Males and females exhibit similar muscle glycogen recovery with varied recovery food sources

Abstract

Purpose Research has elucidated the impact of post-exercise carbohydrate nutrition and environmental conditions on muscle glycogen re-synthesis. However, research has minimally considered the implications of glycogen recovery in females and has mostly focused on commercial sport nutrition products. The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of varied mixed macronutrient feedings on glycogen recovery and subsequent exercise performance in both sexes. Methods Males (n = 8) and females (n = 8) participated in a crossover study. Subjects completed a 90-min cycling glycogen depletion trial, then rested for 4 h. Two carbohydrate feedings (1.6 g kg −1) of either sport supplements or potato-based products were delivered at 0 and 2 h post-exercise. Muscle biopsies (glycogen) and blood samples (glucose, insulin) were collected during the recovery. Afterwards, subjects completed a 20 km cycling time trial. Results There was no difference between sexes or trials for glycogen recovery rates (male: 7.9 ± 2.7, female: 8.2 ± 2.7, potato-based: 8.0 ± 2.5, sport supplement: 8.1 ± 3.1 mM kg wet wt −1 h −1 , p > 0.05). Time trial performance was not different between diets (38.3 ± 4.4 and 37.8 ± 3.9 min for potato and sport supplement, respectively, p > 0.05). Conclusions These results indicate that food items, such as potato-based products, can be as effective as commercially marketed sports supplements when developing glycogen recovery oriented menus and that absolute carbohydrate dose feedings (g kg −1) can be effectively applied to both males and females.

Does the Nutritional Composition of Dairy Milk Based Recovery Beverages Influence Post-exercise Gastrointestinal and Immune Status, and Subsequent Markers of Recovery Optimisation in Response to High Intensity Interval Exercise?

“…Systemic inflammatory cytokine responses are presented as raw values and systemic inflammatory response profile (SIR-profile), as previously reported ( 40 ). Both male and female participants with full data sets within each specific variable were used in the data analysis, which is in accordance previously literature demonstrating similar variable outcomes between biological sexes ( 30 , 31 , 41 ). There were no outliers for female participant data points for any of the primary and secondary outcome measures.…”

Coingestion of Carbohydrate and Protein on Muscle Glycogen Synthesis after Exercise: A Meta-analysis

“…Some research has indicated that substrate oxidation differs by sex, with women oxidizing more fat and less carbohydrate compared with men during aerobic exercise ( 46 – 49 ). However, there appear to be minimal differences between sex postexercise, with men and women exhibiting similar rates of glycogen synthesis postexercise ( 30 , 50 ). This may suggest similar response in men and women to CHO-PRO on glycogen synthesis postexercise.…”

Effects of post‐exercise glucose ingestion at different solution temperatures on glycogen repletion in mice

“…Since it was difficult to control the estrous cycle of the mice in this study, we used only males. Because it has been reported that females exhibit similar muscle glycogen recovery compared to males (Flynn et al, 2020), we presume that hot glucose solution enhances glycogen repletion in female mice like male mice. However, females have also been reported to have lower respiratory exchange ratios and muscle glycogen utilization during exercise (Tarnopolsky et al 1990), and reportedly stored lower levels of liver glycogen compared to males (Gustavsson et al, 2010).…”