Lose Weight by Nixing the Nosh

by Jonny Bowden (Subscribe to Jonny Bowden's posts)
Jan 12th 2009 7:30AM

Categories: Jonny's Take, Diet & Weight Loss, Fitness, Nutrition & Supplements

Jonny Bowden, author, nutritionist and weight loss coach cuts through all the misconceptions about diet and fitness to help you transform your body, your health and your life.

Ever wonder why some trainers still tell you to eat six small meals a day, have a high-carb snack after working out and carb-load every time you go for a run? It's because they are steeped in the bodybuilding-gym culture of the 60s and learned from the training manuals of competitive athletes.

Unless you're training for a marathon or an Ironman competition, that advice is precisely the wrong thing for the average exerciser, especially those looking to lose weight. Consider this: In a recent study, volunteers were given a high-carb mini-meal immediately after exercising on a treadmill for an hour. The results: The ability to clear sugar from the bloodstream was completely wiped out. A separate study tested high-carb mini-meals against low-carb ones and found the low-carb meal did the least damage.

"If people are going to exercise to benefit their health, they should not be eating back the calories immediately, or within a couple of hours, of finishing," says Barry Braun, PhD, director of the Energy Metabolism Lab at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. A light snack containing proteins, some carbs and fat before you work out should hold you for a few hours.

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Comments (2)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Jorn 1-12-2009 @ 1:07PM

This is an awesome article! So, next time you see something suggesting the outdated advice this post refutes, you're not gonna post it...

are you? :)

u262f 1-12-2009 @ 5:23PM

http://www.healthfinder.gov/news/newsstory.aspx?docid=620471

I read about this before, and the article contradicted itself. At the very bottom, it said that it doesn't matter whether the calories / carbs were consumed back before or after exercising. This directly contradicts your last sentence.

Here's the quote:

The third study was all about timing. Participants were given identical meals before, immediately after or three hours after cycling for 75 minutes.

The effectiveness of insulin was about the same no matter what the time, the study revealed.

"That really didn't make a whole lot of difference, which surprised us," Braun stated. "What did seem to matter was whether you ate back calories, and whether those calories were mostly carbohydrates."