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The
Importance of Glycogen
The Protein-Sparing
Effect
Carbohydrate not
only supplies the body with energy but has a "protein-sparing"
effect as well. As long as your body can use carbohydrates for energy,
it will spare the protein you eat to be used for building and maintaining
your muscle structure. In the absence of carbohydrate, your body
will attempt to use the available protein to supply energy, metabolizing
the protein in the muscle structure you have worked so hard to build.
Too little carbohydrate in the body also affects how you look-your
muscles shrink as they lose glycogen and you end up with a drawn,
pinched look.
The Importance
of Glycogen
Much of the muscle
size that bodybuilders create comes from the enhancement of the
"support systems" in the muscles rather than the simple
growth of the muscle itself. One such support system is the increase
in the blood supply to the muscles that accompanies intense weight
training. Another is the ability of the body to store more glycogen
in well-trained muscles.
Glycogen is simply
carbohydrate stored in the muscle, ready to be turned into the energy
for muscular contraction. The trained muscle increases its ability
to store glycogen, and since glycogen is bound together with water
(2.7 grams of water for each gram of glycogen), this extra bulk
in the muscles causes them to swell up and appear larger.
Your muscles are
as packed full of glycogen as possible to increase your apparent
mass and size to the maximum.
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