Should you REALLY eat in the morning before a workout?

BunnyBomb

TrickyDisco wrote: »

BunnyBomb wrote: »

Oooh oooh! I just watched a show on this last week where they did a live test across a bunch of men and women in the hopes to prove or disprove the theory of empty or full stomach workouts!!

There is a series in the UK called "Trust me I'm a doctor" new episode each week where they try to blow things out of the water, a bit like Mythbusters for medical stuff. I only just learned of the series and it started last week.

The first episode focuses on this exact question! From measuring fat burn rates in their groups, they showed that women burn more fat after exercise if they exercise on a full stomach vs empty, but for men it was the opposite. All the men in their groups burned more fat exercising on empty vs those men who ate first.

They ran the test over several days and controlled the exact calories going in etc....kinda like Mythbusters do....to make it as good a test as you can have I suppose. Laboratory conditions and such.

They brought in scientists to explain why, who theorised that it's a symptom of evolution, where woman's bodies are inherently designed to burn fat regardless of any other immediate nutrients being present during exercise. For men they theorised that they are rigged to burn carbohydrates, so you need to not have any present during exercise to get your body to burn fat. I'm simplifying but I believe that was the jist of their "take" on why it was happening in the tests. They also went on to say nobody had done a test like this before so it was new information that warranted further investigation.

So perhaps we'll see full blown studies on this in the months or years to come.

If you're interested you can watch the show for free on the online BBC player for a few more days I think.

I watched this too - with Dr Michael Mosley, his progs are always very interesting. They also analysed/tested protein shakes - two groups, one given protein shake and the other a placebo, muscle growth was around 3% after the test period for both groups. They concluded protein shakes are a great way to make expensive pee. And energy drinks are apparently little better than sugar-water. Highly recommended viewing.

You're so right! I giggled when he did his DIY energy drink, it was such basic stuff.

"..and now we'll add a very special chemical substance to add those lovely electrolytes to our DIY energy drink... it's called table salt."

Lmao. Really like this show.

The antioxidants myth test they did was interesting too. I'm going to watch episode 2 tonight

TrickyDisco

BunnyBomb wrote: »

TrickyDisco wrote: »

BunnyBomb wrote: »

Oooh oooh! I just watched a show on this last week where they did a live test across a bunch of men and women in the hopes to prove or disprove the theory of empty or full stomach workouts!!

There is a series in the UK called "Trust me I'm a doctor" new episode each week where they try to blow things out of the water, a bit like Mythbusters for medical stuff. I only just learned of the series and it started last week.

The first episode focuses on this exact question! From measuring fat burn rates in their groups, they showed that women burn more fat after exercise if they exercise on a full stomach vs empty, but for men it was the opposite. All the men in their groups burned more fat exercising on empty vs those men who ate first.

They ran the test over several days and controlled the exact calories going in etc....kinda like Mythbusters do....to make it as good a test as you can have I suppose. Laboratory conditions and such.

They brought in scientists to explain why, who theorised that it's a symptom of evolution, where woman's bodies are inherently designed to burn fat regardless of any other immediate nutrients being present during exercise. For men they theorised that they are rigged to burn carbohydrates, so you need to not have any present during exercise to get your body to burn fat. I'm simplifying but I believe that was the jist of their "take" on why it was happening in the tests. They also went on to say nobody had done a test like this before so it was new information that warranted further investigation.

So perhaps we'll see full blown studies on this in the months or years to come.

If you're interested you can watch the show for free on the online BBC player for a few more days I think.

I watched this too - with Dr Michael Mosley, his progs are always very interesting. They also analysed/tested protein shakes - two groups, one given protein shake and the other a placebo, muscle growth was around 3% after the test period for both groups. They concluded protein shakes are a great way to make expensive pee. And energy drinks are apparently little better than sugar-water. Highly recommended viewing.

You're so right! I giggled when he did his DIY energy drink, it was such basic stuff.

"..and now we'll add a very special chemical substance to add those lovely electrolytes to our DIY energy drink... it's called table salt."

Lmao. Really like this show.

The antioxidants myth test they did was interesting too. I'm going to watch episode 2 tonight

Haha yeah, forgot about the 'special chemical substance' bit! Must watch tonight too.