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Wisdom Wednesdays: Why you should reframe how you think about Lactic Acid (Lactate) · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Everybody, Welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays, and today
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about a topic that is generally
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  Speaker 1: a bit of a turnoff for people or certainly evokes
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  Speaker 1: bad memories, and that is lactic acid, and I want
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  Speaker 1: to talk about why it's important that we actually reframe
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  Speaker 1: our relationship with it. So if you've been an exerciser
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  Speaker 1: at all, you will know the sensation of lactic acid.
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  Speaker 1: It's when you get that heavy feeling in your arms
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  Speaker 1: and your legs when you're exercising intensely, and it can
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  Speaker 1: make you feel sick and your brain says to you,
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  Speaker 1: why are we doing this shit?
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  Speaker 2: We can just stop right here right now.
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  Speaker 1: Now, it turns out that that discomfort actually comes with
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  Speaker 1: lots of benefits.
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  Speaker 2: So you thinking used to.
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  Speaker 1: Be, certainly when I was doing my masters in Sports
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  Speaker 1: Times twenty five years ago, that lactic acid was a
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  Speaker 1: bit of a byproduct of muscular contraction, and it was
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  Speaker 1: a thought of as a bit of a waste product.
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  Speaker 1: But what now We know that that is absolutely not
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  Speaker 1: the case. And it turns out that lactate, which is
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  Speaker 1: what we actually call it now, not lactic acid, but
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  Speaker 1: lactate isn't a waste product.
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  Speaker 2: It is an absolute powerhouse.
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  Speaker 1: It turns out that the nasty thing that we all
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  Speaker 1: dislike is the hydrogen ion that is created from those
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  Speaker 1: muscular contractions, but lactate and I think we now need
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  Speaker 1: to look at in a different light.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm going to just.
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  Speaker 1: Explore three really important ways that lactiate benefits our body
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  Speaker 1: and our mind, and then how we can harness its potential.
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  Speaker 1: So firstly, is that we now know that lactate, far
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  Speaker 1: from being a waste product, does it said, is actually
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  Speaker 1: a really valuable fuel source for lots of your organs.
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  Speaker 1: So your body just doesn't get energy from glucose or fat.
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  Speaker 1: Turns out that lactate is another key player. Now, after
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  Speaker 1: lactate is produced in your muscles during intense exercise, it
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  Speaker 1: actually is recycled as an energy source for vital organs
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  Speaker 1: such as your heart, your brain, and your liver. And
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  Speaker 1: the heart in particular thrives on lactate during periods of exertion.
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  Speaker 1: So instead of shunning it, your body actually uses lactate
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  Speaker 1: as a high efficiency fuel. It's like having a hybrid
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  Speaker 1: engine that can switch fuel types to keep going when
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  Speaker 1: the road gets tough. And for athletes, or just exercises.
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  Speaker 1: This means better endurance and it really highlights the importance
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  Speaker 1: of generating lactate regularly to keep our internal systems running
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  Speaker 1: really smoothly and be able to react whenever they need to.
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  Speaker 1: That's the key thing.
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  Speaker 2: Now.
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  Speaker 1: The second one is lackdate and brain health, and this
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  Speaker 1: is where things get really fascinating. So lacked it doesn't
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  Speaker 1: just fuel muscles, it also fuels your brain and when
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  Speaker 1: it crosses the blood brain barrier, not only does it
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  Speaker 1: act as a fuel source, but it also triggers the
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  Speaker 1: release of a powerful growth factor called BDNF brain derived
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  Speaker 1: neurotropic factor, and neurotropic means nerve growth, So BDNF has
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  Speaker 1: been called a fertilizer for the brain. It has been
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  Speaker 1: known to promote the groups of new neurons and it
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  Speaker 1: strengthens existing neurons and helps create connections and actually protects
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  Speaker 1: your brain cells against damage. BDNF can also lead to
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  Speaker 1: sharper memory, improve learning, and even better resilience against things
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  Speaker 1: like mental health challenges like depression or traumatic brain injury.
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  Speaker 1: We know that if two people are in a car
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: crash and they say stain a trump, an identical traumatic
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  Speaker 1: brain injury if some person one of them had been
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  Speaker 1: exercising earlier, and they would actually have less brain damage.
