Is Bicarb ruining the sport ?

That why you try it in practice before you try it in a race. How is it possible that you didn't think of that?

Would be interested in your thoughts here, "don't believe the hype" as I do not know real biochemistry and it's been a while since I've read into the topic much. From what I remember, Roberg published a lot on the ATP splitting bit and suggested that the likely source for the accumulation in H+ was increased ATP splitting from non-mitochondrial sources when exercising at intensities above critical power. Could bicarb supplementation not blunt that accumulation in H+ caused by this? Truly curious here as you seem to be suggesting that's not feasible but again, I do not know biochemistry.

Great info. This topic fascinates me. Been running a long time and the Maurten product is the first time I've heard about bicarb.

Like Gatorade?

As soon as you take an external substance to enhance your performance, it is doping because you do not believe in your own strength but rely on an aid to deliver top performance. You are not cheating anyone since it is allowed within the rules. But you are cheating yourself.

Basically, it is the mitochondria's inability to handle the volume of H+ produced by glycolysis that produces acidosis. This is one of the main reasons for developing the aerobic system to it's maximum.

I guess the idea here is the bicarb "nuetralizes" the effectiveness of the acidity to block contraction. It's a logical theory.

Bi Carb has been around for a long time. My middle school coach in 1981 told a few of us to get the baking soda out of the fridge take take a table spoon and mix it with water. Well that didn't go down well.

Now with the mix and making much more stomach friendly it seems like what not. The photo strand signing with Maurten of Strand signing with them with the bi card in his hand and a finger to his mouth kinda says it all.

Just another supplement like caffeine that athletes will use to enhance performance.

With this logic almost every is doping and they are cheating themselves. Almost every athlete on the start line consumes caffeine which enhances your performance. And following your logic runners are cheating themselves in marathons when they consume Gatorade and gels to enhance their performance since those are external substances. If we follow your logic, endurance athletes that take iron supplements are cheating according to your logic. I don't know any that would suggest consuming some coffee, Gatorade, gels and iron supplements would be cheating. Heck there's some evidence that taking vitamin D3 could increase your testosterone, do you want to ban vitamin D3 supplements too?

Yes, agree with all of this, and increasing the intensity that critical power is reached would be an indication that the mitochondria have improved their ability (among other things) to handle this...but my question is moreso a long the lines of whether or not the bicarb supplementation is actually able to neutralize the H+...because it seemed from "don't believe the hype" 's responses that they did not believe this was the case?

Robergs et al also pointed out that when blood glucose enters the muscle cell it uses an ATP and this reaction produces an H+.

So that there is the source of your acidosis, the accumulation of H+ when using fast twitch fibers. This happens because these fast twitch fibers (fast twitch motor units) utilize their available glycogen instantly and although we have many thousands of these motor units, in a high intensity effort we use a lot of these motor units.

So blood glucose has to be used to produce Lactate. Now from muscle glycogem we get 3 ATP per 2 lactate and an H+ is consumed, but from blood glucose, we get only 2 ATP and an H+ is produced.

So, in effect, acidosis is caused by glycogen depletion in the fast twitch motor units. And so the way to reduce acidosis to a manageable amount is to train the brain/nervous system to cycle through these motor units more effectively and efficiently amd and them pace yourself effectively. Also, you need a perfect warm up before the race, which takes a lot of practice and a lot of confidence before an important race.

In short, the assumed corellation of acidosis and musle fatigue is not the actual cause, rather a consequence of glycogen depletion. Thus we feel acidosis not just in high intensity efforts, but whenever we ar e glycogen depleted. Although of course in a sprint, only the most powerful muscle cells are depleted and in a marathon, most of the cells are depleted.

I think you're confusing a few things here.

The basic premise for bicarb as others have noted is that it increases the pH (more basic) of your blood, which acts to "pull" lactate and H+ (protons) out of your muscle. Hence why your lactate levels in blood are higher when supplementing.

The idea that H+ or acidosis is the cause of fatigue is outdated. It is not excessive "lactic acid" - most research now suggests that other metabolites such as inorganic phosphate (Pi), which impacts calcium cycling and thus muscle contraction.

Critically, inorganic phosphate is released with ATP breakdown.

