Originally Posted by jcass

But how much glycogen? In a 75 minute workout I probably have any particular muscle under maximum load all of 5 minutes. Do I have 5 minutes worth of glycogen in my muscle even on a VLC diet? My guess is that I do, because of the reason I gave before, which is that my 1 minute burst strength is not any less now than it was before I went LC.

It is reasonable to suppose that once glycogen levels fall below a certain point the body guards them jealously and uses gluconeogenesis to keep them at that certain minimum level. After all, if you could not use any glycolysis at all then after about 10 seconds of intense work your muscle strength would quickly drop to the aerobic limit of about 25 percent strength, an almost catastrophic drop from a survival perspective. But I have never observed in myself anything remotely like this happening. I can still do the same 8 or 10 or 12 or 15 reps as I could do before on the higher carb diets.