This article is about one of the keys to our OFM Protocol Training (Optimized Fat Metabolism). The Long Slow Warmup (SLW) is a component of OFM Training because of the critical role it plays in your Performance and Health.
Why is a Long Slow Warmup important?
When we are in a relatively sedentary state our body’s have a relatively low energy demand, just like a car at idle. Get moving as in starting a training session that demand changes, say you just put your car in gear and started moving . . . with the car all you have to do to supply more fuel to the engine is press on the accelerator. Unfortunately, with your body it’s a bit more complicated.
When you go from a sedentary state to an active state, we temporarily call on our “fight to flight” mechanism which taps into our glucose and glycogen, to bridge this energy demand gap. While using glucose as the ‘bridge fuel’ is necessary, this is not ideal nor sustainable.
At the same time movement ‘signals’ the body to upregulate the hormonal and enzymatic pathways necessary to open up metabolic pathways to supply energy to meet the demands of physical activity. If the ‘signal’ is sharp and urgent the body ‘gets’ the message it needs to respond NOW so cortisol, adrenaline signalling recruit the metabolism of glucose. However, if the signal is gentle, gradual and building the body upregulates to metabolize fat as it’s base energy.
Your Liver can make Glucose
If you are fat adapted your liver can produce glucose without catabolizing muscle protein to meet the metabolic demands of the higher level work required in training to advance or in competition to supply glucose for threshold work and even pushes into anaerobic levels. This is seen in the post exercise Blood Sugar levels of fat adapted athletes, especially if the athlete hammers during the last part of their workout. As the FASTER Study demonstrated this glucose surge is completely benign as the glucose is shunted into the muscles for glycogen storage.
The Fat Based Switch
Our empirical data has shown us these hormonal and enzymatic pathways require about 32-33 minutes of ‘ramp’ time for a well-conditioned athlete who is fat adapted and rested. This leads to ‘The Switch’, a palpable feeling the athlete gets that now they have the sustainable energy flow to perform. Either we see the Heart Rate Drop at a given workload or pace/power increase without a change in Heart Rate.
That eliminates the need for significant external calories which, in turn, dramatically reduces the risk of having GI or stomach issues.
It does not matter if you are doing a long cardio session or interval training or a tempo, the LSW confers benefits way beyond the obvious. Not only will you continue to improve your fat based physiology to burn a higher rate of fat at a higher intensity but but your recovery, thus, ability to handle a higher training load will increase therefore resulting in higher gains in performance and health.
How Vespa can help with your fat metabolism
VESPA is a true natural catalyst to ‘jump start’ high level fat metabolism for performance & health. Using VESPA though is counter intuitive because, “What you notice is what you don’t notice”.....
The ups & downs in energy levels. You simply feel naturally strong
No bonking
No GI issues from taking in lots of calories
Sharp mental focus
Little to no soreness the next day from the oxidative stress
What’s more VESPA is made from simple natural ingredients. Ingredients so simple and natural you don’t need a PhD in Food Science or Organic Chemistry to know what the ingredients are and so natural the FDA actually classifies VESPA as an ‘Acidified Food’ product and not as a ‘Dietary Supplement’.