Does Trail Running Burn Fat Or Muscle?

It seems like a simple question to answer, but I’m aware that it gets asked a lot. I’m not sure what people’s preoccupation with burning fat over burning muscle is, but here’s my take on it.

Do We Burn Fat Or Muscle First When Trail Running?

Does trail running burn fat or muscle first? I love to Trail Run, as you probably already know it you’ve been on this blog before. It is probably my favourite outdoor pastime. I’ve been doing quite a bit of it in the last month, and I’ve lost some weight and look better, but I was wondering if I am going to lose too much muscle mass rather than just burn lots of fat, which would be my preference. So I thought I’d look a bit deeper to find out. Here’s what I found.

Which Do We Burn First when Trail Running, Fat or Muscle?

You’ll probably be pleased to hear that the answer is that we burn Fat before muscle when we are trail running. We always burn Fat over Muscle when we go for a trail run.

When we put the rigorous demands of Trail Running on our bodies, first our bodies will burn off off any available Carbs in the form of Glycogen in our Muscles and Liver, then it will turn to the Fatty Acids in out Blood Stream and once they are used up, we will switch to burning the Stored Fat deposits. Only after these three energy sources are depleted will our body begin to burn off any Muscle. This scenario is very unlikely in the average and even in the advanced trail runner.

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