Table 2.
Dietary and exercise interventions that influence muscle glycogen synthesis
| Intervention | Response | Reference |
|---|---|---|
| Regular training + diet high in CHO content (>8 g/kg BW/d) | Supercompensated muscle glycogen stores compared with the start of training and greater than if a low-CHO diet is consumed | Ahlborg and Brohult (1967)54 |
| Classic glycogen loading: 3 d of hard training on a low-CHO diet (<5 g/kg BW/d) followed by 3 d of tapered training on a high-CHO diet | Supercompensated muscle glycogen stores compared with before the intervention but training is very difficult both physically and psychologically during the low-CHO phase | Bergstrom et al. (1967)33 and (1972)55 |
| Modified glycogen loading: 3-d taper on a high-CHO diet with 24-h rest prior to competitions | Supercompensated muscle glycogen stores similar to the classic loading regimen | Sherman et al. (1981)56; Bussau et al. (2002)57 |
| Train low, compete high: purposefully reduce daily CHO intake or train after an overnight fast or withhold CHO intake during and for 2 h following a hard training session to promote adaptations that result in glycogen supercompensation | Training low reduces the capacity to train hard and makes training psychologically challenging. No clear evidence of additional benefits to glycogen stores or performance | Bartlett et al. (2015)58; Burke (2010)59 |
| Train high, sleep low: train with high CHO availability in the evening, no CHO replacement prior to sleep, train with low CHO availability in the morning | Evidence of improved performance compared with consuming a consistently high-CHO diet during training. Performance benefits could be due to higher muscle glycogen | Hawley (2014)60; Marquet et al. (2016)61,62; Yeo et al. (2008)63 |
| Protein supplementation | When dietary CHO intake is not adequate, consuming 0.3–0.4 g protein/kg BW has been shown to augment glycogen synthesis | Betts and Williams (2010)64; Ivy et al. (2002)65 |
| Creatine loading | Some studies found enhanced muscle glycogen storage with creatine loading, whereas other studies found no effect | Roberts et al. (2016)66; Sewell et al. (2008)67 |
| Fat loading, train low | >2 weeks on a high-fat, low-CHO diet increases muscle fat oxidation and spares muscle glycogen during moderate-intensity exercise (eg, 60% VO2max). However, fat loading can impair muscle CHO oxidation and performance at higher intensities | Bartlett et al. (2015)58’ Burke and Kiens (2006)68 |
Abbreviations: BW, body weight; CHO, carbohydrate; VO2max, maximal oxygen consumption.