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Supplementing with carbohydrates will be useful in all sports disciplines, especially in endurance and intensive work on mass. If you are only taking on serious work on your body and condition, you must ensure an appropriate calorie balance. When intensive exercise becomes a fixed point in your schedule, what you eat cannot be dictated by whim, greater or lesser appetite on a given day or bad habits. Your need for carbohydrate-rich, nutritious meals increases with the increase and regularity of physical activity
Energy Source
Carbohydrates are our primary source of energy. The matter is simple: muscles need glycogen, and this comes from carbohydrates taken in with food. Muscles tired from long-term, intensive work need more glycogen than in a resting state. Important factors influencing the proper adjustment of carbohydrate levels in the diet are body weight, muscle mass and the type and regularity of physical activity.
It is assumed that people who exercise moderately need about 5-7g of carbohydrates per kilogram of body weight, while those who focus on regular and intensive sessions may need as much as 7-12g. Let's put this into concrete examples. Let's assume that as a minimum plan you focus on an intermediate, one-hour full-body workout from YouTube. If you weigh 65kg, you should take in 325-455g of carbohydrates during the day. Now imagine that you weigh 80kg and regularly burn calories on the running track. Once you jump into your gear, you go for a two-hour jog. In this case, you need up to 960g of carbohydrates per day! That's almost a kilogram of carbo products, and after all, your diet doesn't consist of just them.
How it works
The above should help you understand how to calculate your needs and make you aware of the difficulties of a well-thought-out diet for active people. To ensure that you get the right amount of carbohydrates, you need to eat regularly and wisely. Carbohydrate supplements meet the needs of active people, making it easier to replenish muscle glycogen and construct a diet. Thanks to them, you will avoid the feeling of overeating, with a plate that is too large, or a dangerous calorie deficit that leads to muscle catabolism. Those who train for endurance know the effect of a drop in efficiency caused by the "use" of immediately available glycogen. You can only jump into second gear with easily digestible carbohydrates in reserve.
When to use carbohydrate supplements
Generally speaking, you can always reach for carbohydrate supplements when you know that you lack some carbo-calories to properly nourish your body. Before the actual workout, you should find time for a meal, preferably about 3 hours before exercise. If for some reason your meal was not complete or sufficient, it is worth taking a liquid supplement around the time of training - it will be quickly digested and absorbed, without burdening the digestive system. This rule applies to everyone, regardless of the type of exercise.
If your workout lasts longer than an hour, increasing your energy reserves and replenishing glycogen during exercise will affect your performance and subsequent recovery. Simply put: if you care about muscle mass and endurance, and you work hard on it, maintaining the right blood glucose level is important to you, and a carbohydrate supplement should be in your training bag. And after the session? Glycogen regenerates most intensively up to two hours after training. If you exercise every day, you need to replenish your carbohydrate stores in this time window to fight for exactly the effects you dream of. The best way to recover is a healthy meal (you can probably count on a post-workout appetite!), and the fastest way to a quick or partial carbo-boost is a carbohydrate supplement.
Remember, however, that no preparation can replace a balanced diet, and supplements for athletes are a supplement to the diet (for everyone) and a pre-workout convenience for those who exercise regularly.
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