or rich or has a lot of spices in it. There are obviously some pretty significant limitations to what you can actually take in. Now some of the things that you can do to help prevent gout and help prevent the uric acid buildup, and this is not something I'm doling out as medical advice designed to to treat you. I'm just saying that these are some of the things that traditionally people have used would be staying hydrated. That means taking your weight, dividing that by in half, and at least getting that many ounces per day of water. Foods high in potassium can help out quite a bit. Fruits and vegetables that aren't on the list of those that people with gout should avoid would be on the list. Quercetin is actually a pretty popular natural remedy. Quercetin is something that you'll find in like the FRS energy drink that Lance Armstrong endorses. But you can also get quercetin as a supplement, like at a super supplement outlet or any other supplement type of store. Lemon juice is another thing, as well as baking soda that people have used to help control the uric acid levels. And then a high fiber diet, just because that helps absorb a lot of the acids that are formed in the liver. And a lot of those acids can serve as a precursor to uric acid. Now when you get into the supplements, there are a lot of supplements as well that can act as anti inflammatories against some of the acidic buildup. Fish oil would be one. Flaxseed oil is another. Bromelain is something that's traditionally taken vitamin B, making sure that you actually get adequate vitamin B, specifically the B5, the pantothenic acid that can help out quite a bit. Dr. Dean talks about it a bit in her book Magnesium Miracle. But magnesium, whether topical or oral, could help you a little bit in terms of your mineral balance as well. And vitamin E is another pretty powerful antioxidant that you can use. There are other things that people use. Apple cider vinegar is one that I've heard of. Cherries would be another, just because of their powerful antioxidant properties, as would be red clover. We could probably spend an hour talking about natural remedies for gout. But the basic idea is that there are some foods you want to avoid, there are some supplements, those of which I mentioned, that are associated with something people have tried for gout anecdotally, successfully, but some things to consider. So great question, Curtis, and hopefully that helps you exercise in the presence of your gout and uric acid buildup. You know, if we were to sum up everything, I would definitely be looking into higher fiber vegetable based diet with some of the supplements I talked about. So listener Richard asks a quick question regarding my wife. She is both gluten and lactose intolerant and so she consumes soy milk and products. She has two children and suffers with more mild ailments like colds and generally lower energy levels than myself. I was wondering if you think that soy milk may be a contributing factor to this and whether you suggest that she should mix up her intake with rice milk, etc. If your wife already has a lactose intolerance and gluten intolerance, Richard, she may have other food intolerances. Soy is a known food intolerance and the basic idea is, is that if the intestinal lining can't properly digest proteins like milk proteins and soy proteins, then those proteins are actually taken up into the bloodstream and the body treats them like a foreign object in the bloodstream, what's called an antigen. And the body produces antibodies against those antigens and that causes an allergic response, which is basically an inflammatory condition. And you can get intestinal inflammation, you can get a drop in energy levels, a drop in metabolism, and that happens with some people with soy. It's more common for fermented or, I'm sorry, unfermented soy products like tofu or soy milk to be an issue and fermented products like miso or tempeh or natto to be a little bit less of an issue. So it can kind of depend on the soy that she chooses. But absolutely, if soy milk is a staple in your wife's diet and she has a food intolerance to it, then it could affect her energy levels and her immune system because anytime you mount an inflammatory response in the body, it can cause the immune system to become hypersensitive and increase the frequency of things like colds. What I would do is, as you say, try to substitute some of that soy milk. Rice milk would be a good alternative. Check the nutrition label. A lot of times they'll add sugar to rice milk milk, so be careful that there's not any syrupies or anything sweet or artificial being added to it. Almond milk is another Great source. And there are a lot of good home recipes out there for almond milk. It's easier to make than you think. Basically just requires a blender and water and some almonds. The other thing that you can use as an alternative to the almond milk or the rice milk would be a goat protein. If she can tolerate that. Some people actually can that can't tolerate cow's milk. And we've had an interview with a gentleman from Mount Capra on the show before about that. You can do a search@BenGreevilleFitness.com for goat's milk. And then the last thing you may want to consider something like coconut water. Another thing that's been discussed on this show as an alternative to milk consumption. But I would definitely look into some replacements for the soy milk. And then I've got another question here from listener Chuck. And Chuck says, my question is about rice cakes. I've always figured these are pretty much a useless form of healthy carbohydrates, but I picked up a bag in the grocery store the other day and for the plain variety I was looking at, the only ingredient listed was organic brown rice. This actually doesn't seem like a bad choice. I wouldn't eat them all the time, but they seem like a nice option for some variation to put some almond butter or lean protein on. What are your thoughts? Yeah, absolutely. Rice cakes are low in calories, and although they're high in the glycemic index, meaning they cause a pretty quick release of blood sugar, they're fairly