How Does One Stay Paleo And Simultaneously Ingest Enough Carbs For Endurance Training? -> Educated Experimentation!

Hi folks! Welcome!

I love gardening, and here are my first tomatoes of the season, but how does one fit in a vegetable garden between family, endurance training and everything else, I wonder?

I have successfully completed Ironman races, one at least in a decent time, largely fueled by carbohydrates – totally non-Paleo metabolism. I hated having to stuff down all that food all the time on the bike.

I recently failed to complete one Ironman race by 2-miles (17 hr. cutoff) with an approximately 95% Paleo metabolism, reaching 10 miles into the run before ‘hitting the wall,’ but my performance was off for each event. Clearly not enough fuel.

If you eat lots of carbs you drift away from the ability to effectively burn fats and ketones, due to a major shift in the expression of 100s if not 1000s of transcripts (molecules that are used to convert the DNA code into proteins).

My current goal is to maintain my general Paleo state, whilst taking in the necessary carbohydrate fuels, using an interesting book, shown in the adjacent image, for initial guidance. In my mind, if I stay Paleo I should need less carb supplementation than when in my pre-Paleo state – I wonder if this is true?

Joe Friel is miles ahead of me as usual, but all thoughts would be much appreciated.

I suspect the answer to my optimal carbohydrate load rate and time might be found by using a combination of mathematical modeling and experimentation. Next experiment will be at the Louisville Ironman. Love this stuff!

Remember, you’re not a statistic. You’re you!

-k @FitOldDog