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Gym on empty stomach

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Replies

  • jolive7
    jolive7 Posts: 283 Member
    Depends what you are doing I guess but I certainly wouldn't be able to lift twice my weight off the floor if I had no food in me...
  • angrydads
    angrydads Posts: 162 Member
    I don't mind fasted cardio that's not going to be longer than 40 minutes. But before I weight train, I fully believe in fueling. The more fuel I have on tap, the longer and better I can perform. This is my preference and what I have found to work well for me.
  • zcb94
    zcb94 Posts: 3,678 Member
    superchea wrote: »
    Wake up and go to the gym on empty stomach in the morning is that a good or bad thing? I usually don't have an appetite in the am but I still manage to get in 2,000 calories a day.

    I know some people who can work out on an empty stomach but I am 100% not one of them. I NEED to eat beforehand or else I get very lightheaded.
    Me too! Dizzy, lightheaded, sleepy, all that good stuff
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
    Depends on what I'm doing - for run/bike/swim I prefer to go on an empty stomach. I may bring a snack on longer runs. Doesn't matter as much if I'm lifting, but I'd rather eat something pre-workout. I get more results doing this.
  • gmallan
    gmallan Posts: 2,099 Member
    zcb94 wrote: »
    My workout partner believes not only in fasted cardio, but in what I affectionately call NPO cardio. She doesn't allow even a sip of water before or during exercise.

    Curious as to what her reasoning for this is? How long before the workout does the non-drinking extend? You could get through a workout just fine without water provided you are properly hydrated before and especially if you aren't sweating a lot but I can't actually see any advantages to denying yourself water so it makes me curious
  • gmallan
    gmallan Posts: 2,099 Member
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Depends what you are doing I guess but I certainly wouldn't be able to lift twice my weight off the floor if I had no food in me...

    Whereas I manage this just fine. I'm okay lifting heavy fasted but can't do conditioning or my energy seriously tanks and I don't get what I need out of my workout.
  • gmallan wrote: »
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Depends what you are doing I guess but I certainly wouldn't be able to lift twice my weight off the floor if I had no food in me...

    Whereas I manage this just fine. I'm okay lifting heavy fasted but can't do conditioning or my energy seriously tanks and I don't get what I need out of my workout.

    If you are managing it fine, you probably aren't doing the max you could be lifting then (what one considers "heavy" varies), or you don't lift with very much intensity, or many lifts at a time, or you don't do very much weight compared to your body size (you aren't using all that much energy compared to your size and available energy). Usually fasted you will run out of easily available energy on intense heavy lifting quickly and then your system wont have an easy time catching up with all the anaerobic load and expended energy...and you start to crash a bit.

    I can usually get away with a few heavy sets and be fine too, or if I dont push the lifts hard I'm also OK with a full workout. But when I try doing max weight sets I'm not as strong, and once I tried doing all full weight heavy leg day on an empty stomach, it hit me hard. The last exercise I was doing was about 1,180lbs on the leg press machine for 3 sets of 10 (lots of anaerobically generated power in a short time), felt fine, then suddenly walking away from the machine, wham...lightheaded, felt like I almost fainted, had to lay on the floor for a while. Never happened before or again (after that I'm always eating something relatively close to a heavy weight workout) and no, no health issues ever. I've also seen similar situations happen to others.

    Of the people I've known, usually its the people who don't lift as much typically and aren't really interested in building much muscle, or the untrained that claim it never affects them. I'm sure there are some who could have superior recovery and strength too, just saying those categories will probably all be just fine, but if you are trying maxes and training to increase strength I wouldn't advise it. And for cardio same thing: just look at the olympians and their patterns. They don't go fasted for performance.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    Also depends on what is meant by fasted-lifting.

    Ate a snack at midnight and straight to bed, up and lifting by 7 am.
    That's not really much of a fast - your liver carb stores should be just fine for your brain needed to feel motivated - and of course your muscle glucose stores don't disappear overnight unless you have some massive muscle cramping going on (and bigger problems I'd suggest then).
    Not likely a pass out issue after some heavy lifting.