low in calories and low in what's called the glycemic load. Now, like you say, Chuck, what you looked at was the plain variety, and that's generally what you're going to want to choose. And then you add a protein to that, like a guacamole or a hummus or a nut butter or something of that nature. Now, if you go and you look at something like the Quaker caramel Corn rice cake, pull up that rice cake on a website like just the Quakerouts.com or nutrition data, and you can see they've got a whole grain brown rice as their initial flavor. But then they add corn, they add sugar, they add fructose, they add maltodextrin, caramel color, salt and soy lecithin. Now, once you add all that into the rice cake, then it becomes a completely different food altogether. So if you're going to use rice cake as a snack, I would highly recommend that you use just regular old plain rice cakes and add your own protein. Now, I have A question here from listener Richard and he says, I listened with interest to your interview with swimsmooth.com and I've been trying to make changes to my freestyle swim stroke. I swam competitively when I was younger and as such learned to swim taking my breath over my right shoulder. I am finding that adapting to bilateral breathing is very difficult. How long do you expect it takes for this new behavior to become the norm? Well, first of all, if it's triathlon that you're attempting to compete in, Richard, bilateral breathing is definitely going to be something that you want to work at. It helps you smooth out your stroke, it keeps you balanced. It gives you an option to breathe against the waves or away from the waves or away from someone who happens to be swimming on one side of you. In that case, you'd have to breathe away from that person so you're not sucking in all the water that they're churning up. Bilateral breathing, in my opinion, is crucial for a triathlete to actually be able to learn. Now, in terms of improving your bilateral breathing, the best advice I can give you is to just do it. I know that sounds really simple, but that would be step one is just start to incorporate it and get past the fact that you have that habit of breathing to one side and just begin in every set to force yourself to breathe to both sides. Now, some drills that can help you achieve balance on the side that you're likely not able to balance on are going to be side swimming drills, meaning that you're practicing swimming on your side and emphasizing especially that side that you're not good at breathing on so that your body learns balance. You're basically kicking on your side with one arm extended and one arm at your side. A couple other drills that you can look at, there's a website called GoSwimTV that has some wonderful examples of these drills would be the 6:1 and the 6:3 drill, which are initially taken from the Total Immersion program. I use them a lot with my athletes, but they're great in teaching you to be balanced on both sides of your body. Those will also help your bilateral breathing. I like the zipper drill where you zip up the side of your body during your stroke and learn to have proper rotation and balance on each side. And finally, I'd recommend the head out of the water swimming, which will teach you some of the, some of the subtle shoulder movements that you'll be able to make in order to breathe. And that's just Tarzan style breathing where you're breathing with your head completely out of the water. So do some side swimming, some six one, some six three, some zipper drills and some Tarzan style swimming and all of those will help quite a bit with your bilateral breathing. But definitely don't get in a rut as far as the time that's going to take you to learn that. It's typically about a month to really get a new physical habit in place. So great question. Now I have a question from listener Tom and Tom asks. My question would be if I cut down to say a couple glasses of wine instead of my usual six or so beers, would it be less harmful to my fat levels? I'm 24, never had to exercise until I was 22, had a slim body no matter what I ate or drank until the past year or so and now I've had a dramatic increase in weight and it is really doing me no good, especially being summertime. Any advice? Alright, so the whole idea behind beer versus wine versus liquor is that before you make any of those choices, you need to understand that drinking does mess with your metabolism. Because when you drink, the alcohol that you consume is converted to something called acetate in your liver and your body will preferentially burn acetate over the other calorie sources in your diet. And any of that acetate that doesn't get burned or any of those excess calories that don't get burned are converted to storage fat. Alcohol can also suppress your testosterone levels which will inhibit your ability to build lean muscle mass and it will bump up your cortisol levels, especially if you drink in excess. And that again in excess can lead to fat storage. So when you're choosing your drinks, looking at beer versus wine wine, you're looking at about a four ounce glass depending on the type of wine you choose, being from 65 up to about 140 calories. Typically white wines are going to be lower in calories than red wines, but either way wine is going to be slightly lower calorie overall than beer, which is about 100 to 200 calories for a 12 ounce bottle. You know the light choices are going to be closer to 100. The darker, fuller beers like Stout or Guinness are going to be closer to 200 calories. And then finally, if you look at liquor, it's actually really high. Like a 1 1/2 ounce shot of rum is going to cost you about 125 calories. And the same goes for liquor. Vodka is a little bit less, but either way liquor as well as calorically dense, even though you drink less of it a lot of times you get just as many calories. Now the other thing that you need to consider is that the gluten based protein proteins from the wheat and the beer could also, if you're gluten sensitive at all, affect your metabolism. And wine is sometimes metabolized a little bit cleaner. If you happen to be