My girlfriends mom was talking to a friend, who�s nutritionist said, if you don�t eat before your morning workouts they are useless. I have always thought it was better not to eat anything b/c you will burn more calories??? Which is true??? thank you
i’ve always heard that you should eat something to jump start your metabolism
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If you are interested in burning fat then the author of Body for Life believes that working out on an empty stomach will burn the most fat because you will run out of carbs to burn more quickly. I have done this and it seems to work. I don’t know for sure since I did not follow his program and eat before workouts.
The information that I have gleaned from coaches concerning tri training, eating before a workout is the best approach because it jumpstarts your metabolism and depending on the planned workout, you will need more fuel than is left over from a meal 10 hours ago.
It also insures that you are able to do your best effort druing the workout.
Just have a good breakfast before your interval work. This is what I have
All I can say is that I am very sluggish in my workout if I don’t eat SOMETHING beforehand in the a.m.
The result is invariably,
- I can’t go as fast,
- I can’t go as far, and/or
- I don’t enjoy my workout.
So, yes I would agree that a workout without food is not worth as much.
It depends on what kind of workout as well as what you eat. I notice that if I drink a meal replacement shake(MRP) with complex carbs in the morning right before a workout, I won’t be able to go hard till an hr later. If you’re doing a high interval workout, then going out with depletion of glycogen from the night fast would yield disappointing results.
All in all, if you don’t eat in the morning before your workout, you’d be better off doing a slow ride/run(even then you have to get nutrition as the workout gets longer). If the intensity is too high, you’d be relying alot on carbs which you lack and in turn you won’t be able to reach the intensity you want.
So to answer your question, it’s not always worthless. =P
I am no scientist, but for a short 40 - 60 min work out, i am fine on empty. And don’t worry about nutrition during.
Anything longer and I have some type of breakfast one hour before the workout. And I count how much I put in during the workout to make sure I can hold intensity.
I have found that this is pretty much a useless approach for me. If I don’t eat at least something not only do I hate the workout and hit that really hollow and shaky feeling wondering if I will make it home but even worst when I get home it is harder to control how much I eat. For me, I have found that if I am in the process of losing weight, as I am now, I try to eat the same size breakfast I would have if I wasn’t training but I spread it out before, during, and after my workout. That might mean having an apple or a slice of bread with 1 tablespoon of natural peanut butter before I leave, having some dates on the ride, and then having a bowl of oatmeal when I get back. This way my total calories for breakfast is around 300 calories but I still worked out and not dying of hunger. I find that I enjoy the workout and it has helped me to lose quite a bit of weight.
Can you lose more weight…maybe but I sincerely doubt the extra pain is worth what is probably an extra 20 calories difference - if that much.
“My girlfriends mom was talking to a friend, who’s nutritionist said, if you don’t eat before your morning workouts they are useless. I have always thought it was better not to eat anything b/c you will burn more calories???”
I wouldn’t call the workouts ‘useless’ if you don’t eat; they simply may be sub-par without fuel (breakfast) for the engine (your body). The idea of training (not simply ‘workout’) is to progress. Even recovery training is part of progress, although it probably needs less fuel than a hard training session.
If you are a “fitness person” and decide to do “cardio on an empty stomach to burn more calories” (note that I put these in quotes) this is a different story. Most “cardio workouts” for regular folk are not intense, and they are simply meant to raise the HR and burn extra calories. That is a far cry from a multisport athlete with specific training needs, where every training session is for building and/or recovery.
ALWAYS fuel yourself for a quality training session, especially of some duration. It doesn’t matter if it’s early morning or late evening. Remember: it’s fuel for the engine.
Lauren
Eating something before a workout will jumpstart your metabolism and will start the fat burning process. Some folks, however, don’t need to eat before workouts, while others do, it just depends. Myself, I have to eat quite a bit in the morning otherwise I get lightheaded, dizzy, and weak during my workouts
The most I will “eat” now before a morning workout (and almost 100 % of mine are morning workouts) is a glass of orange juice or, at most, a glass of Accelerade. In college I swam a lot of mornings and never had anything but water beforehand.
This depends on so many things that it is hard for answer to be useful without a large number of qualifiers and disclaimers:
When did you last eat (how late night before)
What type of training cycle are you in (base/build/taper)
What kind of workout do you have planned (sport/duration/intensity)
Will you be consuming during the workout
Are you trying to cut weight
Can you run with breakfast in your stomach.
