carbohydrates provides energy
All the energy and nutrients that enable us to live and do exercise come from the food and drink we consume daily.Among all the nutrients we intake, carbohydrate is probably the fundamental and most efficient energy source that drive our body work.When people are doing exercise, they always feel energetic at the beginning and exhausted in the end.What make such a huge differences?Hence, this essay will mainly focus on how carbs facilitate people performing exercises.
Understanding how carbs aid our performance, it is important to note that there are three forms of carbohydrates, namely monosaccharide, disaccharide and polysaccharide beforehand.Once eaten, no matter what form the carbs is, it will break down into a monosaccharide called glucose.Any glucose that has immediate usage will proceed into respiration, a catabolic reaction that breaks down glucose into pyruvate, NADH and FADH and ultimately, convert all the subunits into ATP, an energy currency that allows skeleton muscle cells to obtain energy for running or jumping.For those without instant demand, they will go through an anabolic reaction that converts into glycogen by condensation of several monosaccharides.A human can store around 445 grams of glycogen in total.They act as an energy reservoir that deposit in different muscle cells and liver as well.During slow and long duration exercise like marathon, those stored glycogen provide energy at a slower rate by respiration as well.As a result, the more you stored inside, the later you 'hit the wall', a term uses when all the carbs inside are out of supply.
However, the demand for carbs not only confined to our physical strength but also the mental strength.Neurones are the basic unit in our nervous system and since carbohydrate is the only energy source for neurones, the brain take in glucose as a nutrient to produce energy in the same way as muscle cells, so that we can make decisions and maintain consciousness during exercise.Besides, the synthesis of acetylcholine, one of the neurotransmitter, require glucose as well.Having more glucose will facilitate the formation of acetylcholine by Choline and acetyl-coenzymeA.They act at neuromuscular junction by transmitting nerve impulses to muscle for contraction.
To sum up, carbohydrate is vital in the sense that it generate energy to support the proper functioning of our whole body.Different form of carbohydrates plays different role in our body by different metabolic reactions.Do not be afraid of carbohydrates.It will benefit your performance somehow.