Workout Nutrition

This topic goes a little deeper into the rabbit hole than we usually go here at Fitness Together. I usually try to keep things simple, and for most people simple is better. So if this sounds like it makes life a little more complicated than you’d like it to be, just ignore it. You’ll still make great progress without applying this information.

However, if you’re looking for another edge to “step up” your progress, or if you’ve been having problems with your energy level during your workouts, then read on.

What we’re talking about here is special rules for eating before, during and after your workout. Not only does what you eat before your workout affect the quality of your workout, but what you eat after your workout affects how quickly you’ll recover from a workout.

As usual, I’m going to try to put this in language everyone can understand. So I’ll try not to use terms like insulin sensitivity, glucose tolerance, glycogen depletion, ATP resynthesis, etc.. So if some of you physicians on my list think this sounds like a little bit of a stretch, trust me, I have the studies to back all of this up. And they are written with those big words.

First, let’s talk about how you should eat before your workout. Everyone digests food a little differently and each of you consume and process carbohydrates differently, so the timing for everyone is a little different. But we all need an adequate amount of carbohydrates in our system to fuel our muscles during the workout.

Remember, the reasons for the empty carbs in breads, pasta’s etc, was to fuel our ancestor’s muscles during a hard day plowing the field. While we no longer need those calorie dense carbohydrates for most of our sedentary lives, if you are doing strenuous workouts then that’s the one time during the day when you can use that fuel.

This holds true even if you are trying to lose weight. Remember, the purpose of the resistance training is to prevent muscle loss while dieting and crank up your metabolism so that you burn even more calories for the days following the workout. If your workout suffers in intensity because your body lacked the proper fuel, then you’ve just “robbed Peter to pay Paul”.

For cardio workouts it’s a little different. In this case, working out on an empty stomach may cause increased fat burning, which is great. Also, the intensity of your cardio workouts isn’t 100% anyway (unless you’re a professional long distance runner), so it doesn’t really matter if our energy levels are down a little.

So what does this mean for your pre-workout nutrition? Either have a piece of fruit on the way to the gym, or include some carbohydrates in the meal before your workout. Just be careful not to eat to close to your workout. Your body isn’t good at digesting food while you’re working out. The results of eating too close to the workout isn’t pleasant.

Recently we’ve had a couple clients that were really dragging during their workouts. Changing their pre-workout nutrition really did the trick.

What about during the workout? Yes, I said during the workout. Some people really do respond well to some quickly digested carbohydrates during their workouts. You’ve all heard of Gatorade. Yes, for the most part it’s just sugar water, and doesn’t have any place in your normal daily routine, but it does do a great job in replenishing your body’s energy levels at the same time that it rehydrates (perhaps more important than the energy it supplies).

One other thing about Gatorade: Someone really did their homework way back when. Gatorade doesn’t have fructose like all other sugary drinks, so it’s much easier for your body to use to fuel your muscles instead of just storing it as fat. For those of you who are attentive enough to notice that I recommended fruit for pre-workout nutrition, amazingly fruit has far less fructose than do sugary sodas, or Kool-aid.

Now it gets a little more complicated, and probably a little harder for some of you to accept: Post-workout nutrition. You see, after an intense workout, your body is in a state of destruction. It’s actually tearing down the very muscle you’re trying to build/maintain. Without proper post workout nutrition, it can stay in that destructive state for several hours, until you give it the fuel to start building. No, it’s not just tearing down fat either, it’s actually tearing down precious muscle tissue.

How do we stop this destructive phase? How do we start the rebuilding process where muscle is built, and fat is burned? The answer is “eat”. Studies have found the optimum post workout meal is actually a combination of easily digested carbohydrates and proteins. Yes, the same insulin spiking sugars we avoid all day long just happen to be the perfect post-workout meal. You see, strangely enough, your body really does know what it’s doing. While normally a blast of sugar would trigger an insulin spike that would immediately store that sugar as fat, after a workout your body knows that your muscles are where the sugar is really needed and it preferentially shuttles the newfound sugars directly to the muscles to jump-start the recovery process.

Along with the sugar, at this point your body can also make use of easily digested, high quality proteins. This makes sense of course, since that’s what our muscles are made of. Studies seem to indicate about half as much protein as carbohydrate is about optimum for recovery.

For recovery nutrition, fat is a big no-no. Just as fat slows digestion in any other meal, it will do the same here, which is exactly what we DON’T WANT. We want the fastest absorption possible, so stay away from all fats, even the good ones.

So what does this means you should do after a workout? Although each study shows a little different results, my recommendation is as follows: For an average man who’s ideal body weight is190lbs, consume 80grams of carbohydrates and 40grams of protein. For a woman whose “ideal” body weight is 130lbs, about 60 grams of carbs and 30 grams of protein are about right.

I recommend using Gatorade for the carbs, and vanilla whey protein for the protein. So for the 180 guy, this would mean about 7.5 tbsp of powdered Gatorade and 1.75 scoops of whey protein powder. I recommend mixing this with about a liter of water to help re-hydrate after the workout as well.

This may seem like a huge amount of sugar to some of you, but that’s the point, this is when your body really needs it. However, these recommendations are for someone who isn’t trying to lose weight. If fat loss is your primary goal, I might reduce the amounts slightly. Maybe 60/30 for guys and 40/20 for women, just to be on the safe side. That way none of it will accidentally get stored as fat.

I personally drink one of these drinks during and after ALL my workouts, including my cardio workouts. Recovery time is simply too important to me. I want to be ready for another workout as soon as possible, so I don’t worry that I might be consuming a little sugar. I don’t want my upper body workout today to affect my mountain bike ride tomorrow.

Of course if you want to get a little more sophisticated (and complicated), post workout is a great time to add some Branched Chain Amino Acids (BCAA’s). These are some very essential proteins that your body can’t manufacture on it’s own, and are critical to building and maintaining muscle. I add two grams of BCAA’s to my workout shakes. Also, if you’re interesting in supplementing your diet with Creatine, the post workout drink is an ideal place to add some.