Why is nobody in fitness talking about this?

Chapters:

00:00 Intro

00:07 1. Effect of your macros on injury risk

03:46 2. Toxic Omega-3

06:55 Outro

Transcript:

Both of these topics are quite concerning. They have a substantial amount of research behind them, yet they are rarely discussed.

The first is the effect of your macros on your injury risk, specifically low fat diets, which are quite common in fitness circles. The researchers of a recent meta-analysis of 9 prospective studies concluded: “Lower total energy and fat intake increase the risk of general running related injuries and bone stress injuries in female distance runners.”

The researchers compared injured and uninjured runners and found that the injured runners had significantly lower fat intakes, but not carbohydrate or protein intakes. In individual studies also, low fat, but not carb or protein intakes, correlated with injury risk. I would note that running is a particularly good activity to look at for injuries, because the injury rates in runners are approximately ten times as high as those in resistance trainees. That’s because of the repeated, consistent stress leading to pattern overuse injuries. Running is relatively uncontrolled, has a lot of impact and a lot of repeated impact, making it much more injurious than strength training or going to the gym, for most people. There is a clear mechanistic reason why low fat intakes would increase injury risk, namely lower anabolic hormone production.

In both, men and women, fat intakes of around 20%, which is about what the female runners in this study or these studies were consuming on average, are associated with lower production of testosterone, estrogen and growth hormone. All of these hormones are anabolic in connective tissue and have been found to improve recovery rates of connective tissue, especially tendons, ligaments, joints, etc. However, these studies were associative, so they cannot establish causality. They were prospective, suggesting that the low fat intake preceded the injury, but it’s a bit weird that they looked at injured vs uninjured runners and then check their macros instead of checking low versus high fat intakes, and then seeing if those resulted in different injury rates. Nevertheless, multiple other studies have just look at correlations which are a bit more intuitive, and they found similar findings.

Another substantial limitation is that the relationships were only statistically significant in women, not in men. However, there were only about half as many data points available for men as for women, so statistical power in the male analysis was relatively low. The most important limitation of these data, though, is that it was impossible to disentangle the effects of low energy intakes from low fat intakes. Low fat intakes inherently also caused lower energy intakes, of course, and while it was specifically fat intake, not carbohydrate or protein intake that was associated with injury risk, it is still not possible to exclude that it was simply the low energy intake, regardless of which macronutrient that energy deficit came from, that caused increased injuries.

Relative energy deficiency in sport is a well-established phenomenon, and increased injuries are a commonly observed side effect. So overall, I think there’s good reason to believe that a low energy intake predisposes you to extra injury risk. Therefore, it’s prudent to lower your total training volume when you are cutting versus when you are bulking. And energy deficit is a recovery deficit. And if that energy deficit includes a low fat intake, around 20% of energy intake or lower, that might further increase the risk of injury because it suppresses your anabolic hormone production.

This is one of multiple reasons why in my PT course and my App I rarely recommend fat intakes below 20% of energy intake. 20% is really the bottom, and if you have the calories, 30 or 40% of calories from fat is much nicer. Of course, sometimes you have to compromise in a cut, and you definitely don’t want to compromise on protein intake, so you have to weigh the pros and cons of carbohydrates versus fat if you are in a deep energy deficit and you have to prioritize which is the more important for your current needs.

The second concerning line of research that you rarely hear people talk about is that if you are supplementing Omega-3 fatty acids, like fish oil, you might in fact be paying for poison. That sounds like clickbait. Unfortunately, it is not. Omega-3 supplements have a wide variety of health benefits, and it’s quite difficult for most people to consume enough Omega-3s in your diet unless you are regularly eating fish. For that reason many people supplement fish oil, or if they are vegans algae oil. Problematically, Omega-3 fatty acids in these oils are highly susceptible to oxidation during the manufacturing process and during storage. Omega-3 is usually anti-inflammatory and good for your health, but when it goes rancid or even when it oxidizes just a little bit, it becomes harmful.

Now, how harmful exactly is actually not entirely clear. We don’t have great data in humans because it is unethical to feed people rancid Omega-3. But the animal data are very alarming. The human data that we have are very, very limited, and they suggest maybe some harm, maybe not so much, but they’re very short term. If you are supplementing something every day over the course of years or decades of your life, then of course, even a small negative health effect might be concerning over the long run. And since oxidized Omega-3 is toxic, it is mainly a matter of how bad, rather than if it’s bad and how reduced the benefits are compared to the increased health risks. So how likely is it that your specific Omega-3 supplement is oxidized?

Unfortunately, it is quite likely because most manufacturers do not report if their oxidation levels exceed safe standards. Moreover, multiple independent surveys have found that the majority of supplements are oxidized and often do not contain exactly what’s on the label, so they might be under dosed, they might have heavy metals in them, and they might exceed the safe levels of oxidation.

To avoid being overly alarmist, though, I should note that the majority of research still finds positive health outcomes of Omega-3 supplements in research. Therefore, on average, it still seems that Omega-3 supplementation for most people, even if it’s oxidized, has net positive health effects. However, if you’re going to pay for something to improve your health, I personally would want to make sure that you’re actually just getting the benefits and none of the risks. Therefore, if you’re going to use an Omega-3 supplement, I would recommend that you use one that has independent lab work validating that it has what’s on the label and only what’s on the label without exceeding safe oxidation standards.

The following supplements, which I’m not affiliated with at all, have been found in independent lab work, usually in studies, to actually meet these criteria. Again, I’m not affiliated with any of these brands. This is a list I compiled for my PT course students and my coaching clients, so feel free to use it. There are probably other brands that are also as good, but I personally have not seen independent lab work of any other brands. If you have, please comment it below and I can add it to the list. But for me personally, these are the only Omega-3 supplements I would personally buy and I recommend to my clients and my students to buy.

If you’re serious about optimizing your physique, then check out my App, for which, by the way, you get a free trial right now if you click on the link in the description, and my online PT certification program. And if you want to watch more of my free content, you can do so right here. Hope to see you in the next video.