    Many people have this misconception that their muscles glucose stores can be put back into the bloodstream and used up overnight, when it's not even needed then - and it can't happen anyway.

    Now, last meal at 8 pm, and lifting at 2 pm with nothing to eat yet.
    Ya - that's fasted and likely to effect performance.

    There are many reasons for getting light-headed after heavy lifting, low blood sugar being one of them.
  • heybales wrote: »
    Also depends on what is meant by fasted-lifting.

    Ate a snack at midnight and straight to bed, up and lifting by 7 am.
    That's not really much of a fast - your liver carb stores should be just fine for your brain needed to feel motivated - and of course your muscle glucose stores don't disappear overnight unless you have some massive muscle cramping going on (and bigger problems I'd suggest then).
    Not likely a pass out issue after some heavy lifting.

    Many people have this misconception that their muscles glucose stores can be put back into the bloodstream and used up overnight, when it's not even needed then - and it can't happen anyway.

    Now, last meal at 8 pm, and lifting at 2 pm with nothing to eat yet.
    Ya - that's fasted and likely to effect performance.

    There are many reasons for getting light-headed after heavy lifting, low blood sugar being one of them.

    Yup it all depends, we can argue about both what is fasted and what is maximal and what is too much energy expenditure pointlessly since its different for everyone and under what circumstances. I have only experienced low blood sugar once after heavy extended lifting and included it as an example, once out of decades of lifting off and on. But I see reduced strength/performance on fasted lifting regularly, I now avoid it, and I advise others to as well if you want to workout hard or extended time, since you might see reduced performance if you do, not that you will for certain, its actually probably not easy to get to that point. For most this isn't really a question which will ever affect them though if they are in reasonably good health, some will never even try to push much, and many don't really care about a specific amount of pounds to achieve in a lift, and that's fine.

    I'm really talking about maximal performance, and I very frequently felt reduction of strength fasted on my way to a 425lb bench goal as compared to training non fasted. I stopped weight training whenever I expected to improve my lifts without eating an hour to two beforehand and I got to my goal. If you really want to see what to do and not, to increase performance, you need to look at people who regularly do such things, like strength athletes and olympians, and again the vast majority just wont go for performance fasted. The majority of my workouts it also doesn't matter. But if you are pushing for that increased weight goal, fasted lifting can hurt your progress.
  • gmallan
    gmallan Posts: 2,099 Member
    gmallan wrote: »
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Depends what you are doing I guess but I certainly wouldn't be able to lift twice my weight off the floor if I had no food in me...

    Whereas I manage this just fine. I'm okay lifting heavy fasted but can't do conditioning or my energy seriously tanks and I don't get what I need out of my workout.

    If you are managing it fine, you probably aren't doing the max you could be lifting then (what one considers "heavy" varies), or you don't lift with very much intensity, or many lifts at a time, or you don't do very much weight compared to your body size (you aren't using all that much energy compared to your size and available energy). Usually fasted you will run out of easily available energy on intense heavy lifting quickly and then your system wont have an easy time catching up with all the anaerobic load and expended energy...and you start to crash a bit.

    I can usually get away with a few heavy sets and be fine too, or if I dont push the lifts hard I'm also OK with a full workout. But when I try doing max weight sets I'm not as strong, and once I tried doing all full weight heavy leg day on an empty stomach, it hit me hard. The last exercise I was doing was about 1,180lbs on the leg press machine for 3 sets of 10 (lots of anaerobically generated power in a short time), felt fine, then suddenly walking away from the machine, wham...lightheaded, felt like I almost fainted, had to lay on the floor for a while. Never happened before or again (after that I'm always eating something relatively close to a heavy weight workout) and no, no health issues ever. I've also seen similar situations happen to others.

    Of the people I've known, usually its the people who don't lift as much typically and aren't really interested in building much muscle, or the untrained that claim it never affects them. I'm sure there are some who could have superior recovery and strength too, just saying those categories will probably all be just fine, but if you are trying maxes and training to increase strength I wouldn't advise it. And for cardio same thing: just look at the olympians and their patterns. They don't go fasted for performance.