ATP + H2O → ADP + Pi + energy

You are correct in some other points - you consume an extra ATP to use glucose from the blood rather than glycogen, which acts to "trap" the glucose in the cell. H+ is produced at this step, but it is also produced via multiple different hydrolysis reactions for the breakdown of glucose/glycogen to pyruvate and lactate, and in the TCA cycle.

As for the fast twitch portion - you'd be surprised how "slow twitch" even fast distance runners are. While Nuguse probably won't be volunteering for a muscle biopsy any time soon - Jim Johnson (3:58 mile) and Prefontaine (3:54 mile) and a group of 12 other world class runners famously did. Those 2 athletes had 60 and 77% slow twitch muscle fibers in their gastroc (calf) muscle. For comparison, Frank Shorter had 80%. The average across the group was 61% (average mile time across the group was 4:04, and this was in 1975).

I am aware of the bicarbonate system. But you haven't acknowledged my point that glycogen depletion is a cause of fatigue and acidosis. I explained the point as succinctly as I could, just as I did 17 years ago on this forum, prompted by the research of Robergs et al.

As for muscle fast twitch proprtions in elite 400m and middle distance runners, I should point out that they will have top speeds of around 9 meters per second in the 1500m, 10 meters per second in the 800 and 11 meters per second in the 400. My top speed was s measly 7.5 m/sec and I am quite familiar with acidosis so I think you need to reconsider my point which is really basic bioenergetics.

As for H+ production and consumption, ar e you aware that lactate prodution from muscle glycogen consumes protons?

Yes metabolic acidosis is a result of anaerobic ATP turnover and an inevitability in the faster races, but haven't you noticed over the years that when the winner decelerates the least in the home straight, they also seem the least disturbed metabolically?

I don't fully understand why people are so resistent to new variables that push human boundaries, which should be the point of the sport. It doesn't devalue the accomplishments of the past, and a changing environment shouldn't be an affront the identities of any athletes or their fans. The entire historical span of the sport excludes the vast majority of human history anyway, so it was always a funciton of "modern" technology and interests anyway. Things change.

So good nutrition should be banned?

You must be new here? Obviously the OP was trolling to get a reaction. Most likely a brojo.

Well, for starters it won't drop your heart rate to 15 bpm and unalive you at 2 am. Secondly, it won't shrink your nutz and give you cancer. I think those are kind of important differences.

I would agree glycogen depletion is associated with fatigue - but I don't necessarily agree it is always associated with acidosis. For example - if you deplete glycogen content in muscle with prolonged, moderate-intensity exercise, you're unlikely to induce a significant strain on the pH of muscle.

Elite athletes will have glycogen values of ~700-800 mmol/kg dry weight muscle. Maximal intensity exercise (think 400-600m all out) has a rate of glycogen depletion of ~100 mmol/kg dry weight/minute, which drops to ~40 mmol/kg/minute for most mid-distance event durations. It has been suggested that you need to drop below 250-300 mmol/kg to impair function. This would suggest you are highly unlikely to deplete glycogen across the entire muscle in middle distance events lasting 100-780 seconds (1:40-13:00 mm:ss).

In contrast, it's entirely possible to deplete glycogen in an event like the marathon, despite lactate levels never exceeding 4 mmol. But yes you are correct - lactate production consumes a H+ ion, but this occurs regardless of where the glucose comes from (glycogen or blood glucose).

As for those speeds: 9 m/s is 540m/60s. That's ~44sec 400m pace.

·Hocker closed the lasted 300m in Paris in ~39.65, which is ~7.6m/s. El Guerrouj also closed the last 300m in ~39.77 when he ran 3:26.

·The fastest 100m in both the Wanamaker Mile (Cam Myers) and the Dr. Sanders 3000m (Grant Fisher) was slightly slower, at ~13.6 s (7.4 m/s).

·Rudisha's opening 200m during the 2012 Olympics was his fastest at ~23.4s, which is ~8.5 m/s.

So while top tier athletes they may potentially hit the speeds you've mentioned as an absolute peak speed, they are absolutely not holding 9-10 m/s for any significant portion of time even when running World/Olympic Records.

Sorry - 39.66 for El G, not 39.77. So same approximate average speed as Hocker.

THOUGHT BAKING SODA TURNED INTO CARBONIC ACID IN BODY, THINK OTHER BICARBONATES ARE MORE EFFICIENT