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BigBadBoss
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Which do you find more effective? Doing cardio first thing in the morning or after your work out?
Cardio Timing? A.M. or post-workout?
- Thread starter BigBadBoss
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mposster
New member
depends on what time of the day you workout.....if you get up at 5 am and and do your cardio from 5 - 6 in the morning....i think its more productive,,,,,
but then again doing cardio in the evening after your workout is good as well after all the glycogenb has been burned throughout your workout.....
but then again doing cardio in the evening after your workout is good as well after all the glycogenb has been burned throughout your workout.....
BigBadBoss
New member
That is kinda what I was thinking. I lift at 5pm. So I was thinking of getting up at 7am and running until 7:30 then shower and get to work.
Tom Treutlein
New member
Synpax, isn't that faulty? I mean, what really matters in terms of burning bodyfat is being in a caloric deficiency, correct? I may be wrong, but if I am, I'd like to know why morning is a better time to do cardio is losing bodyfat is the goal.
I figured that if you train in the AM with nothing in your system, you'll sarifice muscle tissue for energy, as well as fat.
I figured that if you train in the AM with nothing in your system, you'll sarifice muscle tissue for energy, as well as fat.
Synpax
Well-known member
Tom Treutlein said:
You will not loose muscle if you have protein in your diet. I do a shake after my morning cardio.
The idea is that you are on a relatively empty stomach, so your body turns to fat stores for energy in the morning. Your body uses these fat stores for energy faster than it takes the current carbohydrates you recently ate and turns them into fat, although it uses these recent carbs/glucose at the same rate as it uses fat from your body.
IE - your body has 100 calories stored as fat. This fat happened by eating 100 calories a day for 10 days. Notice that not all of the calories you ate were turned into fat. When you wake up in the morning, this is all your body has to get.
Compare that to: You eat 100 calories and go for a run in the afternoon. Your body takes that 100 calories and uses it. But that really only saved you 1/10th the body fat you would have lost had your body used fat in the morning instead.
Essentially, burning body fat is more efficient than limiting the carbohydrates that turn into fat by burning them immediatly.
I'm quoting from memory from Robert Glover's The Competitive Runners Handbook.
The other advantage of running in the morning is that, as long as you can get up for it, it is unlikelyt to be interrupted by social occasions that normally interrupt evening based schedueles.
Tom Treutlein
New member
I've heard all that before, and it makes sense, I've just also heard talk of how you'll just waste away muscle tissue needlessly. Eh, there's not enough research to say which is really true, I'd guess. Thanks for the reply, though.
Synpax
Well-known member
Tom Treutlein said:
No, actually there are more studies on this stuff than you can imagine. Universities have been conducting them for years.
You really need to create some serious deficits on a long term basis to start eating up muscle. Just eat your friggin protein afterwards and you'll be fine.
Synpax
Well-known member
Anthrax said:
Almost every day I do a cardio in the morning and lift in the afternoon, or lift early afternoon and cardio at night.
A lot of it is about conditioning your body, eating right, and getting your eight hours of shut-eye.
CNS is not a big factor in endurance training. You can be pretty certain of this because your 'bottleneck' for cardio is respiratory (or at least it is for almost everyone). You are limited by your oxygen/aerobic deficits, not by your CNS. If you were a sprinter, this would be different, but most endurance athletes do not train much at sprint speeds (though I try to wrap my intervals/distance runs up with just one good sprint).
Tom Treutlein
New member
Sprinting rules.
Synpax, you're smart.
Thanks.
Synpax, you're smart.
Thanks.
Synpax
Well-known member
Thanks. Remember that sprints are a very different type of exercise than endurance training.
Something like this:
100meters is 99% anearobic, 1% aerobic
1 mile is 25% anerobic, 75% aerobic
3 miles is 1% anerobic, 99% aerobic
I have some more specific numbers somehwere, but that is the gist of it.
Something like this:
100meters is 99% anearobic, 1% aerobic
1 mile is 25% anerobic, 75% aerobic
3 miles is 1% anerobic, 99% aerobic
I have some more specific numbers somehwere, but that is the gist of it.
Synpax
Well-known member
It's usually a mix of things if the instructor is anygood, but overall it's like a long cardio session. Part of the reason that there are spinning classes but not treadmill classes is that few people can stay on the treadmill at a reasonable speed for long enough to have that class. It's great for fat burning.
ThatGirl
New member
I do my cardio first thing in the mroning, but I also do my weights right after. I like to get it all done in the morning, and I used to think that I wouldn't feel like it after work. But in the last week I have been going in and doing an extra half hour of cardio, and abs, and orking on things I may have missed in the AM (I wish I had more time in the mroning!) and I find that, cardio wise, once I get going I have more energy than I soemtimes do first thing in the morning. I still don't like to lift in the evening though, because there are nights that I just want to go home after work, or I have errands to run and also because it is alot more crowded in the gym in the evening.
