I’m not asking for medical / nutritional advice, and I’m not worried about this phenomenon. This is more of a physiology question.
I used to bike or elliptical for my moderate and high intensity cardio, but when gyms closed I stopped doing all moderate to high intensity cardio. I hate running, so I just walked or hiked a lot. Within a month of eliminating this cardio, I had no more ammonia-smelling gym clothes! This is despite still sweating A LOT from lifting weights, with a lot of high-rep and superset-style programming.
I recently acquired a stationary bike, and have used it 2-3 times a week for short, moderate-to-high intensity, sessions. Almost instantly the ammonia odor has returned.
If I google about this phenomena, the common answer is about the carb intake being too low, or this occurring in folks who chronically eat a low carb diet. But this doesn’t really apply to me. I am certainly not eating low carb, I probably eat 400-550g of carbs a day, but I also eat about 220-300g of protein a day. I’m also not doing real LSD cardio. I’m using higher intensity cardio that I probably couldn’t sustain for more than 30-60 minutes.
So why do you think this happens?