Eating and exercise: when and what to eat

By Josh Salzmann

We all know it’s a bad idea to swim with a full stomach but other than that what do you really know about eating and exercise?

It stands to reason that if you’re going to achieve your fitness goals you need to eat a nutritious, balanced diet and drink plenty of water. If you don’t, you won’t be able to work out as efficiently as you could or recover properly afterwards.

But a lot of myths surround when you should and shouldn’t eat before and after exercise.
Some people recommend exercising on an empty stomach because they reckon it forces the body to use excess fat as energy. In my opinion, the only time you should do this is first thing in the morning and even then you shouldn’t do it for more than 30 minutes.

Exercising on an empty stomach, or for more 30 minutes pre-breakfast means that your body doesn’t have enough fuel to perform properly and this may result in fatigue and muscular atrophy (when the body uses muscle rather than fat for its energy source).

People who suffer from low blood pressure, diabetes or other medical problems should also check with their doctor or fitness expert before even contemplating early morning empty stomach workouts.

So when is the best time to eat? I recommend eating at least one to two hours before working out. If you work out when your stomach is still full your body will be too busy digesting the food to push blood around your body and the digestion process will also leave you lacking in energy.

Also if you aim to eat five or six small meals daily rather than the traditional three larger ones you will keep your energy and metabolic rates high. The other up side is that you won’t feel hungry so are less likely to snack on sugary treats. Each meal should consist of a portion of protein and complex carbohydrates as well as fats such as the Omega 3 fats found in fish, which are essential to our diet.

Remember though, too much carbohydrate on its own i.e. a large plate of pasta, will raise blood sugar levels quickly but lower them just as fast. By combining protein and carbohydrates, energy levels will stay higher for a longer because glycogen is released into your system more slowly.