So you want to squeeze in a workout… but you forgot to eat.
Why not get that energy burst through your taste buds instead of legal crack?
A recent study aimed to see if “carbohydrate” is among the tastes we can sense – and whether merely tasting carbs can cause the same effect on our mind and body as actually eating them. As sugar and carbs translate to gas for our active pastimes, the journal “Appetite” observed athletes after having them slosh around a carby solution for 30 seconds or so. The response?
There was indeed a jolt in brain activity and sensory perception straight away.
That’s all well and good – but does this study prove that carbs merit a place on the taste list? Eh… I’m not so sure. I mean, my first thought was, “Oh – it’s just a Pavlovian response.” But then, I read that the study accounted for that – creating a placebo solution containing the same taste but none of the carbohydrates – and the folk who got their tastes trolled did not respond quite the same way as those scope-style sloshing the carb-y solution.
Even so – does that really prove it’s a taste receptor thing?
I tend to think it’s more of a combo effect – the Pavlovian response combined with basic biology. The Pavlovian part still makes sense because our taste and smell are so closely linked to one another and to memory. If we taste something that reminds us of prepping for blood pumping routine, wouldn’t that wake up those brain centers?
But as the study shows, that perception of taste alone wasn’t enough (as the placebo group showed). So, on the body-bio end of my theory – there’s that vein underneath your tongue. I remember having a mind-blow moment when I learned that you can put certain drugs and vitamins alike under your taste muscle for “rapid absorption” (and then passing out moments later from the klonopin wafer I’d taken). So, if drugs and vitamin B12 can mosey on through there, then why not the carbalicious cocktail contents in the test?
This study’s a good example of that whole correlation-doesn’t-mean-causation thing. I feel like the only way for this to be a true taste-bud test would be to have people lick a solid sample only. No sucking or swallowing (giggity) or sloshing (less giggity).
That said, the results could still be of use. “Carb” may not be a flavor, but it could totally be marketed by making it into a pre-cardio sublingual tablet. Or chewing gum. Or mix it with coconut oil and pull out the disgusting bacteria as you carb up. #multitasking
Fine from a marketing standpoint but I still say eff the pre-workout powders.
And the shortcuts.
It’s all about them healthy ass bananas with dem nines on the sticker.
Motherfucker.
