Other/Mixed Strength training for insulin sensitivity?

[North Coast Miller]

From everything I've read there are three factors that notably influence insulin sensitivity relative to exercise/body comp.


-Types of exercise that burn a lot of glucose increase sensitivity the most. They also induce a post exercise effect that shuttles glucose into muscle cells independent of insulin levels.

What is the Effect of HIIT on Insulin Resistance?
Data indicate that insulin sensitivity can be improved 23% to 58%. Study lengths vary from 2 weeks to 16 weeks for these adaptations to occur. The mechanism for this improvement appears to be well documented, with the ability of the exercising muscle contractions to stimulate the glucose shuttle transporters (known as GLUT4 translocaters) to take up glucose into the working muscle (from the blood), whether insulin is available or not (ADA, 2013).

-high levels of body fat regardless of muscle mass contribute to insulin resistance, although a good bit of that seems tied to diet.

Association of muscle mass and fat mass with insulin resistance and the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in Korean adults: a cross-sectional study - Scientific Reports

Relationship of muscle mass and fat mass with insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome remains uncertain, especially among Asian population. We performed a cross-sectional study with 14,807 adult participants aged between 18 and 65 in the fourth and fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition...

www.nature.com

-too much (?) saturated fat from animal sources increases insulin resistance, as does too much ingested fat in general. Several studies have been done that improved insulin sensitivity in obese subjects simply by reducing fat macros, without any change in body mass or fat:muscle. Similar effect was demonstrated by substituting animal fat/saturated with plant based/unsaturated, again with no change in body comp.

A high-fat, high-saturated fat diet decreases insulin sensitivity without changing intra-abdominal fat in weight-stable overweight and obese adults - PubMed

NCT00930371.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Some studies have also improved insulin sensitivity using low carb approach. Also outlier research on small subset of extreme endurance athletes show impaired fasting glucose levels, but small subset and extreme metabolic adaptations in these individuals make me wonder if the observations are any more valid than the pre-diabetic glucose levels commonly found in keto adapted.

 

[Steve Freides]

The NCT00930371 study isn't representative of anything I would try. It's still 27% of calories from carbohydrates _plus_ it's higher in fat. Sounds like the pizza diet to me, and therefore shouldn't be confused with a keto diet or similar where carbs are kept very low.

I'm not sure what you mean by "impaired fasting glucose levels" - could you explain? Not sure if this is it, but my casual observation has been that fasting blood sugar levels are higher for those who are adapted to fasting and that seems, in my un-medical opinion, a reasonable and good adaptation. The "normal" fasting blood sugar numbers are for people for whom fasting is an unusual thing.

Thanks.

-S-

 

[North Coast Miller]

"Impaired" is not the correct word - elevated should have been used.

And I agree, in absence of any other factors, a somewhat elevated blood glucose level is nothing to be concerned about. In all reality, anyone who exercises regularly and eats anything resembling a reasonable diet (or a diet matched to energy expenditure - which might look VERY unreasonable viewed in isolation) shouldn't have any concerns re Type 2 insulin resistance.

 

[the hansenator]

Practically you use the glucuse stored in your cells. And, an empty of glucose cell, is a much more insulin sensitive cell.

This was my line of thought which led me to thinking workouts that expend a lot of energy may be the way to go. Like big exercises with body building style programming, or the Bear program, or escalating density. Things that leave the muscles having to replenish their glucose stores.

 

[Antti]

Regarding the muscle glycogen stores, exercise doesn't really tax the stores as much as typically expected and it's only a localised effect. So there are many factors at play.

 

[the hansenator]

Would it safe to assume things that make you leaner also help with insulin/glucose?

I was reading This article from Chad Waterbury where he describes a client who built muscle and got leaner by adding daily pushups to his routine. He then put the client on a program of daily pushups, reverse lunges, and pull ups in addition to the regular work out with impressive results.

 

[Steve Freides]

Would it safe to assume things that make you leaner also help with insulin/glucose?

I was reading This article from Chad Waterbury where he describes a client who built muscle and got leaner by adding daily pushups to his routine. He then put the client on a program of daily pushups, reverse lunges, and pull ups in addition to the regular work out with impressive results.

I think it's probably safer to say that becoming leaner by whatever means is the priority if you're trying to change insulin sensitivity.

-S-

 

[North Coast Miller]

@the hansenator
I think we might need a definition of "help with insulin/glucose". Just the act of exercising helps, having a lean build helps, whole food plant based diets seem to do wonders, and elite level endurance athletes have insulin sensitivity 3x a lean non-exercising individual. When talking about type 2 diabetes, exercising and not being too overweight seem to be about all anyone needs to do.

For exercise specifically to deplete glucose, I have not seen numbers as striking as those for HIIT, it almost doesn't seem possible except it is theorized a great deal of the lactate released is simply not used by the muscle except for the 2 ATP consumed by fast twitch fibers.

It has been shown to improve insulin sensitivity in type 2 diabetics after only a handful of sessions.

A study of six subjects of wildly varying training status were evaluated for glycogen status after HIIT[14]. The HIIT protocol was 1 minute at 140% V̇O2max with 3-minute rests, repeated until the 140% could not be maintained for 30 seconds. The intervals reduced Glycogen stores to 28% of the starting value, and after two hours (fasted) the glycogen stores had only rebounded by ~10% (visual estimate from the chart.) After five hours, glycogen stores continued to be replenished, even in athletes who were fasted for that period.

 

[silveraw]

Would it safe to assume things that make you leaner also help with insulin/glucose?

Yes, kind of. Leaner is the big thing. There is a lot of research showing adipose tissue reduction helps with this over the long term. Things like low carb and HIIT can help short term, but their effect is less changing what the cause is and more working around the limitations.

Think of it like a doorway that insulin opens to allow glucose to get out of the bloodstream. If you have a lot of excess adipose tissue it causes some changes that blocks up the door way so insulin can't open it as much. This is decreased insulin sensitivity. If you do low carb, it reduces the amount of glucose that needs to go through the door way, so you can make due with your restricted doorway. If you do HIIT it is like opening up a window temporarily and it allows more glucose to leave the bloodstream and get into the muscle. Ideally you would remove the block from the doorway, which is what fat loss does.

The study I linked previously showed a reversal of insulin resistance through soley surgical fat loss. So it is less about the things that get you leaner and more about getting leaner itself in this context.