What dietary strategy can enhance endurance performance before an event?

Carbohydrate loading is a dietary strategy specifically designed to enhance endurance performance by maximizing glycogen stores in the muscles and liver. This approach involves increasing carbohydrate intake in the days leading up to an endurance event, while simultaneously tapering exercise to allow for optimal glycogen storage. Glycogen acts as a primary energy source during prolonged, moderate to high-intensity exercise, and enhanced glycogen stores can delay fatigue, improve performance, and increase time to exhaustion for endurance athletes.

The practice of carbohydrate loading typically involves consuming a diet that is rich in carbohydrates, often constituting about 70% of total caloric intake, paired with a reduction in training volume. This prepares the body to store greater amounts of glycogen, which is crucial for sustaining energy levels during endurance events such as marathons or long-distance cycling.

In contrast, the other dietary strategies, such as consuming high protein meals, eating high-fat snacks, or skipping meals, do not provide the same benefits for endurance performance. High protein meals focus more on muscle repair and recovery rather than energy availability, high-fat snacks may not contribute sufficiently to glycogen stores, and skipping meals would likely result in reduced energy availability, leading to decreased performance during endurance activities.