The University of Fitness

Fasted Training for Fat Loss

One way to make your fat loss workouts more efficient is to do them fasted, when your stomach is empty or almost empty. The logic is obviously that without any or too many calories coming from food currently being digested, the body will use stored energy, making fat loss workouts more productive. When using this strategy, a common recommendation is to make sure the last meal is at least 4 hours prior to the workout. However, the body can digest meals up to 6 or 7 hours after eating, especially if the meal was large or had certain nutrients such as fat which can slow digestion. So what is the best way to optimize your fasted workouts? Introducing, the morning workout.

Also, a great way to catch a few more sunrises.

Morning workouts, before breakfast, are particularly effective fasted workouts since your last meal was presumably much longer than four hours ago.  This is the first benefit.  After a night of sleep, the body has switched from food energy to using stored energy, since the last nights meal was done digesting several hours into the night.  The body has already been using its fat and, to a much lesser extent, glycogen stores for energy.  Fat loss training in the morning prolongs this stored energy drain. Also, although most high intensity training will use glycogen (the form in which the body stored carbohydrates) more than fat, training in the morning can encourage the use of body fat due to the lack of food and, therefore, insulin. Insulin, which is released by eating carbs and protein, is a storage hormone, and it encourages the body to siphon away nutrients like fat and carbs from the bloodstream.  Without insulin, the body more readily releases fat into the bloodstream to be used by the body for work.

Along with releasing and using more fat during training, an intense workout raises metabolism for hours following training [anywhere from 8 to 15 hours depending on the study].  The benefit of getting this metabolic effect early in the morning is that it can last longer into the day.  Training later in the day, perhaps in the evening after work or school, will end up raising your metabolism but only for a few hours before you go to bed and the body winds down the metabolism as you sleep.  Training in the morning will ensure that the boost in metabolism last the full 8-15 hours.

Training in the morning is also beneficial for carbohydrate storage.  Glycogen, after being converted from carbs, is stored and used by muscle to do work.  When the stores are full, excess carbs are stored as fat.  However, an intense workout empties the glycogen stores, which means carbs eaten later in the day will go to muscle.  The body is also more insulin sensitive in the morning and after a workout, which means it directs carbs to muscle more readily.  Couple these two facts, and not only does the body burn more fat because of morning workouts, but it also makes sure nutrients and calories eaten later in the day are put to better use so they don’t negate the workout you just completed.  Generally speaking, it is best to get most of your calories for the day after your workout.  Training in the morning ensures this.

Training in the morning can have its drawbacks and restrictions. Most people are pressed for time in the morning, with school and work.  People hate the idea of waking up earlier, even when they go to sleep earlier to get the same amount of sleep.  A way around this is to keep workouts short and intense and to develop the habit of waking up earlier to train until it no longer feels like a pain in the ass (I know, easier said than done).  Resources can also be a problem, if you’re used to training in a gym.  However, simpler workouts involving running or bodyweight exercises can still be done.

Also, a note: in the morning, the spinal discs are filled with fluid because there is less pressure on the spine when lying down.  This enlarges the discs and can sometimes make the back stiff, especially with age.  It is important to warm up properly before training, and advisable to wait around 30 minutes after waking to do any exercise that loads the back.  This generally means heavy lifting, so things that don’t load the back heavily aren’t too much cause for concern.

Morning workouts are not a magic bullet that will burn 200% more calories or some such ridiculous figure.  It is simply a way to optimize the effect and effort of your workout.  However, if you already train, you may notice that changing the timing provides a little added benefit, and makes the effort more worthwhile.

Experiences?  Observations? Questions? Comments.

Focus: the Pitfalls of Being a Jack of All Trades

In my last post, I talked about New Year’s resolutions and how it can be easy to set a goal without laying out how exactly to reach said goal.  Another way to people frequently keep themselves from reaching their goals is by doing the exact opposite, and setting five endpoints and trying to reach them all at once.  As much as every single infomercial on television would like to have you believe, it’s not actually possible to simultaneously lose fat, gain muscle, eliminate those love handles, get a bodybuilder chest, and cure baldness, all at the same time.  Especially not with some stupid contraption that promises all of the above while sitting in a glorified beach chair for 20 minutes a day.  As the cliche-crazy Colonel from Avatar would likely say, “Jack of all trades, master of none.” [And yes, I'm still picking on him.]

The most tricked out pocket knife ever. And simultaneously the most useless.

The point I’m trying to make is, when people try to work towards too many things at once, they end up making little or no progress in either area.  It’s a pretty loose analogy, but that “pocket” knife up there can technically do 400 things but it would probably take 45 minutes and 3 Eagle scouts to whittle some kindling with that thing.  Instead, it pays off much more to focus on one goal, attack it aggressively for X amount of days, and then move on to the next thing on the list.

First of all, in the realm of fitness, trying to tackle too many different things at once is something not even trained professionals can pull of effectively with themselves or their trainees.  This leaves beginners or intermediates that are training themselves dead in the water.  Too commonly, it will result in a lack of direction and a training or diet program that looks like it was put together by a chimp throwing darts at a health magazine.

The lack of results effects the trainee negatively.  Psychologically, it is disheartening to put in effort and not see anything come of it.  This sets a bad precedent for how much it’s actually worth the time and effort to train or diet a certain way.  The realization that the wheels are spinning but the car’s not going anywhere results in the person either giving up immediately or trying even harder for a few days before giving up due to a continued lack of results.  Physically, the strain is not as great, and some training is better than none even if there is no visible or tangible progress, but there is still the matter of wasting effort and exertion without getting anything out of it.

On the flip side, focusing training and diet on one goal at a time has the exact opposite effect.  Concentrating solely on losing fat for a month, let’s say, and completing the process successfully and actually being able to see the fruits of your labor can be motivating for whatever future plans you have.  The task of putting on some muscle after finally shaking some of that fat seems like a much less daunting task after successfully completing a diet and making the first fitness checkpoint.  When it comes to getting in shape, it’s so easy to get used to efforts not paying off that finally reaching a goal becomes tremendously empowering.  I don’t mean to sound like Oprah, but one of the most common sentiments amongst beginners is the joy of hitting that first milestone and realizing that they can change themselves.  Busting your ass isn’t as hard when you know you’re being productive.

Trying to gain muscle and lose fat and cure cancer all at the same time may take years if you try to do them all at once.  But if you compartmentalize and separate different tasks, they can be accomplished much more easily and quickly.  Except maybe that cancer cure.

Closing on a side note: I know I haven’t directly addressed any training or specific diet strategies yet, but that’ll be coming up in the next few posts.  If there’s anything specific you would like addressed, reader [yes, for now it's just the one of you], just leave me a line in the comments and I’ll get to it first.