Gina Kolata’s May 16, 2006 New York Times article “Lactic Acid Is Not Muscles' Foe, It's Fuel”, gives some very valid and important insights into athletic performance and exercise metabolism.  Dr. George Brooks proved after developing a much more complex metabolic model that lactic acid is an energy source for the muscles (as well as the kidney, heart and brain as was previously known).  Prior to Dr Brooks' study lactic acid had been identified as the “limiting factor” in intense muscle contraction causing the “burn” experienced when pushing the limits of conditioning. But, lactic acid is not the problem; it is a “marker” for acid generation in the active muscle.  For every molecule of lactic acid formed during exercise, excess hydrogen ions (protons) are created thereby increasing the acidity within the muscle cell.  If these protons are not addressed, the pH in the muscle region is decreased to the point that it creates a “burn” and slows down energy metabolism in working muscles.

Acid Zapper^® helps buffer the acid so that you can go further before that pain is an issue.  It is analogous to complex carbohydrate loading (i.e.; pasta, rice, beans, or lentils) about 3 to 4 hours before the race to give you stored fuel in the form of muscle and liver glycogen.  With the Alka-Myte® based Acid Zapper, you can accumulate the buffering over days, not hours, and have alkaline compounds available when the sport induced acid load occurs.   Research shows that people eating Western diets and under stress are operating at the lower end of the acceptable pH range.

Lactate levels measured during a pilot study by Dr Emily Cooper at Seattle Performance Medicine were reduced after utilizing our product.  During a ride to exhaustion at the anaerobic threshold, the average lactate level was 8.2 mMol/l before taking our supplement; 5.6 mMol/l, after.  Thus, the use of Acid Zapper gave a 32% reduction in blood lactate levels indicating the body was better processing the lactate fuel during intense exercise.  In addition, the average time to exhaustion was increased by 52%.  Increasing the time to exhaustion by 52% was the big payoff and the test subjects reported that muscle burn was not an issue.

Ed Eyestone’s article “Burn baby Burn, Learn to Train at Your Lactate Threshold, and You’ll Race Faster,” on www.internetfitness.com/articles/running_burnbabyburn.htm has good routines for exercise induced elevation of the anaerobic threshold.  Muscular fitness can be improved rapidly by doing workouts at the threshold for longer and longer times.  He cites that “When your lactic threshold exceeds your body’s ability to deal with it, you’re in trouble: blood lactate dramatically increases, energy production and muscle contraction decreases, fatigue ensues, and performance drops.”  As you train, you process the acid and fuel more efficiently and improve in performance.

We believe that Acid Zapper reduces the lactate levels by neutralizing the excess proton production thus allowing the lactate to be used as fuel to significantly improve time to exhaustion.  Using Acid Zapper with Mr. Eyestone’s routines should accelerate improvement and greatly reduce the “burn”.