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Speaking of Lactate….

Here’s the bottom line from Professor Brooks: “The world’s best athletes stay competitive by interval training. The intense exercise generates big lactate loads, and the body adapts by building up mitochondria to clear lactic acid quickly. If you use it up (as an energy source), it doesn’t accumulate.”

The job of the athlete is to train in a way that causes the mitochondria to process lactic acid faster and more efficiently.

Lactic acid is a fuel. To improve your capacity to use it as a fuel, you must increase the lactic acid load very high during training. (For more details, see my earlier article:http://www.cbass.com/Lacticacid.htm )

Dr. McGuff is on top of this new thinking. He says that high-intensity intervals and high-intensity strength training both perform the same function: they improve aerobic function by forcing the mitochondria to burn lactic acid more efficiently.

“It is during ‘recovery’ from high intensity exercise that you’re actually getting an increased stimulation of the aerobic system equal to or greater than what you would get from conventional steady-state ‘aerobic’ exercise,” McGuff writes.

“If you have been subjected to proper physical training, you can actually make good use of the lactic acid that is produced. If you are intent on improving your aerobic capacity, it’s important to understand that your aerobic system performs at its highest level when recovering from lactic acidosis,” McGuff adds. “It is also important to understand that since muscle is the basic mechanical system being served by the aerobic system, as muscle strength improves, the necessary support systems (which include the aerobic system) must follow suit.”

To improve the ability of your aerobic system to use lactic acid as a fuel, McGuff says: Lift weights. And then, let your mitochondria take over from there. Get your aerobic benefit on the “drive home from the gym or off to lunch or back to work.”

For McGuff, productive exercise begins and ends with strength training. THE key stimulus for strength—and aerobic fitness—is high-intensity muscular effort.

To see and hear Dr. McGuff explain, in 5:50 minutes, just about everything we’ve talked about so far—and why he believes ‘cardio’ really doesn’t exist—visit You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiHhc7eLpQY