Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

In a message dated 8/23/2005 10:57:40 AM Pacific Daylight Time, drnikisahak@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:

> Tom,
> In the context and realm of what you have just said and the numerous papers 
> you put forward and papers  I am sure on human field studies which you have 
> not forwarded due to sheer volume,where does  one put the concept of  
> feeding fats to equine now. Without wanting to be controversial,is this 
> still on,can this still be debated one way or other,or in your book does 
> this belong to the   wastepaper basket ? If so ,why  have we all been lead  
> to the rosy path  by so many  with equally if not more solid  credentials.?
> On the issue of human physiology though I do have to agree with you that I 
> have yet to see a creditable paper  championing feeding fats to marathoners 
> and triatletes.!
> Nik


In the 80s, there was a fad for feeding MCTs (Medium Chain Triglycerides) in human athletes. Studies showed reduced lactic acid production and "glycogen sparing". And fat contained a lot of energy compared to carbohydrate/glcygen. However, in practical application, the athletes lost firepower across the board, from sprinters to marathoners, performance declined with fat supplementation and the practice died out. Even Jim Fixx warned about fat, saying "fat burns on the flame of glycogen". 

Now we understand why the problem exists. First, no matter what you feed, there are plenty of IMTGs available for sustaining lower level muscular contractions. Second, lactic acid is no longer Public Enemy #1, but a beneficial chemical and a viable fuel. And the primary limiting factor for maintaining power output in all athletes is the availability of glycogen--muscle glycoge, liver glycogen and via blood glucose/insulin. Everyone in human athletics now know that you must feed carbohydrates and limit fat intake in all athletes, sprinters to marathoners, and that carbohydrate intake during exercise is also necessary for optimum performance. 

In the midst of the human clamor for MCTs, Potter, et al, delivered a paper, under the sponsorship of the American Rendering Association, showing that feeding fat was beneficial in the performance of racing Quarterhorses. Feed companies, already in a very competitive marketplace with rising grain prices and everybody shopping for $5/bag packaged feed, hopped on the bandwagon quickly because fat was a very cheap way to deliver gross energy. Without the grain, though, they had to find something to fill up the bag, so they jumped on another waste product, beet pulp, so that you could feed the stuff with a scoop instead of a hose. 

Equine science moves a lot slower than the human science. There are fewer researchers, for one thing. And fewer experiments being performed. For example, there has never been a paper that looked at actual performance of an athletic horse with a high fat diet vs high carb diet. In contrast, this has been done dozens of times in the human literature. Some of the "researchers" in the equine field are selling packaged feed themselves, so they, and the Grand Poobahs of equine nutrition have incentives for promoting fat feeding, even if it is only to defend strong pronouncements made in the past--it is a relatively small community, compared to the research community in human athletics/nutrition. 

If you read my book, The Fit Racehorse I & 2, you'll see me advocating the addition of corn oil to the ration. Because I didn't know better and was going on the work of the top equine researchers of the time. But we learned better, the hard way. And that's what's going to happen with the entire equine industry--learning the hard way, with the researchers and their lay magazine heralds being the last to come around. 

In the meantime, you, and your equine athlete, are paying the price. Too bad, but that's the way the world works. In the world of science, those with the "credentials" are almost always proven wrong, eventually. That's the way of science. In the end, the coach and athlete can take hints from the science, but the real rule for them is "what works is real". And what works in athletics is athletic performance--winning. If, as the coach of your athlete, winning is not a goal, then feed fat--it's cheap.

ti