Pre-Workout Nutrition: What To Eat Before Training

When it comes to “meal timing”, there isn’t really a whole pile of things you need to worry about. A relatively even distribution of your nutrition throughout the day is probably the main thing that leads to good outcomes. But, are there other timing strategies that are useful? Is pre-workout nutrition really of concern?

Well, yes.

Having some consideration for what you eat before your training can play a significant role in determining your performance and recovery. The nutrient structure of this meal is of course somewhat important, however, it has to be against the backdrop of a diet that is well set up!

 

Pre-Workout Carbohydrates

When it comes to carbohydrate intake, focusing on the daily total is probably more important than worrying about the actual timing, which is why we tend to favour placing the most calorie-dense foods at times of preference as opposed to only around training. However, there are some additional benefits to including carbohydrates in your pre-workout nutrition.

Pre-workout carbohydrate ingestion has performance-enhancing effects that are undoubtedly beneficial for those of us looking to perform at 100%. Also, just because there are benefits, does not mean you should start slamming down an endless amount of jellies. The performance-enhancing effects of pre-training carbohydrate ingestion can actually be achieved with as little as just RINSING your mouth with a glucose solution, due to the initiation of the cephalic phase of digestion and its respective hormonal/neuronal signalling.

 

Glycogen Depletion

I would say that the importance of placing carbohydrates in the pre-workout meal increases as a dieting period progresses, as calories are lower. The longer one diets for, and hence the longer you spend in caloric restriction, the lower your basal muscle glycogen stores are going to be. While glycogen depletion is typically associated with endurance exercise, resistance training also has a significant glycogenolytic effect. As muscle glycogen stores deplete, we see a concomitant decrease in performance. Therefore, carbohydrate ingestion pre-training may serve to preserve performance by having more glucose availability during training so as to reduce the rate of glycogenolysis (breakdown of muscle glycogen stores).

The increased glucose availability may also provide a modest decrease in the rate of amino acid oxidation during exercise, allowing for a greater positive net protein balance. However, this consideration is of more importance to those engaging in aerobic exercise for longer periods of time, considering the higher fuel demand and hence, substrate oxidation. It still may be worth considering for someone allowing large blocks of time between pre and post-training meals, but in that case, protein intake would also be a primary (and more important) concern.

 

The Pump Is The Cure

Given that most of you are here to look better (to some extent or another), we couldn’t abstain from touching on the PUMP. Anecdotally, I am sure you have all noticed the surge of blood to your muscles is just that bit better when you have eaten a high-carbohydrate meal. This is not only beneficial to our acute vanity, but also our results, so it is something worth considering.

The mechanism by which carbohydrate ingestion can enhance “the pump” comes down to the role of insulin in inducing vasodilation via a nitric oxide dependent pathway. To recap, when we eat carbohydrates, our blood glucose rises, as does the concentration of insulin. Therefore, when we eat carbohydrates, there is a downstream effect on nitric oxide synthase and the urea cycle that facilitates an increase in nitric oxide synthesis and hence vasodilation. Vasodilation can be thought of as a widening of the blood vessels by relaxation of the surrounding smooth muscle, allowing for greater blood flow.

[It’s also important to recognise that there is a distinct difference between a rise in insulin being beneficial versus hyperinsulinemia associated with insulin resistance. These are often thrown around in arguments on low vs high carbohydrate diets as if they are the same thing. High insulin is not bad. A “defect” (not truly correct, as defective would generally imply negative connotations, being insulin resistant is beneficial to the survival of the organism in the case of chronic overfeeding) to the cell’s response to insulin as seen in insulin resistance, however, is different. In this case, the above is one of the mechanisms by which insulin resistance can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. If cells were resistant to the insulin signal, this pathway would be inhibited. This inhibition would not just limit your pump in the gym, but also have an effect on a number of direct and indirect causal factors of cardiovascular disease. The best thing you can do to prevent that is to maintain a healthy weight, get your sleep and stay active.]

 

Pre-Workout Nutrition Psychology

While this is largely hypothetical, the psychology of pre-workout nutrition will affect different trainees to varying degrees, therefore it is worth being mindful of. However, simply being mindful of this is now likely to influence your thought process going forward, so sorry about that!

If you are aware that there are performance-enhancing effects of pre-training carbohydrates, then it’s likely you are going to “feel” more prepared to train after a carbohydrate-dense meal.

