I know we are taught by beach body NOT to eat 3 hours before working out. Now I just read on another bodybuilding/fitness website the following:

It is very important that you eat prior to working out for 2 basic reasons:

1) Your body needs the food to supply energy for your workout. _You are at greater risk of injuring yourself and having to quit early due to lack of energy.

2) If you do not eat prior to working out, your body will burn muscle to sustain you during your workout. _You want to build and tone muscle, not burn muscle.

Additionally, if you choose to workout when you first wake up -- eating when you first wake up, wakes up your metabolism and gets it functioning efficiently throughout the day.

Ok now who is right and is there some scientific proof to back up these claims?? All this conflicting information has my head spinning

Thank you!!
Miranda

First off, eating 3 hours prior to working out IS eating before you workout if you want to workout on an empty stomach, which you should. Eating at 2 hours or 1 can be okay but you should eat less food or you'll be working out with undigested food in your stomach. A meal one hour prior to workout does have a slight "thermogenic" effect that will enable you to burn more calories. However, your workout could be sacrificed some if you eat too much. Food taken within the last hour prior to exercise speeds up glycogen store usage, which is inefficient. If you are famished and need to eat it is more efficient to take in some simple carbs within 5 minutes of starting. Then they will digest while you are warming up and convert to blood glycogen by the time you need them, near the end of the session.

Here's a brief overview. Still long, perhaps, but I could write a book on this.

It really takes 3 hours or so for your body to break down complex carbs and turn them into blood glycogen, which is the fuel for your workout that is needed to push beyond your anaerobic threshold. All workouts at your limit require stored glycogen to enable you to push hard, otherwise you do what's called "bonking".

Close to a workout, you can replenish blood glycogen quicker by ingesting simpler carbs, like sports food, in a protein/carb ratio that shouldn't exceed 1 part protein for 4 parts carbs. Fat at this time interferes with the metabolic process and can cause gastric upset during a workout. Meals with very much fat should absolutely follow the 3 hour rule. Protein too, for that matter, because they don't breakdown quickly. So a lot of protein and fat in a meal taken in, say, one hour prior to exercise will be undigested in your stomach during your workout, which can only have a negative effect.

Your body can only store about an hour of blood glycogen so excessively large meals do no good either. Pre-workout meals should never be large, even 3 hours out.

A perfect workout will utilize most of your glycogen so that you need replenishment. If done, your body will use nutritients up to 400% more efficiently in a window of approximately one hour post workout. Taking these nutrients in a 4:1 carbrotein ratio will maximize absorption, replenishment, and muscle resynthesis.

But wait, there's more to consider...

Low-level workouts do not require the same fueling. Easy to moderate cardio work does not require the heart rate to approach the anaerobic threshold, so these workouts may be done on stored body fat alone. Therefore, you may find it better to do EASY workouts in the morning on an empty stomach to maximize use of stored body fat.

Why?

All bodies will use fat for energy when no blood glycogen is available. But the efficiency of this usage varies and can be trained. For example, the average person takes around 18 hours to burn a pound of stored fat, whereas a trained cyclist can burn a pound in 3 hours. This is done by training your body to use its stored fat by forcing it to do so during low-level workouts.

The injury you refer to is caused by bonking, so as long as you're well fueled for intense sessions it should not occur beyond what is supposed to occur (all training causes injury, called microtrauma, which is why they say that you only get stronger while at rest).

I'd also add that you have to understand the perspective of the author. Eating to lose weight and trim/tone is different than eating to gain muscle mass and develop your physique. They can be compatible, but it's tricky.

The issue of eating on an empty stomach isn't important. All of your nutrients are absorbed in your intestines anyway. Your stomach is the last step in the "preprocessing" before you start actually taking advantage of all that good fuel. Also, a full stomach and the process of digestion can take blood flow away from your extremeties. Maybe not as much as my statement implied, but it happens...

Steve's article is a good one. You are going to find dozens of different ideas about what works and what doesn't. The truth is somewhere in between and is probably different for you than me. Use what you learn to make this work for you.

Bottom line, if you want to lose weight, follow Steve's advice.

Brice