EndurElite Chief Endurance Officer Matt Mosman discusses the recovery benefits of l-carnitine for athletes and why you may want to supplement with it.
Video Transcription:
Good afternoon, family of fast, Matt Mosman the chief endurance officer over at EndurElite coming at you today with a very quick supplement fast fact because I wanna get out on my bicycle because it is very nice out and I'm kinda tired of sitting inside. So, today we're gonna talk about the supplement carnitine. Not to be confused with carnosine. It kinda sounds like...carnitine kinda sounds like something you'd eat or like a meat or like if you're a carnivore, which is spot on because carnitine can be found naturally in beef, milk, fish, and some other lean meats.
Why Carnitine Doesn't Work For Fat Loss
Now, as a whole, carnitine is a pretty popular supplement within like the bodybuilding industry and you're gonna see it a lot in fat burners. So, what they say is if you take supplemental carnitine, that's gonna help shuttle fatty acids into the mitochondria to be used as fuel. So, again, it's mostly seen in fat loss products. But, the evidence isn't particularly strong showing that carnitine helps with fat loss or enough where it shuttles the fatty acids into the mitochondria to be used as energy that equates to more fat loss.
How L-Carnitine Helps Endurance Athletes Recover Faster
But, the good news is we're endurance athletes, we're not bodybuilders, and carnitine is actually probably more beneficial for skinny minis like you and me because there are a lot of studies that show carnitine is an effective recovery agent.
Approximately, eight studies have shown that carnitine can help reduce markers of muscle damage, minimize soreness, and decrease free radical production when taken on a daily basis. There's also about six or so studies that show carnitine can increase endurance performance and even showing that it can increase VO2 max. But, with these six studies, it's usually after multiple bouts of exercise which again goes back to L-carnitine's benefits on recovery.
Carnitine Can Help Glucose Uptake
Now, there's also a little bit of research showing that carnitine can help with the uptake of glucose when taken with carbohydrates after exercise. So, it uptakes glucose in the muscle where it can be stored as glycogen which basically is what you use during exercise, especially high-intensity exercise. And then if you go out later on that day for another bout of exercise, glycogen stores may be a little more saturated, or the next day if you go out your glycogen stores may be a little more saturated as well. So, carnitine probably more now, it is more beneficial for recovery, and then maybe with the uptake of glucose. Not so much, you know, weight loss. Which again as endurance athletes, we probably don't really care about that too much.
How Much Carnitine Should I Take?
Now, what about the dosing of carnitine? It would be pretty darn hard to get the amount of carnitine needed through a regular diet to promote kind of some of these recovery benefits. So, what you wanna do is you wanna get a carnitine stand-alone product and take about one to three grams daily post-exercise. Again, to promote recovery and then also taken with carbs to help with the uptake of glucose.
Now, this is part of the reason why we put carnitine in our soon to be released recovery product, RecoverElite. So, within RecoverElite, you'll find five carb sources, some protein, some amino acids. And then carnitine again to help recovery and help take up the carbohydrates into the muscle to saturate muscle glycogen stores. But until we release that RecoveryElite in about two months, you may wanna look at getting a stand-alone carnitine product.
So, I'm gonna get out and ride my bike. And that's about all I have for today my endurance friends. If you have a friend who likes videos and likes carnitine, please share this video with them. If you want other videos on endurance training, nutrition, and supplementation, subscribe to the EndurElite YouTube channel or head on over to the internet to www.EndurElite.com. Get social with us on Instagram and our Facebook EndurElite Training & Nutrition Club page. And until next time, my friends, stay fueled, stay focused, stay fast, and stay informed.