For me, I can’t run with food in me consumed during the last hour, so usually no morning eating. If I am going for an hour long swim, no problem, a five mile run, no problem. If I am going to ride the bike, then I can eat and hop on. If I am going for 20 mile run, I will try to fuel during from the very start to avoid the bonk (but that will be liquid calories every few miles).
Just too much stuff to consider, the answer has to be tailored to your circumstance. If you notice that your morning training is crap, then change something.
When this thread was started, Pluto was still a planet.
For people trying to lose weight, it might actually be a good idea for them to eat something before working out…your body is constantly regulating itself to avoid a negative energy balance so if you put a stress on your body and there is no real fuel there, your body will slow down your metabolism to “save calories” and this can end up slowing down weight loss efforts. this is the reason why after 3 weeks of cutting back on calories, it becomes much more difficult for someone to lose weight because the body will lower the resting metabolic rate to try to compensate for the reduced caloric intake.
plenty of elites eat nothing before their morning workouts so there definitely is a “whatever works for people” side to it as well. if you can’t stomach eating in the morning before a workout, try having a little snack before going to bed.
My girlfriends mom was talking to a friend, who’s nutritionist said, if you don’t eat before your morning workouts they are useless
That nutritionist is an idiot.
Eat, don’t eat, who cares? typically for a morning workout I don’t eat, unless it’s a really long ride, then I may or may not. I know other’s who eat before every workout.
Do what works for you.
When this thread was started, Pluto was still a planet.
And what’s more amazing is that it doesn’t look like the guy is trying to sell something…
I presume some kind of forum glitch has sent this back to the top of the forum even though noone has posted in it for 4 years, but it’s interesting to see how opinions have changed over the last decade.
The human body’s response to food and exercise hasn’t changed for thousands of years, so I don’t know whether it’s better understanding of physiology or just fashion and fads that dictate public opinion, but it’s interesting nonetheless!
I presume some kind of forum glitch has sent this back to the top of the forum even though noone has posted in it for 4 years, but it’s interesting to see how opinions have changed over the last decade.
The human body’s response to food and exercise hasn’t changed for thousands of years, so I don’t know whether it’s better understanding of physiology or just fashion and fads that dictate public opinion, but it’s interesting nonetheless!
I think Pluto IS a planet! And…
I think it would be great for breakfast! 
seriously - I’m like Stover (aka DD), I don’t need to eat for most workouts. My liver must store a ton of carbs. I feel worse if I eat before any w/o that’s above “easy”
I’ve never bonked in 30+ years.
enjoy the new year/journey
I presume some kind of forum glitch has sent this back to the top of the forum even though noone has posted in it for 4 years, but it’s interesting to see how opinions have changed over the last decade.
The human body’s response to food and exercise hasn’t changed for thousands of years, so I don’t know whether it’s better understanding of physiology or just fashion and fads that dictate public opinion, but it’s interesting nonetheless!
I think Pluto IS a planet! And…I think it would be great for breakfast!
seriously - I’m like Stover (aka DD), I don’t need to eat for most workouts. My liver must store a ton of carbs. I feel worse if I eat before any w/o that’s above “easy”
I’ve never bonked in 30+ years.
enjoy the new year/journey
I’m with you, def prefer to train on an empty or semi-empty stomach, but it is not your liver that is predominately fueling your muscles. From what I’ve read on exer phys, the majority, e.g. 75-95%, of the glycogen used by your muscles during exercise comes from the glycogen already stored in the muscles. Liver glycogen is simply a back-up source for the muscles and mainly the liver glycogen fuels the brain, which has no glycogen storage capacity at all. If it were otherwise, i.e. most of your glycogen comes from your per-workout meal and from calories consumed during the workout or race, then tri-guys would essentially never get tired, as long as they kept eating a lot, but of course this does not happen.
My girlfriends mom was talking to a friend, who�s nutritionist said, if you don�t eat before your morning workouts they are useless. I have always thought it was better not to eat anything b/c you will burn more calories??? Which is true??? thank you
Your nutritionist friend is flat-out wrong. Should be pretty obvious - you train, even on an AM first thing empty stomach, you get faster/better.
I’ve trained for years even doing up to 15 mile runs at 5-7AM without eating anything until 1PM, and even now, I routinely do all-out speedwork sessions in the early more (sometimes as early as 3AM) where I’m definitely hitting my speed and HR targets.
It does take some getting use to if you’re planning on hammerfest super early AM workouts, but it absolutely can be done, and done well, even if you’re feeling like ‘this is gonna suck and I feel like I’m dragging’ even before the workout.