Blog
Nutrition before and after exercise
Teresa de Miguel Miró
Pre-workout nutrition is vital for performing well in the gym, on the pavement, or on your living room rug. And right now is when you should be following a specific training nutrition plan. Why?
Although there are no official statistics, February is the month of dropouts. The good habits agreed upon on January 7th with the serious intention of exercising or getting your money's worth out of your gym membership are wavering. Organizing your food for gym energy is fundamental to avoid burnout and speed up results.
It is not easy to design an ad hoc diet. There are foods that increase muscle mass, foods for strength training, food to increase endurance, and of course, a diet for post-workout recovery.
If you don't want to become part of those sports dropout statistics before the month is even up and end up giving away the workout outfits you got over-motivated by, you must define what you want to achieve beforehand.
Burning fat? Building muscle? Gaining endurance? Just blowing off steam? Depending on that, there is a tailored dietary plan. We'll tell you everything about food for athletes.
NUTRITION FOR EXERCISE: HOW TO CONFIGURE A DIET FOR WEIGHT LOSS WHILE EXERCISING
If what you're looking for is to slim down, lose weight, and burn fat… be very careful. It is not achieved solely through aerobic exercise, nor do you need to restrict calories. This is an unforgivable rookie mistake when training, and the only thing you will achieve is quitting out of exhaustion. A good diet for weight loss with exercise is one that is perfectly balanced and takes caloric expenditure into account. But be careful: when we exercise, we are less careful with what we eat because we think our effort allows us to be less restrained.
There are some basic rules for losing weight with exercise.
You must eat something between 30 and 60 minutes after exercising. Depending on the time of day you practice, you have to recover from the effort, and if you don't, muscle tissue can weaken. The ideal? 250 calories of healthy food.
You don't have a free pass on calories. And even less so if you want to lose weight with exercise. To do that, you would have to be burning them at all hours. To burn 400 calories (which a snack of serrano ham and cheese has), you would have to spend nearly an hour running.
Proteins yes, but don't overdo it. It is true that it is advisable to prioritize them to gain muscle mass and lose fat mass, but you also need healthy fats and a dose of good carbohydrates. All these foods contribute to accelerating the metabolism and losing weight more easily.
Learn to mix. Those varied dishes in which you combine fruit with lettuce, dairy, nuts, and white meats are ideal. You should try to have at least 3 food groups represented in every dish.
Avoid processed foods. They are a death trap, even if you are thin, as they affect your health. Take advantage of your ‘fit streak’ to banish them from your table once and for all.
The two liters of water a day are now more than mandatory. Think about how much you sweat while you move. You are losing essential fluids for the body that you will have to replenish proportionally. To give you an idea, you should drink 500 ml of water in the two hours before training, the same amount fifteen minutes before, and 200 ml every 30 minutes of training. It's not that much.
NUTRITION BEFORE AND AFTER EXERCISE: WHAT TO EAT TO IMPROVE PHYSICAL PERFORMANCE.
So far, we have given you the main guidelines, but now we are going to detail what the perfect food for athletes should be. It is about getting the maximum performance out of your sports practice.
You must know that muscles are exquisite ‘gourmets’ and have very specific preferences depending on the time of day. Nothing like a series of examples at mealtimes to increase energy in the gym and recover after training.
Pre-workout.
The most recommended thing is to take fruit, cereals, and other carbohydrates that are easily digested before training. For example, a natural juice, a piece of multi-grain toast, a yogurt, muesli…
Mid-morning.
You have to try to maintain blood glucose levels to continue providing energy to the brain and muscles until lunchtime, and it is very likely that around 11 or 12 in the morning you will get a voracious hunger attack. Calm it down by resorting to fruit.
Lunch.
You should consume 25% of your total calories for the day. The most recommended? Vegetables, greens, meat, poultry, eggs, fish, or legumes. However, try to make the meat poultry, without overdoing the beef. As for fish, you can allow yourself any type, since the fattier ones contain a large and necessary amount of essential fatty acids.
Afternoon snack.
The goal of this is to keep the feeling of hunger at bay and keep blood glucose levels constant. It should account for 10% of total daily calories, and it is most recommended to opt for a piece of fruit or a handful of nuts.
Dinner.
It should account for 15% of total daily calories (slightly less than lunch), and it is essential that the foods are easily digested and do not cause a feeling of heaviness. The best? Opt for vegetables, proteins, skim dairy, or cereals.
Important: have dinner at least two hours before going to bed. The digestion process should not be done in a horizontal position.
EVERY BIT OF HELP COUNTS
Supplements to lose weight, improve performance… and avoid some ‘side effects’ that sometimes accompany exercise.
From Beldon Beauty, we recommend this selection:
Green Tea from Beldon Beauty. Among the main effects of this green tea with ginger and lemon are its antioxidant function (we cannot forget that exercise can cause oxidation), its role in helping, and its ability to lighten the digestion process and activate the metabolism.
Share