sensitive to gluten based proteins. My recommendation would be that you consider if you really want to decrease your body fat levels, bumping down any alcohol consumption to just one serving, preferably of a wine or a light beer, just about three to four times a week. So as little as you can get away with it and never in doses of more than one serving. I personally and I talked about this a little bit last week about how to stay fit when you're partying. If I'm out at a party or social event or a club most of the time I'll do one ounce of vodka with a little bit of soda water and a splash of cranberry. And for any type of drinking that I do at home with dinner, I'll usually do one glass of red wine. So calorically you're dumping empty calories into your body either way. But wine and then beer and then liquor in that order would be least damaging to most damaging in terms of fat formation. So hopefully that helps out. Great question. My next question is from listener Tim and he says maybe you have addressed this before, but what's the truth regarding chicken? A butcher told me today that there was no difference since the government prohibited the use of hormones now and that chicken was chicken. I see some marked as all natural, but does that mean just at go to market time? I'd heard rumors of them pumping the chicken full of growth substances and then flushing them before butchering them. So they are natural at the time. First of all Tim, fresh on my mind because I just watched it last week. I would recommend that you check out the flick Food Inc. Because that does a great job at laying out the whole idea behind free range chicken versus basically a chicken that's kept in a dark coop 247 in very tight and stressful living conditions. There's definitely going to be a difference between the way those animals are treated, the way that they're raised, and the type of meat that you consume as far as the amount of hormones and additives and growth substances that are added to a chicken. To my knowledge there is no current limitation or prohibition on the use of hormones in raising your chickens and for that reason I choose the natural organic free range chicken. But of course the issue with that is that free range is not defined very well. And it could mean that the Chicken just gets 15 minutes 5ft away from the coop just on a daily basis. Whereas some chickens you're going to find they're out in fresh range pastures all day long getting tons of sun. And, and there's going to be a big difference between those two types of chickens. One of the things that you need to understand is that when an animal is put into a feedlot, and studies have shown this, the amount of valuable omega 3 fatty acids in the meat is going to decline dramatically. And so if you can ensure that the chicken that you're consuming is true free range organic chicken, preferably from local farm, and that's going to be best. And there are a lot of local farm co ops in a lot of cities now. There's also what are called CSAs or Community Supported agriculture that would be the best bet to go for in terms of chicken. Like where I live locally there's a grocery store called fresh abundance freshabundance.com and they get local safe chicken from basically it's a farm, it's called Spring Water Farm up in Deer Park. I know right where it's at, it's 30 minutes from my house. And these chicken have local organic feed. If you drive to the farm and look at it, there's chickens roaming all over the place and they're in a loving family and you can definitely taste the difference between those chickens and the type of chickens, you know, the feedlot based chickens that you get from the grocery store. So I would recommend that you choose your chicken wisely. And yes, there is a case to be made for getting organic free range chicken versus getting just the stuff that you would find mass produced at your grocery store. So I have a question now from listener Kai and he says you probably don't know the answer to this. Geez Kai, thanks. But I'll ask anyway. Why don't food labels add up? Right? I just looked at the Subway 6 inch turkey sandwich on nutritiondata.com and the total kilocalories don't tank. Tie out to the math. 9 kilocalories per gram for fats, 4 kilocalories per gram of carb or protein, et cetera. Well, believe it or not, I actually do know the answer to that question. So let's talk about the missing calories in nutrition labels. It's not really your math that's off, it's basically the rounding off that is allowed on nutrition facts labels. So basically the idea is that the FDA has some rounding rules that corporations need to follow when they're determining their nutrition breakdowns. Let's start with fat. So the idea behind fat is that fat has to be declared on a food label if it has at least 0.5 grams of fat and it is rounded to the nearest half a gram. If there are fewer than 5 grams of of fat in a product, okay. And if a product has more than 5 grams of fat, they round to the nearest whole number. So if a product has 4.6 grams of fat, they'd round that to 4.5 grams on the label. And if the product has over 5 grams, let's say 5.4 grams of fat, then the product would be able to say that it has 5 grams. Now, as far as carbohydrates and proteins, they are simply required to round those to the nearest whole number. So 9.6 grams of carbohydrate would be 10 grams and 15.2 grams of protein would be 15 grams. So calories also have to be listed in specified increments. So what that means is that if a product has 50 calories or less, a manufacturer needs to round off to the nearest multiple five. And if a product has more than 50 calories, they have to round off to the nearest multiple of 10. So let's say you're eating something that has 36 calories, they would round that down to 35. And if you're eating something that has 73 calories, then they would round that down to 70. And so again, just these little changes in the calories can affect the total calorie count on that food. Now, as far as that 944 number that you bring up, the fact that fat has 9 calories per gram, protein has 4 calories per gram, and carbohydrate