early morning pre-workout nutrition

[Judy2]

i've got a question because i usually work out in the mornings and some of the nutrition advice that i've seen online conflicts in this regard.

on the one hand, it's advised to consume around 30g of carbs (preferably simple rather than complex) to fuel the workout, which makes sense to me.

on the other hand, women specifically are advised to get around 15g of protein within an hour of waking for hormonal reasons, and carbs in the morning may set you up for more of a blood sugar roller coaster later in the day.

as i (currently) don't want to have my full breakfast before i work out and prefer to eat more after i am finished, i wonder what the macros of an ideal pre-workout snack, which is simultaneously my first 'meal'/snack of the day, should look like.

so far i've been focussing more on carbs but idk if that is really beneficial or not.

Edited Monday at 05:59 PM by Judy2

[Ramasta9]

Eating early is unnatural and not needed IMO, and your body will tell you this by itself, that is far more intelligent than any expert out there, because its (your body). Exercising in a fasted state is the best, and fueling afterwards is a very natural process humans evolved with for millions of years.

Intuition is all you need. I personally never feel hungry before 11 - 12pm, and sometimes if i do eat, its only fruit or fresh squeezed fruit juice.

Some people do coffee or tea, matcha, herbal stimulants ect... since its zero calories, but i feel it still stimulates the body in an unnatural way and trains us to rely on such things for energy and motivation. So what happens when you don't have them? See the dilemma? 

That's just how I would do it at least, and there is a lot of scientific backing to what i say too, but you gotta follow your own soul.

 

[Natasha Tori Maru]

I tend to eat 2/3 very small meals through the day.

Main meal 3hrs before bed - larger.

I let my body digest and process food by fasting until 11AM. I use the morning for my most focused, intense tasks.

Because my main, larger meal at night, is quite large, it fuels the morning weights/run/ride by loading carbohydrates the evening prior. I have personally found exercising or doing any intense non-linear thinking work on a full stomach to detract from performance.

For this reason, I load the night/evening before.

I have tried one meal a day (OMAD) but it did not do so well for hormones. Such a pity women are not even looked at properly for a lot of modern nutrition studies

My advice is - experiment. The timing and diet for you is the one that YOU can stick to, and gives the best performance. If you cannot stick to something, it's never going to work.

I think all this food timing stuff can feed anxiety; paralysis by analysis!

[Rigel]

4 hours ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

Because my main, larger meal at night, is quite large, it fuels the morning weights/run/ride by loading carbohydrates the evening prior.

I got the same advice from my martial arts teacher. I am not particularly hungry when I wake up from that scenario so I don’t eat. It works for me at the moment. Usually just have small snacks in the day & then eat a big meal when I get back home.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

13 hours ago, Rigel said:

I got the same advice from my martial arts teacher. I am not particularly hungry when I wake up from that scenario so I don’t eat. It works for me at the moment. Usually just have small snacks in the day & then eat a big meal when I get back home.

I have adhered to a similar method years, it hasn't failed me yet.

Sometimes, prior to a 20k + run, or 50/60km ride, I will eat a huge pile of potatoes the evening before, with my meal. 

If I eat that same volume of carbohydrates the morning of, I am sluggish and there is much less power available to me.

I experience this as the oft spoken of 'bonk', where you just run out of steam.

The overnight digestion saturates my muscle glycogen stores (my theory) better than morning fuelling. I used to take meticulous notes on a little pad regarding meal times, types, feeling during training, times etc and work out from scratch best practice. Now its all stored on the Garmin and phone. Technology is great, when used properly  

[Judy2]

i don't know....personally, i don't like eating late at night, either. from what i've seen online and discussed with my dietitian, eating in the morning isn't a bad idea because it counteracts the natural cortisol response after waking up. but nutrition is always so confusing because there are so many conflicting messages out there and even nutritionists keep contradicting each other. so who knows....

[Natasha Tori Maru]

8 minutes ago, Judy2 said:

i don't know....personally, i don't like eating late at night, either. from what i've seen online and discussed with my dietitian, eating in the morning isn't a bad idea because it counteracts the natural cortisol response after waking up. but nutrition is always so confusing because there are so many conflicting messages out there and even nutritionists keep contradicting each other. so who knows....

Oh to be clear - I do not eat late at night

I stop all food 3/4 hours prior to sleep.

I just have my largest, most dense and training fuelled meal in the evening.

[Judy2]

2 hours ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

Oh to be clear - I do not eat late at night

I stop all food 3/4 hours prior to sleep.

I just have my largest, most dense and training fuelled meal in the evening.

okay:)

just out of curiosity, are you vegetarian or vegan? do you have any implicit guidelines when selecting your meals, e.g. by focussing on whole foods or cutting out particular food groups? 

[Ramasta9]

As simple rule of thumb you can use is:

Your last meal should be 3 - 4 hours or more away from bedtime.

You first meal should also be 3 - 4 hours or more after waking up.

Keep it simple sis  

 

[Judy2]

8 minutes ago, Ramasta9 said:

As simple rule of thumb you can use is:

Your last meal should be 3 - 4 hours or more away from bedtime.

You first meal should also be 3 - 4 hours or more after waking up.

Keep it simple sis  

 

i agree on the first one, but the second point i'm still figuring out tbh:)

[PsychedelicEagle]

I think it depends on the type of exercise and the intensity. If you're doing longer cardio, than it's more likely that you need to replenish your glycogen stores. However, it seems that muscular glycogen does not really deplete overnight, so it also depends on how much carbohydrate you've eaten the day before/after your last workout.

If you do decide to eat prior, I think whole fruits would be the best option as they digest quickly (high carb, low protein, low fat). If you are exercising shortly before/after eating something, there's even less need to worry about glucose "spikes" (term popularized by the Glucose Demoness that only cares about blood sugar readings, completely overlooking other mechanisms driving insulin resistance) — exercise causes the GLUT4 glucose transporter to move (translocate) from inside the muscle cell to the cell membrane, unlike the standard insulin-driven pathway.

[Judy2]

@PsychedelicEagle okay thank you for explaining.