Pre-Workout Nutrition – Some Notes

Pre-workout nutrition has many contradictions, especially on the food intakes needed before workout routines are executed on the gym floor. At most, it deals with such subjects as proteins, carbohydrates, fats and other ingredients known to help the body during workouts.

There are also many questions regarding these ingredients. Should one eat protein, or carbohydrates or fats before training? What types and the amount of food are most ideal? Does eating before training beneficial or not?

Let us begin with pre-workout protein.

Pre-workout protein

The amount of protein eaten everyday affects the body’s ability to build muscles. Eating too little and it slows down the gains at the gym. There is evidence that pre-workout protein does enhance post-workout muscle growth.

As you probably know, how much protein you eat every day dramatically affects your body’s ability to build muscle. The question is when was the last time you had eaten.

There is evidence that the faster a protein is digested, plus the more leucine (one of the BCAA amino acids that stimulate protein synthesis) it has, the more short-term muscle growth it stimulates. This is usually from a fast-digesting food like whey, which is very high in leucine.

Pre-workout carbohydrates

Eating carbohydrates 15 to 30 minutes before exercise will provide your muscles with additional fuel for your workouts. However, it will not directly stimulate additional muscle growth. It can help you push more weight and reps in your workouts. (This builds muscles over time.)

Low-glycemic carbs are best for prolonged endurance workouts. High-glycemic carbs are best for shorter, more intense workouts. Get them from food sources like rice, dates, potatoes (white and sweet), and raisins.

25 to 30 grams of carbs half an hour before training is good.

Pre-workout fats

There might be theories that by increasing pre-workout fat intake can reduce carbohydrate utilization during exercise and thereby improve performance. One study showed that increased dietary fat intake actually reduced time-trial performance (cycling) compared to high carb intake.

A review conducted at Deakin University showed that fat intake reduced carbohydrate utilization; it does not have beneficial effects on the exercise performance.

Food absorption

After eating food, the body takes several hours to fully absorb the nutrients in the food. The larger the meal, the longer it does (around 2 to 6 hours).

If you have eaten a big amount of protein one hour or two before you do your workout, the amount of protein does not make much difference in helping build more muscle because the body is already in anabolic state.

Conversely, if it had been several hours since you eat protein, and the amount is small (less than 20 grams), the plasma amino acid levels is low during workout time. pre-workout nutrition helps in building more muscles due to the spiking of the plasma levels (protein synthesis) before training.

A sensible workout program and a flexible diet plan for your pre-workout nutrition needs can help you build muscle and get strong. You can also experience the type of energy rush and performance boost that goes with them.