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  Speaker 1: And what's more, studies show that exercises that generate high
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  Speaker 1: levels of lactate, such as interval training, might boost these
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  Speaker 1: brand benefits by stimulating BDNF production.
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  Speaker 2: And it's really a pretty cool example.
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  Speaker 1: Of how your body and brain work together whenever they
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  Speaker 1: are challenged. And the third thing I want to talk
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  Speaker 1: about is lactate and mitochondrial biogenesis. Now this is quite timely,
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  Speaker 1: having had the podcast with Christabel where we talked all
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  Speaker 1: about the mitochondria, so I think if you'd listen to
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  Speaker 1: those you'd be a big fan of the mitochondria right now.
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  Speaker 1: And it turns out that lactate produced from high intensity
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  Speaker 1: exercise activates a pathway involving what's called PGC one alpha.
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  Speaker 1: So this is a really critical protein in the body
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  Speaker 1: that promotes mitochondria biogenesis. So in simpler terms, it helps
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  Speaker 1: your body to produce more mitochondria and to make the
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  Speaker 1: existing ones more efficient. Now why is that important. Well,
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  Speaker 1: as we discussed with Crystabell, mitochondria are the powerhouses of
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  Speaker 1: the cell. They convert nutrients into energy, but not only
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  Speaker 1: do they do that. We now know that mitochondria do
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  Speaker 1: so much more than just energy production. They carry out
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  Speaker 1: lots of different cellular functions. And the more robust your
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  Speaker 1: mitochondria are, the better your energy levels, the better cellular
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  Speaker 1: rappower happens, and the better your overall health. And as
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  Speaker 1: we discussed in the podcast Damag's, mitochondria play a critical
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  Speaker 1: role in many many different diseases and conditions and it's
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  Speaker 1: a key reason why athletes have such high energy outputs.
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  Speaker 1: And my exercise is often called the ultimate antieging tool
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  Speaker 1: is because of the impact of mitochondria biogenesis. Now we
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  Speaker 1: know that zone two training lower intensity also can help
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  Speaker 1: stimulate that, but lactate seems to be a better driver
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  Speaker 1: of mitochondria biogenesis. So now that we've talked about those benefits,
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  Speaker 1: how do we generate it? Well, lots of people know
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  Speaker 1: it is about going intensely. So if you're thinking, let's
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  Speaker 1: just think of typical track and field and a sprint
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  Speaker 1: is almost exclusively ATPPC.
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  Speaker 2: That's that very fast energy production.
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  Speaker 1: When people are running a marathon and most of their
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  Speaker 1: energy production comes from aerobic metabolism, not exclusively. None of
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  Speaker 1: these are exclusive. But if you think of something like
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  Speaker 1: four hundred meters run that is just right in the
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  Speaker 1: sweet spot for lactic acid. So anything that's kind of
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  Speaker 1: over that thirty to forty seconds of high intensity work
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  Speaker 1: is really going to generate that, right, So that gives
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  Speaker 1: us a clear about things high intensity interval training, doing
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  Speaker 1: those short bursts of exercise anywhere from sort of thirty
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  Speaker 1: seconds up to a few minutes followed by rest. That's
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  Speaker 1: a really good way to produce lactate and then to
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  Speaker 1: recycle it. And we can do resistance training doing heavy
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  Speaker 1: weights with reps until muscular fatigue, you'll feel that lacktate,
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  Speaker 1: and particularly doing things like drop sets and super sets
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  Speaker 1: can really help with this social sort of thing. And
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  Speaker 1: then doing circuit based training where you go from exercise
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  Speaker 1: to exercise or combining aerobic and anaerobic exercises or a
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  Speaker 1: bit of resistance training and a bit of anaerobic stuff,
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  Speaker 1: and that can really help you to produce that lactate.
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  Speaker 2: And then any.
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  Speaker 1: Sports specific stuff you don't think that things like football, AFL, rugby, basketball, tennis,
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  Speaker 1: anything where you're doing those short little bursts of speed,
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  Speaker 1: you're going to be producing lacked it, right, And so
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  Speaker 1: the next time that you're exercising and your brain asks
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  Speaker 1: you why are we doing this shit, you can just
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  Speaker 1: have that long conversation with your brain about why it
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  Speaker 1: needs to actually suck it up and get on with it.
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  Speaker 1: That's it for this week, folks, Catch you next time.