The basis for success in sports is a well balanced diet. People who train and compete a lot have great difficulty in satisfying their total needs of easy accessible energy through their diet. This is where Vitargo® comes into the picture.It is not easy to give exact recommendations on how much Vitargo should be used.
In order to do this requires more detailed information e.g. the balance in the diet, how much energy is used, the person's weight, their sex, the type of sport etc.
All of these parameters are very individual and therefore differ from person to person.General guidelines on how to use Vitargo are written on the packaging from which the individual can later work out for him/her self the necessary dosage to achieve the desired effects.If you would like to know more about how your diet can affect your sporting performance, you can find further information under the headings: The Diet; Energy Distribution and Physical Activities.
How to eat as an athlete
For example: Intensive training's plate model
If you play sport and are a high-energy user, the plate model would look something like this:
½ plate with carbohydrates (pasta, rice, potatoes)
1/4 plate with meat, fish or chicken
1/4 plate with vegetables
At mealtimes you would eat brown or white bread, drink milk or water and normally eat fruit as a dessert. Depending on your energy requirements you may eat one or several of these portions and with extra hard training may also include extra portions of pasta, potatoes or bread and drink more liquids.
Before a competition or an extra hard training session one doesn't want to carry around these extra portions so Vitargo is an excellent compliment. You eat according to the plate method till you are full up and then in between mealtimes supplement your diet with carbohydrates in the form of Vitargo.
The Diet
A normal diet for a western man between the ages of 19-29 gives on average 2500-3000 kcal/day. Of this energy 15% comes from protein, 35% from fat and 50% from digestible carbohydrates. This means that a normal western man takes in around 310-375grams of digestible carbohydrates from his basic diet.
A normal diet for a western woman between the ages of 19-29 gives on average 2000-2500 kcal/day. This means that a normal western woman takes in around 250-310grams of digestible carbohydrates per day.
The problem with a "normal" person and a "normal" diet is that it doesn't describe a sportsman's reality. Sportsmen are usually more concerned about what they eat and often have a lower fat energy -% and a higher carbohydrate energy-% than is the case for a "normal" person. Besides this the sportsman's consumption of food per day is far greater than that of a "normal" person, as they use more energy in their physical exertions, which leads to an increased appetite.
Vitargo should be used to compensate the difference between the daily requirements of digestible carbohydrates and the amount received through the basic diet.
If extra glycogen stocks are required, as with carbohydrate loading before competition, it is necessary to decrease the amount used in training, so that the additional carbohydrates can be stored as glycogen and not burnt up directly with hard muscular activity.
Vitargo should be taken in addition to one's normal diet, it cannot be used as a substitute for ordinary food.
Energy Distrubution
Today's food lacks energy that comes from digestible carbohydrates and has a high fat content. Energy's composition has during the past 100 years changed. From previously having had a composition of 12% fat, 13% protein and 75% carbohydrates, to today where the breakdown is 15% protein, 35-40% fat and 45-50% digestible carbohydrates. Of these carbohydrates, sugars of low molecular structure have increased by 500%. The effects of these changes can be seen in present day so called "good living diseases".
Physical Activity
One hours running training with a 70% VO2max intensity (which represents about 16 on the so-called Borg-scale and around a 160 pulse rate for a 20 year old i.e. intensive training), burns about 1000kcal in a man who weighs 80-85kg. At such an intense level of training around 80% of energy comes from carbohydrates.
This means to say that with such intensive training around 200 grams of carbohydrates are used up.
This increases the need for carbohydrates, which as a result means that carbohydrate stock levels become depleted and need to be replenished so the body has a chance to recover before the next activity.
The carbohydrate reserves are stored as glycogen in the muscles and liver.
Total reserves can reach about 300-500 grams in a "normal" person and up to 1kg for an elite athlete at maximum stock levels.
Especially important is the replenishment of depleted stock levels after an intense work out, when training daily or even several times a day.
If this not happens there is a risk that glycogen stock levels will be emptied and causes fatigue which can result in an ineffective training session.
What amount of digestible carbohydrates would need to be consumed outside of the basic diet to cover the carbohydrate requirements of training/competition?Under carbohydrate burning are the tables you need.
