Fat for increased stamina?
 

Hello,

I read an interesting article in Muscle Media.

There was a recent study in Denmark where they gave athletes a supplement of omega 3 and omega 6 fats which they say most people don't get enough of.

They found that "...within one month of giving athletes 1 tablespoon per 50 pounds of body weight per day of an oil blend with an n-3: n-6 ratio of 2:1, stamina increased by up to 40 or even 60 percent. Athletes could exercise longer before reaching exhaustion, recovered more quickly from fatigue, could exercise more often without overtraining, healed quicker from injuries, built muscle faster and had less joint pain."

They don't tell what kind of athletes they used in the study or what kind of activities they performed.

What do you think? It sounds too good to be true but if half of what they say is true it might be worth trying?

On a long ride fat reserves would come in pretty handy. Im pretty lean and unless I start eating 2 hours or so into a ride I bonk real hard and real quick. Sometimes I think it is because Im pretty lean. This sounds like it would make sense. Those omega fats are very good for the heart so this isnt saying go out and eat french fries to have more endurance. Itll be interesting to see what comes out of this.

Omega fatty acid balance has many hormone-like effects and fats are anabolic by promoting production of hormones.I think Koffee and I have both been posting pretty extensively(maybe even harping) on the need to balance your overall fat intake so the total omega6/3 component is 2/1 or less vs. 10/1 or higher in most modern diets due to overconsumption of processed vegetable oils and depletion of omega 3 from many traditional sources due to modern agricultural techniques.So most people need to increase the omega3 component and reduce the omega6 component (except for perhaps GLA ).Good dietary sources of omega3 are certain nuts,seeds,beans and fatty fish such as walnuts,flax,soy,salmon.As many fish now contain high levels of mercury or low levels of omega3 due to farming a fish oil supplement may be warrented here.But keep in mind balanced fat intake is only one component of a balanced diet which is only one component of a balanced training program(exercise and rest being the others)so don't expect magical results and look to measure any improvements over weeks not days as I believe it takes a while to start seeing results from initial supplementation.