Global Triathlon Network fat burning challenge

The University of Brighton were contacted by Global Triathlon Network to help them investigate fat metabolism.

Global Triathlon Network (GTN) provides content for professional and aspiring triathletes to inform, entertain and inspire them to become better triathletes. Its YouTube channel has 780,000 subscribers.

Former Silver Medal Olympic Pentathlete Heather Fell, along with Mark Threlfall and James Cunnama, both ex-professional triathletes and GTN presenters, were looking to investigate fat metabolism and their individual fat oxidation rates during steady state exercise. Instead of spending hours swimming, cycling and running in the cold they opted to run the tests in the sport and exercise science labs at the university.

Heather, Mark and James had a friendly competition as to who had the highest fat oxidation rate – essentially who could burn the most amount of fat during aerobic exercise!

The tests were run by senior lecturer Dr Gary Brickley and lab technician Bill Norton. All three were tested at four different speeds on the treadmill to calculate their oxidation rates and feedback.

We’re not giving anything away so to find out which presenter burned the most fat you’ll have to watch the video:

Learn about studying sport and exercise at the University of Brighton.