Performance

One of the reasons I wanted to change my diet was to increase my workout performance.  I have been running for 3 years and have made consistent gains until recently.  I still enjoy my workouts, but I would love to go faster and feel better after I am done.  By switching to fat as my main source of fuel, and working to increase my aerobic base (the point where your body switches to glycogen for fuel), I hope to see those gains I have been wanting.  Here is my baseline:

VO2 Max: 51.8 at a heartrate of 173 bpm
RQ @ VO2 Max: .93
Aerobic Base: 42.5 @ 154 bpm

This tells me that I could be worse off.  Many people hit their aerobic base while walking on a flat road.  I was doing a fair amount of work before I hit mine.  It could still be better.  My all day pace is about 163 bpm which is above my aerobic base.  That means that my metabolism is currently set up to hit a wall since I have limited glycogen stores.  Once I can get my aerobic base up to 170 bpm (dare I wish?) I could conceivably keep going.  We will see.

So, how are my workouts?  Last week I worked out 5 days, running 3 and doing calisthenics on 2.  We changed our diet on Sunday.  This week, Monday and Tuesday were good. Wednesday and Thursday were no-go's, and today was very good.  It isn't really fair to blame the middle of the week workouts on the diet.  I didn't sleep much (because we were spending so much time preparing meals for this crazy diet) so I was pretty tired.  Last night I had a great night's sleep, even though it was only about 7 hours.  I think that had a bigger effect on my workout than the food.  So, at this point, I can't say that I am positively affected by the diet, but I also can't say that I am adversely affected either.

Another subjective criteria I plan to track is my soreness and physical recovery time.  In The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance, Phinney and Volek quote ultra marathon runners who saw their recovery time on a 100 mile run drop from 3 weeks to 1 week.  We will see soon if the aches, pains, and stiffness go away.