Hello and welcome back to the Endurance Lab newsletter.

In last week’s newsletter, I talked all about oxygen consumption, VO2, the slow component of oxygen uptake and why you don’t need to run at VO2max to hit VO2max.

I was traveling, so a bit delayed on writing this one and on the podcast, but have faith! One is soon to come! If you haven’t done so, check out the last episode with Hanna Irwin.

This week’s calendar was filled with many of my athletes taking on big races, which overwhelmingly went well. I am extremely proud of all of this week’s huge PRs as the team keeps moving forward with success after success. If you are interested in taking your training to the next level, join our team. Click the link. https://www.endurancelaboratory.com

This week’s newsletter will tell you all about bicarb: the history, physiology, benefits, downsides, and whether it works for a 5k!

In 1930, the father of exercise physiology, D.B. Dill, wrote a paper titled, “EFFECT OF ACIDOSIS AND ALKALOSIS UPON CAPACITY FOR WORK” [1]. It’s free, go read it. In Table 6 they showed that the alkalosis condition, where they gave a single participant 10 grams of sodium bicarbonate, they predict that the buffering capacity of the blood is 27% greater.

Here’s the actual excerpt directly from the paper.

Did you read that? Under acidic conditions he ran 15 minutes, and under alkalotic conditions, he ran 18-20 minutes and was able to tolerate a much higher lactic acid “with less distress at the finish”

And so the idea was born.

Sodium bicarbonate works by increasing the concentration of bicarbonate and raising the pH of the blood. It’s that simple. During hard exercise, hydrogen ions accumulate inside the muscle and are transported into the blood, partly alongside lactate through monocarboxylate transporters. By increasing extracellular buffering capacity, bicarbonate allows more hydrogen ions to leave the muscle and be buffered in the blood [2].

This delays the decline in muscle pH that can interfere with glycolysis, calcium handling, and muscle contraction. In simple terms, bicarbonate does not prevent fatigue, but it may allow you to maintain a high power output for slightly longer before acidosis contributes to the loss of force.

Of note, I want to quickly mention where the H+ is arising. The hydrogens accumulate due to the breakdown of ATP.

When energy demand is high, ATP breakdown is rapid, and so too is H+ accumulation. There are ties with glycolysis here, but again, outside the scope.

And guess what? It REALLY works. Take these results for example. Shown below are the results for 10 participants that underwent 0.3 g/kg of sodium bicarbonate ingestion vs. a control and placebo condition.

IN EVERY SINGLE PARTICIPANT, THE BICARB CONDITION WAS FASTER!! In other words, there was no “responder” effect. It worked. Every time. [3]

The results might be even more pronounced for the 800 as participants had times that were 2.9s faster, higher hydrogen and blood lactate concentrations [4]. Basically, it works.

Like all good things in life, the addition of bicarb wasn’t all good. You see, your stomach is acidic, and bicarb is basic. When an acid and a base mix, they produce water and a gas. The thing about sodium bicarbonate and stomach acid is that it literally forms a children’s science experiment in your stomach. You know, the one with the tiny volcano, red food dye and vinegar?

Functionally, this increases CO2 production and you get so much bloating and gas you are glued to the toilet.

In the above paper, the author stated that, “Two of the athletes reported gastrointestinal disturbances such as stomachache and diarrhea. Neither of them was the heaviest athlete.” Throughout the paper, the authors state several times that 0.3g/kg was the preferred dose based on the papers by McNaughton and colleagues [5].

The solution was simply to encapsulate the beads in a hydrogel. There are other simple solutions like taking it with carbohydrates, plenty of water, and even loading it 2-3 days in advance, as all of these have been shown to reduce GI distress.

This is exactly what modern companies like Bicarb.shop have been doing to reduce the GI distress while maximizing race performance. This is why I highly recommend their products.

As I stated, the earliest research mainly studied the effects of bicarbonate on shorter races. This was largely a function of convenience as most people can run 1-4 laps around the track, this can be done quite quickly and easily batched. However, many people have taken this information and assumed that bicarb only works for shorter events.