    I do what is programmed for me for the day by my very experienced S & C coach. All my max lifts are in the "experienced" to "elite" category for my body weight, age and gender and this is maintained while playing intense contact sport which requires other attributes like speed and endurance that generally trade off with strength to some degree. So I think I'm probably lifting relatively heavy and tracking okay with my training and strength progression. Having said that not every workout needs to be maxing out anyway. I do what I need to do to get my programmed workout done on any given day. I do always eat pre-game when I need to hit 100%.

    Training fasted for me generally means a big dinner at 8pm, a whey casein blend shake at 9pm and training in the morning. I also take BCAAs during my workout. Maybe my performance would be a little better if I wasn't fasted but it is certainly not suffering. I also value my sleep highly so I feel getting up before a morning workout to give time to eat and digest food so it's actually available for use during the workout and not just sitting in the stomach would be a massive trade off for me - probably more than the additional benefit I'd get from eating. When I eat pre-game I get up 3-4 hours before to eat to make sure it has time to digest properly.
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
    edited September 2016
    Meh, I train fasted in the mornings for the most part. Heavy Deadlifts and over 20 miles in my bike are the exceptions. Can't do those fasted.
  • jolive7
    jolive7 Posts: 283 Member
    Hornsby wrote: »
    Meh, I train fasted in the mornings for the most part. Heavy Deadlifts and over 20 miles in my bike are the exceptions. Can't do those fasted.

    I am lightheaded after my deads on a good day haha can't imagine on empty
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Hornsby wrote: »
    Meh, I train fasted in the mornings for the most part. Heavy Deadlifts and over 20 miles in my bike are the exceptions. Can't do those fasted.

    I am lightheaded after my deads on a good day haha can't imagine on empty

    Tried it. Didn't go well. Passed out. Made an *kitten* of myself. Lol. Won't do it again.
  • jolive7
    jolive7 Posts: 283 Member
    Hornsby wrote: »
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Hornsby wrote: »
    Meh, I train fasted in the mornings for the most part. Heavy Deadlifts and over 20 miles in my bike are the exceptions. Can't do those fasted.

    I am lightheaded after my deads on a good day haha can't imagine on empty

    Tried it. Didn't go well. Passed out. Made an *kitten* of myself. Lol. Won't do it again.

    Lol.. I can't say I have ever seen anyone pass out doing deadys but I wouldn't mind seeing it.. :D
  • SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish
    SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish Posts: 831 Member
    edited September 2016
    gmallan wrote: »
    gmallan wrote: »
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Depends what you are doing I guess but I certainly wouldn't be able to lift twice my weight off the floor if I had no food in me...

    Whereas I manage this just fine. I'm okay lifting heavy fasted but can't do conditioning or my energy seriously tanks and I don't get what I need out of my workout.

    If you are managing it fine, you probably aren't doing the max you could be lifting then (what one considers "heavy" varies), or you don't lift with very much intensity, or many lifts at a time, or you don't do very much weight compared to your body size (you aren't using all that much energy compared to your size and available energy). Usually fasted you will run out of easily available energy on intense heavy lifting quickly and then your system wont have an easy time catching up with all the anaerobic load and expended energy...and you start to crash a bit.

    I can usually get away with a few heavy sets and be fine too, or if I dont push the lifts hard I'm also OK with a full workout. But when I try doing max weight sets I'm not as strong, and once I tried doing all full weight heavy leg day on an empty stomach, it hit me hard. The last exercise I was doing was about 1,180lbs on the leg press machine for 3 sets of 10 (lots of anaerobically generated power in a short time), felt fine, then suddenly walking away from the machine, wham...lightheaded, felt like I almost fainted, had to lay on the floor for a while. Never happened before or again (after that I'm always eating something relatively close to a heavy weight workout) and no, no health issues ever. I've also seen similar situations happen to others.

