[h=2]Ideal Pre and Post Workout Meals[/h]
Originally written in Max Sports and Fitness:
What you eat before and after exercise has a big effect on your weight, energy, and immune system. "It can mean the difference between shedding pounds and showing them as fat," says nutritionist Susan Kleiner, Ph.D., R.D., and author of the best-selling Power Eating.
Key to the formula is glycogen availability. Glycogen is the fuel used to fire muscle. If glycogen is not available when you train, your body will turn to other sources in an attempt to find muscle fuel. It can make these attempts through activating both stored body fat and in using muscle tissue for energy.
These pre- and post-exercise eating tips definitely do "count" as part of your total food intake for the day. Factor them in for calories, carbs, fat, and protein.
Eating before exercise
If you're using a blender to make a pre- workout "meal," then drink it from forty-five minutes to an hour before you work out. If you're a solid food fan, then eat between 90 minutes and two hours before you work out. If you're eating solid foods, a bowl of cereal with a little fruit on it is pretty much ideal.
But this is one of the rare times when you may not want a meal high in fiber. Although fiber tends to decrease overall gastointestinal transit time (the time from eating something to the time what remains passing out) it's more difficult to digest.
Nutrient content
The pre-exercise meal should contain about 50 carbohydrates, 5 to 10 grams of protein, and total approximately 250 calories. A mixture of simple and complex carbohydrates is best before working out, with a little more emphasis on having fast-burning simple carbohydrates available quickly for energy.
If endurance training is a big part of your training regimen, make sure that your pre-exercise meal contains significant amounts of branched chain amino acids (BCAAs). Kleiner suggest milk as a good source.
Post exercise nutrition
The role of post-exercise nutrition is to replenish glycogen stores, begin muscular repair and rebuilding, and quickly restore immune system function (which is compromised in high intensity workouts, particularly heavy weight-training).
Timing
There are three 'windows' of opportunity to replenish glycogen," explains Kleiner. "The first and best declines rapidly about 30 minutes after working out, so getting the post-exercise meal consumed within a half-hour after exercise works best." This decline continues and then dives severely about two hours after working out. "If you can't get the meal into the body within two hours, it can take days to adequately produce glycogen for intense workouts." If you're an athlete involved in tournament or pool play over a long period, it's important to use small "post workout" meals after events so that you don't get fatigued.
Nutrient content
Cardiovascular and aerobic exercisers have different post-workout needs than do intense weight-trainers, observes Kleiner.
Cardiovascular & aerobic athletes
"Try to take in a meal with a four-to-one carbohydrate-to-protein ratio," suggests Kleiner. "It should have no less than 80 carbohydrate grams and 20 grams of protein. It needs to be taken within 30 minutes after exercise for best results."
Weights trainers
"The combination of carbohydrates and protein enhances the anabolic muscle-building environment," notes Kleiner. While the pre-exercise meal prevents muscle loss, the post-exercise meal creates the setting for optimal muscular mass increases.
Intense weight trainer needs: 1.5 carbohydrate grams and a half gram of protein per kilogram of bodweight after working out. Again, the half-hour window following the workout is best. Up to two hours is good. After that glycogen stores take far longer to adequately restore.
There are 2.2 pounds per kilogram. Using a 220-pound man as an example, he weighs 100 kilograms. (Divide pounds by 2.2 to find the corresponding kilograms. In this example, 220 pounds conveniently divided by 2.2 = 100 kilograms.) He needs 150 carbohydrate grams and 50 grams of protein directly following his workout. You might lean a little more heavily towards complex carbohydrates in your post exercise meal. But don't neglect simple carbs, either; they more quickly stimulate the production of insulin, which helps drives digested protein into the repairing muscles.
But beware of too many simple carbs: new studies indicate you can create an insulin resistance through repeated habitually repeated spikes. Complex carbohydrates decrease the downward "slope" and tapering of spikes created by simple sugars.
Immune system depression
"Your immune system is immediately suppressed after intense resistance exercise," says Kleiner. It be may less critical if you're working out with weights at moderate intensity three times a week, but intense exercise five days a week can result in fatigue and symptoms of overtraining.