This led many conclude the following: 1) any event that is more anaerobic will inherently have more rapid hydrogen ion accumulation, 2) races of this nature will be more heavily affected by hydrogen accumulation, thus 3) that bicarb will have more of an effect.

This is incorrect. For example, at the end of a 5k, lactate levels reach 8.9 mmol on average [6], and after taking bicarb participants reached lactates as high as 11.1 mmol [7]. What’s more, after participants took bicarb their VO2maxs tested roughly 2 ml/kg/min higher (59 vs 61), albeit not statistically significant, likely due to the smaller sample size.

From a performance basis, a recent conference paper showed that bicarb could improve 5k time trial performance by up to 18 seconds.

Here are 3 more papers that showed increases in performance in longer distance events [8-10], albeit in cyclists.

For context, results in cyclists generalize well to running, and the benefits in one are usually considered the same in the other mode of exercise. They’re usually grouped in meta-analyses as “aerobic performance”.  

The last thing I want to add is that you should train with bicarb, not just race with it. Because it has acute effects on each individual workout, the benefits stack week over week and month over month. For example, consider doing 5 x 1 mile on 1’ rest. Let’s say your threshold pace is 5:30. You take bicarb and perform the workout at an average pace of 5:28. Let’s say you do that week over week. 5:28 as opposed to your normal 5:30 pace. That’s 10 seconds faster over the course of 8km of work. If you do this workout once per week, you’ll have run over 40s faster over 32km in a month. In 2 months, it’ll be 80s over 64 km, and so on and so forth. The longer and more consistent you are at each of these individual sessions, the higher the cumulative intensity and load. As a result, you reap the training benefits, and increase the likelihood of a successful performance on race day. 

Well, that’s that. Bicarb works. Take it. Take it for workouts. Take it for 5ks. Take it on the bike. Take it with food, specifically easily digestible carbs. Take it with water. Take 0.3g/kg, and take it always.

References

1.         Dennig, H., et al., EFFECT OF ACIDOSIS AND ALKALOSIS UPON CAPACITY FOR WORK. J Clin Invest, 1931. 9(4): p. 601-13.

2.         Lindinger, M.I., et al., Role of skeletal muscle in plasma ion and acid-base regulation after NaHCO3 and KHCO3 loading in humans. Am J Physiol, 1999. 276(1): p. R32-43.

3.         Bird, S.R., J. Wiles, and J. Robbins, The effect of sodium bicarbonate ingestion on 1500-m racing time. J Sports Sci, 1995. 13(5): p. 399-403.

4.         Wilkes, D., N. Gledhill, and R. Smyth, Effect of acute induced metabolic alkalosis on 800-m racing time. Med Sci Sports Exerc, 1983. 15(4): p. 277-80.

5.         McNaughton, L.R., Sodium bicarbonate ingestion and its effects on anaerobic exercise of various durations. J Sports Sci, 1992. 10(5): p. 425-35.

6.         Gupta, S., A. Stanula, and A. Goswami, Peak Blood Lactate Concentration and Its Arrival Time Following Different Track Running Events in Under-20 Male Track Athletes. Int J Sports Physiol Perform, 2021. 16(11): p. 1625-1633.

7.         Freis, T., et al., Effect of sodium bicarbonate on prolonged running performance: A randomized, double-blind, cross-over study. PLoS One, 2017. 12(8): p. e0182158.

8.         Shannon, E.S., et al., The effect of sodium bicarbonate mini-tablets ingested in a carbohydrate hydrogel system on 40 km cycling time trial performance and metabolism in trained male cyclists. Eur J Appl Physiol, 2024. 124(12): p. 3671-3682.

9.         Egger, F., et al., Effects of Sodium Bicarbonate on High-Intensity Endurance Performance in Cyclists: A Double-Blind, Randomized Cross-Over Trial. PLoS One, 2014. 9(12): p. e114729.

10.      McNaughton, L., B. Dalton, and G. Palmer, Sodium bicarbonate can be used as an ergogenic aid in high-intensity, competitive cycle ergometry of 1 h duration. Eur J Appl Physiol Occup Physiol, 1999. 80(1): p. 64-9.

Book a free coaching consultation call if you are interested in joining the team, here: https://www.endurancelaboratory.com