has 4 calories per gram, that's actually not the exact numbers. So carbohydrate actually has about 3.6 calories per gram, not 4 calories per gram. Fat is just a little bit over 9 calories per gram. Protein usually has about 4.1 to 4.2 calories per gram. And, you know, if we're looking at 156 versus 150 calories, once you add up that math, it's not going to make that much of a difference. But that's the reason that the calories really don't add up sometimes on the nutrition label. And then the final thing that the FDA allows people to do is that manufacturers can subtract out from the calories Any calories that are attributable to insoluble fiber. Because insoluble fiber just passes through your entire system and doesn't get digested, those calories don't get utilized. So, for example, if you look at Quaker Oats, they subtract out all the insoluble fiber when they're adding up the calorie content. Okay. But overall, most of these are going to have a very small impact on your actual diet. So. Great question, Kai. And going to move on to a question now from listener Chuck. And Chuck says, I know the importance of eating before working out, but how much of what we eat actually fuels the workout as opposed to the carb and fat stores the body has? If you could explain that briefly, that would be great. All right, this is my last question. I'm going to spend a little bit more time on this question because ultimately, it's a really important question, and I want to give you guys kind of the basics and then move on into the specifics of how the body actually utilizes fuel. Okay? So the idea is that muscles burn sugar for energy, as most of you know, and the longer you exercise, the. The more carbohydrate your muscles are going to need for fuel. And when I use the term carbohydrate, I'm using that synonymously with the word sugar. Now, when, let's say, you get on a bike and you start pedaling, the demand for sugar, for glucose to your leg muscles starts to increase, and your leg muscles send out a signal to your body to start supplying the glucose that you need. But that glucose isn't coming from just raw glucose stored inside the body. The body is actually making glucose from other substances. And essentially what's happening is that when you eat glucose, it gets converted into glycogen, or storage carbohydrate. And it can also be derived from your storage fat or. Or your storage protein. That's through a process called gluconeogenesis. Now, with all these different carbohydrate sources, your body can actually supply the glucose that your legs need to pedal those bikes. So. Or pedal that bike. So it can break down protein and turn that into sugar, it can break down fat and turn that into sugar, and it can break down storage carbohydrate and use that as sugar as well. Now, you're going to get more fuel in the form of blood glucose from breaking down a gram of fat than from a gram of protein or a gram of carbohydrate. But the idea is that when you break down fat. That's a very slow and inefficient process. So your body is only going to break down fat and turn that into glucose to be used for energy. If you're moving at a very slow pace and to keep yourself from cannibalizing your lean muscle mass, your body will also only rely on protein as a significant source of blood glucose, via breaking down protein and turning it into sugar only after about three hours or so of exercise. So unless you're exercising at a very low intensity or for a very long period of time, fat and protein sources of blood sugar are not going to predominate. So that leaves us with two possibilities for you. While you're riding your bike on a typical 30 minute or 60 minute or 90 minute training session, storage carbohydrate inside your muscles, or the actual blood glucose that's circulating in your body from the sugars that you eat. Well, the answer is that your body is going to first go to the circulating blood sugar, because it doesn't have to actually be broken down. There's fewer chemical processes required to take pure raw blood sugar and use that for energy versus taking storage carbohydrate branches and breaking down using those for energy. But here's the thing. In most humans, basically, you've got about 80, up to about 110, what are called milligrams per deciliter of actual blood glucose. Based off of the total blood volume of somebody, average about 160 to 170 pounds, who's got about five liters of blood. If you do the math on that, that's going to come out to the equivalent of about 5 grams of glucose in the blood. Okay, from the carbohydrate equations that we talked about earlier in this podcast, that gives you about 20 calories, okay, about the equivalent to a small sugar packet that you would put in your coffee, that type of size. So that is what your body has available to burn through before it starts to rely on your storage carbohydrate. And then once you've burnt through all the storage carbohydrate, that's when you start to go after more of the fat and the protein. Now, it's not an all or nothing, okay? A lot of people will burn 60% fat, 40% carbohydrate at lower intensities, and eventually at higher and higher intensities will get up to 100% carbohydrate and 0% fat. But the idea in terms of order while you're exercising, it's first blood sugar and then a combination of fat and carbohydrate until your carbohydrate stores are emptied, and then it is a combination of blood sugar and fat and protein. So hopefully that answers your question. I think it was a great question and hopefully you understand the physiology of the process a little bit better. So those are all the questions for this week. Now please leave us a ranking in itunes and be sure to ask me your questions if you have some. And go check out the Rockstar Triathlete Academy. If you're even mildly interested in triathlon, this is going to be way up your alley@rockstartriathlete.com consider donating to our podcast or just going out and checking out the show notes where I paste a lot of useful information. And until next time, this is Ben Greenfield signing out from BenGreenfieldFitness.com have a healthy week. Sam. Sat.