Along with this, simply being full will also allow you to be in a better place mentally. Nobody wants to be hungry entering the gym, and a carbohydrate-dense meal, particularly one with some fibre, tends to be the best way to achieve a feeling of satiety, However, these are minor considerations that I just wanted to quickly throw in, but should not be seen as the deciding factors!

To round up and give you a ballpark recommendation, a modest serving of ~30-100g depending on your size, type of training, current goals, and overall calorie intake etc. in the 60-90 minutes before training would be a solid baseline for most people.

 

Pre-Workout Protein

We know that resistance training leads to both an increase in muscle protein breakdown and synthesis. When you think about it, this is pretty intuitive, as we are causing muscle damage during training, breaking down older and potentially less functional muscle proteins, but we are also triggering the metabolic pathways involved in upregulating muscle protein synthesis to replace these older proteins with new functional muscle proteins.

Obviously, we are going to be doing resistance training, so if we wish to maximise the net protein balance in favour of a positive outcome, we need to feed with protein appropriately.

Consuming a protein feeding in the 2 hours pre-workout is a good idea, which will mean that the anabolic effects of that meal are still present once the training window comes around. In reality, the postprandial (after eating) anabolic effect of a meal can last 5-6 hours. Studies have shown that as little as 20g whey protein ingestion immediately before exercise led to an elevated muscular uptake of amino acids that did not return to baseline until 3 hours after training. Therefore, in that case, the importance of a post-training feeding wouldn’t come about until roughly 3 hours after training.

To put this into a practical setting where we consider both pre and post-exercise nutrition, it would actually be smarter to look at this as a peri-training (around training) window of opportunity, as opposed to looking at the pre and post-training meals as separate entities, that in fact lasts 3-4 hours around that session. Therefore, we should ensure that for maximum net protein balance, we are aiming to leave no longer than 3-4 hours between pre and post-training meals.

I think that would be pretty common anyway, as most people tend to eat 1-2 hours before, and immediately after, with training lasting 1-1.5 hours. Whether this window is shifted left or right in favour of either the pre or post-training meal is up to you, and in reality, this window is really more like a 5-6 hour window in the grander scheme of a much larger 24-48 hour window. But we are just focusing on that last 1% when stating 3-4 hours, which most people do not need to worry about. With regards to specific meal composition, ensuring that the meal has 0.4-0.5g protein per kg of your lean body mass is most important, which is probably a lot lower of a recommendation than some might expect, but falls right between the 20-40g range as recommended in recent research.

 

Pre-Workout Fat

Fat isn’t of massive concern here. One of the interesting effects fat does have is that it slows gastric emptying. Because fat is pretty difficult for the digestive system to break down, the rate at which it is released from the stomach is controlled. If there is excess fat, the pyloric valve at the bottom of the stomach will constrict itself to limit the exit of stomach contents, slowing down digestion and making for what replicates a “Lower Glycemic Index” meal (this will be covered in another post).

Depending on the source of carbohydrates, fat may or may not be useful. If you are eating close to the session with the goal of obtaining higher blood glucose and a subsequent spike in insulin pretty soon after, and the source of carbohydrates is a faster digesting, more refined carbohydrate source, then adding fat is probably not a great idea, as it will slow this process down.

However, if you are eating a high GI carbohydrate source 2+ hours pre-workout, then slowing the release of that through the addition of fat may be a useful strategy.

Overall, fat intake isn’t going to make a significant difference, unless you are having 30-50g or more, which may upset your digestion, which we certainly don’t want right before training.

 

Pre-Workout Nutrition

A mixed meal containing a lean protein source, a complex carbohydrate source and a little fat, roughly 2 hours as a pre-workout meal is a pretty solid recommendation. Play around with it, as there is a lot of inter-individual difference with this sort of stuff and it really does depend on the specifics of your situation. When it comes to eating around training, gauging what is best based on how YOU actually feel is a pretty good idea. Nobody else but you will know how certain meals affect your perception of digestive comfort, and of course your actual energy levels/training performance!

If you are really struggling to set up your diet effectively, and can’t figure out your pre-workout nutrition, then it may make sense to look into online coaching. It isn’t for everyone, but if you need specific help, then obviously getting professional help is going to solve your issues in the most time efficient manner.