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 January 26 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. 

[Natasha Tori Maru]

18 hours 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 prefer this eating timing also

18 hours ago, Judy2 said:

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? 

I do not like to cut out or restrict anything. I am firm in that I believe the best diet is the one that you can maintain, within certain principles. If you cannot sustain something, it simply isn't going to get you the results you want (ie bodyfat gain/loss, muscle gain/loss, health/homeostatic balance.

Having said that, me personally? I do have some digestion issues that mean some things I must be conscious of dose. Simply put I mainly eat plants, eggs, fish, small amounts of cheese and once a week some red meat in the form of kangaroo (not farmed, in Australia these animals are culled due to overpopulation, so I prefer to eat this type of red meat for sustainability reasons). Fruit, vegetables 70% - the rest fish/eggs/cheese/meat. Spices, herbs and no sauce. I eat a lot of EVOO - by the spoonful in my food. I don't have a problem adhering to this. I do not even consider other food varieties as options. I prefer to think of food as little as possible and stick to similar meals in rotation so I can get on with all the other stuff  I am not a food oriented person. I do enjoy food for sure. But I feel like thinking about food, preparing, shopping, organising, recipes, takes up a lot of 'mind space' and I like to free my mind from all overthinking and anxieties.

Having said that, I will break my own rules for customary occasions. I am not rigid.

Balance and homeostasis are what I consider healthy!

[Judy2]

@Natasha Tori Maru thank you for sharing:) 

[Natasha Tori Maru]

6 minutes ago, Judy2 said:

@Natasha Tori Maru thank you for sharing:) 

My pleasure 🤍

You are an absolute sweety btw, beautiful gentle energy on the forum 

[Judy2]

@Natasha Tori Maru that's really nice to hear, thank you♡

[Judy2]

@Ramasta9 @Natasha Tori Maru

hey:) i had to think of our discussion again this afternoon, particularly the timing of meals.

i was wondering how you do/would handle things if you have a workday or some other thing impacting your meal timing. does that upset you at all?

for example, i'm currently doing an internship and don't feel comfortable eating at work, so to make that fit my schedule, i have to eat before work at 7am and then after work at 3pm... which is not ideal for me, but i don't see how else i would make that work. do you mind it when you have to eat your meals outside your home, and in this case, would you just eat at work to stick to the timing, or adjust your timing to be able to eat at home?

sorry if i'm being so meticulous about this topic:) i'm currently working on figuring out a new structure that works for me and try to hear inspiration from people who seem to have their relationship with food figured out:)

 

btw i tried training fasted a few times and it went okay depending on how late i had my last meal the day before, and also depending on the intensity of the exercise. 

[bazera]

@Judy2 I think it's more of an individual thing.

For example for me, I have no problem working out fasted except for the lowerbody exercises. For some reason I get very dizzy and nauseous on leg day on an empty stomach to the point that workout becomes impossible. So I eat a banana and 1-2 egg before it. 

It also depends on the intensity of the workout. As guys said above, loading up with carbs prior evening or in the morning is a good idea if the intensity is high enough. It all depends.

Quote

oes that upset you at all?

It's irritating, yeah.

5 hours ago, Judy2 said:

for example, i'm currently doing an internship and don't feel comfortable eating at work, so to make that fit my schedule, i have to eat before work at 7am and then after work at 3pm... which is not ideal for me, but i don't see how else i would make that work. do you mind it when you have to eat your meals outside your home, and in this case, would you just eat at work to stick to the timing, or adjust your timing to be able to eat at home?

For me it depends on current priorities. Is that situation going to last for month / years? If so, then I'd go for a version that's more sustainable. Which is more sustainable, eating at home or at work?

Do you bring home-prepped food to your workspace? If eating at work means eating out daily, I'd go with the home version. 

Quote

which is not ideal for me

What would be the ideal schedule for you if work wasn't interrupting?

[Ramasta9]

9 hours ago, Judy2 said:

@Ramasta9 @Natasha Tori Maru

hey:) i had to think of our discussion again this afternoon, particularly the timing of meals.

i was wondering how you do/would handle things if you have a workday or some other thing impacting your meal timing. does that upset you at all?

for example, i'm currently doing an internship and don't feel comfortable eating at work, so to make that fit my schedule, i have to eat before work at 7am and then after work at 3pm... which is not ideal for me, but i don't see how else i would make that work. do you mind it when you have to eat your meals outside your home, and in this case, would you just eat at work to stick to the timing, or adjust your timing to be able to eat at home?

sorry if i'm being so meticulous about this topic:) i'm currently working on figuring out a new structure that works for me and try to hear inspiration from people who seem to have their relationship with food figured out:)

 

btw i tried training fasted a few times and it went okay depending on how late i had my last meal the day before, and also depending on the intensity of the exercise. 

Hi there dear friend, I personally live / eat very intuitively, and I am very experienced in fasting so even if i don't eat, i can go long periods of time without feeling uncomfortable, i just breathe and drink water or tea, sometimes coffee, and keep myself occupied until i can actually sit down and enjoy a well deserved meal. I know it can be challenging with our modern lifestyles sometimes, but i used to eat one meal a day at one point and drink tea / water throughout the day and after a week my body adapted and was perfectly normal and easy. Our bodies simply become entrained by the daily routine. When i was eating 6 meals a day as a teenager and into bodybuilding, i would be hungry 6 or more times a day, because that's how my body was trained. So really we are like biological machines that become programmed / conditioned by the daily habits and routines.

I don't mind eating out, I would just rather prepare my own food and bring with me rather than eat fast foods cause i had too many bad experiences.

I think Natasha may give you a better response, i personally am less structured with how i eat and live, especially since i don't work lately i can relax a bit but when i do have a bit of a work schedule, i can easily find a middle way. Either i bring something light or some fruit or just fast it until i arrive home.

Sometimes when i would fast all day and have one meal, i would start my first meal with a nutrient rich smoothie, then followed by a main meal to fill my stomach and feel full and relax my body, then maybe a light snack of dried fruit and nut and tea in the evening, seemed to work well. I did this more in the winter, as fruit is less appealing and tends to cool the body down too much, so i would focus more on avocados, pumpkin / coconut soup, rice, potatoes, beans, hearty salads ect...

Hopefully you can get something out of this and i didn't confuse you further <3 

 

Edited 38 minutes ago by Ramasta9