Kleiner urges immediate glutamine replacement in the post-exercise meal. Kleiner says just two grams of additional glutamine (usually found as L-glutamine on supplement labels) directly after working out works good. Kleiner gets her glutamine in her whey protein. It can also be found separately as a food supplement
What you eat before and after exercise has a big effect on your weight, energy, and immune system. "It can mean the difference between shedding pounds and showing them as fat," says nutritionist Susan Kleiner, Ph.D., R.D., and author of the best-selling Power Eating.
Key to the formula is glycogen availability. Glycogen is the fuel used to fire muscle. If glycogen is not available when you train, your body will turn to other sources in an attempt to find muscle fuel. It can make these attempts through activating both stored body fat and in using muscle tissue for energy.
These pre- and post-exercise eating tips definitely do "count" as part of your total food intake for the day. Factor them in for calories, carbs, fat, and protein.
Eating before exercise
If you're using a blender to make a pre- workout "meal," then drink it from forty-five minutes to an hour before you work out. If you're a solid food fan, then eat between 90 minutes and two hours before you work out. If you're eating solid foods, a bowl of cereal with a little fruit on it is pretty much ideal.
But this is one of the rare times when you may not want a meal high in fiber. Although fiber tends to decrease overall gastointestinal transit time (the time from eating something to the time what remains passing out) it's more difficult to digest.
Nutrient content
The pre-exercise meal should contain about 50 carbohydrates, 5 to 10 grams of protein, and total approximately 250 calories. A mixture of simple and complex carbohydrates is best before working out, with a little more emphasis on having fast-burning simple carbohydrates available quickly for energy.
If endurance training is a big part of your training regimen, make sure that your pre-exercise meal contains significant amounts of branched chain amino acids (BCAAs). Kleiner suggest milk as a good source.
Post exercise nutrition
The role of post-exercise nutrition is to replenish glycogen stores, begin muscular repair and rebuilding, and quickly restore immune system function (which is compromised in high intensity workouts, particularly heavy weight-training).
Timing
There are three 'windows' of opportunity to replenish glycogen," explains Kleiner. "The first and best declines rapidly about 30 minutes after working out, so getting the post-exercise meal consumed within a half-hour after exercise works best." This decline continues and then dives severely about two hours after working out. "If you can't get the meal into the body within two hours, it can take days to adequately produce glycogen for intense workouts." If you're an athlete involved in tournament or pool play over a long period, it's important to use small "post workout" meals after events so that you don't get fatigued.
Nutrient content
Cardiovascular and aerobic exercisers have different post-workout needs than do intense weight-trainers, observes Kleiner.
Cardiovascular & aerobic athletes
"Try to take in a meal with a four-to-one carbohydrate-to-protein ratio," suggests Kleiner. "It should have no less than 80 carbohydrate grams and 20 grams of protein. It needs to be taken within 30 minutes after exercise for best results."
Weights trainers
"The combination of carbohydrates and protein enhances the anabolic muscle-building environment," notes Kleiner. While the pre-exercise meal prevents muscle loss, the post-exercise meal creates the setting for optimal muscular mass increases.
Intense weight trainer needs: 1.5 carbohydrate grams and a half gram of protein per kilogram of bodweight after working out. Again, the half-hour window following the workout is best. Up to two hours is good. After that glycogen stores take far longer to adequately restore.
There are 2.2 pounds per kilogram. Using a 220-pound man as an example, he weighs 100 kilograms. (Divide pounds by 2.2 to find the corresponding kilograms. In this example, 220 pounds conveniently divided by 2.2 = 100 kilograms.) He needs 150 carbohydrate grams and 50 grams of protein directly following his workout. You might lean a little more heavily towards complex carbohydrates in your post exercise meal. But don't neglect simple carbs, either; they more quickly stimulate the production of insulin, which helps drives digested protein into the repairing muscles.
But beware of too many simple carbs: new studies indicate you can create an insulin resistance through repeated habitually repeated spikes. Complex carbohydrates decrease the downward "slope" and tapering of spikes created by simple sugars.
Immune system depression
"Your immune system is immediately suppressed after intense resistance exercise," says Kleiner. It be may less critical if you're working out with weights at moderate intensity three times a week, but intense exercise five days a week can result in fatigue and symptoms of overtraining.
Kleiner urges immediate glutamine replacement in the post-exercise meal. Kleiner says just two grams of additional glutamine (usually found as L-glutamine on supplement labels) directly after working out works good. Kleiner gets her glutamine in her whey protein. It can also be found separately as a food supplement