    Of the people I've known, usually its the people who don't lift as much typically and aren't really interested in building much muscle, or the untrained that claim it never affects them. I'm sure there are some who could have superior recovery and strength too, just saying those categories will probably all be just fine, but if you are trying maxes and training to increase strength I wouldn't advise it. And for cardio same thing: just look at the olympians and their patterns. They don't go fasted for performance.

    I do what is programmed for me for the day by my very experienced S & C coach. All my max lifts are in the "experienced" to "elite" category for my body weight, age and gender and this is maintained while playing intense contact sport which requires other attributes like speed and endurance that generally trade off with strength to some degree. So I think I'm probably lifting relatively heavy and tracking okay with my training and strength progression. Having said that not every workout needs to be maxing out anyway. I do what I need to do to get my programmed workout done on any given day. I do always eat pre-game when I need to hit 100%.

    Training fasted for me generally means a big dinner at 8pm, a whey casein blend shake at 9pm and training in the morning. I also take BCAAs during my workout. Maybe my performance would be a little better if I wasn't fasted but it is certainly not suffering. I also value my sleep highly so I feel getting up before a morning workout to give time to eat and digest food so it's actually available for use during the workout and not just sitting in the stomach would be a massive trade off for me - probably more than the additional benefit I'd get from eating. When I eat pre-game I get up 3-4 hours before to eat to make sure it has time to digest properly.

    OK, I wasn't really saying anything about you per se. :smile: And it really sounds like with what you said this time we completely agree here: "I do what I need to do to get my programmed workout done on any given day. I do always eat pre-game when I need to hit 100%."

    I'm not saying its always necessary, just helps when you are trying to get max lifts or go high intensity for long periods to get max performance. Sometimes, probably most times, its better to just get the workout in than postpone it (or skip a day) for meal timing.
  • Hornsby wrote: »
    jolive7 wrote: »
    Hornsby wrote: »
    Meh, I train fasted in the mornings for the most part. Heavy Deadlifts and over 20 miles in my bike are the exceptions. Can't do those fasted.

    I am lightheaded after my deads on a good day haha can't imagine on empty

    Tried it. Didn't go well. Passed out. Made an *kitten* of myself. Lol. Won't do it again.

    Ha, hopefully you had a padded landing. Never quite gone that far as to pass out, the day I had to lay down though I had done deads before my leg presses too, along with quite a bit of other training: low blood sugar flattened me.
  • i_SWEAT_n_SWEAR
    i_SWEAT_n_SWEAR Posts: 3,315 Member
    Good.... yes! Fasted cardio/weights is what I do each day.
  • Connieluvsfitness
    Connieluvsfitness Posts: 55 Member
    superchea wrote: »
    Wake up and go to the gym on empty stomach in the morning is that a good or bad thing? I usually don't have an appetite in the am but I still manage to get in 2,000 calories a day.
    No I used to go to the gym right after work without eating before I went in and I was so exhausted. I can't imagine how it would feel in the morning.... no for me ,at least a piece of fruit and oj.
  • manther88
    manther88 Posts: 213 Member
    I think it's fine either way. But for me, I have to eat something because I get low blood sugar and lose my energy halfway through. I normally eat carbs and protein in the morning then workout.
  • MalkinMagic71
    MalkinMagic71 Posts: 1,433 Member
    Always on an empty stomach for me in the morning. Just my preference.
  • KrazyKrissyy
    KrazyKrissyy Posts: 322 Member
    That's not a bad thing at all. Do what suits you best. I go to the gym on an empty stomach as well and do IF. My gym performance is better fasted since I have digestive issues. Food + exercise = mess...
  • bionicdiver
    bionicdiver Posts: 198 Member
    I try not to workout on an empty stomach...that being said, i workout at 4 am and i have a protein shake and pre-workout on my drive to the gym. Not sure if that constitutes and empty stomach.
  • tomteboda
    tomteboda Posts: 2,171 Member
    edited January 2017
    I never could because of hypoglycemia issues, even in high school when I got up and did farm chores before heading to swim for an hour in the pool.

    Totally off topic, but I seriously wonder how I made it through high school and college both
    on so little sleep.