We all exercise for general fitness but do you want to exercise and see a performance improvement by paddling faster or for longer?
The performance equation says and increase exercise stress plus adequate nutrition and recovery equals an increase in exercise performance.
If you are working at 85% of your Max heart rate you are producing lactic acid and at 85% of your Max heart rate you are able to remove the lactic acid at the same time as you are producing lactic acid, and this is applying a stress to your anaerobic threshold. When you apply a stress over and over for a 4 – 6 week period of time you are going to see an adaptation, you are going to see a positive change in your anaerobic threshold. To effectively make these positive changes we need to align the three R’s – Refuel, repair, rehydrate.
Refuel - is about refuelling the petrol tank and for us humans that's carbohydrates and ideally we want one gram of carbohydrate per kilo of body weight.
Repair - protein repairs muscle fibres and is the building blocks for the body cells to make new red blood cells and to make more mitochondria which is the little powerhouses in the muscles. For endurance type people it is ideal to have 10 - 20 grams of protein immediately after your workout in that “window of opportunity”
Rehydrate - is replacing the fluid that we lose during the workout, it is recommended to consume 1.5 times the amount of body weight that you lost in the workout.