Gassing Out Against Younger Fighters
July 2017 — day 34
That summer I was training MMA. Not cardio kickboxing (nothing against it, it's a great workout). I mean combat classes with people who were younger than me, getting ready to actually fight, and working out five or six times a week (video cTGYIFOTPl8).
A normal class for me was knees, the clinch, takedowns, head kicks. Explosive stuff. Then I'd sit in the sauna afterwards for a good while, so by the end my body was pretty much drained (video cTGYIFOTPl8).
And on keto, I ran out of gas sooner.
What it felt like
I'm not going to pretend my performance was the same. It wasn't. When I gassed out, it was the wall, the thing runners talk about. My glycogen was gone, the easy energy wasn't there, and I'd outrun what ketosis could hand me in that hour (video cTGYIFOTPl8).
In a short clip I recorded on July 17, I said I was training with a guy who had a fight coming up. He was 24, six foot, 185 pounds, and he lifts. We sparred, actual combat, and I let myself go flat (live AHKD9573).
The easy fix I didn't take
Here's the thing. I knew how to fix it, or at least how I'd go about it. From what I'd been reading, you add carbs around the workout. Two hours before if you want to perform better, during, or right after if you want to recover better. Something like 20 extra carbs, maybe one Gatorade, and you might feel a real lift (live AHKD9573).
If I'd been in a fight-camp week, I said I'd probably put some carbs back, because I'd need them to perform at my best in the gym (video cTGYIFOTPl8).
But I wasn't in fight camp. I was trying to keep my skills up. And I was on keto for my blood sugar. I was mostly trying to get my insulin under control, and I carried most of my fat on my belly, which is the worst place to carry it if insulin's your problem. I'd have guessed I was around 25% body fat back then (video cTGYIFOTPl8).
So winning practice wasn't the goal. Being at my best in that room wasn't the goal. It's training. It doesn't matter to me if I dominate the whole class. I actually like knowing what it feels like to be tired (live AHKD9573).
That was the decision: I'll gas out, and that's fine. Gassing out is perfectly fine if what you're after is weight loss. It's a problem if keeping your performance up is the goal (live AHKD9573).
What I did instead of carbs
So I turned gassing out into a little game.
When I was tired, I did things the way I'd do them tired. I used my footwork. I used range. I protected myself. I threw fewer punches, and I tried hard not to let the other guy know I was tired (video cTGYIFOTPl8). Practising being tired is part of practising.
The best thing I bought for exercise
The other thing that helped was a heart rate monitor. Honestly, it was the best thing I ever did for my exercise. I had a Polar FT4 (live 10000000_637424646467238_6646023133880909824_n).
Here's why. I'm a heavyweight. I practice with guys at 145. They kick more than me, punch more than me, go longer and go harder. If you watch heavyweight title fights and flyweight title fights, it's the same thing at the top: guys my size don't go as hard as the little guys. So comparing my gas tank to theirs was just a way to feel bad (live 10000000_637424646467238_6646023133880909824_n).
What I needed was my own heart rate. Am I working hard enough for me? The number I used was 60 to 75% of your max, which I called an excellent workout. And if you don't want to buy anything, the rough check is whether you can still talk normally (live 10000000_637424646467238_6646023133880909824_n).
When I see a weight-loss show put a big guy on a treadmill and make him run, I think he probably gets to his ideal cardio heart rate just walking. Put a heart monitor on him, and if he goes above it, he's off (live 10000000_637424646467238_6646023133880909824_n).
Exercise is relative. Judge effort by your body, not by the lighter guys next to you.
The lesson I took from all this: know which goal you're serving today. If it's the fight, eat for the fight. If it's your blood sugar, then being tired in practice is just the cost, and you get to decide if you'll pay it.
What I'd tell you now
I still think this way. A month later I made a short video on dosing carbs for hard workouts: most people doing keto for weight loss don't need them, slow carbs go an hour or two out, fast ones like Gatorade closer to 30 minutes before, and I said I'd done an hour or more of kickboxing on keto without adding carbs (video XhEJ9x5sP0g). That's one guy's gym experience, not a study. None of the research pages behind this site cover keto and sports performance yet, so I'm not going to dress it up as one. One medical note: if you're on blood-pressure medication or you have a heart condition, ask your doctor what heart rate zone is right for you before you go chasing a number off a chart.
More on this: carbs for hard workouts, do you need to exercise on keto, keto for MMA and combat sports, tired during workouts, and the video where I first talked about it, cTGYIFOTPl8.
Earlier: Arts Fest, and Friends Who Stopped Listening · Later: How KetoDick Got Its Name